The collection is comprised of nearly 1,200 unique video interviews with Jewish men and women who fought in the Soviet armed forces and partisan detachments during World War II, also known in Russia as the Great Patriotic War. Interviews that are currently live include full transcripts and English translations. In addition, the collection includes more than 11,700 ephemera items from the veterans’ personal archives, including photographs, personal correspondence documents, diaries, state- and military-issued documents, articles, and memoirs. Diaries and various other documents have also been transcribed and translated. Several second-generation interviews were recorded, though the vast majority of the testimonies are from the veterans themselves. While testimony focus is on the period of the war between 1941 and 1945, the veterans also speak about their childhood, family, education, career, homecoming and postwar experience, and immigration. Descriptions of wartime experiences include information about military forces, battles, daily life, and the emotional experience of the war and the Holocaust. 

 
Over 1,500 hours of interview video were recorded, both in individuals’ homes and in local veteran association centers. The video recordings are supplemented by thousands of photographs, documents, letters, and diary pages. These physical artifacts were brought by the veterans to the interviews and digitized on-site, following production quality standards. In some instances, the originals were donated to the Archive. 

While interviews with veterans have mostly ceased, the Archive continues to collect stories and material artifacts from the veterans’ family members.