Rachel Lazarus was born in May 1939 in Amsterdam, Holland [Annotator's Notes: Amsterdam, Netherlands]. Her father's parents were diamond cutters and sellers and her mother's family sold cloister clothing to religious groups. Her mother was born in Patterson, New Jersey, but since Lazarus' grandmother hated New Jersey, the family moved back to Amsterdam. Her father was an antique book dealer, while her mother was a pattern seamstress for men's suits. Her parents met and lived in a Jewish neighborhood in the middle of Amsterdam. Lazarus does not have many memories of her father except seeing him behind barbed wire in the concentration camp.

During World War 2, Rachel Lazarus and her mother were in a concentration camp together. Her mother worked in the kitchen because she could speak fluent German. Because her mother was an American, Lazarus believes that is the reason they were not killed in the camp. Her mother worked all day and would bring her food at night. Lazarus either was alone or with children during the day. She recalled that her mother warned her that if she heard the Germans shout "showers", to run and hide. One day, the guards had caught her and put her in line, but a friend of her mother's was able to grab her and hide her. In the concentration camp they would feed the prisoners turnups. Her father died 7 March 1945. They brought Lazarus and her mother to a little hut where her father's remains were placed. Because of her mother's American citizenship, they were supposed to be exchanged but that never came to fruition. Lazarus recalled riding on the train near the end of the war. All of a sudden, the train stopped on a bridge and she was pushed out. Planes over head were bombing the area. She remembered seeing German soldiers fall into the water. She also remembered being in a barn with other prisoners that had just been freed. Her mother contracted Typhus and was sent to an American triage. Lazarus was sent to live at a huge estate with other people and children. She would walk to the hospital everyday to see her mother. She remembered eating white bread and margarine for the first time since she was freed from the concentration camp and it was the best food she had ever eaten. She recalled sitting with her mother in the concentration camp while she cooked turnips at a fire. All of a sudden, a bullet hit the hat her mother was wearing. She does not recall what happened after that, but her mother was not injured.

During World War 2, Rachel Lazarus and her mother were in a concentration camp together. She recalled one day, while sitting with other children, a Nazi soldier came over and patted her on the head and gave her a piece of sugar. After the war, they were transported back to Amsterdam [Annotator's Notes: Amsterdam, Netherlands], but they did not stay for long. They moved to Haarlem [Annotator's Notes: Haarlem, Netherlands] and opened a store that her aunt used to own. While in the concentration camp, Lazarus and her mother could stand in front of the barbed wire. Men were on one side and the women and children were on the other. One night, they talked with a man that had a child in hiding and he asked them to find her after the war. He handed Lazarus' mother a piece of paper to help her find the child. After the war, her mother was able to locate the child. He was hiding with her mom's former fiancé. The two were never separated again. Lazarus, her mother, and stepfather relocated to the United States in 1948. They moved to New Jersey because of an aunt who had moved there before the war.

During World War 2, Rachel Lazarus and her mother were in a concentration camp together. Because she was so young; camp life was normal to her. She did not realize how her daily life was threatened until years later after the war. Before the war, while her father was hiding in a monastery, Lazarus and her mother went on a train to visit her aunt. They encountered two gestapo [Annotator's Note: Geheime Staatspolizei or Secret State Police] men, who recognized that they were Jewish. Her mother and Lazarus got off the next stop and were hidden by a pharmacist. After the war, Lazarus, her mother and stepfather moved to the United States. She can recall having a language barrier, along with meeting her uncle and cousins for the first time. One of her cousins would translate for her when she went to school. She remembered being bullied by a boy in school and dealt with some antisemitism.

Rachel Lazarus, a Holocaust Survivor, thinks that the State of Israel is wonderful for the Jewish People. She experienced some antisemitism in the United States as a young girl in school but since then has not felt it directly in her life. She talked very little about her experiences in the Holocaust with her husband or children. She did answer questions for her granddaughter when she had to write a paper for school. Lazarus commented that her mother was a strong woman to go through what she experienced in Europe and she was happy to start a new life in America with her family. Her mother did not care to talk much about her Holocaust experience, even with Lazarus. She would only comment every now and then. Lazarus does remember her mother saying the women guards were worse than the men. Lazarus and her mother were both in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. She feels that she missed out on what it feels like to have the love of a father because her father died in the Holocaust. Lazarus believes she needs to speak about the Holocaust now because future generations need to know about her experiences. Because there is a belief that the Holocaust never happen and for family that were killed, Lazarus feels it is necessary to share her stories.