The title makes one dread begin reading it, especially if one has even the slightest familiarity with the era, the place, the holocaust, any of it, and at the same time makes one feel guilty about the dread; after all, they lived it! But soon enough, after having finally mustered courage enough to begin, one realises it isn't among the harshest accounts of the era, despite the various terrors, dangers and injustices and more that are ever present.
The author's clan was among the more fortunate in having survived and in most part so without having experienced the worst, even though they were always in danger of being caught or told on; and the title stems from their having lived in a small farmhouse within a mile of Majdanek.
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Before beginning the book itself, one comes across a stern reprimand, on the publishing information page:-
"This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author."
While one sympathises with the last expressed reminder, one wonders, does that mean that whoever issued that whole instruction wishes to burn every public or otherwise free library, including libraries in schools and universities, thereby limiting any reading of - say - Shakespeare or Jane Austen, and other great authors, strictly to those who purchased an individual copy?
What about the said individuals themselves, should they retain the right to bequeath their personal libraries to their heirs, or must everyone be forced to cremate them at or before their own funerals?
And what about theatre then, does it not violate this individual purchase principle much more, since it's hardly likely individual performers and theatre goers have each purchased an individual copy of the play performed? Should theatre tickets only be sold to those with receipts, carefully numbered so they are not circulated?
Why limit this to books? Why not require that all property be individual, strictly not shared, or passed on at or before death, but cremated after use of the first buyer? For the stern instructions above say nothing at all about rights of a buyer, to resell or gift or otherwise pass on, except in terms of strict disapproval. Why not extend it to all products of human labour? Palaces and jewellery included?
Should museums be included in this, since by definition they are usually not where the original owner of an art work resides currently, and viewers are not the original purchasers of any of the art works? If the principle inherent in the stern instructions above is extended fairly, the answer would be, yes.
And if tomorrow everybody everywhere suddenly agrees and obeys those instructions, well, personally one is ecstatic one has seen some good museums - before they are all closed down for ever, or worse - in Boston, New York, London, Paris, Detroit, Chicago, Southern California, and even some good ones in Germany, and some astounding ones in India.
What this stern instruction in the book signifies, ultimately, is certainly not respect for human labour - for those who labour to produce, and those who pay for that product with fruit of their labour, neither are likely to approve of cremation of the said product, post usage by a single individual; nor are most authors likely to approve of their works sitting in library shelves to be destroyed, any more than anybody likes their home destroyed after they stop living there.
For that matter, the worst part of reading the said stern instruction, and for that matter even understanding the author's point, is that it brings home the horror of having watched a video on a news channel some close to two decades ago, of a young girl being assaulted by several males, and finally being hit in head with a huge stone by one of them; she was defending herself valiantly until that point, fighting back, but then just lay there, and one waited to see her move, realising with horror that one had just watched a murder and could do nothing about it. The video wasn't shown after a couple of repeat telecasts in the news cycle, but remained for ever in memory.
It was an execution one had happened to see because someone filmed it and sent it; the abrahmic faith considered her property, not human on par with the males, and subject to their rights of ownership; their law in religion prescribes execution by stone pelting for infraction. It wasn't clear if she'd merely looked at someone, or refused to marry a cousin she was ordered to, but execution by mob it was.
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The author makes it easy for a non-reader to avoid reading this book, for instance someone possibly doing a school assignment but without heart in it, by practically summing up the broad lines of the story in the page after contents, as timeline of events. Of course, such a non-reader would miss the joys of reading, which one imagines is what they regularly do!
The author makes it easy for a non-reader to avoid reading this book, for instance someone possibly doing a school assignment but without heart in it, by practically summing up the broad lines of the story in the page after contents, as timeline of events. Of course, such a non-reader would miss the joys of reading, which one imagines is what they regularly do!
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The first short chapter, a brief history of Jews in Poland, is quite helpful, to those not as familiar with this background.
"From the founding of the Kingdom of Poland in 1025, until 1569, Poland was known as the Paradise for Jews. Poland was the most tolerant country in Europe and it welcomed the Jews who were expelled from other countries. By the middle of the 16th century Poland was home of three quarters of all the European Jews. That tolerance began to weaken in the 17th century. When Poland was conquered and divided in 1795, Jews became subject to the anti-Semitic Russian, Austro-Hungarian and Prussian powers. As Poland regained its independence after World War I, the approximately three million Jews residing within its borders represented the largest concentration of Jews in Europe. Anti-Semitism, common throughout Europe, was a growing problem. Only a tiny minority of Jews was assimilated, speaking Polish in their homes. The majority lived apart from the Polish population, preserving their culture and ethnic identity, speaking Yiddish amongst themselves. The children attended the Heder, a religious Jewish school, where the language of instruction was predominantly Yiddish and occasionally Hebrew. These orthodox Jews spoke Polish, but spoke it poorly and with a distinctive Yiddish accent."
"In the 1920’s a large influx of Russian and Ukrainian Jews settled in Poland, escaping frequent pogroms in their home countries. This wave of immigrants fanned Polish anti-Jewish sentiment. This was particularly true in smaller towns where Jews were more numerous than Poles. That is when university quotas were introduced cutting in half the number of Jewish students who were accepted. Trade unions expelled Jews and Jews retaliated by forming their own unions which did not accept Poles. Jews were expelled from Polish government jobs and anti-Semitism reached its peak just as World War II was about to break out."
The first short chapter, a brief history of Jews in Poland, is quite helpful, to those not as familiar with this background.
"From the founding of the Kingdom of Poland in 1025, until 1569, Poland was known as the Paradise for Jews. Poland was the most tolerant country in Europe and it welcomed the Jews who were expelled from other countries. By the middle of the 16th century Poland was home of three quarters of all the European Jews. That tolerance began to weaken in the 17th century. When Poland was conquered and divided in 1795, Jews became subject to the anti-Semitic Russian, Austro-Hungarian and Prussian powers. As Poland regained its independence after World War I, the approximately three million Jews residing within its borders represented the largest concentration of Jews in Europe. Anti-Semitism, common throughout Europe, was a growing problem. Only a tiny minority of Jews was assimilated, speaking Polish in their homes. The majority lived apart from the Polish population, preserving their culture and ethnic identity, speaking Yiddish amongst themselves. The children attended the Heder, a religious Jewish school, where the language of instruction was predominantly Yiddish and occasionally Hebrew. These orthodox Jews spoke Polish, but spoke it poorly and with a distinctive Yiddish accent."
"In the 1920’s a large influx of Russian and Ukrainian Jews settled in Poland, escaping frequent pogroms in their home countries. This wave of immigrants fanned Polish anti-Jewish sentiment. This was particularly true in smaller towns where Jews were more numerous than Poles. That is when university quotas were introduced cutting in half the number of Jewish students who were accepted. Trade unions expelled Jews and Jews retaliated by forming their own unions which did not accept Poles. Jews were expelled from Polish government jobs and anti-Semitism reached its peak just as World War II was about to break out."
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The Rinde family was, as many in the region in that era were, and Jews all the more so, quite cosmopolitan and very multilingual, due to change of regime so often.
"Their children attended Polish schools for their general education and the Heder for their Jewish education, but Yiddish was the language of the home. Study of languages was encouraged and private tutors were hired so that most of the children spoke French, the cultured language of the day, and some English. During World War I, when the Province of Galicia, where Przemyśl is located, was ruled by the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the family moved to Vienna for a period of time to escape the fighting between the Russian and Austrian forces so that my father and all his siblings became fluent in German."
"When my grandmother’s brother was not able to make a living in Poland, my grandfather helped him emigrate to the United States, and get established there as he started a second family in the new world. That extended American family came to our assistance by giving us an affidavit when it was our turn to emigrate to the United States after World War II."
"My mother came from quite a different family. Her parents were not as wealthy as my father’s, but they led a comfortable and pleasant life in a beautifully furnished apartment with a maid. Her parents were educated and spoke German, French, Yiddish, and Polish. Her father also knew Latin which he taught to his children along with math."
"In the spring of 1939, Jews feared an outbreak of war, and a German occupation under which they would be second-class citizens. Many Polish Jews who had settled in Germany had been forcibly deported back to Poland, and these refugees told of persecutions and mal treatment of Jews in Germany."
"On the eve of World War II almost the entire Rinde family was in Przemyśl with the exception of Enia who lived in Lwów with her family, and Oscar who was in Paris, with his wife, on business."
"The second week of the war, on September 7, Przemyśl was bombed. Several houses were destroyed and many people were killed. ... As the German army approached, the common belief was that only Jewish men aged 18 to 60 years were in danger. My father, his brothers, and brothers-in-law left their wives and children and headed east."
" ... The Rinde men reached the Romanian border on September 15. Some of the fleeing Polish army officers convinced the Romanian guards not to allow the Jews to cross the border. The following day the Romanians changed their mind and allowed all to enter. ... The rest of the Rinde men taking note of the easily swayed Romanian attitude toward Jews, and being concerned about their wives and children, decided to return to Przemyśl. The next day, September 17, they learned about the pull out of the German troops from Przemyśl as a result of the secret Non-Aggression Treaty entered between Germany and the USSR on August 23, 1939. Known as the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, it called for, among other things, partition of Poland - a recurring fate as Poland was repeatedly conquered in the course of its history by her stronger neighbors. On September 17, the Soviet forces invaded Poland leading to partition of the country. In the province of Galicia, the partition ran along the San River which flows through Przemyśl.
"As the men headed back home they were confronted by Ukrainians armed with clubs and weapons bent on attacking the Jews. Fortunately, the Russian army had already entered the area and a contingent of Jewish Russian soldiers armed with machine guns dispersed the hooligans and issued orders to shoot at anyone creating a disturbance. Taking advantage of partially restored rail service, it nevertheless took the men a week to return to Przemyśl."
"The short-lived German occupation of Przemyśl was immediately ruthless and brutal. Jews were deemed responsible for the death of a German general during the battle, and an order was issued to kill a number of prominent Jews. The Germans were well prepared with lists of leading Jewish citizens. Several Wehrmacht officers came to our apartment looking for my father but my mother, quick on her feet, responded that he was drafted into the Polish army. Fortunately, my uncles had also left the city, but seventy other prominent Jews were rounded up and executed."
USSR invaded on September 17, and Przemyśl, at the border, was divided along with Poland.
"For Jews this was a welcome reprieve; but for my family another threat emerged. The USSR was communist and since we owned the means of production our “crime” was no longer that we were born Jewish, but that we were capitalists.
"Very soon the store and factory became nationalized - an elegant way of saying confiscated."
So we're their home and most of the property. Since former capitalists were not eligible for employment, it meant starvation. They decided to move.
"The former capital of the province of Galicia, Lwów is probably better known by its German name Lemberg, when it was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Between the two world wars the region became part of the Second Polish Republic, and took its Polish name of Lwów, and that is how I refer to it. With the Soviet invasion in 1939, Lwów was annexed by the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, but as a result of Germany’s attack of the Soviet Union in 1941, it came under German occupation until the Soviet Red Army retook it in 1944. The city is now part of the independent state of Ukraine and is known as Lviv."
"Many Polish Jews had fled Nazi occupied Poland to Lithuania where Jews lived in peace and prosperity, but conditions began changing for the worse when Russia invaded Lithuania on June 15, 1940. Suddenly, Lithuanian Jews could no longer go east, but ironically Polish Jews could emigrate and travel through the Soviet Union if they possessed visas for a given destination. Japanese Consul, Chiune Sugihara, against his government’s instructions, was giving Japanese transit visas to Jews, allowing them to travel through the Soviet Union."
The Rinde family was, as many in the region in that era were, and Jews all the more so, quite cosmopolitan and very multilingual, due to change of regime so often.
"Their children attended Polish schools for their general education and the Heder for their Jewish education, but Yiddish was the language of the home. Study of languages was encouraged and private tutors were hired so that most of the children spoke French, the cultured language of the day, and some English. During World War I, when the Province of Galicia, where Przemyśl is located, was ruled by the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the family moved to Vienna for a period of time to escape the fighting between the Russian and Austrian forces so that my father and all his siblings became fluent in German."
"When my grandmother’s brother was not able to make a living in Poland, my grandfather helped him emigrate to the United States, and get established there as he started a second family in the new world. That extended American family came to our assistance by giving us an affidavit when it was our turn to emigrate to the United States after World War II."
"My mother came from quite a different family. Her parents were not as wealthy as my father’s, but they led a comfortable and pleasant life in a beautifully furnished apartment with a maid. Her parents were educated and spoke German, French, Yiddish, and Polish. Her father also knew Latin which he taught to his children along with math."
"In the spring of 1939, Jews feared an outbreak of war, and a German occupation under which they would be second-class citizens. Many Polish Jews who had settled in Germany had been forcibly deported back to Poland, and these refugees told of persecutions and mal treatment of Jews in Germany."
"On the eve of World War II almost the entire Rinde family was in Przemyśl with the exception of Enia who lived in Lwów with her family, and Oscar who was in Paris, with his wife, on business."
"The second week of the war, on September 7, Przemyśl was bombed. Several houses were destroyed and many people were killed. ... As the German army approached, the common belief was that only Jewish men aged 18 to 60 years were in danger. My father, his brothers, and brothers-in-law left their wives and children and headed east."
" ... The Rinde men reached the Romanian border on September 15. Some of the fleeing Polish army officers convinced the Romanian guards not to allow the Jews to cross the border. The following day the Romanians changed their mind and allowed all to enter. ... The rest of the Rinde men taking note of the easily swayed Romanian attitude toward Jews, and being concerned about their wives and children, decided to return to Przemyśl. The next day, September 17, they learned about the pull out of the German troops from Przemyśl as a result of the secret Non-Aggression Treaty entered between Germany and the USSR on August 23, 1939. Known as the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, it called for, among other things, partition of Poland - a recurring fate as Poland was repeatedly conquered in the course of its history by her stronger neighbors. On September 17, the Soviet forces invaded Poland leading to partition of the country. In the province of Galicia, the partition ran along the San River which flows through Przemyśl.
"As the men headed back home they were confronted by Ukrainians armed with clubs and weapons bent on attacking the Jews. Fortunately, the Russian army had already entered the area and a contingent of Jewish Russian soldiers armed with machine guns dispersed the hooligans and issued orders to shoot at anyone creating a disturbance. Taking advantage of partially restored rail service, it nevertheless took the men a week to return to Przemyśl."
"The short-lived German occupation of Przemyśl was immediately ruthless and brutal. Jews were deemed responsible for the death of a German general during the battle, and an order was issued to kill a number of prominent Jews. The Germans were well prepared with lists of leading Jewish citizens. Several Wehrmacht officers came to our apartment looking for my father but my mother, quick on her feet, responded that he was drafted into the Polish army. Fortunately, my uncles had also left the city, but seventy other prominent Jews were rounded up and executed."
USSR invaded on September 17, and Przemyśl, at the border, was divided along with Poland.
"For Jews this was a welcome reprieve; but for my family another threat emerged. The USSR was communist and since we owned the means of production our “crime” was no longer that we were born Jewish, but that we were capitalists.
"Very soon the store and factory became nationalized - an elegant way of saying confiscated."
So we're their home and most of the property. Since former capitalists were not eligible for employment, it meant starvation. They decided to move.
"The former capital of the province of Galicia, Lwów is probably better known by its German name Lemberg, when it was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Between the two world wars the region became part of the Second Polish Republic, and took its Polish name of Lwów, and that is how I refer to it. With the Soviet invasion in 1939, Lwów was annexed by the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, but as a result of Germany’s attack of the Soviet Union in 1941, it came under German occupation until the Soviet Red Army retook it in 1944. The city is now part of the independent state of Ukraine and is known as Lviv."
................................................................................................
"Many Polish Jews had fled Nazi occupied Poland to Lithuania where Jews lived in peace and prosperity, but conditions began changing for the worse when Russia invaded Lithuania on June 15, 1940. Suddenly, Lithuanian Jews could no longer go east, but ironically Polish Jews could emigrate and travel through the Soviet Union if they possessed visas for a given destination. Japanese Consul, Chiune Sugihara, against his government’s instructions, was giving Japanese transit visas to Jews, allowing them to travel through the Soviet Union."
................................................................................................
"While the Polish population resisted the German occupation, their neighbors, the Ukrainians, welcomed it and collaborated with the Nazi regime. The Ukrainians’ hope was that the Germans would help them secure independence from the Soviet Union. This did not occur, and the Nazis eventually severely maltreated the Ukrainians, but in the meantime, the Nazis exploited the good will of the Ukrainians and used them in the round-up of Jews. In general, Ukrainians actively collaborated not only in rounding up Jews, but also in massacring them."
"German officers were all too happy to take advantage of the discrimination laws. They would enter a Jewish apartment as if it were a store, and if they found it to their liking they would simply tell the Jews to vacate the premises, or they would select the best pieces of furniture, clothing or lingerie and have the owners transport them to the Germans’ residence. If more help was needed, then a Jew passing by would be caught and told to help carry the spoils of the theft. My father was caught once and with other Jews had to pick up from a Jewish apartment whatever had been selected and transport the stolen objects to the German’s residence. There was never any payment in cash or food for such services as Jews were considered slaves and treated as such."
"The work detail requirement at High Holiday time was ten times the normal quota and rumors were flying that this was a prelude to deportations to various camps. Some people thought they landed a good job working with a German detachment building barracks near the Janowska prison. When the construction was finished however, the workers learned that the barracks were for them. This was the beginning of the Janowska concentration camp where slave laborers from the factory lived. This factory was an armament workshop that was part of a network of factories the Germans set up in the area. Jews were herded into these barracks; those fit for labor were allowed to exist a while longer whereas the “unfit” were deported to extermination camps or simply were shot in the Piaski ravine north of the camp."
"While the Polish population resisted the German occupation, their neighbors, the Ukrainians, welcomed it and collaborated with the Nazi regime. The Ukrainians’ hope was that the Germans would help them secure independence from the Soviet Union. This did not occur, and the Nazis eventually severely maltreated the Ukrainians, but in the meantime, the Nazis exploited the good will of the Ukrainians and used them in the round-up of Jews. In general, Ukrainians actively collaborated not only in rounding up Jews, but also in massacring them."
"German officers were all too happy to take advantage of the discrimination laws. They would enter a Jewish apartment as if it were a store, and if they found it to their liking they would simply tell the Jews to vacate the premises, or they would select the best pieces of furniture, clothing or lingerie and have the owners transport them to the Germans’ residence. If more help was needed, then a Jew passing by would be caught and told to help carry the spoils of the theft. My father was caught once and with other Jews had to pick up from a Jewish apartment whatever had been selected and transport the stolen objects to the German’s residence. There was never any payment in cash or food for such services as Jews were considered slaves and treated as such."
................................................................................................
"The work detail requirement at High Holiday time was ten times the normal quota and rumors were flying that this was a prelude to deportations to various camps. Some people thought they landed a good job working with a German detachment building barracks near the Janowska prison. When the construction was finished however, the workers learned that the barracks were for them. This was the beginning of the Janowska concentration camp where slave laborers from the factory lived. This factory was an armament workshop that was part of a network of factories the Germans set up in the area. Jews were herded into these barracks; those fit for labor were allowed to exist a while longer whereas the “unfit” were deported to extermination camps or simply were shot in the Piaski ravine north of the camp."
................................................................................................
"The first extermination camp built on Himmler’s orders to implement “the final solution of the Jewish question” was Bełżec. It was situated near the railroad line and on the main road running between Lublin and Lwów, and it was located in the heart of the Polish Jewish population centers of Galicia and the Lublin district. The camp became operational in mid-March 1942 and its efficiency was tested on the Lublin and Lwów populations. In March 1942, the authorities declared that the Jewish population of 93,000 in Lwów was too large, and 33,000 had to be deported to work in other places. The Judenrat was in charge of selecting for deportation “the undesirable elements” such as beggars, the unemployed, and children, otherwise the entire Jewish population of Lwów was threatened with destruction and complete annihilation. Suspecting ill intentions, the Judenrat nevertheless tried to comply hoping to save the remaining 60,000, but could only gather a small number. The Germans stepped in, took whoever happened to be in their path regardless whether they were employed or young, and deported them to Bełżec.
"With the success of the Bełżec experiment, the Nazis started implementing this method to annihilate Polish and other European Jews starting in the West. Slowly information began to filter in of what was happening in Kraków, Tarnów, Rzeszów and Przemyśl. It was obvious that Lwów would be next. The Germans’ method was designed not to arouse suspicion of their ultimate goal and provoke an armed resistance as occurred later in Warsaw. The deportations, which were euphemistically referred to as relocations, initially were partial and selective, giving people the illusion that some would be exempt. Jews considered to be essential to the war effort received, on their identification papers, a round seal which exempted them from deportation. Everyone, of course, tried to secure such a seal. The Judenrat was deluged with offers of money but it lacked the power to issue the seals. Occasionally some people succeeded in bribing the Germans."
After some near escapes, they decided to move to Lublin and found an escort.
"We needed to go to a city where my father had not done business before the war, where he was not likely to run into people he had known then, and which was not known for already having many Jews with false papers. The reality, however, was that the Germans had decided to Germanize the city by populating it with ethnic Germans. The Polish population was being expelled and everything was controlled by the German authorities. The area was also the site of Majdanek, the second largest concentration camp in Poland. The camp was designed in November 1941, to be a forced labor and prisoner of war camp, and it grew as the number of Soviet and Ukrainian prisoners increased dramatically after Germany’s invasion of Russia. In April 1942, Majdanek became an extermination camp. There are various estimates as to the number of victims, but the conservative ones state that at least 360,000 people died in Majdanek, 200,000 of them were Jewish and the balance were Soviet prisoners of war and Poles."
They managed to secure new papers and an apartment.
"In Poland, the big event for children is the feast of St. Nicholas, on December 6, when “Swiety Mikołaj,” the American Santa Claus, visits the children, and gives them gifts for being good or bad."
"The first extermination camp built on Himmler’s orders to implement “the final solution of the Jewish question” was Bełżec. It was situated near the railroad line and on the main road running between Lublin and Lwów, and it was located in the heart of the Polish Jewish population centers of Galicia and the Lublin district. The camp became operational in mid-March 1942 and its efficiency was tested on the Lublin and Lwów populations. In March 1942, the authorities declared that the Jewish population of 93,000 in Lwów was too large, and 33,000 had to be deported to work in other places. The Judenrat was in charge of selecting for deportation “the undesirable elements” such as beggars, the unemployed, and children, otherwise the entire Jewish population of Lwów was threatened with destruction and complete annihilation. Suspecting ill intentions, the Judenrat nevertheless tried to comply hoping to save the remaining 60,000, but could only gather a small number. The Germans stepped in, took whoever happened to be in their path regardless whether they were employed or young, and deported them to Bełżec.
"With the success of the Bełżec experiment, the Nazis started implementing this method to annihilate Polish and other European Jews starting in the West. Slowly information began to filter in of what was happening in Kraków, Tarnów, Rzeszów and Przemyśl. It was obvious that Lwów would be next. The Germans’ method was designed not to arouse suspicion of their ultimate goal and provoke an armed resistance as occurred later in Warsaw. The deportations, which were euphemistically referred to as relocations, initially were partial and selective, giving people the illusion that some would be exempt. Jews considered to be essential to the war effort received, on their identification papers, a round seal which exempted them from deportation. Everyone, of course, tried to secure such a seal. The Judenrat was deluged with offers of money but it lacked the power to issue the seals. Occasionally some people succeeded in bribing the Germans."
................................................................................................
After some near escapes, they decided to move to Lublin and found an escort.
"We needed to go to a city where my father had not done business before the war, where he was not likely to run into people he had known then, and which was not known for already having many Jews with false papers. The reality, however, was that the Germans had decided to Germanize the city by populating it with ethnic Germans. The Polish population was being expelled and everything was controlled by the German authorities. The area was also the site of Majdanek, the second largest concentration camp in Poland. The camp was designed in November 1941, to be a forced labor and prisoner of war camp, and it grew as the number of Soviet and Ukrainian prisoners increased dramatically after Germany’s invasion of Russia. In April 1942, Majdanek became an extermination camp. There are various estimates as to the number of victims, but the conservative ones state that at least 360,000 people died in Majdanek, 200,000 of them were Jewish and the balance were Soviet prisoners of war and Poles."
They managed to secure new papers and an apartment.
"In Poland, the big event for children is the feast of St. Nicholas, on December 6, when “Swiety Mikołaj,” the American Santa Claus, visits the children, and gives them gifts for being good or bad."
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Uncle Henry and his daughters looked Jewish, although their mother didn't, so they were placed in a convent in exchange for a large diamond ring; they were baptised, on entrance.
"Life at the convent was harsh, aggravated by lack of heat and a chronic shortage of food. The girls in the convent were all very nice, but the nuns were mean. The girls did all the work including washing the big windows with cold water in the winter, receiving less food than the nuns who used food to control the girls’ behavior. Many of the nuns were toothless so they would cut the crust from their white bread and award the crusts to the girls who pleased them that day. The cruel nuns beat the girls with leather straps till they drew blood. Roma was very frightened of the beatings and she began bedwetting which was severely punished. The sisters slept in the same bed so Fila rose early each morning to clean her sister and make her bed before the nuns could see the offense."
Various relatives arrived in Lublin seeking to escape and survive, and it was difficult housing them in the one room apartment without arousing suspicionsof neighbours and building caretaker.
"In the vicinity of the War factory, there was a one family house owned by the widow of a Polish railroad worker who had been evicted to make room for a German family. It was a detached house consisting of one big room, a large kitchen, a foyer, an attic and a cellar. It stood on a fenced-in quarter acre corner lot located less than a mile from the Majdanek concentration camp. The house had neither electricity nor indoor plumbing. There was a well in the front yard, a barn on the side of the house where we kept coal in the winter, and at the end of the barn was an outhouse. Located in the suburbs, this home would be ideal for our enlarged family if only my father could secure permission to occupy these premises."
They managed to get permission for acquiring that place and moved in, so they could house everyone.
Herein the title.
Uncle Henry and his daughters looked Jewish, although their mother didn't, so they were placed in a convent in exchange for a large diamond ring; they were baptised, on entrance.
"Life at the convent was harsh, aggravated by lack of heat and a chronic shortage of food. The girls in the convent were all very nice, but the nuns were mean. The girls did all the work including washing the big windows with cold water in the winter, receiving less food than the nuns who used food to control the girls’ behavior. Many of the nuns were toothless so they would cut the crust from their white bread and award the crusts to the girls who pleased them that day. The cruel nuns beat the girls with leather straps till they drew blood. Roma was very frightened of the beatings and she began bedwetting which was severely punished. The sisters slept in the same bed so Fila rose early each morning to clean her sister and make her bed before the nuns could see the offense."
................................................................................................
Various relatives arrived in Lublin seeking to escape and survive, and it was difficult housing them in the one room apartment without arousing suspicionsof neighbours and building caretaker.
"In the vicinity of the War factory, there was a one family house owned by the widow of a Polish railroad worker who had been evicted to make room for a German family. It was a detached house consisting of one big room, a large kitchen, a foyer, an attic and a cellar. It stood on a fenced-in quarter acre corner lot located less than a mile from the Majdanek concentration camp. The house had neither electricity nor indoor plumbing. There was a well in the front yard, a barn on the side of the house where we kept coal in the winter, and at the end of the barn was an outhouse. Located in the suburbs, this home would be ideal for our enlarged family if only my father could secure permission to occupy these premises."
They managed to get permission for acquiring that place and moved in, so they could house everyone.
Herein the title.
................................................................................................
"As soon as we were settled in our new house, mother asked Tadziu to go to Tarnów, her hometown, to fetch her mother, her sister Dora and her niece, and bring them to us to Lublin where they could be sheltered. Unfortunately, he arrived too late. Two weeks earlier there had been a round-up of children and the little girl was taken. Sick with grief and guilt, the two women turned themselves to the Gestapo a few days later hoping to be reunited with the little girl. It is highly unlikely that they ever were reunited and all perished separately."
"Our survival was due in large part to my father’s fluency in German, but that asset presented its own unique dangers. In general, Poles spoke only Polish with the exception of the aristocracy which also spoke French. Few Poles spoke German. That tended to be the purview of the Jews, because Jews spoke Yiddish which is similar to German, and because Jews were involved in business and trade in which knowledge of German was needed. My father was questioned on two separate occasions about his fluency in the German language and the first time he was ill prepared and almost trapped himself; but, subsequently, he learned to put the questioner on the defensive."
"Our residence, in the peaceful setting of the suburbs, was located less than a mile from Majdanek, the second largest concentration and extermination camp in Poland equipped with gas chambers and crematoria. Some nights we could hear the screams coming from that direction, and in the morning we smelled and saw the thick smoke emanating from the crematoria. It was difficult to understand why Uncle Henry, with his experience from the Przemyśl ghetto, and the warning received from Uncle Lumek, would not accept that the Germans were murdering Jews. John and I, kids that we were, we knew the Germans were killing Jews which explained why we had to behave the way we did. One day as a neighbor came to visit and commented how it stank because the Germans were burning Jews, Uncle Henry exclaimed, “What stories people will tell!” He either wouldn’t or couldn’t accept the reality of what was going on. Perhaps that was the reason for his confrontational behavior towards my mother and his refusal to comply with the conditions of being hidden."
"As soon as we were settled in our new house, mother asked Tadziu to go to Tarnów, her hometown, to fetch her mother, her sister Dora and her niece, and bring them to us to Lublin where they could be sheltered. Unfortunately, he arrived too late. Two weeks earlier there had been a round-up of children and the little girl was taken. Sick with grief and guilt, the two women turned themselves to the Gestapo a few days later hoping to be reunited with the little girl. It is highly unlikely that they ever were reunited and all perished separately."
................................................................................................
"Our survival was due in large part to my father’s fluency in German, but that asset presented its own unique dangers. In general, Poles spoke only Polish with the exception of the aristocracy which also spoke French. Few Poles spoke German. That tended to be the purview of the Jews, because Jews spoke Yiddish which is similar to German, and because Jews were involved in business and trade in which knowledge of German was needed. My father was questioned on two separate occasions about his fluency in the German language and the first time he was ill prepared and almost trapped himself; but, subsequently, he learned to put the questioner on the defensive."
................................................................................................
"Our residence, in the peaceful setting of the suburbs, was located less than a mile from Majdanek, the second largest concentration and extermination camp in Poland equipped with gas chambers and crematoria. Some nights we could hear the screams coming from that direction, and in the morning we smelled and saw the thick smoke emanating from the crematoria. It was difficult to understand why Uncle Henry, with his experience from the Przemyśl ghetto, and the warning received from Uncle Lumek, would not accept that the Germans were murdering Jews. John and I, kids that we were, we knew the Germans were killing Jews which explained why we had to behave the way we did. One day as a neighbor came to visit and commented how it stank because the Germans were burning Jews, Uncle Henry exclaimed, “What stories people will tell!” He either wouldn’t or couldn’t accept the reality of what was going on. Perhaps that was the reason for his confrontational behavior towards my mother and his refusal to comply with the conditions of being hidden."
................................................................................................
"Another occasion when my father had to accompany Wiktor to attend a production conference in Kraków came very close to being disastrous. Rumors were circulating that Germans were making round-ups not only in cities but also on train stations, and it was becoming even more dangerous to travel. The conference lasted two days and while there were small round-ups in Kraków, rumors persisted regarding round-ups on trains. My father offered to go back to the authorities and request a certificate stating that they attended a conference regarding food production for the Wehrmacht. Wiktor laughed saying that people always exaggerate but if it made my father feel better he could get such a certificate.
"The train, bound for Warsaw with a stop in Lublin, left on schedule. As it approached Lublin, Wiktor said to my father: “See how people exaggerate, nothing happened and we are almost home without a problem”. When the train stopped at the Lublin station it was surrounded by the Gestapo, everyone was ordered off the train and line up for registration to go to Majdanek, the concentration camp. This time Wiktor was frightened to death. My father noticed which Gestapo man was in charge of the operation, and suggested that they go speak to him with the certificate he had obtained in Kraków. Upon seeing the certificate, the Gestapo man suggested that Wiktor and my father use the exit for the army a suggestion he did not need to repeat a second time. In normal times, the station was like a beehive with people milling about, but this time there was no one exiting the station. The coachman who had been dispatched from the factory to pick them up was astonished to see the men, saying they were the only ones to have come out. When Wiktor and my father were in Kraków they met a friend from Lublin also on business who was in a hurry to return home. He took the train a day earlier. This man was Polish from Silesia, and spoke fairly good German, yet when he had the same experience at the Lublin train station, he landed in Majdanek. When he tried to negotiate with the Gestapo there was only one question: was he Reichsdeutsch (a German citizen who lived in the Reich) or Voksdeutsch (a German national who lived in Polish occupied territory as a result of World War I), the only two categories that were excused. Once he said that was a Pole, there was no further discussion. It took four weeks of effort and a great deal of money to secure his release."
"Another occasion when my father had to accompany Wiktor to attend a production conference in Kraków came very close to being disastrous. Rumors were circulating that Germans were making round-ups not only in cities but also on train stations, and it was becoming even more dangerous to travel. The conference lasted two days and while there were small round-ups in Kraków, rumors persisted regarding round-ups on trains. My father offered to go back to the authorities and request a certificate stating that they attended a conference regarding food production for the Wehrmacht. Wiktor laughed saying that people always exaggerate but if it made my father feel better he could get such a certificate.
"The train, bound for Warsaw with a stop in Lublin, left on schedule. As it approached Lublin, Wiktor said to my father: “See how people exaggerate, nothing happened and we are almost home without a problem”. When the train stopped at the Lublin station it was surrounded by the Gestapo, everyone was ordered off the train and line up for registration to go to Majdanek, the concentration camp. This time Wiktor was frightened to death. My father noticed which Gestapo man was in charge of the operation, and suggested that they go speak to him with the certificate he had obtained in Kraków. Upon seeing the certificate, the Gestapo man suggested that Wiktor and my father use the exit for the army a suggestion he did not need to repeat a second time. In normal times, the station was like a beehive with people milling about, but this time there was no one exiting the station. The coachman who had been dispatched from the factory to pick them up was astonished to see the men, saying they were the only ones to have come out. When Wiktor and my father were in Kraków they met a friend from Lublin also on business who was in a hurry to return home. He took the train a day earlier. This man was Polish from Silesia, and spoke fairly good German, yet when he had the same experience at the Lublin train station, he landed in Majdanek. When he tried to negotiate with the Gestapo there was only one question: was he Reichsdeutsch (a German citizen who lived in the Reich) or Voksdeutsch (a German national who lived in Polish occupied territory as a result of World War I), the only two categories that were excused. Once he said that was a Pole, there was no further discussion. It took four weeks of effort and a great deal of money to secure his release."
................................................................................................
"At that time we had been using our assumed name for a year and my father was wondering if I, aged six, still remembered what my real name was. One day he asked me what my name was, and in spite of repeated questioning I kept insisting that my Christian name was my name. Finally, my father said, “But to me you can tell the truth”, and so I put my lips to his ear and whispered my original pre-war Jewish name, proving that I still remembered, and knew full well not to reveal it. Amazing how trainable children are!"
................................................................................................
"Aunt Enia, without news from Fela for several days, asked him to make an effort and visit that family.
"While neither Mrs. Cyrankiewicz nor her son looked Jewish, this was not the case with her husband. Worst of all, he spoke Polish with a Yiddish accent and insisted going out and speaking wherever he was. On the day that my father decided to comply with his sister’s demand and visit their apartment, Mr. Cyrankiewicz went to a barber’s shop and engaged the barber in conversation. When he was ready to leave, two men got up and accompanied him home. It was a well-known fact that Poles blackmailed Jews hiding under a Polish name, extracting money and names of other such Jews.
"When my father knocked at the Cyrankiewicz’ door that fateful day in May 1944, the lady did not attempt to tip him off that danger lurked inside. On the contrary, she welcomed him in. No sooner did my father enter that he realized what the situation was, but it was too late to back out. He remained there for a while. When he got up to take his leave, the two blackmailers searched him and relieved him of all his money, his watch and whatever else they felt was of some value, and informed him that they would accompany him to his home. My father tried to dissuade them by saying that he lived with a Polish family and all they would achieve would be to blow his cover, but they would not be deterred.
"I was playing with my friends on the street in front of the house when I spotted my father coming home. My father always walked at a brisk pace forcing me to run to keep up with him. This time he walked like a condemned man: flanked by a man on each side, his face red like a beet, his head drooping, and he was walking unusually slowly. I immediately sensed that something was wrong and ran into the house to warn my mother saying that my father was coming home with two strange men. Since it was the end of the day, all the hidden people were downstairs. As my father was stalling outside, my mother dispatched everyone to the attic and Uncle Henry had the time to pull up the ladder and close the opening to the attic.
"The blackmailers remained at the house for a long period of time, searched everywhere thoroughly, and took whatever appealed to them including my father’s fur lined winter coat, but promised not to bother him anymore and not to report him to the authorities.
"Although we knew that the end of our trials was near and that the war was winding down, it was still very dangerous to be Jewish as the German killing machine was unrelenting. With so many people hiding in our home, there was no way my parents could look for another place to live and to hide; they had no choice but to rely on the blackmailers’ promise."
"At that time we had been using our assumed name for a year and my father was wondering if I, aged six, still remembered what my real name was. One day he asked me what my name was, and in spite of repeated questioning I kept insisting that my Christian name was my name. Finally, my father said, “But to me you can tell the truth”, and so I put my lips to his ear and whispered my original pre-war Jewish name, proving that I still remembered, and knew full well not to reveal it. Amazing how trainable children are!"
................................................................................................
"Aunt Enia, without news from Fela for several days, asked him to make an effort and visit that family.
"While neither Mrs. Cyrankiewicz nor her son looked Jewish, this was not the case with her husband. Worst of all, he spoke Polish with a Yiddish accent and insisted going out and speaking wherever he was. On the day that my father decided to comply with his sister’s demand and visit their apartment, Mr. Cyrankiewicz went to a barber’s shop and engaged the barber in conversation. When he was ready to leave, two men got up and accompanied him home. It was a well-known fact that Poles blackmailed Jews hiding under a Polish name, extracting money and names of other such Jews.
"When my father knocked at the Cyrankiewicz’ door that fateful day in May 1944, the lady did not attempt to tip him off that danger lurked inside. On the contrary, she welcomed him in. No sooner did my father enter that he realized what the situation was, but it was too late to back out. He remained there for a while. When he got up to take his leave, the two blackmailers searched him and relieved him of all his money, his watch and whatever else they felt was of some value, and informed him that they would accompany him to his home. My father tried to dissuade them by saying that he lived with a Polish family and all they would achieve would be to blow his cover, but they would not be deterred.
"I was playing with my friends on the street in front of the house when I spotted my father coming home. My father always walked at a brisk pace forcing me to run to keep up with him. This time he walked like a condemned man: flanked by a man on each side, his face red like a beet, his head drooping, and he was walking unusually slowly. I immediately sensed that something was wrong and ran into the house to warn my mother saying that my father was coming home with two strange men. Since it was the end of the day, all the hidden people were downstairs. As my father was stalling outside, my mother dispatched everyone to the attic and Uncle Henry had the time to pull up the ladder and close the opening to the attic.
"The blackmailers remained at the house for a long period of time, searched everywhere thoroughly, and took whatever appealed to them including my father’s fur lined winter coat, but promised not to bother him anymore and not to report him to the authorities.
"Although we knew that the end of our trials was near and that the war was winding down, it was still very dangerous to be Jewish as the German killing machine was unrelenting. With so many people hiding in our home, there was no way my parents could look for another place to live and to hide; they had no choice but to rely on the blackmailers’ promise."
................................................................................................
"In March 1944, Germany suffered a severe defeat on the Eastern Front and an evacuation order was issued. Unfortunately, our happiness was short lived. The Germans consolidated their military position and the evacuation order was rescinded, but a program of building fortifications was initiated calling on all companies and private citizens to give a full day of work once a week to that endeavor."
"My cousin Ewa, as an able-bodied civilian, had to report for the fortification work. Her group was assigned to dig antitank trenches near the fence of Majdanek. A week before the Russians came, she could see the women prisoners in their prison garb and knew they were Jewish because of the yellow Star of David affixed on the chest of their uniforms. A week later there was not a single soul left alive. All Ewa could see were corpses lying around with more corpses in the crematoria."
"Two days before the Germans retreated from Lublin, intelligent and educated soldiers said that Poland made a big mistake in 1939 to start the war. My father did not argue, but asked when they expected the war to be over. They responded that Germany would win in a few months. They firmly believed that Germany had secret weapons and the goal was to lure the American and British forces to France where they would be annihilated. Then, Germany would be free to use its might on the Soviets. As this conversation was taking place, a detachment of Russian soldiers arrived close to where my father’s crew was working. They disarmed the German soldiers who were supervising the construction, and sent the workers home.
"The news of the Russian raid spread quickly. My father and his contingent were dismissed earlier than usual and all went to the factory while the Germans began a systematic search of all the houses in the neighborhood. Uncle Henry, his family, and Aunt Enia were alone in the house and there was nothing my father could do to shield them. As Aunt Wanda would say later, our guardian angel protected the family because the search stopped two houses before ours."
"In March 1944, Germany suffered a severe defeat on the Eastern Front and an evacuation order was issued. Unfortunately, our happiness was short lived. The Germans consolidated their military position and the evacuation order was rescinded, but a program of building fortifications was initiated calling on all companies and private citizens to give a full day of work once a week to that endeavor."
"My cousin Ewa, as an able-bodied civilian, had to report for the fortification work. Her group was assigned to dig antitank trenches near the fence of Majdanek. A week before the Russians came, she could see the women prisoners in their prison garb and knew they were Jewish because of the yellow Star of David affixed on the chest of their uniforms. A week later there was not a single soul left alive. All Ewa could see were corpses lying around with more corpses in the crematoria."
................................................................................................
"Two days before the Germans retreated from Lublin, intelligent and educated soldiers said that Poland made a big mistake in 1939 to start the war. My father did not argue, but asked when they expected the war to be over. They responded that Germany would win in a few months. They firmly believed that Germany had secret weapons and the goal was to lure the American and British forces to France where they would be annihilated. Then, Germany would be free to use its might on the Soviets. As this conversation was taking place, a detachment of Russian soldiers arrived close to where my father’s crew was working. They disarmed the German soldiers who were supervising the construction, and sent the workers home.
"The news of the Russian raid spread quickly. My father and his contingent were dismissed earlier than usual and all went to the factory while the Germans began a systematic search of all the houses in the neighborhood. Uncle Henry, his family, and Aunt Enia were alone in the house and there was nothing my father could do to shield them. As Aunt Wanda would say later, our guardian angel protected the family because the search stopped two houses before ours."
................................................................................................
"Next day, as our landlady, mother and I went walking in the countryside, we noticed an enormous cloud of dust on the horizon coming our way. Startled, we stopped, then the two women exclaimed, “The Germans are running away!” We linked hands forming a ring and began dancing and singing, “The Germans are running away, the Germans are running away.” We saw the trucks and jeeps drive past us and then the convoy stopped. An officer got out of a jeep and asked my mother for some information. Noticing that the road was lined with cherry trees he asked me to pick cherries for them. He lifted me up into a tree, gave me a bag and I filled it with cherries for the soldiers while my mother engaged the officer in conversation. I remember him to be like most German officers: tall, blond, handsome and in this case smiling. When my mother asked him who would win the war, unhesitatingly he answered “We, of course!” That weekend my father joined us in the village, and discretely we watched as the Germans drove west. They were not a pleasant bunch, robbing on the way. As I was playing in the street with some of the kids, we saw an older soldier enter the hut of an old woman and walk out with the only valuable item she possessed -- a sheepskin vest.
"Shortly afterwards, a neighbor came to tell us the good news that the Russians had entered Lublin. My father would not believe him until a Russian soldier showed up at our door asking for vodka."
"Two days later we left the village and returned to a German-free Lublin. It still was not safe to be Jewish and we continued pretending to be Catholic using our assumed name. Soon a Jewish Committee was formed where all surviving Jews registered this was an awkward situation for us since we still pretended to be Aryans. As surviving Jews began to come out from their various hiding places, the hostility of the Polish population became obvious and vocal. In town, my father repeatedly heard Poles express their dismay that there were still Jews around. They thought the Germans had killed all of them, but that actually there was no way to get rid of Jews. A number of Jews arrived with the Red Army and they provided a measure of security."
"The advance of the Russian army on Lublin was so swift that the escaping Germans did not have time to destroy the murderous evidence of their activity in Majdanek. The camp was captured with the gas chambers and crematoria intact along with six personnel members. Unfortunately, one was able to commit suicide. In November 1944, the remaining five murderers were put on trial and found guilty, but were allowed to write appeals for pardon to the new Polish authorities. I remember my parents showing me newspaper pictures of the camp commanders as they wrote their appeals. This scene was shown in newsreels in all the movie houses. The appeals were just a formality because, as expected, they were denied. On December 3, 1944, a public hanging of the murderers was held."
"Next day, as our landlady, mother and I went walking in the countryside, we noticed an enormous cloud of dust on the horizon coming our way. Startled, we stopped, then the two women exclaimed, “The Germans are running away!” We linked hands forming a ring and began dancing and singing, “The Germans are running away, the Germans are running away.” We saw the trucks and jeeps drive past us and then the convoy stopped. An officer got out of a jeep and asked my mother for some information. Noticing that the road was lined with cherry trees he asked me to pick cherries for them. He lifted me up into a tree, gave me a bag and I filled it with cherries for the soldiers while my mother engaged the officer in conversation. I remember him to be like most German officers: tall, blond, handsome and in this case smiling. When my mother asked him who would win the war, unhesitatingly he answered “We, of course!” That weekend my father joined us in the village, and discretely we watched as the Germans drove west. They were not a pleasant bunch, robbing on the way. As I was playing in the street with some of the kids, we saw an older soldier enter the hut of an old woman and walk out with the only valuable item she possessed -- a sheepskin vest.
"Shortly afterwards, a neighbor came to tell us the good news that the Russians had entered Lublin. My father would not believe him until a Russian soldier showed up at our door asking for vodka."
................................................................................................
"Two days later we left the village and returned to a German-free Lublin. It still was not safe to be Jewish and we continued pretending to be Catholic using our assumed name. Soon a Jewish Committee was formed where all surviving Jews registered this was an awkward situation for us since we still pretended to be Aryans. As surviving Jews began to come out from their various hiding places, the hostility of the Polish population became obvious and vocal. In town, my father repeatedly heard Poles express their dismay that there were still Jews around. They thought the Germans had killed all of them, but that actually there was no way to get rid of Jews. A number of Jews arrived with the Red Army and they provided a measure of security."
"The advance of the Russian army on Lublin was so swift that the escaping Germans did not have time to destroy the murderous evidence of their activity in Majdanek. The camp was captured with the gas chambers and crematoria intact along with six personnel members. Unfortunately, one was able to commit suicide. In November 1944, the remaining five murderers were put on trial and found guilty, but were allowed to write appeals for pardon to the new Polish authorities. I remember my parents showing me newspaper pictures of the camp commanders as they wrote their appeals. This scene was shown in newsreels in all the movie houses. The appeals were just a formality because, as expected, they were denied. On December 3, 1944, a public hanging of the murderers was held."
................................................................................................
"Many things changed with the Russian liberation. The War factory where my father had been working was closed. Most of the Jewish inmates of Majdanek had been forcibly marched to Auschwitz but the concentration camp still housed a large number of prisoners of war from France, Britain, and America. The Russians took the first steps to convert the camp into a museum. Thanks to his linguistic ability my father was involved in that endeavor and had what I believe was his first contact with Americans. The starved POWs started receiving food packages from home. Those coming from the United States, to my father’s amazement, included cameras an astonishing luxury for us at the time. My parents hired a French officer to teach French to John and my mother, and she in the process fed the Frenchman a few home cooked meals.
"With his position at Majdanek, my father could bring guests to view the camp early on before the evidence of the horrors perpetrated could be sanitized and all four of us went to the camp. The memory of that visit is vividly imprinted in my mind to this day.
"First there was the approach to the camp: the abject poverty of dilapidated houses in which people lived, the extensive barbed wire fences and watchtowers surrounding the camp, the absolute desolation of the area, and the camp itself. There were barracks overflowing with shoes of all styles and sizes including infants and dainty little girls; other barracks were filled with eyeglasses, hair or clothing. There were barns filled with suitcases and with all sorts of documents. There were rows of barracks in which the inmates slept on wooden planks thinly covered with straw. The prisoners were packed like sardines. Walking toward the crematoria, we passed trenches where I saw what I believed were tree trunks, until my mother explained they were human bodies that were mummified from exposure to the sun and the elements. Past the gas chambers were the crematoria where human bones were still lying around, not having been thoroughly incinerated. The stench was unbelievable. Walking on, we could see how the Russians were meting out to the Germans captured at the camp the same medicine they had dished out to their prisoners. There was a wire enclosure where the Germans were told to dig up the buried bones of their victims. There were shovels present on the periphery, but the Germans were not allowed to use them. They had to do the dirty work with their hands, just the way they had ordered the Jews to perform menial work. One of the Germans pretended not to understand and went for a shovel, but my father stepped forward and told him in German to put the shovel down and work with his hands the way the Jews had to do it. Shooting him a murderous look, the German threw the shovel away and proceeded to dig with his hands.
"John and I went back to Poland and to Majdanek in 1993 and 1994, respectively. Wikipedia states that it is the best-preserved concentration camp in Poland. It conveys quite well to the uninitiated, in my case my husband and daughter, the horror of the camp, but to me and to John, the sanitized version was a poor conveyance of what Jews had been subjected to. The quantity of Jewish belongings was reduced and neatly piled behind grilled doors, the living quarters lacked the straw but have pictures representing sleeping conditions. The bones lying in front of the crematoria are gone as are the mummified bodies and the stench. There was one new feature that John noticed: the ground had an undulation, like a sine wave. The attendant explained that the depressions were the sites where the bodies were buried but as they decomposed, the ground sank giving the landscape its current appearance."
"Polish train cars had an unusual configuration. Each compartment could be accessed individually by a door opening on the trackside. Facing that door was another door which opened to a long corridor. At each end of the corridor was a door leading to the platform. Somewhere between Lublin and Warsaw the train stopped at a station. Russian soldiers came on board using the doors from the trackside and announced that everyone had to get off the train and pushed the passengers out into the corridor. Before the passengers could react and retrieve their suitcases from the overhead racks, the soldiers grabbed the suitcases and threw them out onto the tracks. My father managed to get hold of one of his suitcases before the other one was tossed out by the soldiers. When there were no more suitcases remaining in the overhead racks, the soldiers left. By the time the passengers could get to the tracks to retrieve their luggage, all was gone. My father went to the Polish stationmaster to complain, but was told this was a daily occurrence and there was nothing he could do. My father tried to lodge a complaint with the Russian authorities. But when the Russian commander asked, “Are you accusing Russian soldiers of theft? Because if you do, it is punishable with prison!” My father quickly learned to desist."
"Many things changed with the Russian liberation. The War factory where my father had been working was closed. Most of the Jewish inmates of Majdanek had been forcibly marched to Auschwitz but the concentration camp still housed a large number of prisoners of war from France, Britain, and America. The Russians took the first steps to convert the camp into a museum. Thanks to his linguistic ability my father was involved in that endeavor and had what I believe was his first contact with Americans. The starved POWs started receiving food packages from home. Those coming from the United States, to my father’s amazement, included cameras an astonishing luxury for us at the time. My parents hired a French officer to teach French to John and my mother, and she in the process fed the Frenchman a few home cooked meals.
"With his position at Majdanek, my father could bring guests to view the camp early on before the evidence of the horrors perpetrated could be sanitized and all four of us went to the camp. The memory of that visit is vividly imprinted in my mind to this day.
"First there was the approach to the camp: the abject poverty of dilapidated houses in which people lived, the extensive barbed wire fences and watchtowers surrounding the camp, the absolute desolation of the area, and the camp itself. There were barracks overflowing with shoes of all styles and sizes including infants and dainty little girls; other barracks were filled with eyeglasses, hair or clothing. There were barns filled with suitcases and with all sorts of documents. There were rows of barracks in which the inmates slept on wooden planks thinly covered with straw. The prisoners were packed like sardines. Walking toward the crematoria, we passed trenches where I saw what I believed were tree trunks, until my mother explained they were human bodies that were mummified from exposure to the sun and the elements. Past the gas chambers were the crematoria where human bones were still lying around, not having been thoroughly incinerated. The stench was unbelievable. Walking on, we could see how the Russians were meting out to the Germans captured at the camp the same medicine they had dished out to their prisoners. There was a wire enclosure where the Germans were told to dig up the buried bones of their victims. There were shovels present on the periphery, but the Germans were not allowed to use them. They had to do the dirty work with their hands, just the way they had ordered the Jews to perform menial work. One of the Germans pretended not to understand and went for a shovel, but my father stepped forward and told him in German to put the shovel down and work with his hands the way the Jews had to do it. Shooting him a murderous look, the German threw the shovel away and proceeded to dig with his hands.
"John and I went back to Poland and to Majdanek in 1993 and 1994, respectively. Wikipedia states that it is the best-preserved concentration camp in Poland. It conveys quite well to the uninitiated, in my case my husband and daughter, the horror of the camp, but to me and to John, the sanitized version was a poor conveyance of what Jews had been subjected to. The quantity of Jewish belongings was reduced and neatly piled behind grilled doors, the living quarters lacked the straw but have pictures representing sleeping conditions. The bones lying in front of the crematoria are gone as are the mummified bodies and the stench. There was one new feature that John noticed: the ground had an undulation, like a sine wave. The attendant explained that the depressions were the sites where the bodies were buried but as they decomposed, the ground sank giving the landscape its current appearance."
................................................................................................
"Polish train cars had an unusual configuration. Each compartment could be accessed individually by a door opening on the trackside. Facing that door was another door which opened to a long corridor. At each end of the corridor was a door leading to the platform. Somewhere between Lublin and Warsaw the train stopped at a station. Russian soldiers came on board using the doors from the trackside and announced that everyone had to get off the train and pushed the passengers out into the corridor. Before the passengers could react and retrieve their suitcases from the overhead racks, the soldiers grabbed the suitcases and threw them out onto the tracks. My father managed to get hold of one of his suitcases before the other one was tossed out by the soldiers. When there were no more suitcases remaining in the overhead racks, the soldiers left. By the time the passengers could get to the tracks to retrieve their luggage, all was gone. My father went to the Polish stationmaster to complain, but was told this was a daily occurrence and there was nothing he could do. My father tried to lodge a complaint with the Russian authorities. But when the Russian commander asked, “Are you accusing Russian soldiers of theft? Because if you do, it is punishable with prison!” My father quickly learned to desist."
................................................................................................
"The United States had imposed a very limited quota for immigrants from Poland, and our number was very high. Other countries were more liberal in allowing refugees to enter. In February 1946, my parents received transit visas to France. It was not the United States but it allowed us to leave Poland. The train took as far as Prague where we were stranded. All the trains going to Paris went through Switzerland and the Swiss would not issue transit visas to travelers with Polish passports. ... Always resourceful, my father learned that there was a twenty-passenger plane leaving for Paris in a few days and he succeeded obtaining seats for us. The day of our flight the sky was very overcast and the ride was bumpy forcing an unscheduled stop in Strasbourg for refueling, but we arrived safely in Paris. The next plane making the Prague to Paris flight crashed upon landing and all passengers died.
"In 1946, France was reeling from the devastation of the war and there were severe shortages of everything, but the French shared their scarce resources with the refugees who were flooding their country. We received ration coupons for bread and milk especially for the children. The challenge, however, was to obtain permission to extend our stay in France. Our visas were good for only three weeks. To get an extension one needed to show proof of employment, but to secure a job one needed permission to stay in the country. To complicate matters, due to the high unemployment, a French firm could not hire a foreigner without proving that no French person was qualified for the position."
"After the trauma of the Holocaust, my mother was never comfortable being Jewish and she saw anti-Semitism at every turn. The ration coupons in France were determined, among other things, by the children’s age. John and I qualified for a classification called J-2 (J for jeunesse youth). When the letter J is pronounced the French way and is followed by the number two in French, the combination sounds very much like the word Jews (Żydy) in Polish. To pick up our ration coupons my mother went to the office that issued them accompanied by a translator. When the clerk, wanting to confirm our classification, asked is we were J-2 my mother became incensed at how anti-Semitic the clerk was why did he need to know if we were Jewish? She calmed down when the translator explained the confusion to her. We all laughed when she related this episode to us, but it was very symptomatic of how sensitive my mother was, and would remain for the rest of her life. Later that year, my mother found that she was pregnant. Given the condition we were living in, she wanted to terminate the pregnancy. My father begged her to keep the child arguing that six million Jews had just been murdered and her pregnancy was a symbol of our people’s revival. My mother agreed on one condition: should the child be a boy, he would not be circumcised. My father tried to reason with her, but she was unyielding, and reluctantly my father agreed. When my brother Joseph, named after my paternal grandfather who chose suicide over deportation, was born, my father tried to renege on his promise, but my mother held him to it."
"In 1950, when the Korean conflict started, panic spread in Europe that World War III was around the corner. Germany had not been rebuilt, so there was no buffer between the Soviet Union and France. Many believed that if a war broke out the Russians would be in Paris in 48 hours. My parents had two encounters with the comrades; they did not wish to have a third. Now in particular, having given up our Polish citizenship because of its communist regime, we would be prime targets for deportation to Siberia. My parents decided to resume their efforts to obtain visas to the United States. They were finally granted late in 1951.
"As subjects of the International Relief Organization, we were eligible for free passage. The transport ships that brought American GIs to Europe were used to transport the new immigrants to the United States. In December 1951, after almost six years in France, we left Paris for Bremen, Germany, where we spent a few days at a Displaced Persons camp before boarding the USS General Stewart."
"The United States had imposed a very limited quota for immigrants from Poland, and our number was very high. Other countries were more liberal in allowing refugees to enter. In February 1946, my parents received transit visas to France. It was not the United States but it allowed us to leave Poland. The train took as far as Prague where we were stranded. All the trains going to Paris went through Switzerland and the Swiss would not issue transit visas to travelers with Polish passports. ... Always resourceful, my father learned that there was a twenty-passenger plane leaving for Paris in a few days and he succeeded obtaining seats for us. The day of our flight the sky was very overcast and the ride was bumpy forcing an unscheduled stop in Strasbourg for refueling, but we arrived safely in Paris. The next plane making the Prague to Paris flight crashed upon landing and all passengers died.
"In 1946, France was reeling from the devastation of the war and there were severe shortages of everything, but the French shared their scarce resources with the refugees who were flooding their country. We received ration coupons for bread and milk especially for the children. The challenge, however, was to obtain permission to extend our stay in France. Our visas were good for only three weeks. To get an extension one needed to show proof of employment, but to secure a job one needed permission to stay in the country. To complicate matters, due to the high unemployment, a French firm could not hire a foreigner without proving that no French person was qualified for the position."
"After the trauma of the Holocaust, my mother was never comfortable being Jewish and she saw anti-Semitism at every turn. The ration coupons in France were determined, among other things, by the children’s age. John and I qualified for a classification called J-2 (J for jeunesse youth). When the letter J is pronounced the French way and is followed by the number two in French, the combination sounds very much like the word Jews (Żydy) in Polish. To pick up our ration coupons my mother went to the office that issued them accompanied by a translator. When the clerk, wanting to confirm our classification, asked is we were J-2 my mother became incensed at how anti-Semitic the clerk was why did he need to know if we were Jewish? She calmed down when the translator explained the confusion to her. We all laughed when she related this episode to us, but it was very symptomatic of how sensitive my mother was, and would remain for the rest of her life. Later that year, my mother found that she was pregnant. Given the condition we were living in, she wanted to terminate the pregnancy. My father begged her to keep the child arguing that six million Jews had just been murdered and her pregnancy was a symbol of our people’s revival. My mother agreed on one condition: should the child be a boy, he would not be circumcised. My father tried to reason with her, but she was unyielding, and reluctantly my father agreed. When my brother Joseph, named after my paternal grandfather who chose suicide over deportation, was born, my father tried to renege on his promise, but my mother held him to it."
................................................................................................
"In 1950, when the Korean conflict started, panic spread in Europe that World War III was around the corner. Germany had not been rebuilt, so there was no buffer between the Soviet Union and France. Many believed that if a war broke out the Russians would be in Paris in 48 hours. My parents had two encounters with the comrades; they did not wish to have a third. Now in particular, having given up our Polish citizenship because of its communist regime, we would be prime targets for deportation to Siberia. My parents decided to resume their efforts to obtain visas to the United States. They were finally granted late in 1951.
"As subjects of the International Relief Organization, we were eligible for free passage. The transport ships that brought American GIs to Europe were used to transport the new immigrants to the United States. In December 1951, after almost six years in France, we left Paris for Bremen, Germany, where we spent a few days at a Displaced Persons camp before boarding the USS General Stewart."
................................................................................................
"Starting a new life, yet again, in a strange land and a new language was not an easy task for my parents. In 1952, my father was fifty years old. He was not comfortable speaking English and keenly felt the lack of having a profession. He landed a job with a company exporting merchandise to Latin America. It was a small firm owned by two Austrian Jews, so he could fall back on German to communicate with his bosses, giving him time to perfect his English, and in the process, learn Spanish as well. His salary, however, was grossly inadequate to support the family and my mother had to go to work. Her linguistic skills were much weaker than my father’s so she started working in the warehouse of a cosmetics company. I earned a few dollars teaching French to rich little kids on the East Side of Manhattan so I could buy more stylish clothing.
"The United States is the land of opportunity where immigrants are welcome and after five years can become citizens; but, for my brother and me, adjusting in the United States was more difficult than it had been in France. In many respects, we had a lot in common with our French peers: their country had been under Nazi occupation, they had suffered hunger, shortages, and rations. In the United States, our peers had none of those experiences, and their daily concerns were quite different from ours, and to us they appeared very frivolous. I particularly remember that my classmates wore a different outfit every day. I had one dress for everyday and one a little more elegant for when I went out with my parents. I felt like Cinderella.
"After a year or two working in the cosmetics factory, my mother felt comfortable enough in her command of English to try out for an office clerk’s position. Her interview went pretty well until her future boss asked her a question she did not understand, whereupon he pulled out a Bible from his desk drawer, and she said: “Oh, yes” meaning that she understood. He took it as agreeing that she was Christian. And so she found herself working for a very nice boss, in a very pleasant setting except that she had to pretend that she was Christian. She made sure not to bring a meat sandwich for lunch on Fridays, and worked on Jewish holidays including Yom Kippur. I was furious saying that for her Hitler was still alive."
"There are two ironies with my mother’s ambivalence about being Jewish. One is that Joseph was eventually circumcised for medical reasons, and he became orthodox. The other was when I became engaged and my fiancé’s mother did not believe that my mother was Jewish. After all, my mother did not look Jewish, she did not speak Yiddish, and she was behaving like a Christian in her place of work. My future mother-in-law did not want her son, her only child, to marry a shiksa (a non-Jewish girl). Suddenly, to her consternation, my mother realized that she had no way to prove that indeed she was Jewish. According to Jewish law, one is Jewish only if one is born of a Jewish mother. So the fact that my father was Jewish did not count to make me Jewish. My mother’s father died before the war and she had a picture of his tomb stone with Hebrew inscription, but again, it was her father so it did not count to make her Jewish. My father managed to persuade my future mother-in-law that given his religious background he would never have married a non-Jewish woman."
"Both John and I went to college. John received a full scholarship to MIT from which he graduated with a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering followed two years later by a Mechanical Engineer’s degree (a degree unique to MIT). Subsequently, he attended Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute at night and obtained a master’s degree in electrical engineering. After working as an engineer for several years, John went to medical school and is now a retired internist. I went to Brooklyn College, graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Chemistry, and followed it with a Masters in Library Service from Columbia University. After raising my three children, I received an MBA from the University of Pittsburgh and co-founded a business manufacturing small medical ultrasound scanners which I sold in 1998. My brother, Joseph, went to Stevens Technical Institute from which he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in computer science, and followed it up with a master’s degree from Carnegie Tech (now Carnegie Mellon University). In his retirement, Joseph works in real estate."
"Starting a new life, yet again, in a strange land and a new language was not an easy task for my parents. In 1952, my father was fifty years old. He was not comfortable speaking English and keenly felt the lack of having a profession. He landed a job with a company exporting merchandise to Latin America. It was a small firm owned by two Austrian Jews, so he could fall back on German to communicate with his bosses, giving him time to perfect his English, and in the process, learn Spanish as well. His salary, however, was grossly inadequate to support the family and my mother had to go to work. Her linguistic skills were much weaker than my father’s so she started working in the warehouse of a cosmetics company. I earned a few dollars teaching French to rich little kids on the East Side of Manhattan so I could buy more stylish clothing.
"The United States is the land of opportunity where immigrants are welcome and after five years can become citizens; but, for my brother and me, adjusting in the United States was more difficult than it had been in France. In many respects, we had a lot in common with our French peers: their country had been under Nazi occupation, they had suffered hunger, shortages, and rations. In the United States, our peers had none of those experiences, and their daily concerns were quite different from ours, and to us they appeared very frivolous. I particularly remember that my classmates wore a different outfit every day. I had one dress for everyday and one a little more elegant for when I went out with my parents. I felt like Cinderella.
"After a year or two working in the cosmetics factory, my mother felt comfortable enough in her command of English to try out for an office clerk’s position. Her interview went pretty well until her future boss asked her a question she did not understand, whereupon he pulled out a Bible from his desk drawer, and she said: “Oh, yes” meaning that she understood. He took it as agreeing that she was Christian. And so she found herself working for a very nice boss, in a very pleasant setting except that she had to pretend that she was Christian. She made sure not to bring a meat sandwich for lunch on Fridays, and worked on Jewish holidays including Yom Kippur. I was furious saying that for her Hitler was still alive."
................................................................................................
"There are two ironies with my mother’s ambivalence about being Jewish. One is that Joseph was eventually circumcised for medical reasons, and he became orthodox. The other was when I became engaged and my fiancé’s mother did not believe that my mother was Jewish. After all, my mother did not look Jewish, she did not speak Yiddish, and she was behaving like a Christian in her place of work. My future mother-in-law did not want her son, her only child, to marry a shiksa (a non-Jewish girl). Suddenly, to her consternation, my mother realized that she had no way to prove that indeed she was Jewish. According to Jewish law, one is Jewish only if one is born of a Jewish mother. So the fact that my father was Jewish did not count to make me Jewish. My mother’s father died before the war and she had a picture of his tomb stone with Hebrew inscription, but again, it was her father so it did not count to make her Jewish. My father managed to persuade my future mother-in-law that given his religious background he would never have married a non-Jewish woman."
"Both John and I went to college. John received a full scholarship to MIT from which he graduated with a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering followed two years later by a Mechanical Engineer’s degree (a degree unique to MIT). Subsequently, he attended Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute at night and obtained a master’s degree in electrical engineering. After working as an engineer for several years, John went to medical school and is now a retired internist. I went to Brooklyn College, graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Chemistry, and followed it with a Masters in Library Service from Columbia University. After raising my three children, I received an MBA from the University of Pittsburgh and co-founded a business manufacturing small medical ultrasound scanners which I sold in 1998. My brother, Joseph, went to Stevens Technical Institute from which he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in computer science, and followed it up with a master’s degree from Carnegie Tech (now Carnegie Mellon University). In his retirement, Joseph works in real estate."
................................................................................................
"My father always maintained contact with the two Pacałowski families especially once we got settled in the United States and the tables were turned financially. Although we struggled to make ends meet, at least we were not under communism. The Pacałowskis were no longer as wealthy as they once had been and life was difficult for them. My parents, but especially my father, never forgot the debt they owed to these two families. I remember that not too long after our arrival in the US, as my parents were struggling financially, they received a request from Wiktor for a motorcycle for his son. I don’t remember the details except that the cost was close to the equivalent of a year’s income for my parents. My mother was outraged at how they could make such a request. Very quietly my father asked her “And if they had made such a request in 1943, what would your answer have been?” Red faced, my mother had no answer. I don’t know what my parents did, but I was, and am to this day, impressed that my father would not forget what that family had done for us. Over the years, my parents sent packages with whatever the communists allowed. After the fall of the Berlin wall, my parents invited Alfred’s widow and daughter for an all paid vacation in the former Yugoslavia. When currency control relaxed, my father regularly sent checks to Poland. My mother followed that practice after my father’s death and I carried it on with checks every Christmas and Easter till the last of my generation in Wiktor’s family in Poland passed away."
"In 2014, there are 60 people who live thanks to my parents. Six are first cousins; five who lived through the war, Ewa, Fila, Roma, John and I, and my younger brother Joseph who was born after the war. All the first cousins married within the faith; three married other survivors and Joseph became very orthodox. Of the first cousins’ seventeen children, fourteen are married and only one married outside the faith. There are also thirty-three grandchildren and four great grandchildren. Among the survivors and their descendants there are five physicians, four business entrepreneurs, two graphic designers, one computer scientist, one attorney, one certified public accountant, one civil servant and one news editor. They are scattered throughout the United States, Canada, and Israel."
" ...I nevertheless find it difficult to dismiss the family story of my paternal grandmother’s miracle worker rabbi ancestor. ...That miracle worker rabbi is buried in Lublin! Only those members of the Rinde family who came to Lublin during the war survived. Conversely, of those who failed to come to Lublin none survived. Coincidence?"
"My father always maintained contact with the two Pacałowski families especially once we got settled in the United States and the tables were turned financially. Although we struggled to make ends meet, at least we were not under communism. The Pacałowskis were no longer as wealthy as they once had been and life was difficult for them. My parents, but especially my father, never forgot the debt they owed to these two families. I remember that not too long after our arrival in the US, as my parents were struggling financially, they received a request from Wiktor for a motorcycle for his son. I don’t remember the details except that the cost was close to the equivalent of a year’s income for my parents. My mother was outraged at how they could make such a request. Very quietly my father asked her “And if they had made such a request in 1943, what would your answer have been?” Red faced, my mother had no answer. I don’t know what my parents did, but I was, and am to this day, impressed that my father would not forget what that family had done for us. Over the years, my parents sent packages with whatever the communists allowed. After the fall of the Berlin wall, my parents invited Alfred’s widow and daughter for an all paid vacation in the former Yugoslavia. When currency control relaxed, my father regularly sent checks to Poland. My mother followed that practice after my father’s death and I carried it on with checks every Christmas and Easter till the last of my generation in Wiktor’s family in Poland passed away."
................................................................................................
"In 2014, there are 60 people who live thanks to my parents. Six are first cousins; five who lived through the war, Ewa, Fila, Roma, John and I, and my younger brother Joseph who was born after the war. All the first cousins married within the faith; three married other survivors and Joseph became very orthodox. Of the first cousins’ seventeen children, fourteen are married and only one married outside the faith. There are also thirty-three grandchildren and four great grandchildren. Among the survivors and their descendants there are five physicians, four business entrepreneurs, two graphic designers, one computer scientist, one attorney, one certified public accountant, one civil servant and one news editor. They are scattered throughout the United States, Canada, and Israel."
" ...I nevertheless find it difficult to dismiss the family story of my paternal grandmother’s miracle worker rabbi ancestor. ...That miracle worker rabbi is buried in Lublin! Only those members of the Rinde family who came to Lublin during the war survived. Conversely, of those who failed to come to Lublin none survived. Coincidence?"
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February 24, 2020 - March 29, 2020 - March 31, 2020.
ISBN 978-0-9915716-1-1
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February 24, 2020 - March 29, 2020 - March 31, 2020.
ISBN 978-0-9915716-1-1
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