Anna Koppich letters

Anna Koppich (1909-2005) was a Jewish doctor living in Hungary at the time of German occupation in 1944. She, her son, Gyurika (George), and her parents were incarcerated in the Kolozsvàr ghetto in 1944, after her husband, Ferri had already been deported to a labor camp. In the ghetto, Anna continued to work as a physician and care for the sick. In June 1944 Anna and her family and were transported to Auschwitz, where Anna was separated from her child and parents and sent to work in the camp as a physician. George and her parents were later killed in the camp. Once a hospital was established in Auschwitz, Anna was put to work and there she encountered Joseph Mengele. Anna remained detained in Auschwitz until the camp was liberated in 1945. After the war she was reunited with her husband and worked as a gynecologist in Bucharest, Romania. She eventually immigrated to the United States and settled in Los Angeles County, California. Anna died in 2005 at the age of 90. The Anna Koppich letters are a series of letters totaling 33 pages written by Anna Koppich to her husband, Ferri in the days after her liberation from Auschwitz, between March 6th and March 23rd 1945. The letters describe in detail the events of her life that transpired between when her husband was sent to a labor camp sometime before 1943 until her liberation from Auschwitz in January 1945 and many are written on Auschwitz stationary. In the letters, Anna discusses her son George’s depression after Ferri was sent away, wearing a yellow star, their life in the Kolozsvàr ghetto and the sense of community among the Jews there, their transport to Auschwitz in cattle cars, her separation from her son upon arrival at the camp, and her various duties within the camp’s hospital.