14 Facts About Judith Hemmendinger

Judith Hemmendinger was a German-born Israeli researcher and author who specialised in child survivors of the Holocaust.

Judith Hemmendinger authored books and papers on the Holocaust experiences and later lives of child survivors.

Judith Hemmendinger was awarded the French Legion of Honor in 2003.

Judith Hemmendinger was a great granddaughter of Eliezer Liepman Philip Prins.

When her older sister began high school, Judith Hemmendinger's family moved to Paris.

Judith Hemmendinger was arrested at the Nice train station and interned in the Gurs internment camp.

Judith Hemmendinger was afterwards deported to the Drancy internment camp and on to Auschwitz in September 1943, where he was murdered on the same day he arrived.

Judith Hemmendinger developed a relationship with one of the students, Claude Hemmendinger, but in September 1943, her mother called her to accompany her and her younger siblings on an escape to Switzerland, following her father's arrest.

Judith Hemmendinger applied for a six-month course being offered by the OSE to train social workers "to deal with the post-war situation", and was accepted.

Judith Hemmendinger traveled to the Chateau d'Ambloy in Loir-et-Cher, France, where a home had been set up for 90 to 100 teenage boys from Orthodox homes who had requested kosher facilities and a higher level of religious observance than that being provided to the larger group of Buchenwald child survivors in France.

Judith Hemmendinger stayed with the home on its move to the Chateau de Vaucelles in Taverny in October 1945, and remained as its director until September 1947, when the last child had found a permanent placement.

In Strasbourg, Judith Hemmendinger began seeing a psychotherapist to work through her wartime experiences.

Judith Hemmendinger remained in contact with the Buchenwald children and their offspring for years.

Judith Hemmendinger died on 24 March 2024, at the age of 100.