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During
World War II, concentration, labor and transit camps were set
up throughout Europe. These camps housed hundreds of thousands of
prisoners, many of whom were murdered.
Eva
Modval was deported to Tolonc and Kistarcsa camps from her home in
St. Gyorgy, Transylvania. Eva’s
doll, Gerta, had
accompanied Eva the entire time. The doll was Eva’s best friend
and the only witness to the good times enjoyed by Eva’s family
before the war. When Eva loaned her much-beloved doll Gerta to Yad
Vashem for this exhibit, she had a very difficult time separating
from it. In Eva’s
farewell letter to Gerta she expressed some of these feelings :
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Goodbye,
my doll Gerta!
“.
. . I am leaving you with a heavy heart. Maybe you’ll be able to
tell the people of today, and particularly the children, what you
saw and where you were with me – a sad story, but also a cheerful
one, because I survived . . . Dear Gerta, you will be the last
witness of a dreadful childhood. May no child anywhere go through
anything like that again . . . Maybe some day I’ll come to visit
you; the only grave I have for my father and grandfather is Yad
Vashem. And perhaps my children and grandchildren will come, and
then you won’t be alone there!
Maybe
you’ll meet toys and dolls who were in worse places, but survived
all the same. My dear doll! Today you have become an inseparable
part of my people, which has risen from fire and ashes like a
phoenix..
You
will always be in my heart.
Eva
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