Evelina Merová was a Czech Jewish girl whose childhood in Prague was destroyed by Nazi persecution before she was deported first to Theresienstadt and later to Auschwitz.
Born Evelina Landová on Christmas Day 1930, she grew up in a loving and comfortable home surrounded by family, school, and friends. But after Nazi Germany occupied the Czech lands in March 1939, the Landas were gradually stripped of their rights, property, and freedom.
Their business was seized, bank accounts were frozen, and the family was forced from their apartment. Evelina watched as anti-Jewish regulations increasingly controlled everyday life. Jews were excluded from parks, libraries, cafés, cinemas, schools, and other parts of public life. In 1941, she was forced to wear the Yellow Star.
At Prague’s Hagibor sports ground, one of the last places where Jewish children could gather, Evelina encountered Fredy Hirsch, the remarkable youth leader who organized physical activities and encouraged children to maintain their dignity and strength despite worsening persecution.
On 2 July 1942, Evelina and her parents were deported to the Theresienstadt ghetto. There, she was placed in Room 28 of the girls’ home L 410, where education, friendship, music, and solidarity created what she later remembered as a “beam of light” amid hunger, overcrowding, disease, and constant fear of deportation.
But Theresienstadt was only another stage in Evelina’s ordeal. As transports continued eastward, she would eventually face Auschwitz and the destruction of much of the world she had known.
This documentary tells the remarkable story of Evelina Merová, from her childhood in Prague through Nazi persecution, Theresienstadt, Auschwitz, and her struggle to survive the Holocaust.
This episode is part of the series Survivors of the Holocaust and Nazi Persecution.
Watch the full documentary and explore hundreds of historical films at:
WorldHistory.tv.
