Auschwitz Survivor

I was born city of plots can 1909 25th 1925 I'm a one up for five boys five brothers my mother used to say she has a basketball team five boys and if you'd see a picture we go every two and a half years that different is two and a half years from one to the other and Poland just like most of the European countries before the war were not rich countries Poland was a again I don't want to see a poor but not a rich country the majority of the people were middle class or lower than middle class and then there were some of course some rich people too just like everybody else my father was a custom tailor making clothes for customers and we have we had a good life I mean under the condition under the circumstances that would existing at that time in Poland when John and I and my grandson went to Poland and I took them to the place where we used to live they were I could see that they were amazed looking at me and as if to say how could this how could that have been we lived in a two-room apartment I mean that was middle-class in one of the rooms was the kitchen my father's tailor shop and in the second room we had the living room the reception room and the bedroom and so and there was no there was running water an electricity in our in our place in our house but there was no toilets it was an outhouse and so we were living a five brothers and my father my mother was seven people living in the two rooms so we were sleeping seven people in one room and of course like we live over here you know every child has a room at least and the ways I room and probably a study room depending on where how and when but over there we were ass like I said the bedroom was during today was a living room in the reception room and at night it was the bedroom and so we had seven people living that my in the bedroom but we were happy we knew anything that that's was the wild and and that's what we were used to I attended school and I was active even as a youngster participating in different sports and belonging to organizations and Don came World War two September 1st 1939 when world war ii broke out that was 14 years old the city applauds being can ninety kilometers from the German border took the German army three days to occupy to get to the city applause so on the 3rd of September I mean yes of the 3rd of September the German army occupied the city of plots and then everything of course changed the first day welcome when the regular army came in yeah they would just say very briefly because they moved on with the front line by behind them 10 D occupation forces consisting of SS and I see in bet you have the black uniform the disappoint the compassion they will mean and then all with them came all the bad laws especially the Nuremberg Laws the nürnberg was number one were depriving us of our civil rights how with all due respect being an American you maybe you know maybe you don't realize because it's difficult for one that doesn't live under those circumstances to know what it means to live to lose your civil rights you are nothing you are nobody anybody can do with you whatever they want anybody can take away from you whatever they have you have no recourse you cannot sue anybody you cannot complain you're nothing you're just a living term human being but they're not being you're not being treated as a human being and then longer and that was very there was the bad thing there were many many restrictions number one we will not allow to have any businesses and the properties and the foreign currency schools were closed during the summer but we're not home reopened the September which is usually the time when the schools reopen and so there was the education was interrupted there was no more education and the Nazis especially the SS know very brutal and doing terrible thing beating torturing a ghetto was fair ordering all the Jewish people from the city of clocks to assemble in a certain section a certain area and and then they had to bring in people from outside area from the nearby villages and so now they say that we were living in a two-room apartment seven people they brought in other people and we had to take in another family properly of the same size so imagine now you had you could have 10 12 14 or more people living in a two-room apartment or you had a one-room for the whole thing anthem and the NPM food supply but getting shorter and shorter and less and less and then you had to report the specialty men from the age of firm 15 16 to 45 or 50 had to report for work in order to get a food card you had to report for work if you didn't so you didn't get the food card so you couldn't get any food what was the work some of them of course there's always something that is needed but most of the time it was just to discriminate just eliminate the people to do things that were not necessary at all for instance let's say there were a pile of rocks we were ordered one day to take the rocks and carry him by hand say a whole distance the next day we had to bring him back and they spit specially on the religious people to give them to dehumanize them for instance they give them a bucket with water and a brush to scrub the streets and beating and torturing and people started to disappear they would pick up people and nobody knew whether where they went what happened to them and there were no place to inquire about it because nobody would tell you what happened if they told they said they were sent to work to the east and they're working there the city applauds being 90 kilometers from the German border was in 1940 incorporated into the third drive into German into Germany and therefore declared what they call you Narang free of Jews and so in the middle of the night assessment with the dogs and flying rifle butts or that everybody out without prior warning we had to leave everything behind imagine where you have in your family I don't know probably from generations items or things but whatever is it is - you could be sentimental all there maybe not of monetary value but of sentimental value but here you were ordered to leave everything behind and leave to hell leave your house from there we were assembled in the on the streets and shipped out to a concentration camp to a camp at that time was not a compensation him it was a transit camp in East Prussian how we were there for about about a week or two and then we were sent from there into further into Poland into even low intimate poo-pooed a part of the country and they again we will place with another family also with the large family the large families before the war in Europe and and to enter we had to live there in that city called sir it's a and Poland there was it before the war a Polish ammonition factory now the Germans took it over and ammunition were produced for the German army of course and so we had to work in the ammunition factory it was again the same thing if you want to receive at food duration you got a word another paid for if you didn't work you then get that ratio cut if you didn't have a ration card you didn't get any food so of course we reported to to work there was a community a Jewish Community Council and he had to report a and they assigned you to work toward a big wood my first assignment when I came from there that came from thee from the other camp into the city of start of it said I report that to the Jewish Community Council and they assigned me to work in the Gestapo now I don't know how much you know our the Gestapo but that was that was the worst part of the Nazi order and and I had to be there seven o'clock in the morning at the first thing in the moment I had to shine the officers boots if at night they put out their boots in front of the door so my job was to come in the morning shine their boots so they had when they got up in the moment they had the boot surrender and damn during the day we're in the wind that I had to take care of the ovens there was no central heating there were ovens heat that buy coal and wood so I had to break all about fire in the ovens and keep the offices warm I had to clean the outdoors and all that kind of that kind of work but I was very badly treated although as a youngster I was mystery that beaten every day for instance if the assessment there was in charge of the author if he came out and after washing doubt though he would just go with this end like this and if he found a little dust on his sand I got a beating because I didn't clean the outer good and to go back a little with the occupying the city by the SS the occupation forces and depriving us of the civil rights at the age of fourteen I was declared a slave condemned to death for the only time that I committed because I was born to Jewish parents and so they my where they came that I had no right to lifted come my I got my dad passed I'm only living including the bond to myself but the entire Jewish population for as long as we can perform work for the German for the German military for German government and so I get down I was very mistreated there as a youngster and so I went to the Jewish Community Council complaint and says so they had them being mistreated and beaten and so they changed my job and send me to the ammunition factory excuse me so now I was working in the ammunition factory producing 105 millimeter artillery shells for the for the German army you can imagine how I felt in my heart that here I was hoping to praying every minute for Germany to lose the war and he I was forced to produce artillery shells that I know they'll be using to kill Allied forces American British French who I was fighting against them and that was a terrible feeling but it was slave labor I had to do it and that was going on until 1942 which he was still living in the ghetto with my parents in 1941 in a villa called van z in the outskirts of Berlin a group of assessment were assembled with the orders from him led to work out and the final solution of the Jewish Question and so after a wild day in a bunch of drunken assessment declared the final solution then that the Jewish people those that are now under the German occupation and those that will come under the German occupation later on who have to be exterminated and so in 1900 in October of 1942 again in the middle of the night we were ordered out from their homes leave everything they assemble in the marketplace where a selection took place at the young and and also were capable to work were taken on one side the very young and the elderly selected on the other side we were myself and two of my brothers were selected among the young ones to go to go to work but I was working God at the end of my brothers also demolition factory so we will consider Zwarte s my parents my father my mother their my seven-year-old brother with the population with the entire descend the population of that city was sent to what that came to Treblinka and they emerged that by guessing melted that was that was problem that was not the most horrible day of my life which is still with me I seeing my parents for the very less time knowing that I won't see him anymore and being a teenager and they were taken away and then that's all it didn't seem any more on the other hand the young people myself and my two brothers and the others were taken to to a camp I prepared the now slave labor camp and the we were assigned to work in the ammunition Factory which I did work anyways and that was going on from 42 till 44 in nineteen hundred and forty-four the Russian army was moving vest now they are ready at the Polish border coming you know cope and polish cities and so the Germans started to liquidates the concentration camps and we were taken out from there and sent to the final destination on that day that we had there were rumors were there that were going to be some to Auschwitz we knew that Auschwitz is the final solution that they are guest-chamber stay on camera thorium's and then this is going to be the final solution and so we decided that instead of going and dying in our in Auschwitz that we will cry in start a breakout from here so to say revolt the camp was not far away from a forest and so we plan to break out from there kill whatever we can refit and kill some guards the camp was a circle with a wooden fence south course before a sign we didn't have any thing to fight with the Germans had the piano all kinds of arms and we started a revolt we broke the plan to break the fence and have people around through the broken fence towards the forest and whoever can we knew that not everybody will be able to succeed but whoever will be able to reach the forest they might might have a chance of saving themselves surviving because in the vicinity was a large group and very effective group of partisans so if you can reach the partisans so now you have a chance you can fight with the far partisans against the Germans we had the chance to kill I think one or two guards and broke the fence I was assigned to to defense and people started to run but they didn't take long and the alarm went on and from there by the barracks the Germans came out in on bicycles motorcycles and encircled the area and anybody that was caught outside the fence was shot right on the spot the rest that were still in the camp they didn't get out from through the fence we were closed up and the next day we will shift out which at that time we figured well we know now this is the end that we want won't be long until be always killed it took about I think on three days they put us in cattle trains I hunted down them 20 people my inner cattle train without food or water after all we'll not only now condemned to death because who we wear but now we are again condemned to that because we revolted against the German government and has a German army so but because of that we didn't get any food or water for three days there was actually on the train on the in the kettle plan and this wagon was with two buckets one was you to use the so toilet and one had water in it so this is that's all we could use from there and that on the third day we arrived I remember early in the morning and in there in a place he wasn't back around it were ll vias and we could see inside people with the striped uniforms and and now we know that this is outfit again coming off the train that we were unloaded and done there was a selection by the famous doctor Mengele you must have heard about them about dr. Mandela's who with the movement with the point of one finger decided who's to live in whose to die so there again there were two columns who'd that does in his opinion are capable to work and the others went one direction and we went the other direction we never saw the people that were on the other column again we knew where they were where they were taken my column were taken into the camp and we'll place them in Auschwitz where we will greet that number one with the sign that you probably by now which was our bed max rifling through be through work and the greeting that we received was with all you are in Auschwitz now that they were like you're the army now you're an Auschwitz now and the only out only way out of here is through the chimneys you know what it means the chimneys Damis with the smoke and there were four large chimneys that you could see the smoke and fire coming out from it and so I said the other column discipline the different direction we never saw them again I was placed on our on a barrack and my two brothers and now we were assigned to work now about the conditions in Auschwitz is just impossible to describe to know that such a place ever existed on this planet operated by human beings by the government the atrocities but took place there is just unbelievable and cannot be described you must tell you must remember that the now switch was not only Jews there were all nationalities even prisoners of war there was a large group of Russian prisoners of war there were Americans there were like I said nationalities from all over the world and the gas chambers were working everyday transports pralaya rivaled whatever bringing people again the same thing the young and the elderly were taken to the gas chambers guests cremated the ashes spread into the river visa or useful fertilizer and time and that said that what was going on and there were people being murdered that day in and day out in the life and circumstances are indescribable there were people that you had everyday you know the vias that were another house with or the high-voltage - let's show people some people that couldn't take the atrocities in the torture and the lack of food who draw themselves on the high voltage wires because I said what's the use that nobody comes out from here until 1944 when I was there there was nobody up till that time that ever came out of life from Auschwitz once you get in there behind those high voltage pilots there was it that was the end and again life was the gist just beyond explanation then in 1980 and of 1944 the Russian army was on the move and coming closer and so the Germans were shutting down the concentration camps there were six concentration camp death camps though many concentration but it was six dead games and they closed under that Kem's and tried to cover up what took place there so the Allied forces want no one see what happened and so people they started to liquidate people but the time was getting very short because the Russians were moving fast and they also did what they were they were a fight between two parts so to say a five I live between two paths in the German government one was the SS him web o--'s and Eichmann who wanted to exterminate all the Jews on the other hand were those that were producing a working to supply the German army but I'm initially whatever is needed and so they need that the labor the slave labor and he had they got the people so they wanted the people still to keep alive where as long as they can produce to supply the German army with the neither material and so evidently I was with that group that they selected and sent from Auschwitz to actually first to another come in stuff that was neg dance and from there was some deep into Germany to work there because even even while the Allied armies were in the West were already on the German board they are part of Germany and the Eastern Russian but Hitler you know was still promising to German people that they will win the war that he is working on a secret weapon well it wonders at that time was the v1 and v2 with run upon Brown which I flee but then came to the United States would for us but they were also working on the atom bomb you know before even at the United States worked on it and so maybe this one I had my but he said that he's day working on the secret weapon and that they still gonna win the war thank God that they didn't develop the Year at the bomb as but they still made that the slave labor and so we were some to Germany and put there to work first I was placed and they the city of Stuttgart where the German built a airfield of the night fighters for the protection of the city of Stuttgart and so we were place I was placed there with 600 other people where we build them first our way a highway for to bring supplies to the park how we had to be ready that was under the winter 41 from the 40 44 45 we had to be ready when the alarm sound out of when the it was snowing to be out with shovels and cleared the theorem way so that the planes can be ready to take off they had stationed day and night like this and and so we would do maintenance thereafter after highway build the highway support that and things like that I was working I was assigned to work in a query you know what the credits breaking stones from lads don't too small to send to pebble they were being used for the highway and also ready to fix the runway because they were allied force especially the Americans were bumping the runways the airfield and so we had to come out and patch it up and fix it up so the medium so the fighters can get up and then one day the American planes came in the beginning we saw a lot of the planes just or other planes and all of a sudden the word came out and screaming everybody out from we was stationed day and I hunger there wasn't even a Kim was a hunger that they put the city and we had the yell everybody out on me from our own people and Jewish planes are here to pick us up it was the Jewish planes here whether the Jews have planes and when they get pilots you know the American plan has this star you know but it is a five star Jewish the start of David the sixth but we did in the sixth car but we didn't know that it was a you know we saw blue plane with with the light blue you know deal with a I with a star on the need of the fuselage and they were flying so low that you could read the numbers they would destroy it they destroyed every plane that was stationed on the runway they the barracks of the airmen the runway some of our people also got killed from the mesh machine-gunning you know because people were running now towards the planes I said Jewish planes everybody wanted to get first on the planes but that they destroyed everything and so we won't need that anymore and so we will send to another camp where the Germans were producing now you know they lost Romania where they were getting the oil gasoline oil from there so now they try to get our oil shale oil you know shell from shell from rocks and so they built a factory data and so we were taking there but again that was already 1945 again the Americans came and the Americans were bombing during the day and the British at night of it all right first of all every day there was no German air force any longer the American planes were flying air at will and bumping destroyed that Factory and so we will no need it anymore and so now the end was that we have to be destroyed the order came from Himmler that no Jewish prisoners should fall into the hands of the Allies and so we were taking on the dead march and there was the other horrible thing because we would hate into to a destination we were to be killed so we were walking from marching down to south Eero South Tyrol Otero whatever you call it and they were going to be placed in abundant salt mines and there destroyed on the working from the camp a buzzer was her horrible because we didn't get any food and they affect the Germans in the hell and the food for themselves and people were dying people were being shot if you if you stepped out from the line seeing on the street something that you could chew on a rotten apple or a rotten potato or whatever and if you went out from line you was shot there and left and this the highway was littered with them with them with bothers with people that were killed and the first night I remember they were afraid to walk us at night they what that's just during the day they were afraid to walk us at night that number one we might them but other way and then so they put us in a bomb in a bomb you know and we could hear arguments out there between the Germans between the gods there were some that of course you could hear read the artillery and the fire ink and the fires at night from the from the Allied forces that were getting closer and closer and so the the gods themselves wanted to run away in change uniforms and hide the war of it as so they there was some that suggest that while we're in that ban that they were putting out gasoline and so that they will burn the gasoline with husband was alive in the in the bomb there were others that said not because they were afraid presumably we when we were not involved in that we just what we had the argument that the eventual they might become prisoners of war and they will be held responsible for that so they said no and they said they can comment on said this is my destination My Orders are to bring them to the destination and that's what we're going to do and so they took us out in the morning and we will magic again on the second day see it that it was already allies like I said what around and there was no place to go some other effect on the third day third day we were walking down early in circles then I remember we came to a bridge and the gods were going to take us across the bridge but when we came to the bridge there were German engineers attaching dynamite to the bridge to blow up the bridge because that Americans were already on the other side so that the Americans cannot cross the river and so on we could head there and jr. saying now you cannot cross the river the Americans are already over there on the other side but if you want you can put him on the bridge and we'll blow up the bridge so warm with them and kill them in this way again they didn't agree with that but we'll take it off of the bridge kept on marching and done later on during the day they kept coming down cut on the front we had they had wagons and we were the horses pulling two wagons where the Germans the gods had their belongings instead of carrying they got the wagons you get up on one of the wagons and said that in was on the highway through the forest the Black Forest I don't know what they had the Schwarz well the Black Forest and the Kim condom one up on down the bag and and said them there's a village ahead here the guards are tired and I know you're tired all of a sudden they started to feel sorry for us says the guards are we're going to go into the village to clean up in there fresh and I order you to get off of the highway to sit at the wayside so now for the first time in five and a half years we'll going to be free let me they without the guards they they let us sit between and he or that the cards not as the so they should run not as losers but still as a army ordered them to assemble another march forward and of course as soon as they took the first steps we started to run in both direction to the photos the only problem was that at the end of some of our people were killed because the this side was going there and from the other side were coming the German troops running running from the frontline and so and there was the forest so we were on the right into their path and seeing people it you know with Strad uniforms and again they didn't know whether we were having to attack them or whatever some just were shooting for you know because they knew who you movie were but so some were shot I was lucky to get through into the forest run and I just run as far and as deep as I could must then later on deep in the forest where it's very thick there were a few other people for others and so there were five of us that got together and we decided that we're going to stick together and we it was April it was cold just to sit the night there and so we just said close together to get the body heat from one to another to be able because we had no winter clothes we had just old jackets that you see here and we said through the night there and we could hear it the night aloud the commotion a lot of noise on the highway where we came from but we didn't know what it is in the morning we had one guy we didn't want to go down but the head I volunteer who said he's going to climb them and see what's happening on the highway he went down and then later he came back like something close with that with a blanket over his back and then with all kinds of goodies he says the allies are here and there's a truck turned over right at the edge of the forest with all kinds of supplies with all kinds of goodies chocolates and canned goods and so he brought up on to us and we sat down we had a fiesta ate some of that and then we went down to the highway and we thought it's American because it was American tanks American trucks American uniform but it was the French was the Free French army and they picked us up and and put us into the lair close by city of signaling them placed us there in a school but it looked like that the job that the French had experienced a proper liberating of finding other survivors because it didn't take long and came that the nurses came in doctors in a field kitchen whether he gave us food and and nurses or doctors to help us and then they are that the nearby villages that every German had to take out some taking some of our people in to their homes clean us and give us food and give us shelter there and so I was placed there with another boy with a German family and were staying there in the beginning I didn't know what happened I am I was numb I didn't realize and most of us we didn't realize what happened where we are and what this is being five and a half years of the condition and the god and being all that being told what to do and live under the worst condition and now what does it mean to be free to go wherever you want to get up in the morning when you want to go to sleep when you want and we didn't comprehend what's going on here whether it is just there just like that that kept coming down said we're gonna come back and pick you up again but then the the Allied armies right here so that's impossible but the after by the week I remember just one day I broke down I was crying hysterical I was screaming Who am I I I had no name I had a number my number is that's what I was called in the camps I was called a number not the name I said Who am I where am I going what am I going to do where is my family is anybody alive am I the only one you

Channel: The World War II Foundation

Views: 183,822

Keywords: Holocaust, Auschwitz Concentration Camp (Concentration Camp), World War II Foundation, Tim Gray, Tim Gray Media, Arbeiter, Jews, Germans

Id: LxCW2cYNhsw

Length: 45min 40sec (2740 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 14 2011