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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Hilda Dajč/archive1

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted by Ian Rose via FACBot (talk) 14:31 28 August 2026 FACBot (talk) 23:05, 28 August 2026 (UTC).

Hilda Dajč


Nominator(s): Aeengath (talk) 14:23, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

This article is about Hilda Dajč, a young jewish woman who volunteered as a nurse at the Sajmište concentration camp near Belgrade and smuggled out letters describing conditions there before she was murdered with the rest of the detainees. Her letters are one of the only surviving documents written by a prisoner of the camp and one of the few first person accounts of the Holocaust in German-occupied Serbia to survive at all.

I've expanded this from a GA to what I believe is FA standard, using historical scholarship (Manoschek, Matthäus, Browning, Subotić, Byford, Saiger, Daković, Giergiel, Krug) Several sources are in German or Serbian; I can provide quotes on request for spot-checking. Thank you. Aeengath (talk) 14:23, 20 July 2026 (UTC)

Support from Jaguarnik

I like this article. I've checked this against the WP:FACR and I don't see any major issues with the prose (although I do admit I don't have much experience with FAC and other reviewers may have a more discerning eye). The prose is well-written, broad, well-researched; I didn't feel as if I had any questions left to ask. Earwig doesn't flag any copyright violations. I don't see any grammatical errors. It has a lead that covers all sections of the article and appropriate structure. The length of the article is acceptable per WP:SIZERULE; sadly it is a bit short, but that's to be expected when the subject's life was cut so short. Only a few comments:

  • Remove "often" from often called a Serbian Anne Frank in the lead, as the body says that she is sometimes/occasionally compared to Frank.
  • During the winter of 1941–42, an average of around one hundred prisoners at Sajmište died each day from exposure. I'm guessing that this is exposure to the cold, but from the description of conditions, it sounds like it could be exposure to illnesses because of the poor conditions, so there is some ambiguity.
  • Not necessary, but a translation of the memorial plaque to Hilda would not hurt (at least as an alt caption).
  • Why does citation 65 use a sfn ref with the label of Jerusalem Post when the author's (Radojković) name is known? Wouldn't it be simpler for it to link to Radojković?

Jaguarnik (talk) 14:09, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for the close read @Jaguarnik!
  • Changed "often" to "sometimes" in the lead.
  • I've left "exposure" since it's Subotić's exact word (p. 52) she writes "During the harsh winter of 1941–42, an average of one hundred Semlin inmates died daily from exposure." She treats exposure as distinct from disease and starvation elsewhere in the same book too (p. 3: "more than ten thousand died in the camp from disease, starvation, exposure, physical exhaustion, and savage guard beatings" and p. 153: "Many died in Siberian camps from exposure, disease or exhaustion"), so it does specifically mean death from the cold rather than illness. Hopefully that resolves the ambiguity.
  • Added a translation of the plaque to the caption.
  • Fixed citation 65, it now points to the author {{sfn|Radojković|2018}}.
Aeengath (talk) 21:08, 21 July 2026 (UTC)
All my comments are resolved; I'm happy to voice my support for this FAC. Jaguarnik (talk) 21:39, 21 July 2026 (UTC)

Support from ThaesOfereode

Good to see more Balkan topics come to FAC, despite how depressing this one is. I speak passable Croatian so I'll probably end up doing a source review for Serbian-language sources as well. I think there are German speakers who haunt FAC, but few if any BCMS speakers. More to come, but to begin:

Thank you for the review @ThaesOfereode, really glad to have an editor who can check the Serbian-language sources too! Aeengath (talk) 13:26, 27 July 2026 (UTC)
  • Our subject is referred to by her Serbian name here. You should include the Serbian Cyrillic (Хилда Дајч) and the Serbian pronunciation (Serbian pronunciation: [xîlda dâjt͡ʃ]; you can easily cite to the HJP here). To avoid bloat, your footnote already captures the "Deutch" spelling so you can remove that from the lede.
Added the Serbian Cyrillic (Хилда Дајч) to the lead. I'd rather keep "Hilda Deitch" bolded in the lead since it's a legitimate alternate name in my sources and the title of the graphic novel about her. Jerusalem Post
HJP does have "Dajč" listed but as a list of German-derived surnames, marked as used in two Croatian towns with a different accent than the one you proposed. So I'm not sure it can be used, it's also Croatian data not Serbian. That said, I think you're right that a pronunciation should be in the lead.
Correction to my comment above, I misread the accent notation. Your proposed [xîlda dâjt͡ʃ] uses circumflex without a length mark which per Help:IPA/Serbo-Croatian is short falling, matching what HJP actually shows for "Dajč". Not in conflict after all I compared two different diacritic systems by mistake. Adding the pronunciation to the lead now, cited to HJP.
  • On the topic, do sources really spell it "Deutch" instead of "Deutsch"? They also, in article, should be Soft suggestion to include the German pronunciation.
"Deutch" isn't a spelling that appears in any sources as far as I know, the variation is between "Deitch" (Saiger, Daković) and "Deutsch" (Shelach). The footnote now cites both properly, attributed to the sources that use each one. I don't think the lead needs German pronunciation too, her story is almost entirely Serbian, Vienna is just her birthplace.
  • That first sentence is... long. You should consider splitting it (maybe Jewish prisoners held there and represent one of the few → Jewish prisoners held there. They represent one of the few).
Split the first lead sentence as suggested.
  • "Stolpersteine" should be in a {{lang}} template
Added lang template to "Stolpersteine"
  • Might be worth mentioning what the award honors since it's not immediately obvious.
Added the award's two categories (youth award, outstanding contribution to remembrance culture) per sources.
  • All of the family were executed in 1942, so why is her brother's death date the only one noted in that first section?
Added death years for Augusta and Emil alongside Hans as suggested, per sources. Aeengath (talk) 13:26, 27 July 2026 (UTC)

More now

  • Belgrade was subjected to heavy aerial bombardment – I'd just have the link cover this whole phrase. I thought the link would lead to some kind of specific style of bombardment (e.g., Blitzkrieg) rather than a particular instance and we want to avoid an WP:EGG here.
Extended the link as suggested.
Changed the link text to the article's actual title Territory of the Military Commander in Serbia
  • During the early months of the occupation – Recommend breaking the paragraph here and combining with the one below.
Done as suggested.
  • Her father, Emil Dajč, an engineer – First, you don't need to tell us either his name or his title (father) again; you just told us one paragraph ago, so pick one and go with it. Second, this is a long sentence so I recommend cutting it up.
Done as suggested.
  • A decree of 30 May 1941 required Belgrade's Jews to register with the authorities – Does this decree have a name? A Serbian-language Wikipedia page? Worth milling through Wikidata to see. Also, again this is a very long sentence that could bear to be cut up a bit.
Decree now named and cited, split up sentence.
Done.
  • Following an anti-German uprising in German-occupied Serbia that summer – Was all of Serbia under German occupation at this point? If so, you can just remove "German-occupied". Also, presumably this happened in particular locations within Serbia; do we know which had the largest numbers or impact?
Removed "German-occupied" and added where the uprising began and its biggest success, the capture of Užice.
Done.
  • by the year's end, most of Serbia's Jewish men were dead – Do we have any idea what the original number was?
I don't have a sourced count of men specifically and the territory itself changed with the invasion, so I'd rather leave it out than guess.
  • On 8 December 1941, the surviving Jews in Belgrade, about 7,000 women and children, along with others from Banat, Šabac, Niš, Kragujevac, Kosovska Mitrovica, Novi Pazar and elsewhere in occupied Serbia, were ordered to report to the police to be transferred to the former Belgrade Fairgrounds across the Sava River, near the town of Zemun (Semlin in German). → On 8 December 1941, the surviving 7,000 Jewish women and children in Belgrade – along with others from Banat, Šabac, Niš, Kragujevac, Kosovska Mitrovica, Novi Pazar and elsewhere in occupied Serbia – were ordered to report to the police to be transferred to the former Belgrade Fairgrounds across the Sava River, near the town of Zemun (Semlin in German).
Done.
I think I got them all now.
Done.
  • were released before the murder of the Jewish prisoners – What? Why?
Both sources I have (Manoschek p.178; Winstone p.404) report this as a fact but don't explain why so I'd rather not speculate about the reasoning behind it.
Found it: An order issued by the Military Commander in Serbia on 11 July 1941 allowed Romani prisoners to be removed from the official register of "Gypsies" and reclassified as Serbs which is why they were released while the Jewish prisoners were not. Added this to the footnote with new source (Pisarri 2014) added to bibliography.
  • Sicherheitspolizei, Standartenführer, and Untersturmführer need to be in {{lang}} templates.
Done.
Done.
  • five kilometres needs to be in a {{convert}} template.
Done.
  • around 7,000 Jewish prisoners were interned there – 7,000 additional Jews? Or is this just a reflection of the previous 7k Jews mentioned earlier?
They're the same 7,000 people described in the Death section. Reworded to make that connection clear.
  • German-occupied Serbia – As above
This is different, removing it would make it unclear which population the "half" is calculated from.
  • Although her father's position initially protected the family from some anti-Jewish measures in occupied Serbia – Why on earth would this protect them? If anything, it seems like this would put a big target on their backs.
Rephrased for clarity per source (Dakovic says :"During the first months of the occupation, her life remained relatively unchanged since her father, Emil Dajč, secured a prominent position in the “Vertretung der Judischen Gemainchaft, the representative body of the Jewish community in Belgrade,” allowing him to protect his family from the deteriorating living conditions.")
  • Dajč chose in early December 1941, after completing a medical course that year, to enter the camp voluntarily to serve as a nurse, against her family's wishes. → After completing a medical course that year, Dajč chose to enter the camp voluntarily to serve as a nurse in early December 1941, against her family's wishes.
Done.
  • On 8 December 1941, she reported, like other Jewish women and children, to the headquarters of the Jewish police and was transported by truck to the Sajmište concentration camp. → Like other Jewish women and children, she reported to the headquarters of the Jewish police on 8 December and was transported by truck to the Sajmište concentration camp. (You already established the timing.)
Done.
  • Link Sava River and probably want to find an appropriate link for "exposure" here too.
Done.
Linked Jewish cemetery, left "bury the dead" unlinked as not enough detail to specify a funeral rite.
  • Weinstein, the camp's Jewish administrator – No first name?
The source (Berger et al. 2017, p. 426.) only names him as "Herr Weinstein".

All done now, thank you! @ThaesOfereode: Aeengath (talk) 10:02, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Thanks for your patience. More again:

  • four letters to two schoolmates – Not a big deal, but two each?
Yes two each: the first and third letters to Novak, the second and fourth to Petrović, as detailed further down in the section.
  • Link Aleksa Šantić, unless his literary society has a sr.WP equivalent (?)
Done as suggested, also literary society
Done as suggested.
  • Specify Serbian Cyrillic; there are notable differences, especially in handwriting.
Done as suggested.
Done as suggested.
  • According to historian Magdalena Saiger – Passim perhaps, but consider whether you want to use false titles or not. Strictly, they are not prohibited, so I will not object if you decide to keep them. Same with the Oxford comma, passim.
Added "the" before the descriptor in all the false title constructions and a consistency pass on the Oxford comma.
  • staff from the Jewish hospital – If the same as linked before, capitalize "hospital". Once again a passim note.
Capitalised throughout.
  • on the eve of – Borderline MOS:EUPH; prefer "the night before" since "the eve of" is broader and murkier.
Done as suggested.
  • In it Dajč explains – Comma after "it".
Done.
  • only about 80 cm of personal space each – {{convert}}
Done.
Done.
Done.
Changed it to surgery suite.
  • Giergiel's account of the letter suggests a date of around 13 December. – Does he say why?
No she doesn't give a reason, I've kept 11 December as the primary date, since that's given directly in the archival document itself (VEJ vol. 14, Doc. 136) and by Saiger; Giergiel's approximate date is noted in the footnote for transparency.
Done as suggested.
  • The hospital's daily courier visited – Given the following information, what is this supposed to convey? Her brother clearly knew their parents were en route.
Rephrased so it's clearer that Hans came separately.
Done as suggested.
  • as well as English and Hebrew textbooks – Like "how to learn a language" textbooks or textbooks in those languages on such topics?
Not done, type of textbooks isn't specified in my sources.
  • As an aside, do we know how she got these books?
yes she brought them with her when she entered the camp. I found it in the third letter "Although we were only allowed to bring as much as we were allowed to bring, I have Werther, Heine, Pascal, Montaigne, an English and Hebrew textbook."
  • Even amid these conditions, Despite the harsh circumstances, etc. – Another passim note: one or two of these are fine per section, but these are one after the other (and kind of a writing crutch).
Reworded that whole paragraph to break up the pattern.
  • the growing sense of isolation from the outside world. She writes that the inmates felt "so near the outside world, yet so far from everyone", – Kind of repetitive, re: "outside world"
Reworded as well.
  • At the same time she – Comma after "time".
Done.
  • as Dajč asks whether they might be shot – Asks whom? Petrović?
Changed it to "wonders" since it reads more as her own uncertainty.
  • the two friends were able on several occasions to arrange brief meetings when prisoners were allowed to cross → the two friends were able to arrange brief meetings on several occasions when prisoners were allowed to cross
Done.
  • to eliminate the remaining inmates of Sajmište → to kill the remaining inmates at Sajmište – Per WP:EUPH, I hope you'll agree it's important not to mince words here.
Yes, changed it to "murder".
  • Given this was before the time historians generally view the "changing tide" of the war, it may be important to explain why the internees were being killed en masse like this.
Good point, added a paragraph per Browning on the Wannsee Conference and Heydrich's decision, which left Belgrade without a deportation option prompting Berlin to supply a gas van instead.
  • Remove the quotes for "Entlausungswagen".
Done.
  • Those killed included Dajč's mother and younger brother, Hans – So not Dajč herself? Dajč's death is not mentioned directly at all in a section supposedly about her death. Worth also pointing out that she died in spring 1942, which could be added to the infobox.
Her own death is stated directly earlier in the section ("she was among the Jewish prisoners killed in the gas van") so "also killed" here refers back to that. Added her death to the infobox as "Spring 1942 (aged 19)".
@Aeengath: Do we know she was 19? 22 March is only two days into spring; it seems much more likely that she was 20, but without knowing the day she was killed, this is only speculation. ThaesOfereode (talk) 17:32, 31 July 2026 (UTC)
I have three sources saying 19 (including Almuli directly), but you're right that I shouldn't assert a specific number without knowing her exact death date, especially given how close it falls to her birthday. Changed it to "Spring 1942 (aged 19–20)"
  • In August 1942 Turner reported – Comma after 1942
Done.
Linked "Jewish problem" Holding off on linking "solved" to Final Solution, as we may risk the same WP:EGG problem you flagged earlier.
  • Almuli located the letters' recipients, Nada Novak and Mirjana Petrović – Reintroducing Nada and Mirjana but not Jaša. Why? Why reintroduce them at all?
Fair point, removed their names here.
Done.
  • An earlier documentary, Ljudi govore: Hilda Dajč ('People Speak: Hilda Dajč'), directed by Radoslav Ognjenović – Minor translation quibble, but might "The People Speak" be a more appropriate translation? Open to pushback here. Typically I would reserve "the" for a word like narod (i.e., the people at large, as in We the People), but here I think it works better here.
Agreed, changed to "The People Speak: Hilda Dajč".
  • The Serbian artist Aleksandar Zograf has also depicted her letters and the experiences of Jewish prisoners at Sajmište in a graphic novel, profiled in The Jerusalem Post in 2018. – Presumably this effort has a title?
It does, The Letters of Hilda Deitch, added.
Done.
Done.
  • Recommend adding a blurb from one of the letters to the "Letters" section, especially since Cyrillic handwriting is notoriously difficult to read; I recommend using both English and Serbian for those interested (as I did at Argos (dog) with the Greek)
Added a quote from the fourth letter as a quote box, with the Serbian Cyrillic original collapsed underneath as suggested. Really enjoyed reading (and learning) about Argos (dog) in the process.
@Aeengath: Thanks for the kind words; it was an enjoyable page to write. As an aside, I recommend a comma after "fourth letter" since it seems otherwise that this is the fourth letter she wrote to Petrović rather than the fourth letter overall. ThaesOfereode (talk) 17:34, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

Source review to follow. A nice article overall. ThaesOfereode (talk) 18:39, 29 July 2026 (UTC)

All done, thank you @ThaesOfereode:! Aeengath (talk) 16:05, 30 July 2026 (UTC)
Two additional minor quibbles:
  1. You appear to be using British spelling without Oxford standards, so Aryanization should be spelled with an "s" instead of a "z".
    Done.
  2. In footnote A, Deutsch and Deitch should be italicized rather than quoted or left alone in accordance with MOS:WAW
    Done.
ThaesOfereode (talk) 17:38, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

Source review

Serbian-language source review below:

  • Almuli (2005): Link the author. Email me the relevant pages.
Author linked, working on relevant pages.
Sent a transcript of p. 127, have requested a proper scan and will send that along if I get one.
Scan received, sent it along to you. Aeengath (talk) 09:32, 9 August 2026 (UTC)
  • Almuli (2010): Ut supra
Sent.
  • Byford (2011): Link the author. Also another translation quibble, but probably "The Old Fairgrounds", right? Especially since your German sources use "the" (Das Gelände der alten Messe)
Author linked. Also changed to "The Old Fairground", I checked Google Books and the singular form is far more established than "Fairgrounds" so I left it as is.
    • [36]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
    • [69]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
    • [168]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
  • Vukadinović (2026): Translation quibble, but it's "Hilda Dajč and Her Letters: A Rare Record of the Holocaust in Belgrade". Also, why are you forcing the sfnref when there's a credited author? I thought you hadn't even used the source for a minute.
Fixed the trans-title and dropped the forced sfnref. Updated the sfn to Vukadinović instead.
    • [29a]: This says until May 1942 (do maja 1942), not March.
      Good catch, that source wasn't actually supporting that end date anyway so I removed it from the sentence and left Krug as the sole citation. It's been rephrased to match Krug exactly
    • [29b]: Quibbles -- Is this an indefinite usage? I'm not 100% sure. If it is, I get why you would translate malog as "small" here, but I think the intent is more like "short". If it isn't, then it should be "the little diary of Anne Frank" or "Anne Frank's little diary", which is substantively different. Given the semantic ambiguity, I would just write that Almuli compares the work to the diary and leave it at that, without the quote.
      Agreed, the phrase is genuinely ambiguous in Serbian. Dropped the quoted "small diary" and just left that Almuli compared her letters to Anne Frank's diary.
  • Vulović & Draškić (1988): Email the relevant pages.
Sent.
  • The Film Center Serbia source has the page in English, so I'm not sure why you're presenting the Serbian-language form here.
Now leads with their own English title with the Serbian as the parenthetical. Also added italics to the lang template.

Will be on the lookout for the emailed sources. ThaesOfereode (talk) 19:45, 31 July 2026 (UTC)

@Aeengath:
  • Almuli (2010): Any reason why you don't include the term "martyr" (mučenica) in your chapter title for this?
    I did miss that, have updated the citation to match.
    • [3a]: Dates and location check out, but Almuli calls her parents merchants (trgovca), not an engineer? I see that Berger et al. calls him an engineer, but is there any reason to we should consider that source more informative than this one? May not be mutually exclusive either.
      Kept "engineer" per the majority (Matthäus, Saiger, VEJ/Berger) but added a footnote mentioning Almuli's calling him a merchant. I agree that the two aren't necessarily contradictory, he could have trained as an engineer but was also a merchant.
    • [3b]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
    • [8a]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
    • [8b]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
    • [38]: Isn't this just page 35?
      Fixed.
    • [41]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
    • [46]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
    • [47a]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
    • [47b]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
      • As an aside to this, it seems noteworthy that Dajč is writing about what appears to be either systematic rape or at least transactional prison sex (whatever ljubavnicizam is supposed to mean; 'mistressism' is probably the most accurate literal translation, but that seems wildly misleading) at the camps. She uses some euphemisms here too; does she specify what her "special affection" (osobita naklonost) means? Similarly, I'm not entirely sure how to interpret jer ko prvi devojci onome u devojka. This may be a Serbian phrase I'm unfamiliar with. Do any of your other sources discuss this element of her letters, because admittedly it jumped out at me.
        Working through getting the passage and the translation right.
        Ljubavnicizam does seem to describe favoritism tied to relationships with young female inmates, it seems to be Hilda's own coinage, built by analogy to nepotizam used in the same sentence. Osobita naklonost reads as ironic here not literal fondness. In jer ko prvi devojci, onome i devojka, roughly "whoever gets to a girl first, she becomes his," she's describing the predatory dynamic of the camp, similar to the English phrase "first come, first served." Semlin.info's translation is: "as soon as one of them chats with a girl, she becomes his girlfriend." Almuli (p.39) frames it as part of the camp's corrupt kapo system run by young women from Banat but doesn't comment on that specific favoritism/relationships claim itself. I have also checked Berger, Byford, Daković, Krug, Matthäus, Saiger, Subotic and Giergiel, none of them touch this part of her letters. Given that I don't think I can include it, it'd be leaning entirely on my own reading of one letter with nothing in the secondary sources to back it up. Leaving it out for now but will revisit if something turns up. Thank you for highlighting it. Aeengath (talk) 10:04, 2 August 2026 (UTC)`
        Yes, I gathered the irony of the naklost but I thought it may have been a reference to some other event(s) in her life; no matter. I agree that it seems there's nothing really to add to the body, which is a real shame because it's an interesting set of remarks about the experience of the women inmates. ThaesOfereode (talk) 12:15, 2 August 2026 (UTC)
        I agree and I'll keep an eye out in case a source ever discusses it directly.
    • [48]: Checks out.
      Thank you for checking
    • [52a]: Wrong page? Appears to be pp. 43–44, not 42.
      Fixed.
      • As an aside, is this your translation or one found elsewhere? If yours, I do have to ask why you chose 'outside word' as the translation to sveta? Also need a {{sic}} tag next to her misspelling of klaonica unless this is a dialectal thing. Also also, "We are all alike in our cowardice, you all and us" seems like an important crescendo to the quote. Any reason you left it out?
        The translation came from semlin.info (Giergiel p.272 also used "We are so near the outside world, yet so far from everyone") but you're right "sveta" just means "world" so I have trimmed it to match the original. "Klanica" is not a misspelling it's the standard Serbian form, "klaonica" is the Croatian equivalent. I have restored the missing closing line too, corrected the page and ended per Almuli with a period not an exclamation mark.
        TIL. People always discount how many Serbian terms are different from Croatian ones. ThaesOfereode (talk) 12:38, 2 August 2026 (UTC)
    • [52b]: This appears to be the wrong page too. This looks like 41–42, though I admit the use of the word letujem ('fly'?) is throwing me. Is this an ad hoc perfectivizer? HJP was not helpful in interpreting that for me.
      It's not the wrong page but it makes sense to add p. 41 and her hope for imminent release, leading to p. 42 footnote, thank you for pointing this out. On "letujem", it's from letovati ("to summer"),, "I have no intention of summering here", it is not related to leteti ("fly").
      Damn, I did consider that, but of course in English this has something of an upper crust affect so I must've just batted it out of mind. Shame on me. ThaesOfereode (talk) 12:38, 2 August 2026 (UTC)
  • The one Vulović & Draškić (1988) citation checks out, but I would either move that source to the comma break (i.e., After completing a medical course that year) or put it in a {{multiref2}} and say something along the lines of For her medical training see Vulović & Draškić (1988), p. 123., vel sim.
    Now moved after the content it supports.
Still waiting on Almuli (2005), but if all is like before should be an easy pass. Apologies for the false ping earlier. ThaesOfereode (talk) 15:55, 1 August 2026 (UTC)
Thank you @ThaesOfereode, all done. Aeengath (talk) 08:01, 2 August 2026 (UTC) Added final reply Aeengath (talk) 10:04, 2 August 2026 (UTC)
Almuli (2005):
  • [a]: Checks out. Other info seems to be supported in the other sources, so that's fine.
    Thank you for checking
  • [b]: Checks out. Other info seems to be supported in the other sources, so that's fine.
    Thank you for checking
  • [c]: Checks out. Other info seems to be supported in the other sources, so that's fine.
    Thank you for checking
  • [d]: Checks out. Doesn't explicitly say the date, but I trust our readership to understand the concept of "7 + 1 = 8".
    Same!
That's all from me. Everything else is just nitpicks. Happy to support based on prose quality and Serbian-language source review. Congratulations on an excellent article which appears to be headed in the direction of being your first FA! ThaesOfereode (talk) 13:01, 2 August 2026 (UTC)
Thank you so much @ThaesOfereode: the article is much stronger thanks to your careful review. I hope this means more people will learn about Hilda's story. Aeengath (talk) 21:34, 2 August 2026 (UTC)
Hi ThaesOfereode, it looks to me that we have here a spotcheck of the sources for accurate use, which is excellent, but can you confirm no instances of too-close paraphrasing of the sources inspected? Also I notice a check of the formatting of the references but are you also vouching for their reliability? Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 14:38, 23 August 2026 (UTC)
Happy to confirm both reliability and not-too-close paraphrasing for Serbian-language sourcing. ThaesOfereode (talk) 00:33, 24 August 2026 (UTC)
Thank you. We'd also need sign-off on the reliability of the English-language sources -- how are you with that? Cheers, Ian Rose (talk) 12:39, 25 August 2026 (UTC)
Just a reliability check or a full source review? If the former, I've taken a look and only have a few notes. @Aeengath:
  • Overall, there is a bit of inconsistency in whether you include location and publisher.
    • Pisarri (2005) should indicate that the publisher is the university
      Done, added |publisher= Ca' Foscari University of Venice
    • Yad Vashem Studies is published by a well-known museum; you should include that.
      Done, added |publisher=Yad Vashem
    • "Böhlau Wien" should be Böhlau Verlag with its location set for Vienna.
      Done, changed to |publisher=Böhlau Verlag |location=Vienna
  • The Forum for Applied History is published by what appears to be an arm of a German political party. What makes it reliable? In any event, it should be noted as the publisher, unless you have an objection.
    The book publisher Forum for Applied History was founded in 2013 in Belgrade out of a 2010 initiative to educate about the Sajmište concentration camp; it collaborated with RLS from 2013–2014, coinciding with this book's publication. RLS is a German political foundation affiliated with Die Linke but it's a legally independent organisation, one of six such party-affiliated foundations in Germany, all of which are publicly/government funded rather than financed by their respective parties. The author, Milovan Pisarri, has a PhD in social history from the University of Venice and specialises in the Holocaust and the Roma genocide in Serbia; Yad Vashem published a full review of the book with feedback from historians including Yehuda Bauer. I'd treat this as RS regardless of the collaboration's funding structure. I'm ok with disclosing the RLS involvement on the citation if you think it's needed (I don't see a parameter for funding/support disclosure in {{cite book}}, so maybe a note?), but then shouldn't we apply the same standard to the other sources too? Aeengath (talk) 10:23, 26 August 2026 (UTC)
  • Avotaynu was a magazine for Jewish geneology which was more or less self-published (i.e., by Avotaynu Inc.). What makes it reliable?
    The author Ženi Lebl is a well-regarded Holocaust researcher and survivor whose work has been studied by scholars (like this peer-reviewed analysis in (Cambridge University Press ), that said since this particular claim is supported by multiple other sources, I've switched the citation to Manoschek p. 170, for ease.
ThaesOfereode (talk) 15:25, 25 August 2026 (UTC)
Thank you. Aeengath (talk) 10:23, 26 August 2026 (UTC)
I think you've adequately addressed all my questions. I don't have any further comments or objections on this front. ThaesOfereode (talk) 11:57, 26 August 2026 (UTC)

Drive-by comment by Vacant0

Hey, thanks for writing this article. In case if you need more reviews, I'll gladly review this. I don't have time to do it during this week though. I only noticed while scrolling that the Serbian BBC source is not used in the article, although it is listed under used sources. You can either incorporate the source in the article, move it to "further reading", or remove the source from the article. Good luck with your nomination. Vacant0 (talk • contribs) 16:51, 7 August 2026 (UTC)

@Vacant0 thanks for catching that, I recently replaced that citation with a better academic source and forgot to move it out. Always happy for more reviews to improve this article, thank you. Aeengath (talk) 10:18, 8 August 2026 (UTC)

Image review

Looks like ALT, image use, placement and licence are OK. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 12:20, 12 August 2026 (UTC)

Thank you for checking @Jo-Jo Eumerus. Aeengath (talk) 14:33, 17 August 2026 (UTC)

Borsoka

  • While the article is very well written and clearly based on thorough research, my general impression is that it could nevertheless be shortened, as it contains details that are not directly relevant to its subject. I am referring to the introductory passage in the section "Persecution and imprisonment" and the first two paragraphs of the section "Sajmište (Judenlager Semlin)", which seem too lengthy for an introduction to the Nazi occupation of Serbia and the subsequent persecution of Jews in an encyclopedic article about the life one of the victims of that persecution.
    @Borsoka: Thank you for your review.
    Have now trimmed both sections significantly.
  • Which source supports the English spelling "Deitch"? Given that she was born in Vienna, her birth name was most likely "Hilda Deutsch", which is also the form used in the English version of the cited bilingual study by Menachem Shelach. Furthermore, Shelach refers to her letter as "Deutsch letters" in a footnote. Likewise, the English version of the bilingual catalogue of an exhibition about Judenlager Semlin also uses the "Hilda Deutsch" form ().
    You are right that Austrian civil registration probably used the German spelling "Deutsch" but "Deitch" is a distinct Jewish surname. Daković (2025, p. 134) supports this directly: "Dajč is the Serbian version of the Jewish name Deitch. In the absence of an English version, the paper features the Serbian transliteration." Sabina Giergiel (2020, pp. 266-275) also uses "Deitch" throughout: "the letters of Hilda Deitch," "Deitch's epistolary narrative". "Deitch" is also the title of Aleksandar Zograf's graphic novel The Letters of Hilda Deitch, which received press coverage. This question was actually raised and discussed with ThaesOfereode earlier in this review. The catalogue you linked was translated by a single translator with some questionable spelling choices such as rendering "Aryans" as "Arians" throughout so I'd weigh it below Daković's and Shelach's peer reviewed work. I've also revised the lead footnote to attribute each claim to its actual source. (edited) Aeengath (talk) 14:45, 17 August 2026 (UTC)
  • Were her parents whenever called "Dajč"?
    Yes both Almuli's Serbian text (2010, p.34) "Хилда je рођена у Бечу 22. марта 1922. као кћи Августе и Емила Дајча, трговца из Београда" and Berger (2017, p.410) call her father "Emil Dajč" "Hildas Familie wurde auch in Semlin interniert und ermordet. Ihr Vater, Emil Dajč, war in der Lagerverwaltung tätig, siehe Dok. 143 vom 31.1.1942."
  • ...vice-president of the Jewish Community... I am not sure, I understand it. Was he a religious leader or a leader of a Jewish self-governing body?
    He was a civic leader, to make it clearer I added that the Jewish Community was "the representative body of the city's Jewish population" per Dakovic (2025, p.136)
  • Estimates of the death toll vary: the historian Walter Manoschek cites the wartime official figure of approximately 7,500, noting that other contemporary estimates ranged as high as 8,000; Jürgen Matthäus puts the figure at close to 7,000; and the political scientist Jelena Subotić gives a lower figure of approximately 6,300. I would suggest moving these statements to a footnote, since they do not directly concern her.
    Done.
  • In the "See also" section, I am not sure how the article "Genocide of Serbs in the Independent State of Croatia" is relevant to this article. Borsoka (talk) 07:35, 16 August 2026 (UTC)
    @ThaesOfereode:, given you suggested this originally, do you want to weigh in? Aeengath (talk) 10:28, 17 August 2026 (UTC)
    Given that Yugoslavia is one of the lesser-known theaters of the Holocaust, I felt it was useful to add for anyone interested in exploring the topic further. I'm not particularly attached to it, so do what you will with it; I won't fight about it. ThaesOfereode (talk) 11:36, 17 August 2026 (UTC)
    @Borsoka, given the connection is fairly thin I've removed it from See also. Thanks @ThaesOfereode for your input. Aeengath (talk) 12:23, 17 August 2026 (UTC)

All my concerns have been addressed, and I therefore have no hesitation in supporting the promotion of this excellent article. Thank you very much for all your careful work on it. Borsoka (talk) 15:14, 17 August 2026 (UTC)

Thank you @Borsoka!. Aeengath (talk) 06:11, 18 August 2026 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.

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