DEFA – Digitisation and cataloguing of refugee files

Aim of the project

In 2023, the AfZ will digitise the refugee files of the Verband Schweizerischer Jüdischer Fürsorgen/Flüchtlinshilfen (VSJF), delivery B, in collaboration with the DigiCenter of the ETH Library. The digitisation facilitates access to the sources and offers a unification of the entire holdings.

Description of the project

The VSJF holdings have been in the Archive of Contemporary History since the 1990s. It is one of the most frequently used holdings, as the association looked after around 23,000 people during the Second World War alone - towards and after the end of the war many of them were survivors of concentration camps.

Delivery A of the VSJF (duration 1938-1990) has already been completely digitised. Delivery B (duration 1920-2016) comprises approx. 40 linear metres of documents, of which 12-13 linear metres are refugee files. These are partly continuations of dossiers on persons who were looked after for several decades and partly new dossiers.

As part of the DEFA project, the refugee files are being digitised, which show in particular the exchanges between the VSJF and the persons cared for as well as the authorities. In a next step, the information from the dossiers will be entered into the internal VSJF refugee database, which facilitates research on Swiss refugee policy through a variety of searchable parameters (such as age, gender, origin, information on entry and onward travel). There are also plans to digitise the institutional files of the VSJF Ablieferung B and the VSJF Luzern.

Synergies and context

The holdings will be prepared for digitisation by the AfZ in close consultation with the DigiCenter (AVOR), transported to the DigiCenter and digitised there - mainly using the reflected light method.

Time frame

January 2023 to December 2023