Ella Blumenthal’s story of surviving the Holocaust and building a new life in South Africa could easily be mistaken for fiction. Together with her niece Roma Rothstein, five years her junior, Ella survived three concentration camps before being liberated by the British Army in 1945. They made their way across Europe to join their last surviving family member in Palestine where Ella met the South African man she would marry after just thirteen days. She followed Isaac Blumenthal to the tip of Africa where they settled in Brakpan, outside Johannesburg where Ella and her husband built a business and raised their four children.
An award-winning documentary about her remarkable live, I Am Here was released in 2021. A book with the same title, written by Joanne Jowell, releases in 2023. Ella lives in Sea Point.
