My Voice: Elena Grosskopf

Elena Grosskopf was born in June 1924 and grew up in Merano on the Austrian-Italian border. Following a happy childhood in the Italian Tyrol and later on in Milan, the rise of antisemitism in Mussolini’s regime in the late 1930s caused Elena’s parents to arrange for her to escape to England with her brother Josie. Elena recounts their experiences of life with foster families and in hostels in Manchester, and as evacuees in Blackpool.

After the war, Elena married Leo. They settled in Manchester and had three children, regularly travelling to Italy to spend time with Elena’s parents who had miraculously survived the war and found one another again there.

Elena’s book is part of the My Voice book collection, a stand-alone project of The Fed, the leading Jewish social care charity in Manchester, dedicated to preserving the life stories of Holocaust survivors and refugees from Nazi persecution who settled in the UK. The oral history, which is recorded and transcribed, captures their entire lives from before, during and after the war years. The books are written in the words of the survivor so that future generations can always hear their voice. The My Voice book collection is a valuable resource for Holocaust awareness and education.