Holocaust Survivor-Brigitte Altman

          Brigitte Altman was born on August 15, 1924 in Memel, Lithuania off the Baltic Coast. Her family consisted of her parents Elias Friedmann and Dina-Malka Friedmann. They lived in a two story house on the second level along a lovely quiet street. She first experienced some antisemitism when German school friends became distant all of a sudden and no longer sat with the Jewish girls. Brigitte learned of the events going on in the world like "Kristallnacht" at the dinner table from her parents. Her family made several attempts to gain visas to the United States because of their close relatives living there, but the quota kept them from going.

            In June 1941 the Germans took over Lithuania and at the time Brigitte’s family relocated to Kovno, a city soon to become a Jewish ghetto. During their stay in the ghetto Brigitte’s family stayed in a farm house attic where they had very little room and poor living conditions. She was assigned a job in the ghetto working in the nursery and greenhouse. Her father was assigned as a lead on construction jobs. Her mother died in the ghetto from illness shortly after being relocated.

            Brigitte’s father ultimately found a way to get her out of the ghetto by contacting a non-Jewish family friend who had work business within the ghetto. Through uncertain bribery and a small group of outside workers she somehow escaped across a river on a boat and met a carriage set out for her by the wife of this family friend. She stayed with the couple for about four weeks pretending to be their maid, before they sent her to the old family farm where it would be safer for her and them. She worked at the farm until the war ended, after the liberation Brigitte hitch-hiked back to Kovno where she could stay with a friend. The rumors of a newly formed Israel enticed her to begin her exodus journey with other refugees to this new country of safety. She never made it to Israel because she heard news of her father’s whereabouts and went to find him in Graz, Austria instead.

            Once Brigitte and her father were reunited they headed to Dallas, Texas in 1949 where close relatives lived. She met her husband Fredrick Altman, an Air Force officer, in 1951 and they moved to Fort Worth, Texas. They now have three sons and a daughter. She never spoke much about the holocaust to her children, mostly because she did not want to relive it and because she immersed herself into the duties of a housewife placing her full attention upon her family instead of the past. She overcame the horrors of her past and still lived an ordinary life afterwards with a healthy and positive attitude. Brigitte truly possessed an incredible strength and willpower to live life to the best, especially for her family.  

Quotes from Brigitte:

“How do they have the audacity to claim that the holocaust never existed that it’s the figment of the Jewish imagination and if indeed parts of the story are true they’re greatly exaggerated, all I can say to them is I wish they were right that it never happened.”

“Testimony of this nature also memorializes those who perished. They’re graves are mostly unmarked, they’re names are forgotten, who knows that they ever existed, but they did and many were beautiful, bright, and brilliant, many were not, but we certainly lost the bloom of our youth.”