Parent(s) in Prison or Labor Camp, Executed

Banks, John, Wilkomirski, Binjamin, Westheimer, Ruth Siegel, Shoah, Nazi Germany, Li Peng, Li Lu, Adler-Collins, Je Kan, Jehoash, Fyodorova, Victoria, Forman, Miloš, Fisher, Antwone, Eastman, Charles Alexander, Culpepper, Daunte, Zweig, Stefan Jerzy,

Banks, John

Banks was a New Zealand National Party MP from 1981 to 1999 and has been Minister of Tourism; Sport, Fitness and Leisure; Local Government; and Civil Defence (he resigned his cabinet posts ... [more]

Wilkomirski, Binjamin

Wilkomirski (he is not sure whether this is in fact his real name) claims to be one of the many Jewish children orphaned by the Nazi Holocaust and one of the few hundred young children to s... [more]

Westheimer, Ruth Siegel

Westheimer, known to millions as Dr. Ruth, is the most famous psychosexual therapist in the world. She was sent by her German parents to boarding school in Switzerland when she was 10, a... [more]

Shoah

The Shoah, also known as the Holocaust , is the name given to the attempt by Nazi Germany to exterminate not only the Jews of Europe, their primary target, but also the mentally and physic... [more]

Nazi Germany

Three special aspects of this terrible time are related to adoption. These are in addition to the orphans and separated families created when foresighted Jewish parents sent their children ... [more]

Li Peng

Li, an ethnic Hakka, was born the son of Li Shixun and Zhoa Juntao, friends of Zhou Enlai and his wife, Deng Yingchao. His father, who like Zhou and Deng was a Communist revolutionary, was ... [more]

Li Lu

Li Lu was one of the leaders of the Chinese student democracy movement which culminated in the Tiananmen Square Massacre. His parents were victims of the Cultural Revolution: when he was a ... [more]

Adler-Collins, Je Kan

Adler-Collins was the child of a military family who was taken into care at the age of three when his mother shot his father during a domestic dispute. He was abused in care for years, but ... [more]

Jehoash

Jehoash, King of Judah (not the same man as Jehoash, King of Israel, who lived at the same time) was the son of King Ahaziah. His uncles had been assassinated when he was a baby when Jehu, ... [more]

Fyodorova, Victoria

Fyodorova was the child of American naval officer Jackson Tate and Russian actress Zoya Fyodorova, from a brief affair at the end of World War II. When she was a year old her mother was imp... [more]

Forman, Miloš

Forman was born Tomas Jan, one of three sons, in Cáslav, now in the Czech Republic. When he was nine his parents were arrested by the Gestapo, and both soon died in concentration camps. The... [more]

Fisher was born in a prison, where his mother was an inmate; his father died before he was born. He spent two years in an orphanage before being adopted by a family who physically and verbal... [more]

Eastman, Charles Alexander

Eastman (his maternal grandfather's surname) was born Ohiyesa, the last of five children. His mother died soon after he was born. In 1862, after the Minnesota Sioux uprising he escaped with... [more]

Culpepper, Daunte

Culpepper was born to an unmarried teenager in jail for armed robbery (she is now a qualified social worker, with five other children, and they have always been in contact, although he has ... [more]

Zweig, Stefan Jerzy

Zweig was the son of a prosperous Polish Jewish lawyer. When he was only a toddler the Nazis sent him and his father to the Buchenwald concentration camp. There they were separated and his ... [more]