Alexander and Aviva Bartal papers

Alexander Bartal was born Aleksander Ziser Bicz in 1927 in Pabianice, Poland, to tailor Abram Bicz (b. 1902) and his wife Rozka Rajzl Halberg (b. 1905). His brother Izak Icus was born in 1931. The family was confined to the Pabianice ghetto in 1940. When the ghetto was liquidated in 1942, Alexander’s family was sent to the Łódź ghetto, and when the Łódź ghetto was liquidated in 1944, they were sent to Auschwitz. Rozka and Izak were immediately sent to the gas chambers. Alexander and Abram were transferred to Mauthausen two months later and then to Gusen II to perform slave labor in the Messerschmitt aircraft factory. Abram died of exhaustion and disease in April 1945, and Alexander was liberated in May. After recuperating in a Swiss sanatorium, he was taken to a transit camp in Santa Maria, Italy, where he met Henia Aviva Radoszycka. The couple immigrated to Palestine in November 1945 and were married in 1947. Alexander served under Ezer Weizman in the newly created Israeli Air Force.

Aviva Bartal (1929-2015) was born Henryka Henia Radoszycka in Łódź, Poland, to textile manufacturer Israel Mordechai Mietek Radoszycki (b. 1900) and his wife, Jenta Janka Bajer (b. 1905). Her brother Chaim Mendel Imek was born in 1933. The family was confined to the Łódź ghetto in 1940 and deported to Auschwitz in 1944. Imek and both of Aviva’s grandmothers were immediately sent to the gas chambers; Mietek was transferred to the Dernau subcamp of Buchenwald for slave labor and died shortly before liberation; and Aviva was transferred with her mother and aunt to the Halbstadt subcamp of Gross-Rosen where they were liberated in May 1945. She met Alexander Bartal in a transit camp in Santa Maria, Italy, immigrated to Israel, and married Alexander in 1947. She was involved in the illegal preparation of guns and ammunition for the Hagana.