Compare and Contrast diary of Mary Berg and Adam Czerniakow Free Essay Example, 1500 words

Synopsis Warsaw Ghetto: A Diary by Mary Berg Mary Berg’s diary was the first one to be published in 1945 and can be considered to be a living witness to the atrocities committed by the Nazis. Mary Berg was unique among the witnesses of the Warsaw Ghetto in that the Germans exempted her from the danger of deportation and extermination since her mother was an American citizen (Kremer 253). In October 1939, Mary, the daughter of a prosperous Lodz art dealer, had just turned fifteen when she wrote her first entry. She wrote her last entry in March, 1944, when she was nineteen-and-half years of age, when there were on board a ship to America (Pentlin 5). Mary felt guilty that her father’s money and her mother’s status provided her family some measure of protection. Eventually they used their American passport for German prisoner of war exchange. Her family had gone to Warsaw in an effort to flee the terror of Lodz. Her family was subjected to the tightening vice of terror in Warsaw, until Mary confronted her fear of registering with the German police, when she realized that their only opportunity lay in claiming unique privileges as foreign nationals (Kremer 254). We will write a custom essay sample on Compare and Contrast diary of Mary Berg and Adam Czerniakow or any topic specifically for you Only $17.96 $11.86/pageorder now The family was removed from the ghetto by the German prior to the deportations, temporarily interned and later transported to Lisbon and freed during in a war time exchange. Synopsis Adam Czerniakow: the Warsaw diary of Adam Czerniakow Adam Czerniakow was born in 1880, in Warsaw. The author undertook his studies in Warsaw and became actively involved in Jewish public life before the First World War. The author devoted himself to preserving and promoting the interests of the Jewish craftsmen and he published extensively on subjects related to Jewish artisans. Czerniakow official title was the Chairman of the Jewish Council and as from 1941, he was considered as the â€Å"mayor, † although the chairman of the Jewish Council in Warsaw was the mainly used title (Berger 255). Czerniakow diary and notebooks avail modern day scholars with a distinct perspective on Holocaust. His diary avails a systematized and logical account of the episodes that transpired while being the Warsaw Judenrat (Czerniakow, Hilberg, Staron and Kermish 12). The diary represents an immense collection of thoughts spanning from September 6, 1939, until July 23, 1942, a day prior to his untimely death (Berger 258). There are nine notebooks that constitute Czerniakow’s experiences, although one of the notebooks (notebook five), was lost.