Fate Unknown: Tracing the Missing after the Holocaust

To mark Holocaust Memorial Day, the Public Record Office of Northern Ireland is delighted to welcome Elise Bath who will be speaking about a remarkable and little-known archive, the International Tracing Service Archive.

By the end of World War II, millions of people had been murdered or displaced by war and genocide. Families and communities were torn apart. Many were missing, and some people’s fates remain unclear to this day. Despite immense logistical challenges, a number of charities, such as the British Red Cross Society and the Jewish Relief Unit, attempted to help find missing people and reunite families. Their efforts came together in what became known as the International Tracing Service (ITS).

The ITS Archive now contains over 30 million pages of Holocaust-era documents relating to the experiences of over 17.5 million people. Elise will use materials from this archive to discuss the agonising search for those people lost, considering the legacy of the search for descendants of those affected by World War II, and the impact of fates unknown.

Elise Bath is the ITS Archive Team Manager at The Wiener Holocaust Library in London, one of the world’s leading and most extensive archives on the Holocaust, the Nazi era and genocide.