At first glance, this photo depicts a happy, smiling woman leaning out a window.




At first glance, this photo depicts a happy, smiling woman leaning out a window. But, upon closer inspection, the image reveals a dark history. On the woman's left arm, there is a faint tattoo, identifying her as a survivor of Auschwitz. 

The woman in the photo is Margarete Kraus, a Romani woman who was deported with her family to Auschwitz when she was just a teenager. The Nazi regime persecuted and murdered Roma and Sinti because they considered them to be "racially inferior." 

At Auschwitz, Margarete was forced to live in the so-called Zigeunerlager ("gypsy camp") and subjected to inhumane medical experimentation. While she managed to survive, her parents did not. They were among the 250,000 to 500,000 Roma and Sinti murdered by the Nazis and their allies and collaborators.

In 1966, this image of Margarete was captured by a German journalist. However, we know very little else about her life. The stories of many Roma and Sinti, including Margarete's experience, have not been fully told, in part due to ongoing postwar discrimination. 

Photo: Reimar Gilsenbach. Wiener Holocaust Library Collections/ Courtesy of H. Gilsenbach

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