Susan Pollack grew up in a small Hungarian town where Jewish life was rapidly destabilised after the German occupation of Hungary in 1944. Within months, antisemitic regulations escalated from curfews and confiscations to forced ghettoisation and deportation. Torn from her family as a teenager, Susan was transported to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where she endured starvation, disease and the terror of daily selections. She was later sent to a series of forced-labour camps before being driven on a brutal death march as the Nazi regime collapsed. By the time liberation came at Bergen-Belsen in April 1945, she was gravely ill and alone, having lost most of her family.

After the war, Susan was brought to Britain to recuperate and began the long process of rebuilding her life. She married, raised a family, and, many decades later, chose to break her silence to educate others about the consequences of hatred and complacency.

Susan’s book is part of the My Voice book collection, a stand-alone project of The Fed, the leading Jewish social care charity in Manchester, dedicated to preserving the life stories of Holocaust survivors and refugees from Nazi persecution who settled in the UK. The oral history, which is recorded and transcribed, captures their entire lives from before, during and after the war years. The books are written in the words of the survivor so that future generations can always hear their voice. The My Voice book collection is a valuable resource for Holocaust awareness and education.