Names Not Numbers

Rena Quint

Piotrkow Trybunalski, Poland

Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp

1935

Rena Quint

Piotrkow Trybunalski, Poland

1935

Rena Quint was born Freida "Freidel" Lichtenstein in December 1935 in the city of Piotrków Trybunalski, Poland. In 1939, when she was just three years old, the Nazis invaded and occupied her hometown. By October 1942, tragedy struck when her mother and two older brothers were deported to the Treblinka extermination camp, where they were murdered.

Rena, not yet seven, was deported along with her father to a concentration camp, where she had to pretend to be a boy in order to survive.

After her father was murdered, Rena was left alone in the camp. She was later transferred to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. During her time in various camps, she was adopted by different women, though each of them tragically died.

At the end of the war, Rena was sent to Sweden, where she was adopted by a Holocaust survivor who passed away just a few months later.

In 1946, Rena emigrated to the United States with another adoptive mother, also a Holocaust survivor, who passed away after three months due to her poor health. Eventually, Rena was adopted by a Jewish couple who had no children of their own.

‍

She went on to earn both her bachelor's and master's degrees in education and worked as a teacher in schools, as well as a lecturer at Adelphi University in New York and at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

‍

In 1984, Rena and her husband emigrated to Israel with their four married children. For over 30 years, Rena has volunteered at Yad Vashem, where she meets with groups from around the world, sharing her story and ensuring that the memories of the Holocaust are preserved.

‍

Names Not Numbers

Rena Quint

Rena Quint

The End