| Description | An interview with Dora COHEN, a widow woman with one daughter, who is a Retired secretary, born in Warsaw, Poland and now living in Birmingham. Dora COHEN’s father was a Soldier, born in Poland and her mother a Tailoress born in Poland. In the interview, she talks about …
'DORA COHEN MS2255/2/131 Logged by Lorraine Blakemore
01
I was born in Walsall in 1914. My mother was a tailoress and one of the best. My father was a soldier. He was in the Polish army…. Imprisoned by the Russians in 1917.
02
Hardly knew her father.
03
Mother was brought to England with help from her sisters.
04
05
In 1920 when I was 6 years old we were brought to Birmingham.
Family were scattered about the city. Dora lived in Holloway Head with her aunt Rosie.
1.32 Visited mother in Pershore Street.
1.57 Entire family were tailors. My grandmother was blind, but she was always feeling the materials, the make of the clothes and if she thought they’d made a mistake or a stitch was wrong, she’d make them undo it….
3.00 Describes the food eaten by the family.
06
Taught English by cousins.
1.34 Attended Hebrew School in Ellis Street.
2.25 Story about visiting the Synagogue in Wrottesley Street.
3.36 The community was quite a big one then and wherever you went, you always spoke or met somebody who was speaking Yiddish….
07
As a child Dora wasn’t aware of any Liberal or Reform Synagogue in the city.
14” Describes the Jewish shops in Birmingham.
1.58 Dora had friends in Holloway Head who were not Jewish.
3.00 Describes the house she lived in with her aunt.
4.34 At the Hebrew School for about 7 years.
08
Gives details of classes at school.
09
10
11
Taught Hebrew at school after the English lessons. Also attended Saturday (Sabbath) school. Family were very Orthodox.
1.12 Story about visiting the reservoir during Jewish holidays.
2.12 No writing, no sewing, no nothing…we’d either sit and talk, read from the Bible and if we had a party it would be on the Sunday…
12
Employed as an errand girl for a tailor in Sutton Street at the age of about 13. Remembers her uncle buying her first pair of shoes at England’s Shoes and visiting the cinema.
3.07 When I was 14, my aunt and uncle paid for me to go to a typist training college. They said they wanted to make something of me instead of going into tailoring….I went to…Guildhall Buildings in Navigation Street and my first job was with The Birmingham Gazette.
13
Details her role at the Gazette.
14
15
Moved back to live with her mother and assist with the rent.
2.03 Many people moving into the city during the 1930s.
16
17
18
I went to Christchurch Passage Shorthand & Typing…describes her role.
19
Moved to Wragge & Co. Solicitors.
20
Remembers the outbreak of war. Mother was distraught at the fate of her husband in Poland.
1.20 Storty about how family coped during this time.
21
22
23
Story about mother’s home being bombed.
24
Forced to move to Stourbridge.
Married first husband in 1942. Storyabout meeting her husband.
25
Continued.
26
Married in registry office.
27
Moved from Sherlock Street to a house in Belgrave Road with husband and children. Met husband in Eastbourne at convalescent home. [unclear]
Lived in London before returning to Birmingham.
28
Daughter lived in Quinton and invited Dora to live nearby in the 1970s.
1.00 Changes in Birmingham. No longer able to visit the Synagogue.
29
In Selly Oak hospital for several months and then placed in Andrew Cohen Nursing Home.
30
Andrew Cohen is a Jewish nursing home. Not exclusively Jewish. There are several Christian residents.
31
Praises the social worker at the home.
32
Memories of Poland and death of her father. [unclear]
ENDS. |