Adriana Turk discovers 50 relatives via DNA test after Holocaust loss

Adriana Turk, a 74-year-old woman, has discovered more than 50 living relatives worldwide after taking a DNA test through MyHeritage. For decades, Turk believed her father’s family had been almost entirely wiped out during the Holocaust.

Her father, Hans Turk, fled Nazi Germany for New Zealand in 1937. He rarely discussed his past, and Turk grew up knowing only that her grandmother died in the Warsaw Ghetto and her aunt, uncle, and two children were murdered in Auschwitz. Following the death of her only brother, Julian, in late 2024, Turk felt she was the last remaining member of her family line.

The DNA results revealed descendants of three Holocaust survivors from her grandmother’s lineage, with relatives located in Germany, Israel, Brazil, and other nations. Turk has since traveled from Australia to Europe and Israel to meet her newly discovered family members, including her cousin Raanan Gidron, a psychotherapist in Tel Aviv. Turk described the experience as feeling ‘born anew’ after transitioning from a sense of total isolation to finding a large, interconnected family tree.