For 80 years, Raymonde (Ray) Fiol believed that her mother and all her mother’s family had been murdered in the Holocaust. That all changed when a Montreal woman contacted her after their DNA matched on an online genealogy platform.
Fiol was born in Paris, France, and is a Jewish child survivor of the Holocaust. She was hidden during the war by a Christian family. Her parents, David Nathansohn and Esther Bendet, were murdered in Auschwitz when Ray was just seven years old.
She was taken in by an uncle, her father’s brother. She later met, and married, an American soldier, Phil Fiol, in Paris. They moved to New York, then Florida, and ended up in Las Vegas.
Fiol has researched her family history extensively. She has been reunited with the beloved Christian family that saved her life, but there were still gaps.
In Canada, meanwhile, Montreal residentBrenda Fayerman had been researching her family. Her father was a Holocaust survivor who lost most of his family. In 2022, she received a match from her DNA test on MyHeritage and contacted Fiol.
“I spoke to Ray and she said ‘I don’t remember my mother. I can’t find a single document about her.’ But when she told me where her mother came from in Poland, I said her mother had to be related to my father’s family because that’s right next to where they came from,” said Fayerman.
Fayerman had access to an abundance of research from this part of her family thanks to her New York relatives, Howard Lewin and William Lipschutz. They hold extensive records of the families’ history.
“I searched the PDF document of the family tree for Esther Bendet. The only Bendet I found was a Sura Bendet Zelcer who had two daughters, one of them named Esther Zelcer,” said Fayerman.
Fayerman suggested to Fiol that her mother’s name was actually Esther Zelcer and she was using her mother’s maiden name in order to hide at the time but still be recognized by family later.
“I was told by an aunt on my father’s side that my mother had changed her name in Poland because she was an activist and the authorities were after her, but I never made the connection,” said Fiol.
Fiol spoke to Lewin who confirmed this hypothesis about her mother. He said Esther Zelcer had two brothers who survived the Holocaust and lived in Lakewood, New Jersey until they died in 1966 and 1999.
“I couldn’t believe it was possible that two of my mother’s brothers were living just an hour away from me in New York for many years,” said Fiol.
One of their daughters, Sarah Zelcer Orenstein, was living in Queens, New York.
“I called Sarah, and I said I think we are cousins. She had never done a DNA test, so she started the process,” said Fiol.
In the meantime, Orenstein found a document from her father indicating that he had a sister named Esther who married David Nathansohn in Paris.
“Three weeks later, I get a call from Sarah saying, ‘hi cousin.’ Her DNA test showed that we are first cousins,” said Fiol.
For decades, Fiol thought she had no one from her mother’s side. Now, not only does she have a first cousin, but many other close relatives living in New York.
“After a long reflection, I said to my husband that I’d like to go to New York and meet the family,” she said.
She contacted Orenstein who organized a family reunion with relatives flying in from Florida and Israel. Fayerman, who is actually a fairly distant fourth cousin, was also there.
On July 18, Fiol, Fayerman, and their spouses walked up to Orenstein’s door in New York. They were met by over 50 family members.
“It was overwhelming. I have no words. It was something that I dreamt of for so long. It was just wonderful,” said Fiol.
Fiol and Fayerman were able to meet Orenstein and her family in person including Sarah’s brother from Florida, another first cousin.
“Sometimes you see reunions in the airport with balloons and people hugging and screaming. It wasn’t like that, it felt very natural. We felt like we were part of the family,” said Fayerman.
Fiol said she even saw a resemblance between her daughter and Orenstein. Together, they looked at family photos and caught up on the many years they missed together.
“When I was at Sarah’s house with all of these family members, all I could think about was that Hitler didn’t win,” said Fiol. “I will remember that moment until the end of my days.”
Fiol and Fayerman continue to keep in touch with their newfound family members, and are talking about planning the next reunion in Fiol’s hometown of Las Vegas.
