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Oral history interview with Lilly Kroo

Oral History | Digitized | Accession Number: 1993.A.0095.39 | RG Number: RG-50.163.0039

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    Oral history interview with Lilly Kroo
    Transcript
    My name is Beverly Kragen. Today is January 6, 1985.
    I am here to interview Lilly Rubin
    Kroo, who is a survivor of the Nazi Holocaust.
    I am doing this under the auspices of the Oral History
    Project, Jewish Community Council of Greater Washington.
    The purpose of this interview is to add
    to the oral history of the Nazi Holocaust
    so that, through the living memorial,
    future generations will know what happened.
    With this knowledge, hopefully we
    can prevent any such occurrence in the future.
    Please tell us your name and where you were born.
    My name is Lilly Rubin Kroo.
    I was born in Czechoslovakia, Vary--
    V-A-R-Y, very, Vary.
    And what was the date of your birth?
    October 28, 1923.
    The city of Vary, is it very--
    what size town is it?
    It's a small-- a big village, a small town.
    About 3,000, 4,000 people live there.
    And about 35 or 40 Jewish family is there.
    But I mean, Jewish family, grandmother
    and children and grandchildren.
    So the Jewish population from the 40 families was more like--
    Yeah, not like a couple.
    So it was 300?
    About.
    About.
    And how would you say the Jews in your town
    earned their living?
    Well, that's in Czechoslovakia that time, till 1938.
    And then 1938, became Hungary.
    But till 1938, everybody just--
    my father was a businessman till 1939, actually,
    when they took everything away from us.
    Whatever you were doing, if you were a farmer,
    you were a farmer or a shoemaker.
    We didn't have any problems as Jews in Czechoslovakia.
    How many children were in your immediate family?
    We had three.
    I am the oldest one, and my sister and my brother.
    And what was the name of your brother and your sister?
    My brother is Jack Rubin, and my sister, Elizabeth Rubin Gewirtz.
    They live in Connecticut.
    What were your parents' names?
    Yitzchak Fichet Rubin, and my mother, Rachel.
    When and where were your parents born?
    My mother was born not in Vary, but close to,
    another little town.
    And my father was born what was in Romania.
    But when he was born in 1900, it was still
    belonged to Austria-Hungary.
    You said your father had a business.
    What type of business did he have?
    Oh, everything from hat to wooden spoon, everything.
    You know, this kind of small-town business
    what you sell everything there.
    Grocery, clothes, you name it.
    What schools did you attend?
    I only grade school, eighth grade.
    How far were you able to go with your education
    before the war interfered?
    Did you stop because of the war, in other words?
    Yes.
    Did you have any contact with non-Jews before the war?
    Oh, yes.
    It wasn't different.
    I mean, we had a Passover and they had Easter.
    This was the only difference.
    We went to the shul.
    They went to the church.
    I mean--
    So you were living with non-Jews as your neighbors?
    Yes, of course-- till 1938.
    So until 1938, you felt no antisemitism?
    No.
    No.
    I never heard "dirty Jew" till then or anything concerning.
    You know?
    How did you first learn about the war?
    How?
    When, in 1938, when the [INAUDIBLE]
    already were still in Czechoslovakia.
    And it was already maybe going to be a war, maybe not.
    I was 15 year old, and that's all I remember, being young.
    And the same summer, I went to learn first aid, which later
    on came handy in the ghetto.
    Where did you get your training for the first aid?
    From a doctor in the village, in Vary.
    And that's it.
    And we were-- I mean, the Czech, we
    lived in the border, reservoir there, this side here, a river.
    And this side was Vary.
    This side was Hungary.
    And already soldiers was coming in the border and everything.
    So yes, we heard about the war.
    I mean, I know [INAUDIBLE] is good.
    How did your life first begin to change because of the war?
    How did it really change?
    When you were still living at home.
    Everything changed.
    First of all, became Hungary.
    Czech-- no more Czechoslovakia.
    And then already knew, the Hungarian came in.
    The same evening, they went to the Jewish stores.
    They robbed the Jewish stores.
    And then they took away everything, the permit,
    let's say, to have a business, to have a store.
    And they give it to a non-Jewish man.
    And everything, everything what we owned, it started to--
    they started to take things away from us.
    Where were you living at the time?
    Did you have your--
    In Vary.
    Did you have your own home, or was it--
    Yes.
    Yeah.
    Everybody owned their own.
    And did-- well, they took away your father's business.
    Yes.
    So economically, how did you survive?
    I don't know.
    I think my father [INAUDIBLE].
    I know I had to go--
    I have to go.
    My father had, as you can see, beard and payos.
    And he was a-- first, he was a scholar.
    He wanted to be a rabbi.
    And when he got married, he became a businessman.
    But he wasn't a hustler.
    He couldn't black market everything.
    But we had to live.
    We have to eat.
    So I was the oldest.
    And I had a bicycle.
    And I went to exchange things for food.
    The personal belongings of the family?
    Not exactly.
    We still had rice, and rice already was very [? scarce. ?]
    And it wasn't growing in this part of the world.
    Sugar, a little bit--
    and this, somehow, this is how we lived.
    And you know something?
    The other day I was thinking about my father must have been
    either in his late 30s or early 40s Because this picture was
    made in 1941, when we had to--
    we have to have the--
    so anyway, I remember he used to--
    every stove was wooden stove.
    And he used to make the wood for this.
    Chop the wood?
    Chop the wood, yes.
    And he used to pack in nicely in one side and then again
    from this side to the other side.
    And lately I was thinking, not so long ago, my god,
    they took everything away from him.
    He was a young man, a happy, young man.
    He had to do something.
    It's a very terrible memory.
    What did you hear about what was happening in Germany?
    We know there was antisemitism.
    The Jews had to live in ghettos.
    So you heard this when you were living in Czechoslovakia?
    Yes.
    And they took people to Poland.
    This we heard too.
    Did any members of your family or yourself
    try to leave at this time?
    We didn't have nowhere to go.
    We didn't have any relative here in the United States.
    We didn't have anywhere to go.
    And we wasn't that rich to buy something somewhere.
    And don't forget, families in Europe, everybody
    and everybody's cousin is a close cousin, close.
    So it wasn't easy to leave, I think, for my parents either.
    I don't know.
    I think so.
    What happened in your town between the time the war started
    and the Nazi occupation?
    It was calm.
    It wasn't-- they didn't beat us or anything,
    especially the women.
    I was afraid my daddy to go out or something, out of our village
    or something.
    No, we wouldn't let my father because they did ugly things.
    There were these Hungarian gendarmes, police.
    They were, they were animals--
    no, monsters, terrible people.
    I'm not saying "animal" because I like animals.
    And the animal only hurt other people when they are hurt.
    So I-- monsters, evils.
    Yes, that's it.
    No, we didn't.
    When there was laws, Jewish people cannot walk
    on the sidewalk.
    A couple of my best friends told me, Lilly, you're
    not supposed to walk in the sidewalk.
    I just forgot.
    We walk on the sidewalk.
    And then we had to wear for a while--
    and then again, then again, the yellow--
    how you call that?
    The armband?
    Yeah.
    And then we didn't wear it.
    Later, before they took us away again,
    that time we had to wear it.
    So originally, you knew things were changing,
    but it wasn't so strict.
    No.
    No.
    The only thing they take away, they take away
    our business, everything.
    This was the only thing.
    Otherwise, personally, no.
    That's why I have to go and deal with the black market,
    because we wouldn't let my daddy to go.
    On what date did the Germans occupy your town?
    It was only in 1944, before Pesach.
    I don't know exactly because I remember again,
    my parents were praying, please, God,
    just let us eat the matzo at home,
    meaning they were so religious.
    And we don't have to eat chometz.
    We can have holiday.
    And God was so gracious.
    Yes, we had the eight days.
    But next early morning, day after Pesach, four o'clock,
    they took us away.
    So as soon as the German soldiers came in,
    they took you immediately.
    What was your first--
    that was your first personal contact with the Nazis?
    So before you actually went to the ghetto,
    and before you actually saw the Nazis come into the town?
    The Hungarians themselves, the Hungarian gendarmes,
    and they did everything.
    OK.
    Could you describe the changes that
    were made that you were just telling me.
    They took away everything from us,
    our business, our livelihood.
    And how about the food?
    The food?
    Everybody had to have stamps.
    And us Jews was always the last in the line to get the food.
    And most of the time we did not.
    And sometimes we have to sell shoes.
    And we did not have shoes because we were hungry--
    and on the other things too.
    How did the non-Jewish population
    respond to what was going on, that the Jews weren't
    getting the food and they saw that they were suffering?
    It's so hard to say.
    Everybody take everything for granted.
    You know, I had a friend.
    She was not Jewish.
    OK, when I was born, I was very small.
    And my mother couldn't nurse me.
    So my mother, they hired this friend of my mother.
    And she nursed us both.
    So we grown up really like sisters.
    And somehow, I don't know, nobody cared.
    And she was the first one who told me, Lilly, you
    are not supposed to walk on the sidewalk because you are Jewish.
    So how can you explain this?
    Were there any helps?
    Was there any act of help from any of the non-Jewish neighbors?
    Yes, some.
    Could you tell me specifically any one you remember?
    Well, there are two of us girls, my sister and I.
    And we had a very nice--
    how you call it, when a girl gets married and has
    so many beautiful things?
    A shower, a party?
    No, no, no.
    You know, when the mother is collecting all this beautiful--
    I don't know.
    Oh, her trousseau.
    Yes.
    So slowly, my mother had to give it
    away to have enough food in the house and everything.
    And in this way, I think, that's why I made this at school.
    Some of them was real-- were real.
    What did they do to help?
    They have mine what have.
    Did they give you food?
    Or they helped you to make the trade?
    Yeah.
    And then when we were in the ghetto--
    OK.
    OK, when we come to this part later--
    Did the Jewish community do anything to organize themselves?
    No.
    Look.
    Most all the men was in the labor camps years and years.
    They were somewhere in Russia or Poland.
    Many of them, we didn't know if they are alive.
    Most of the men were not in the community anymore.
    No.
    No.
    But your father was still there?
    Yeah.
    And we thought we are so lucky because my father wouldn't [?
    betray for ?] and then [INAUDIBLE] [? bad. ?]
    Now, let's talk about the time that you went to the ghetto.
    How did you learn that you were going to go
    and be moved to the ghetto?
    Early morning, around three or four o'clock, on the door--
    [BANGING] banging the door.
    And we all had to go to the school first.
    And it was the day after Pesach.
    I mean, we didn't have any bread, anything to take with us.
    So anyway-- and then they let--
    after all the Jews was in the schoolhouse,
    they let us go home to bring, I think,
    20 or 25 kilogram packages.
    I'm not sure-- the same day.
    And my sister said--
    I don't remember-- my sister said, I sat down in the couch.
    And one of the boy was went to school together,
    and he had a real rifle, gun with him.
    He was helping the Germans to get the Jews together.
    And I told him, I don't want to go anywhere.
    If you want to shot me, I want to die at home.
    I don't remember that.
    My sister told me this.
    Yeah.
    And then we all went to the ghetto,
    but they let my mother stay home.
    And this was very nice to my neighbors.
    It's true.
    My mother gave everything away, what was in the house.
    But they helped my mother to bake bread.
    And next day, they brought my mother in the ghetto.
    What ghetto were you in?
    Beregszasz-- Oh, B-E-R-E-G-S-Z-A-S-Z.
    This was a brick factory.
    First we were in the shul.
    And then when so many people was,
    they took us to the brick factory in the city.
    So this was the brick factory of Vary?
    Yes.
    How were you transported there?
    How did you get there?
    Walked.
    We walked.
    And there were people on horse--
    Wagons?
    Wagons, yeah-- and our packages.
    And what did you take with you in your package?
    What was very important.
    We couldn't even take food because the Pesach just
    was over.
    So mostly clothes, I think.
    Yes.
    And my mother were with him.
    You know, pots and pans to cook at.
    Can you describe your thoughts and feelings
    when you first entered the ghetto?
    No.
    Because when you are young, I mean,
    at least you always think of tomorrow.
    So you were still real optimistic?
    Yes.
    We cut our hair, just a little bit
    because I always had long hair.
    And for two reasons, one, because
    of the bugs or something, lice.
    And second, then we won't look pretty.
    They wouldn't bother us girls, the gendarmes and the Nazis
    already, in the ghetto.
    And how I felt?
    I was-- that's what I mean about my first aid, learned first aid.
    I became a nurse in the ghetto.
    And this was everything to me.
    They assigned this, I don't know, eight weeks, I think,
    or 12 weeks before they started to clean the ghetto.
    I saw that because, from every hospital,
    they brought the sick people in, Jewish people.
    I saw so many things there.
    I don't know.
    I think the only way--
    I don't remember.
    Who guarded the ghetto gates?
    Gendarmes.
    And they brought-- gendarme mean police,
    but ugly police, not like in the United States,
    the police officer there, but the ugliest monsters,
    the Hungarian gendarmes.
    Were you able to get in and out of the ghetto?
    No.
    No.
    Did anyone try?
    Yes.
    And--
    He was caught.
    Yes.
    And what happened when they were caught?
    They get a little beating mostly, the men.
    And they was brought back.
    What were the rules of the ghetto?
    Well, it was-- we had a big kitchen.
    I mean, everybody when we ate at the kitchen that time.
    Excuse me one minute.
    You were all together in a factory.
    So there were no individual little apartments.
    And it was one kitchen for everyone.
    OK, go ahead.
    Somebody who had, like, I need this, so brought in.
    They couldn't come in the ghetto.
    But outside the ghetto, they could bring us something to eat.
    And outside, they made-- how do you call it?
    You know, to cook, like in the--
    An outdoor pit?
    Yes, to cook.
    But everybody, we went to the kitchen.
    I didn't have to go because I was in the hospital.
    But my parents-- my sister worked in the kitchen.
    Everybody had to go there.
    The hospital was in a different building?
    Yes.
    Two different buildings.
    There were two buildings for the sick?
    How many buildings were there all together?
    Well, It was a big, a big brick factory.
    And it wasn't-- have you ever seen how they dry bricks?
    No.
    No.
    It doesn't even have a wall.
    Only, let's say it's very tall building, a long, tall building.
    And the wall, let's say, about that.
    And the rest, we had to put whatever we had.
    I don't know, blankets, bedsheets, everything,
    because it was cold.
    It was still in March.
    So this was how we lived.
    So it was an open building.
    You were exposed to the outdoors.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Outdoors and to each other, because everybody just
    had a little space--
    families, not persons, families.
    Let's say this is the Rubin family.
    There's the Lewkowicz family.
    There's the Weiss family.
    So not--
    And in the brick factory, it was the 30 to 40 families
    from your town that were in there?
    Yes, I think so.
    But this was a very, very long brick building.
    There were other people too, not only from our town.
    From other towns they also brought them.
    So it was large?
    Yeah.
    It was very large.
    And what did they provide you with?
    Did they give you beds?
    [INAUDIBLE] They let us bring in.
    You moved some of your things from home?
    Yeah. like a bed, pillows, and blankets, and you know.
    How do you call this?
    Down bed, we used to have pad there.
    Oh, the quilt.
    It's old [INAUDIBLE], yes.
    This kind, yes.
    This was ours.
    They let us bring this.
    OK, now ask.
    And when they started to liquidate the ghetto,
    then we took, whoever stayed there, what was left over.
    If we were too cold or whoever was cold,
    we gave that to the people.
    Bring it to the hospital if we needed it
    when they started to liquidate.
    When someone left, you took--
    Liquidate the ghetto.
    Yes.
    Within the factory, how did the people who lived there, did they
    do anything to organize themselves?
    Yes.
    There had to be.
    Yes, of course.
    So many people, there was.
    There was the head there, whatever in the kitchen.
    There had to be.
    There were so many people there.
    There must have been rules and regulations.
    And to keep clean, not to--
    the toilet, it was all--
    oh, yes, and one day in the ghetto,
    they picked up about 50 Jews.
    My father was one of them.
    And this gendarme, this Hungarian police
    said, no, you are going to come, and you make your own--
    your own grave.
    He went.
    No, they didn't help us there.
    No.
    They needed.
    I don't know for what reason.
    How big?
    I don't know how many meters long and wide.
    How do you call when you start to--
    To dig?
    Dig, yeah.
    I don't know.
    For some purpose I forgot.
    But they told the first, the 50 Jews we are throwing in it.
    And here, and they are going to dig their own grave there.
    Can you imagine?
    And you can't do nothing.
    You couldn't do nothing.
    You couldn't do anything.
    Yeah.
    You couldn't do anything.
    Did you have water?
    Yes.
    And electricity?
    Yes.
    This also belonged to a Jew, also.
    His name was Kroo, like mine.
    Everything-- this was a big factory, and modern.
    I mean modern in that age, at the time.
    Oh, yes.
    And you had the sanitation?
    You had toilets?
    Yes.
    This is a problem because it wasn't so
    many people in this brick.
    I mean, this factory where we were.
    So this was a little problem.
    They built a lot latrines.
    You know what latrines is.
    Shut it off.
    I don't want.
    --saying that you had built the latrines for sanitation.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Now, you were working in a little hospital.
    What were the healthcare problems
    that you were seeing in the ghetto?
    What?
    How do you mean?
    Who were you treating in this hospital?
    Everything and everybody, from syphilis to new babies,
    from hernia to TB.
    You name it because they were all these sick people
    from the hospitals, from the private sanatoriums,
    everybody in the ghetto.
    We had a new baby hospital separate.
    This was a big deal.
    They lived here a couple of weeks, and we watched them.
    So anyway, before I break it.
    Anyway, everybody we-- everybody was there.
    And you know, in that part of the world
    a nice Jewish girl wasn't a nurse.
    So our head nurse was a--
    how do you call it now?
    You know, who helps the baby to be born.
    A midwife?
    Midwife.
    She was wonderful.
    There was a doctor, a Jewish doctor,
    who lost his leg in-- both legs--
    in the First World War.
    And he needed always the [INAUDIBLE] and sometimes
    [? catering. ?] But he always wanted me to hold his
    what you might call it.
    And I didn't know anything.
    And once the head nurse, this midwife,
    said, what you are doing?
    I said, I have to hold.
    Oh, then she gave him.
    He never asked me again to hold it.
    I didn't know.
    How much I know about this thing?
    In first aid, we didn't learn many things.
    There was many people, mostly doctors, small children.
    I gave his family injection, and next thing you buried them.
    Or old parents, very sick old parents--
    also, next day, we buried them.
    Then I learned never to save it.
    If a doctor give an injection, if the patient dies next day,
    you don't mention it.
    Who was giving the injection?
    This Jewish--
    The doctor.
    This Jewish doctor?
    For himself, his children, or for his parents, if he saw
    his parents was very old or very sick.
    And I think he did a good thing.
    They were doing it because they wanted to?
    Yes.
    I understand.
    Was Jewish doctor.
    Yes, I understand.
    Was there any other--
    you were in the hospital.
    Was there any other type of work to be done?
    Kitchen.
    Your sister worked in the kitchen.
    How about your brother?
    My brother was only 16--
    15, 16 years old.
    I don't know.
    He's probably-- he didn't.
    And children, there was kindergarten sort
    of thing for little children.
    So they had a little school for the children?
    Yes.
    They was organized.
    We watched very much.
    Were you able to participate in any religious activities
    in the ghetto?
    Oh, yes.
    I mean, of course.
    They were Jewish people there.
    I mean, this was a Jewish ghetto.
    Right.
    But they were still able to participate?
    Yes.
    To practice?
    I didn't.
    They didn't?
    You didn't.
    You didn't.
    But that was because you chose to-- not to.
    Right.
    And what was your father doing in the ghetto?
    Did he have any job?
    No.
    Religious Jewish people, they were
    saying their prayers and this kind of thing,
    waiting for Mashiach.
    He was there, you know.
    But he got sick.
    Mashiach, he was in Auschwitz.
    You know what Mashiach is.
    He used to have a joke there.
    A Messiah, Mashiach came in Auschwitz and then
    they got sick from the--
    how do you call it?
    From the smell-- and that's why he left.
    It's a joke.
    Some joke.
    But your family was all together in the ghetto?
    Yes.
    Did you hear what was going on in other parts of Europe?
    It's interesting.
    Once-- you see, we didn't have a railroad station.
    We had to go about eight kilometers.
    And once I was coming from Beregszasz,
    was the nearest city.
    I was coming home, and the railroad,
    how you call it-- the person who is responsible for the railroad,
    he was a very good man.
    And he said, Lilly, run and go to every Jewish house.
    Ask for food, what already--
    mostly bread, this kind of thing.
    Because here a-- he showed me in the side.
    There was a train with wagons, these kind of wagons
    that they took us to Auschwitz.
    But this was in 1943.
    And there were some Polish [INAUDIBLE]
    and Hungarian, Polish Jewish people,
    who was hiding in Hungary.
    And they catch them.
    And they were taking them somewhere.
    And this guard, this non-Jewish man, wanted to help them.
    So I was there as a Jewish girl.
    So I whatever I could, and people there in this little town
    [PLACE NAME], we took.
    And this man, how you call it--
    The conductor?
    No.
    Who is responsible in the whole thing.
    And he gave that to this.
    This was the first time I heard about something bad.
    So this was-- you knew from this family.
    Yes, something bad happens to Jewish people.
    But they told us, we don't have to be afraid.
    They're just taking us away because we are too
    close to the front, to the--
    To the fighting.
    --fighting.
    And they don't trust us.
    So that's why they resettle us.
    After the war, we can come back.
    Did I tell you something?
    Three days and three nights, we were
    traveling to Auschwitz, plus one night
    because too many trains came.
    So they didn't open our train till next morning.
    And when we arrived around seven o'clock, it was almost dark.
    And there were two men.
    One standed up on the other's shoulder
    to look out in this little window in the cattle car.
    And he said, oh, he saw the chimneys.
    We are in a place, in a factory.
    We are going to work in a factory.
    It was in Auschwitz.
    Yes.
    When you heard the stories that they were just
    going to move you and bring you back,
    did you believe these stories?
    No, some where, no.
    But don't forget, young people is a--
    Now, you had said that some of the people
    were liquidated from the ghetto.
    This attitude is funny, isn't it?
    First they started to liquidate those who had--
    I don't know-- like a Bronze Star here or some kind of-- from
    the First World War, the big shots--
    not big shots.
    It's not-- who fighted in the--
    and they wanted to give them privileges first.
    And they didn't stay in the ghetto.
    They stayed in their home.
    And from their home, they took them to Auschwitz.
    Oh, so they went first.
    So they--
    Yes.
    This was the first.
    Can you imagine?
    And you heard that when you were in the ghetto?
    Yes.
    So there must have been news from outside the ghetto coming
    in.
    I think when they started to liquidate,
    when the first or second--
    I'm not sure, but I think that's what
    happened because everything changed among us, even
    among youngsters.
    Somebody find something in one of the--
    in the train somewhere.
    And they told us where--
    I mean, in a little paper.
    And this how some of us, not I, but let's
    say the others, they know where we are going,
    what is going to happen to us.
    Not everybody-- a few of the, let's say, of the doctors,
    lawyers who was left over.
    So yes, some of us--
    I didn't, but some of us, yes, they
    know there is a place Auschwitz or Birkenau.
    And there we are going.
    But they didn't told us.
    You know, when I came back after the war,
    I met somebody who told me this.
    Is there any specific incident from the ghetto
    that makes a special impression on your memory?
    [WHISPERS] Children.
    No.
    I don't think.
    I'm sorry.
    I'm not good at this.
    [INAUDIBLE] Children, new babies, and they died.
    They killed them.
    When we arrived in Auschwitz--
    you want anything to ask more from the ghetto?
    It was the last transport.
    Well, let's talk about the day that you left the ghetto.
    I don't remember.
    I know I remember day after Shavuos we arrived.
    And in Connecticut-- we lived in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
    At that time, I used to be Orthodox Jew, still
    Orthodox Jew.
    And the rabbi told us-- we asked him to keep our yahrzeit.
    And the rabbi told us the same day
    when we arrived in Auschwitz.
    So day after Shavuos this how we keep
    our yahrzeit, the memory for our parents.
    We're jumping ahead a little.
    Who left with you?
    Who?
    My whole family.
    Your whole family went together?
    Yes, because I always-- whenever we know already
    ahead of time there's going to be transportation,
    I brought my family with me in the hospital.
    You brought them out of the brick factory
    over to the hospital?
    Yeah.
    Was there any problem doing that,
    or it was just because you knew it was coming?
    We learned.
    Yeah.
    They liquidated the ghetto slowly or all at once?
    No, slowly.
    Slowly.
    Slowly.
    But you had no idea what was going to happen when you left.
    We are going to work.
    To work?
    You should see.
    They made from a bedsheet, like a [INAUDIBLE].
    Everything double, everything double because during war we
    cannot buy anything new.
    So everything is help.
    Let's say, wearing a slip--
    instead of from one piece like this,
    no, my mother made four, out of four bedsheet.
    Uh-huh.
    To wear?
    Slips, yeah, because we have enough.
    In case, you know, we have enough.
    We are going to take apart wherever we go.
    And then we are going to have enough.
    So when you left, what were you able to take with you?
    Not too many things.
    They didn't mind, whatever.
    You could take anything.
    From when you-- they--
    Yeah.
    Yes.
    --moved you out, you could take--
    Because they knowed we are not going to use it anyway.
    Oh, yes.
    Did you try to hide anything?
    At home?
    We didn't have time.
    You don't know how stupid my parents were, and me too.
    They played so much.
    Just let us eat the matzo, and next morning they took us away.
    Oh, yes, my mother gave a couple of her jewelry
    to our very good friends.
    Did you ever see it?
    I didn't either.
    Or her Persian coat, we took it with us to Auschwitz
    because I sewed in things, and in our shoes, dollar bills.
    Oh, so you did put the things in your coat?
    Yes.
    And in our shoes, a nicely dollar bills--
    not $1 bills.
    I don't remember.
    I don't want to lie that.
    Big bills-- my daddy made, like, from a--
    how do you call it now?
    This good-- that is made of--
    Wood?
    Leather?
    Leather.
    Leather.
    Yeah, and put it in my shoes, and in between,
    the bills, the dollar bills.
    So you prepared when you saw that the other people were
    going?
    Yes.
    Mostly in the ghetto.
    Yes.
    And then the one evening, one early morning or evening--
    I know it was dark.
    They came, the gendarmes, everybody
    to give everything what they have, Jews--
    jewelry and money and everything.
    So my father didn't want to take a chance to any of us
    to get hurt.
    So he gave many things away.
    That was in the ghetto.
    So when you actually left, you had the extra sheets
    that your mother made for you.
    Not only-- everything, every [? muppet-- ?]
    every fabric you can think of.
    Everything was double on us to be
    sure we are going to have enough.
    We are going to work, you know.
    And we need it.
    Yes.
    So you and your family were now in the hospital.
    Yeah.
    When they came to--
    Right.
    Could you tell us about when they came for you?
    When they came from us, there wasn't nobody else left.
    You were one of the last ones to leave.
    Last one to leave.
    Yes.
    I never saw how because I was in the hospital.
    How did they choose who went from the ghetto?
    They started from the first building and so forth and so on.
    Oh, so they just moved right down.
    And then whomever they catched on the street,
    in case they needed--
    let's say they have 85 or 80 people in one, this wagons,
    and they didn't have enough.
    So whomever they find on the street--
    he was one of our doctors.
    Was out and he got taken.
    Yeah.
    And that's that.
    So your family was one of the last to go?
    Yes.
    Do you remember anyone making an attempt to hide or to escape?
    Yes.
    Yes.
    I told you, there was a family.
    They were hiding on the--
    there was a attic, a big attic.
    And we had a wood stove, so we needed big chimneys.
    And they were hiding in their empty house in the attic,
    in the chimney.
    And they find them.
    This was before they went to the ghetto?
    No.
    Oh, they got back down to their home?
    Yes.
    And other peoples, some of them was OK.
    There was a girl from the other city, a beautiful girl.
    She became Catholic in the ghetto.
    The Catholic priest came and everything.
    And I don't know what happened.
    But we were together in Auschwitz and in Stutthof
    and arbeitslager.
    So even though she became Catholic, it didn't matter.
    Yeah.
    And when she came home, she married a non-Jewish.
    She used her.
    The people who tried to hide, did they have success?
    Some of them.
    They arrested a few.
    And those who got found?
    That were find?
    They were sended somewhere.
    I don't know where.
    So you were taken from the ghetto.
    You said it was eight kilometers to the train.
    No.
    No.
    The station, the first station, when you wanted to go somewhere,
    Beregszasz.
    I'm talking about normal circumstances.
    We didn't have--
    Vary did not have railroad station.
    We had to go eight kilometers to the nearest railroad station.
    This when I first heard about bad things
    happen to Jewish people.
    I didn't know Auschwitz or anything, just bad things
    because this non-Jewish man came to me.
    I just stepped down from the regular train.
    I was coming from Beregszasz.
    And he said, Lilly, go to every Jewish house
    and collect food, mostly bread, meaning not something liquid.
    This was the very first time.
    This was, I think, in 1943 or '42, '43.
    How were you taken from the ghetto?
    Train.
    You know, the brick, where they made the brick,
    they had their own-- how do you call it?
    It's not the railroad.
    And a train could come in because when the brick
    factory was working, they were selling
    the brick all over in this country or whatever.
    So they had their own railroad thing.
    So the ghetto came.
    I mean, the train came there.
    Came to you.
    And could you just--
    could you describe the type of cars they put you in?
    Cattle car.
    The cattle cars.
    You want me to talk about the train?
    Let's talk about the, right, the train, the trip to the camp.
    I wanted to stay with my people, my same people, the hospital.
    And my mother didn't let me.
    Oh, you didn't want to leave the hospital.
    No, I wanted to go in the train.
    You know, because the sick people had a separate wagon.
    So they took everyone who was in the hospital also.
    Yeah, everybody.
    And they put all the sick people together.
    The sick people together, yes.
    And then your family--
    And the healthy people was in a separate.
    And I wanted to go with my sick people.
    My mother didn't let me.
    She pulled me down from this train.
    We were about 80 of us.
    We was-- we had a little baby.
    He was born there in the train.
    I mean, in this one wagon.
    How you call this one where we were?
    And there was an old man.
    He died.
    And we young people, mostly we were standing almost all
    the way.
    And when the train stopped in Auschwitz already,
    my mother was sitting.
    Let's say, here is the door.
    We were standing right here, close the door
    to have fresh air.
    And let's say my mother was sitting in this corner.
    And when the train stopped in Auschwitz already,
    but we didn't know still, I went next to my mother.
    And I fall asleep laying there.
    Here I still feel it sometimes.
    [BACKGROUND NOISE]
    Why didn't she know that I don't know.
    She was so [INAUDIBLE].
    And when they opened the door, [GERMAN] Out, out, everybody.
    My father and my brother jumped out first.
    They are going to help us.
    We are going to give them the packages, suitcases.
    That's the last time I saw my father.
    And then-- then my mother was in the middle, my sister,
    and I was carrying the packages, the suitcases, whatever.
    And we came to the--
    to [INAUDIBLE] No.
    No.
    Well, let's go back a little bit.
    No.
    No.
    No.
    You know, I think everywhere everybody has somebody favorite,
    not favorite, isn't favorite.
    There was, in the hospital in the ghetto, a woman.
    She was about 40 year old, a widow lady--
    oh, not even 40.
    She had four children.
    She was paralyzed from--
    you have to feed her, everything.
    Everything you have to do for her.
    Only her beautiful, lovely smile, and her voice is kind,
    lovely voice is the only thing.
    I liked her very much.
    I don't know why.
    I don't know what was wrong with her.
    And when was putting the sick people in the train,
    she was very special.
    I made her very comfortable.
    And she was the reason why I wanted
    to stay with my sick people because you have to feed her.
    You have to take the water, get from her sometime.
    Well, anyway, we are standing in order.
    And I saw a man, a Jewish man in a striped outfit.
    Did you see those?
    She was laying in the [INAUDIBLE] bed sheet.
    He was pulling her.
    From the train?
    From the train.
    Because she was heavy, so this man wasn't able.
    And he went-- you know, twice in my life-- first time
    something clicked in my mind, and it
    was like Lilly is watching another Lilly.
    No, it's not.
    It doesn't.
    I'm not.
    I'm here.
    It's not-- you understand this?
    Second time this happened, when my husband was killed.
    But anyway, it's many, many, many things.
    My sister tells me what happened.
    It's that time when I saw this very sick lady.
    The man was pulling her because she was heavy.
    That time, something happened here in my head,
    like a click, like I am watching me.
    How long did the trip take from the ghetto to the camp?
    Three days and three nights plus one night
    when he was already there and they didn't have time.
    They stopped you at the camp?
    Yes.
    Because they had too many that time, too many Hungarian.
    They brought in too many Hungarian Jews.
    And they didn't have time to open everybody's doors.
    But meanwhile, sometimes they put us in the sideline,
    and we had to wait a half day--
    on our way to Auschwitz.
    On the way?
    Yes.
    So it wasn't straight, because it's not so far.
    It's not very far.
    It's not a three-day trip.
    No.
    No.
    No.
    No.
    No.
    Not even a whole day, not even one day.
    So they must have-- so you were standing still a lot.
    What did you do for food for three days?
    They let us bring.
    You had food with you?
    Yes.
    Whatever you brought.
    But we didn't have water.
    And for sanitation?
    And the smelling of the car--
    they gave us a--
    I know I didn't--
    I don't know how we did it.
    We didn't.
    Only there, there is one to-- how do you say this?
    To use the bathroom.
    Bathroom?
    What kind of bathroom?
    A couple of-- how you call this thing now?
    A bucket?
    Buckets.
    One was for clean water.
    The other was for the toilet--
    and next to each other.
    You know, some of the men were so smart, they made--
    I don't know how they made a hole in the--
    how do you call it?
    On the floor.
    And whatever they had leftover, watches, good watches
    and many other valuable things, they throw that out.
    And the train brought it.
    Then nobody could have used it now.
    That's why they did it.
    And the same thing, some of the boys made a little holes.
    And they went, you know.
    But they other people couldn't do a hole.
    It was terrible smell.
    And we had two dead with us, the baby and the old man.
    In your car.
    And 80 of us, 80, 80.
    It was in May, and of May, I think.
    When Shavuos is?
    This time.
    Did anybody try and leave the train?
    How?
    God, Almighty, how?
    What happened?
    Why did this happen?
    --about your mother.
    She knowed somehow.
    We don't talk too much about personal things with my sister.
    We always talk about the camp.
    Whenever people who was in the KZ--
    we call it KZ, the concentration camp--
    no matter what the gossip or anything,
    we end up talking about the lager,
    about the concentration camp.
    But we never talk personal, about mother or father--
    because it's still too painful.
    And when did I see my sister?
    Anyway, I was talking about and my sister said, you know,
    Lilly, I know my mother knowed it.
    I said, funny, this is how I feel.
    She knowed it.
    It's not good where we-- we are going.
    And your father?
    My father was very damn religious.
    In our house, even to ask was a [INAUDIBLE], a sin.
    To ask something-- everything is.
    So I don't know.
    He believed so much in his god.
    His god couldn't do anything wrong.
    This the [INAUDIBLE].
    Now, the train arrived at Auschwitz.
    Yes.
    Around six o'clock, 6:00 AM.
    In the morning.
    Early morning.
    Yes.
    And after I saw this, I told you, something clicked.
    Nothing could hurt me or bother me.
    Now when you said nothing could bother you,
    did that feeling stay with you?
    For a long time, yes, a long time.
    Just like watching myself, like two of me now.
    They took us first.
    They took everything away, our clothes, our hair--
    every part where hair was.
    Well, first you came off the train,
    and you said you never saw your father again.
    And then we walked for a while with my mother in the middle,
    between the two of us, my sister and I. And
    when we arrived in a--
    And where was your brother?
    My brother was with my father.
    They jumped down from the train first to take our packages.
    And that's the last time I saw my father.
    Thank God my brother survived, so he's here now.
    And we walked.
    And then we always have to stop.
    And the man was there.
    Some of us went that way, some of us that way.
    Who met you at the train?
    Was there any--
    The how you call it?
    The SS, with the dogs, and the men with the stripe.
    And some of the men what there is there, they keep whispering.
    I didn't know Yiddish too much.
    But I never forget, [YIDDISH].
    Children to the old people, to give you
    the children, to the old people, to the grandmothers.
    Because they knowed the old people will die anyway.
    So why not save the young mother.
    But we didn't know what they are trying to tell us.
    And I didn't even know Yiddish that time, to really understand
    what he meant, even the words.
    But I learned Yiddish.
    I learned in the camps and here in this building.
    What did you first see when the train stopped?
    When the train stopped, everything was so clean,
    and the air was so--
    from where we came, the air was--
    Different from the train to the outside?
    Yeah.
    And we looked around for my father.
    But he wasn't there.
    They said, don't worry about your packages.
    Don't worry.
    You have your name.
    And we had to put our names on everything.
    You are going to get your package.
    Just go, go, go.
    Go in the line, and go.
    I remember, I was hit, my mother and my sister.
    And my mother only had a blanket because we didn't
    want to her to carry heavy.
    And anyway, they didn't let us to carry the heavy packages.
    I only took the rucksack.
    You know the--
    A backpack?
    --backpack of mine, and that's it.
    And yes, we went.
    We went.
    How little-- then we always had to stop and again.
    And then there was a SS and that [INAUDIBLE] we call it.
    And some of us went this way, some of us this way.
    And my mother went in the wrong way.
    Did you know what they were doing
    when some went this way and some went-- you
    had no idea what was happening?
    No.
    But when we're standing in the line,
    you know how is a little of this, a little?
    And every five, let's say--
    one, two, three, four, five--
    no, not even five.
    The SS man was standing with a gun.
    To right-- left, he said.
    And I don't know where it came.
    They said the children goes with the parents who has children
    because they--
    we young people has to work.
    But the older people is going to take care of the babies.
    And once a month we can visit them.
    I don't know who started this.
    But this was already in Auschwitz.
    We were standing there already.
    Because in the train was so, so terrible, the smell.
    So we didn't even--
    we couldn't even smell--
    recognize that they were burning us there.
    But you didn't smell it from the difference?
    No.
    No.
    Because in the wagon, the smell was so bad.
    Oh.
    We didn't even recognize the other smell.
    And anyway, we would tell each other, this is a factory.
    Well, that much we knowed.
    So you thought you were coming into a camp that had a factory,
    and you were going to work.
    Yes.
    And the mother is going to take the children,
    the small children.
    And they don't have to work so hard like young people, us.
    And once a month we can go and see our mother.
    And the men went to work, naturally.
    They went in the-- the men went to the men's camp.
    And your brother went there?
    With my father.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    And you didn't what happened?
    No.
    No, no, no.
    No problem.
    Yes that's all.
    Still, we were near the train, and then separation.
    We didn't even know.
    You didn't think.
    We didn't even look back.
    My sister said she looked back.
    And my mother was looking after us, and she was so sad.
    I didn't even look back because I was so happy.
    My mother was only 41.
    And I thought if she's going to be with the children,
    don't have to work so hard as we will.
    Oh, you thought that you were sparing--
    she would be spared from the hard labor.
    Yes.
    Right.
    Funny, you [INAUDIBLE] at the other.
    [CRYING] They never remembered this.
    Remember this one.
    My sister remembers more.
    I told you, when I saw that, something clicked and then
    many things, many things.
    But this, I [INAUDIBLE].
    So we went in the inside, and they took all our clothes.
    They gave me a panty somebody had--
    like a long John--
    somebody had her period in it.
    And it was so hard.
    The blood was dried in it.
    I'm sorry.
    I didn't understand.
    They took our clothes away.
    And after they shaved us and everything,
    they gave us all junky clothes.
    And they gave me a panty, like a long John.
    And somebody's period was.
    And it was dried in this.
    What else?
    I had to wear it, or I would be naked.
    And it didn't mean anything.
    I mean, after the [? sleep, ?] that meant nothing.
    I mean, I was afraid of beating.
    This, I remember.
    I was afraid of beating because those beating was terrible.
    And hunger?
    Everybody was hungry.
    Cold.
    Somewhere here is-- we was in the C lager.
    This was not finished, the C camp.
    I want this my grandson to have that,
    but I want him to know I am [INAUDIBLE].
    No that's not ours.
    That's not the C lager.
    See?
    See this hands up?
    Somewhere I must be.
    And my sister is somewhere here.
    Because we wanted to see how we look after.
    I went by a building what had windows.
    And I thought, I am going to hold up my hand
    and see how I look--
    Without hair.
    --without hair.
    But other people, other girls were smart too.
    So you remember when they came and took these pictures?
    No, I don't remember the pictures.
    I just know I wanted to see myself
    in the glass, how I looked.
    But I saw so many arms there, I don't know which one was ours,
    how I looked.
    This was when you first went through,
    when they shaved your hair and they shaved your body.
    And they give me the dirty clothes.
    They gave you the dirty clothes.
    So you had these dirty long underwear.
    And what else did they give you to wear?
    Something?
    Some of them-- see this dress that long?
    Some of us so short--
    and I always had big head, like.
    And the dress was--
    I don't know-- size eight.
    And I needed I don't know.
    You can imagine.
    And the long [INAUDIBLE] didn't matter.
    After I saw this, because I was so sure
    my mother went to take care of the children,
    so there wasn't any tragedy or anything in me.
    When I saw this lady, my patient, this--
    and I think it was good.
    It was good this happened, this click in my head,
    like watching myself.
    Somewhere here is my lager and Della.
    She was a nice Jewish girl, because some
    of the Jewish girls--
    the kapo was-- they were worse than the Nazis.
    They wanted to show off they are better than the Nazis.
    They had the C lager.
    Here I slept on.
    It wasn't finished.
    It was a unfinished block.
    Was made of wood.
    So then, after you got your clothing,
    then they took you to this block.
    And it was made of wood.
    And what else could you describe to me about it?
    So many people was there and hot.
    And we didn't have any bed or anything, just the floor, floor,
    mud.
    And next to us was the washroom.
    And across from us was the latrine.
    Was this in a separate building, or part of your building?
    No, different building but next to us, because
    in between the buildings was where we standed Appell.
    Were you still with your sister?
    Yes.
    We were always together.
    This, I think, saved my life and hers too,
    because we had-- you know, we knew
    we had to leave for the other one.
    I know I wouldn't survive without her.
    No, I think not.
    I would not.
    I could not survive without my sister.
    She was strong physically and every way.
    I'm sure she feels the same about you.
    I don't know.
    Not my sister-- she's a very smart lady.
    So there were no beds.
    You had to sleep on the floor?
    Yes.
    And it was mud.
    Mud.
    It was not finished.
    Mud.
    OK, and one more little story--
    about two days after we arrived in Auschwitz,
    in C lager, C camp, there was a--
    all of a sudden, we heard--
    we didn't went out for Appell for some reason.
    Was [NON-ENGLISH].
    [NON-ENGLISH] mean they locked--
    we couldn't go out because the crematorium and everything
    was working too much.
    It was too close.
    They didn't want us to see.
    So anyway, all of a sudden we heard some noise.
    You know, [INAUDIBLE] like hearing this and everything.
    I should have [INAUDIBLE].
    Anyway, a block is how it looked like.
    It's a long building, and in the middle,
    a big like a stove or oven, whatever you want to call it.
    And then here is a little where you walk.
    And then here is little spaces for I
    don't know how many people.
    OK, one after each other, you find at least.
    But anyway, I was standing up.
    We were, let's say, in this side, in the right side.
    One, two-- was the second from the door,
    the second little cubicle area.
    All of a sudden, we hear some noise.
    Is a little boy was born across from us.
    A woman had a little baby boy, beautiful little pink baby boy.
    And the German, the SS woman, put the baby
    in the middle of this long oven.
    It wasn't anything because it wasn't--
    they wasn't using now, the oven.
    It was cold, no.
    But nobody can give anything for the baby eat, anything to eat.
    They took the mother away, a young woman.
    And you know, this baby, it was so beautiful, pink,
    when he was born.
    Did you ever see a lemon when it turns
    yellowish, brown, yellow and wrinkled?
    That's what happened to this baby.
    And he was still alive.
    He was still crying.
    And then one day, was at Auschwitz, and the baby--
    we left still the baby there.
    And when we came in, the baby was not there.
    Somebody said the men used to come from the men's lager
    to clean the latrine.
    And you know, like we have a garbage can
    outside, but [INAUDIBLE]?
    The baby was still alive.
    They put the-- throw the baby in there.
    [INAUDIBLE], this little Jewish boy.
    [SOBBING] He [INAUDIBLE] went on living and living.
    Why didn't he died, this little man, this little boy?
    And the girls said, here, the baby still looked
    like a little cat, a tiny--
    he couldn't even cry.
    And then they had to do it.
    They didn't do it because they wanted.
    Can you imagine how they--
    how hurt they were?
    Because mostly Jewish men was there.
    Tell me something.
    How can we ever forgive?
    Start with God.
    I can't answer that.
    Could you describe for me a day's routine
    in the life at the camp?
    Early morning, very early morning.
    rain or shine, Appell--
    you stand there hours and hours, hours.
    And then-- five in a row.
    Then they start counting and counting.
    And then come lunchtime, they bring the soup.
    Soup-- what is the soup?
    All the dirt in it--
    I mean it.
    Piece of wood--
    I don't know.
    I can't even describe it.
    But we drank it.
    You see, we don't have a spoon, so we drink it.
    And then again, a little bit, then they out--
    we are outside.
    We're sitting on the floor, the floor-- not the floor.
    On the ground.
    On the ground, yes.
    We talk-- and always cook.
    Always, always recipes and cooking, I mean.
    Sleeping [INAUDIBLE].
    And then Appell time again.
    Somebody have to go in the toilet.
    To be sure, you save a little piece
    of bread because maybe, maybe this girl doesn't let you
    in if you don't [? save. ?] Because they clean the toilet.
    They had an extra--
    I don't know-- bread, but she wants to make more.
    So you be sure you have an extra little piece of something,
    bread.
    Or a piece of--
    you leave your piece of salami there to give it to the girl
    to be able to get in.
    To let you into the bathroom.
    To the latrine, yes.
    And before you know it, again Appell.
    And the sun-- you know, in Auschwitz, there
    wasn't in between.
    I mean, either it was very cold or very hot.
    You couldn't see a bird flying there.
    No.
    There wasn't any grass.
    Well, we would have eaten anyway.
    But there wasn't no grass there in these lagers,
    in these camps where I was.
    And again, Appell and Appell.
    And finally, the Appell is over.
    They give you the bread.
    And a time you can sit with the salami or slice of--
    or a cheese.
    But you can see through it, this little piece of bread.
    And then you wake.
    They wake you up again.
    And you fight.
    You beat everybody next door, the next girl,
    because she doesn't want to move and you don't have anyone there
    on the ground or in the mud.
    Or they beat you up, whoever is stronger.
    Or they steal your bread if you didn't fast everything at once.
    I usually did.
    Then my sister and others saved something
    because they always stole it, no matter where I put my bread.
    My big head lies always here, I couldn't put it.
    Because my dress was so small, I didn't have room there.
    So I just ate it.
    And then two, three o'clock, again, out, out, out to wash.
    We go to the washroom.
    The faucet just dripping--
    dark, no water, no nothing.
    Again, they beat you up or you beat them or you kick somebody.
    They kick the hell out of you.
    It's dark-- scared, everybody.
    Where is the water?
    How do I wash?
    Finally, the SS had a good time.
    They let you back in the barracks.
    If you are lucky, you sleep a couple hours.
    And [GERMAN] raus again, it's Appell time again.
    When you say you were fighting, that's
    with the other women in the barracks
    because there were so many?
    Yeah.
    So many.
    There wasn't even room to lay down.
    Like in the headquarters, like babies and the mothers, yeah--
    most of us.
    And if somebody had a blanket, was a very lucky person.
    Somebody had a-- to hide this ugly, ugly--
    A scarf or something?
    Yeah.
    And they fought over these things?
    Everything.
    Everything.
    A little drop of water--
    everything meant so much.
    Everything life.
    You want to live.
    You are young.
    You want to live--
    life.
    You don't even think of anything else, not even the word survive.
    No.
    You don't even think of survive.
    Just you want to, and no matter.
    I wasn't that.
    I heard many speeches and everything,
    when they said we must--
    somebody said about himself or herself,
    I have to survive because the world.
    I have to tell the world what happened.
    No, I wasn't that good.
    I just wanted to be alive.
    The only thing I wanted, to see how the end comes.
    Not my end, how is the liberation.
    How?
    This I wanted to see.
    What happened at the Appell?
    You went outside, and you sat or you stood five in a row.
    And this was a roll call?
    Yes.
    They took your names?
    No, not the names.
    Numbers.
    Counting like animals, counting--
    five in row, five person.
    And I don't know how long was this.
    This had to be exact.
    And heaven help you if you fall asleep or something.
    It was your fault. For some reason,
    you couldn't happen-- you know, it happened sometime.
    Some girls fall asleep.
    And what would they do?
    They-- that time, the SS with the daylight, kill the daylight,
    that one--
    her.
    And we was only with women, so I don't
    know a man, the men's lager.
    I'm talking about young girls, 19 years old, like I was,
    or my sister, 18.
    It's a-- you know, even now talking about it,
    I'm looking at it again, again, like looking at it.
    That's only way, I think.
    We all have-- we all have some--
    I don't know-- some way to survive.
    My way is to keep myself out.
    I don't know how to explain it.
    Was there any special way you could help
    yourself to deal with the hunger?
    Only if I steal, but I wasn't good at it.
    I was too stupid.
    One girl to the other girl-- look, we were like animals.
    Had to live.
    So the girls stole from each other?
    Yes.
    And did they steal from you?
    Yes.
    I had fever, and I couldn't eat.
    I had a sore throat or whatever.
    And you see, I am not religious anymore.
    I came a very religious home.
    And I don't like God, but I can't afford the luxury
    not to believe in God because God is too much in me.
    And I have a daughter who is very young.
    And so I cannot afford not to believe in God.
    But there are so many questions.
    So that's I don't even think.
    I just take things as it is, and that's that.
    So anyway, what was the question?
    How you dealt with the hunger.
    How you were able to cope with it.
    Talk about cooking and baking.
    There is no way to deal with hunger, only to eat.
    And there is nothing to eat, so you don't.
    I fainted many times, my sister said.
    You were telling me how you had a sore throat
    and you couldn't eat.
    Yeah.
    Yeah, and again, I got.
    I was very sick.
    And we were in the mud too.
    When it was raining, the [INAUDIBLE], it wasn't good.
    [INAUDIBLE]
    Yes.
    And a couple of days I was inside.
    The block elder let me stay a day inside,
    not to go out to stand in Appell when it was raining.
    So anyway, that day, she didn't let me.
    And I had a high fever and everything.
    She knowed that day they are coming to liquidate the lager,
    to take people to the--
    Those who didn't go out.
    Yes, the sick people.
    And she gave me a big patch.
    And she said out.
    Nothing will happen to you.
    Out, out for Appell.
    And this saved my-- she saved my life.
    Now, who was this woman?
    She was a blockalteste, Della.
    I told you, blockalteste, like a sergeant.
    And she saved my life.
    And I ate it, and my sister ate it.
    But she wanted me to live.
    I mean, there's so many people, so many young girls that time.
    First we have to take them to the 25th lager-- not lager--
    barrack.
    And from then, they took them straight to the gas chamber,
    to the crematorium.
    What is the 25th lager?
    The 25th is a barrack.
    And when somebody was sick from this, from the C lager, C camp,
    then we took them to the 25th barrack.
    I was in the 30.
    Every barrack had a number.
    [AUDIO OUT]
    [INAUDIBLE] because to me, every day is a yahrzeit,
    is an anniversary.
    First the ghetto, and then when they
    started to empty the ghetto, and beautiful young girls,
    my friends, they didn't come home.
    They were just as happy as I. Their background is mine.
    And they didn't come back.
    And children-- once, when we was there, oh, a couple days,
    we could see the railroads.
    And a transport came in, probably
    Hungarians because at that time only Hungarian Jews came.
    And in the very first line was a mother,
    must be mother, a tall woman wearing a beige raincoat--
    you couldn't see exactly their face--
    and a little girl.
    And the mother, the woman, was fixing the--
    how do you call it?
    Her braids?
    Her hair?
    No, no.
    The-- how do you call it nowadays?
    This big--
    Oh, a ribbon?
    --ribbon in her little girl's hair.
    And one of the girls was there longer
    than I, in Hungarian, said in which she's fixing the ribbon.
    Ribbon, for which chimney?
    And I still didn't believe it.
    And you still didn't believe?
    You didn't?
    No.
    So even when you were there, you mentally
    had removed yourself not to see what was going on.
    Look but no see.
    After the day you were sick, and this woman actually helped you
    by making you go out--
    She was a young girl too.
    But she came from Slovakia.
    She has longer, months already in Auschwitz.
    That's why she became the blockalteste.
    And she spoke Hungarian.
    So the block captain was Jewish.
    Of course.
    Matter of fact, she was a very good Jew, even there.
    Whenever somebody died, she used to say Kaddish.
    And she had to say, too often, Kaddish.
    Were there any other times when you know of that she helped you?
    She beat the daylight out of us in the same time.
    But she had to.
    That time, you can't imagine how we hated her and everything.
    But looking back, she saved, I think, many, many our lives.
    I don't know what happened to her.
    I never heard about her, Della.
    I only know her name was Della.
    And I have her picture here.
    And I know she was from Slovensko, somewhere,
    from Bratislava, somewhere from Slovensko.
    I never heard of her after the war over.
    I never even asked too much.
    Was there ever a free day?
    Every day was a free day in Auschwitz.
    No, when they left you alone.
    No.
    No?
    Whatever they could find to torment us, to do,
    they closed the water.
    It was so hot.
    I told you, in Auschwitz, in Birkenau, it wasn't cold--
    a cold day or--
    either very cold or very hot.
    It was so hot and no water.
    They closed the water, and you couldn't drink.
    Were there any further selections
    while you were in the camp?
    Always-- there was always selections.
    There was a girl, two girls, two sisters
    who were from Beregszasz.
    I know them from home.
    And she-- somehow her mother--
    I don't know how it happened.
    Her mother came in with them.
    And there was a selection a week later.
    And they took their mother.
    And we were talking, and they were saying better for mother
    because she's not going to suffer so much, like we're
    suffering here.
    When they had the selections, what
    was the reason for whichever way they sent you?
    When the selection was in the camp,
    the which way we they sent us was we arrived.
    Right.
    Now, within the camp?
    Within the camp, if they see you--
    I don't know.
    Many time we have to be naked, take everything off
    and walk like this.
    And if they saw, like, appendix, appendix scar or something, OK,
    it was enough.
    Or he didn't like somebody's I don't know what.
    It wasn't why.
    It wasn't no reason why.
    And always, whenever a selection always, we start,
    I started my sister face to look red, you know, happy looking,
    not pale.
    So for instance-- so they told you to come out or whatever
    and to get undressed.
    And then they just looked at everybody and then took--
    After Appell.
    After Appell?
    Yes.
    Take off everything, and one by one.
    And who was the one who was making the selection?
    The Angel of Death, Mengele, oy.
    He always used to--
    you know, the [INAUDIBLE] have a whistle.
    You said there was times when the women were
    fighting with each other.
    Was there any times when they were helping one another?
    Yeah, I think.
    What kind of help you talking about?
    To give you bread?
    Your bread was your life, this little piece of bread.
    This was your lifeline.
    A blanket?
    It's cold.
    I don't want to freeze.
    I want to live.
    I want to survive.
    But it wasn't in your mind, the word survive or something--
    like animals, instinct, not words, was instinct.
    Can you understand this?
    I don't think I could ever understand
    because I wasn't there.
    Thank God.
    As I said before, I am not so noble to say
    I wanted to survive to tell the world what happened.
    No, I wanted to survive, Lilly to be alive.
    Yes.
    Do you ever feel there was a time where,
    besides this woman who actually did help you,
    when there was another woman with you who did anything
    to help you?
    You know, it was like this, but most of--
    I think most of us, we were five of us in our always
    [INAUDIBLE] there, my sister, and from my village
    other two girls, two sisters, and one girl, Giselle,
    who was-- didn't have a sister.
    We always together.
    You understand?
    And we kept each other alive.
    Oh, yes.
    Yes.
    And it's a funny thing.
    Whenever somebody said, I can't take it anymore.
    I want to-- you know, they died.
    Something happened.
    And later on, the only way we keep each other alive, my sister
    and I, we told each other stories.
    When we go home, the first houses--
    we are going to go in the first house.
    Mr. Biro lives there.
    And we are going to send him to tell our mother and father we
    are coming because we don't want to surprise them, shock them.
    So first, he's going to tell us, your children are alive,
    and they are coming home--
    this kind of this thing.
    That's how we kept each other alive.
    That's how.
    You know, in the arbeitslager-- from Auschwitz,
    we went to Stutthof.
    Stutthof is like Auschwitz, but smaller, not as big--
    crematorium and everything.
    And there we was two weeks.
    And also in an unfinished building.
    Anyway, it's-- and from there we went to a arbeitslager,
    a labor camp in the Danzig corridor.
    You've heard of Danzig in Poland,
    used to belong to Germany.
    This is the first Germany--
    Hitler wanted back Danzig.
    And we was building an airport, was working outside airport.
    What we were doing is we were making
    the runway and the cables.
    We were making a--
    digging ditches that had to be exactly one meter wide
    and I don't know how many meters deep.
    And we put this heavy, like the--
    The cable.
    --wire, cables.
    And it was so heavy.
    And you know how warm, how very warm the asphalt,
    the gray powder what you made the--
    Cement?
    Cement.
    You know how warm that is?
    So we were dressed because we freezing.
    It's very cold up there in the north, near the North Sea.
    And my sister said-- you see, I didn't remember this.
    My breast was frozen because it was snowing and carrying
    those wires.
    From my body, the snow melted and right away freeze.
    So I was in a whole week in a--
    but in the arbeitslager, in the hospital, but not
    a real hospital.
    And I survived.
    I don't know why.
    And they came every Wednesday a selection,
    too, from Stutthof to Praust.
    Because there's a labor camp, the arbeitslager, where I was.
    I was a city or a town near Praust, near Praust.
    There was-- we had a chance to be clean,
    to clean ourselves more.
    And the food was better.
    We had to work harder, not even--
    I don't know how we did it.
    But we did it.
    And there are about 800, a small arbeitslager.
    I don't think 200 of us came back.
    200 of us came back because of the death marches.
    They started to-- this-- this is--
    OK.
    Let's slow down a little.
    From Auschwitz, how long were you there?
    About five weeks, five, six weeks.
    And then you refer to--
    And then they took us to Stutthof.
    But when we was going, again.
    oh, God Almighty.
    We had a friend whose aunt married to a boy in our--
    and she was from Slovakia.
    She also was a long time in Auschwitz.
    And when we were going, when they
    selected us to go to the arbeitslager, we didn't know.
    Her name was Viola, Ibi in Hungarian.
    And she came and kissed me.
    Lilly, Lilly-- I didn't know why.
    And anyway, they took us in a--
    and my sister doesn't want to remember.
    I swear to God, I guess I can't stand nobody to come close to me
    now.
    She took us in a long room.
    And there was, like, a shower.
    They said, we are going to get a shower now.
    There wasn't anything where the water goes, and just straight
    in the long, gray room.
    There's only so many of us, you couldn't-- naked women,
    young women-- you couldn't put a needle between us.
    And for some-- from some--
    I don't know why.
    They took us out from there.
    Two women stayed there because they were pregnant.
    They came in pregnant, but they didn't show.
    But anyway, and then they took us to have a real, real shower.
    And they gave us clean gray clothes, gray clothes,
    gray dress, and our shoes-- you know, these wooden shoes--
    and a white little piece of something in our head,
    and a piece of the tefillin, like that.
    And then the train came.
    And yes, they gave us a whole bread, a whole bread.
    And I don't know how many pieces of salami and cheese.
    And they took us to arbeitslager, to arbeitslager.
    After the war, I met this Ibi, this Viola.
    Lilly, you are alive.
    And I, of course, of course.
    And she was so happy and crying.
    And she told me her sister was in a other barrack, the sergeant
    or blockalteste.
    And she told her, they are liquidating that C lager,
    the 30th.
    And she thought they are going to kill us.
    She, this friend of mine, Viola.
    She was sure they are taking us to the gas chamber.
    They didn't.
    Well, you said that you actually were in--
    Yes.
    I recognized it.
    I showed my sister.
    And she said something.
    It was a long, gray room.
    And only it was--
    the water come in.
    But here was straight.
    It wasn't--
    No drain.
    Yeah, the drain.
    Drain, yeah.
    And I told my sister and a friend of ours,
    we was together because the two sisters stayed home in Budapest.
    They went to Budapest.
    But the girl who didn't have any sister, she lives in New York.
    And I told her, she said, of course, she [INAUDIBLE]
    And I told her that time, said, you know where we was?
    Because that time already, books came out.
    So they took your whole barracks that time.
    They took the whole thing, the whole 30.
    Yes.
    Barracks 30.
    And you went through--
    which was actually the gas chamber.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    Yes.
    And for some reason--
    For some reason.
    There was so many women together,
    you couldn't put a needle between us, so many naked women.
    And they didn't close the door or anything.
    And a little while later, they said, [GERMAN] raus.
    And then we went.
    Then we got a shower.
    And they put this white powder because a little bit
    our hair started to grow, so white powder on our hair.
    Hair-- hair-- it wasn't there--
    and a little kerchief, a piece of junk--
    and a whole bread.
    And they took us to the train.
    And on the train we have a regular Wehrmacht,
    not the SS who watched us.
    I'm sorry.
    You had regular--
    Regular army, not SS.
    Wehrmacht they call it in--
    not the SS.
    Yeah.
    And he stopped the train and water and--
    fresh water and always cleaned the two [INAUDIBLE],
    the latrine boxes.
    I mean, the latrine.
    The toilets, right.
    Yeah.
    And they were taking you to-- where were they--
    First to Stutthof.
    Stutthof.
    This was like Auschwitz, but smaller.
    There was a crematorium and gas chamber.
    And again, there was selection.
    Why did they move you?
    Do you have any idea why they?
    Because they needed workers, I think, workers.
    And we were all young, I don't think any of us was over 35 yet.
    And we were there two weeks.
    Again, selections.
    We lost a couple of girls in Stutthof.
    And in Stutthof, is that where you dug the cable?
    No.
    No.
    In Proust -- this is a labor camp.
    Right.
    So in Stutthof, they just treated
    you like they did in-- like in Auschwitz.
    Yes.
    Did they treat you any better?
    At least you had clothes.
    Yeah, but, damn it.
    And they took our clothes away.
    Oh, when you got there?
    OK.
    And then we got stripes.
    Oh, So you got--
    Yeah, before that.
    So you took this train trip.
    And again, was it a big cattle car?
    Yes, but clean.
    Cleaner.
    Yes.
    And you had a little food.
    Yeah.
    And do you recall how long it took to get from Auschwitz?
    About two days.
    Two days.
    About two days.
    And then I was in Stutthof.
    We lost-- I lost two friends.
    It wasn't feeling they were sick.
    They couldn't come to the arbeitslager.
    Yeah.
    So now when you arrived in Stutthof, again you--
    It was a big unfinished building.
    We arrived in the evening.
    And there was, you know-- the SS was all black.
    I don't know why they were wearing black uniforms.
    It was so frightening.
    And this unfinished big building was not finished yet.
    They throw us in there.
    Everybody was fighting with everybody.
    It was dark.
    Everybody was looking for a sister or a friend, and dark
    and--
    and the SS, be their rifle, in the-- where they would--
    [? pack ?] this on their back.
    Then the next morning, we woke up.
    Again, Appell.
    It wasn't bad there.
    It wasn't as bad.
    As Auschwitz.
    And was there about two weeks, I think.
    And then we went to the labor camp.
    Again, they gave us new uniform, that time with stripes,
    with the striped uniform.
    So in Stutthof, was the food any better?
    No.
    And it was the same routine, with the Appell.
    Yeah, but it wasn't so dirty.
    We wasn't in the mud.
    Did you have a place to sleep?
    On the floor, yes.
    But it was a floor, not mud.
    It's and unfinished building.
    I don't know what it.
    Was the real windows there.
    What different forms of punishment
    did you see in either Auschwitz or Stutthof?
    Oh, god.
    Ever heard of [GERMAN]?
    I'm sorry.
    I didn't catch that.
    Ever heard of the word [GERMAN]?
    No.
    That's in German.
    In English, 25, beating.
    Beating.
    Make sport out of it.
    Sport out of it.
    Were you yourself beaten?
    Yes.
    Everybody was beaten.
    In the labor camp, for example, they are going to give out shoes
    because these old-- how you call it--
    wooden shoes wasn't good.
    There was big snow.
    And not because they wanted to keep me alive
    or anything, because they needed my work.
    And OK, we are going--
    they are giving.
    Before they give you shoes, they beat you up first.
    But you have to go because you need the shoes.
    You can't walk in this big snow without shoes.
    Every-- everything beating.
    They make a sport out of it.
    I know Goethe, Bach, Mozart, all was German.
    And I enjoyed that music--
    Goethe's verse, poet.
    But I never could look at a German person as a human being,
    not from the newborn to the 100-year-old.
    To me, they don't belong to the human race.
    I don't hate.
    I'm too tired even to be angry anymore.
    I used to be angry.
    I'm not even angry anymore.
    I just cannot accept them as belonging to a human race.
    In the camp itself, in the physical structure of the camp,
    did you actually see what was enclosing the camp?
    Usually made the camps--
    at least that's the only arbeits,
    the work camp I was in--
    and they made in middle of nowhere.
    But there are people are coming because there are farmers,
    fields where--
    I don't know-- corn or whatever.
    So they know we are there.
    Yes.
    Don't believe they didn't know it.
    Around the edge of the camp, was there
    a fence or electrical wire?
    Wires were.
    Fence there.
    You know, they never, never grow anything there.
    And you know something?
    I asked already once, but I have to ask again.
    This already in the camp, in the work camp, just very--
    also, I don't know what-- well, anyway, it was very hard, this.
    And whenever somebody had a little something, [INAUDIBLE].
    Next day it became--
    and then a week later, they--
    how you call it?
    The flesh, like rottening, like come--
    Oh, it was peeling, coming off?
    Not peeling, the whole thing, the whole--
    everything off.
    Not only this thing happened.
    I think because we didn't have air.
    I don't know, something to fight with.
    And you know, what medicine was the best.
    And eyes, eyes started to get red.
    And if you didn't watch it, that's that.
    They took us away.
    I mean, the truck, every Wednesday, the truck
    came and took people away.
    You know what was the best medicine that we used?
    When a little bit started to get red,
    right away pee pee, our own.
    And with the eyes too.
    And this helped.
    I don't know what kind of acid there was in [?
    this hell ?] because somebody who had this little red spot,
    next day started the swollen.
    And then not even a week, couple of days
    later, like [INAUDIBLE] the whole flesh.
    And it smelled terrible.
    And these people what outlived Auschwitz and I
    don't know how many selections were already
    in the arbeitslager, in the working camp.
    And then already we had more food-- not enough.
    We still were hungry, but better taste and clean.
    We had a chance to wash ourselves and wash our clothes.
    And this happened, this kind of--
    this illness.
    I would like to ask a doctor or somebody.
    I read so much about.
    And [?
    I'm mad. ?] I didn't find anywhere [INAUDIBLE].
    And we didn't have our period either.
    I don't know why.
    It was good in a way because what could we do?
    You know, not even a piece of toilet paper,
    nothing [INAUDIBLE].
    But what did they do to us, the young women?
    From the malnutrition, your whole body structure was off.
    I don't know.
    But I know, when we started to-- when we got married
    and started-- became pregnant, like a miracle because always
    the bad news, we--
    Instead of a sunburn, we claim that we--
    the only medicine we had, our own pee pee, and for our eyes.
    I don't think we got that on the tape.
    No.
    No, I don't think so.
    But I want this on the tape because too many of us died,
    and for their memory.
    I want this on the tape.
    All right, you were telling me an incident
    that you remembered when that was in the ghetto.
    No, this was in the--
    I'm sorry.
    That was in the labor camp.
    The sunburn, just it started with a tiny little red spot.
    And then it became like when you burn yourself there.
    How do you call it?
    That's white.
    And then a couple days, two days later, one day later,
    it started the whole arm and all over the body,
    like, rotten flesh.
    And it smelled terrible too.
    So the only way you could wash yourself
    if you saw that little red spot, right away to put your own pee
    pee on it, to wash it.
    At least this saved me because I had it too, the red spot.
    And the eyes, and our eyes became red also.
    We cured that with our own pee pee, our own urine.
    OK.
    Yes, there, everywhere there.
    The labor camp was clean.
    We had more food.
    We were still hungry.
    Were always dead.
    And [GERMAN], the beating.
    There was two women, two oberaufseherin.
    One was N and M, were two big, like two big horse.
    And they made a sport of it.
    Girls so skinny, and they have to take off their clothes.
    And with a big--
    how do you call it?
    A stick.
    With a whip?
    Yeah, a thin one-- you know, beating.
    And she had to count herself when
    they were beating, one, two.
    And she fainted.
    Then they put cold water on her.
    She came to again, and her skin was coming.
    Whoever was beaten.
    These two women, two women, they made a sport out of it.
    What camp was this in?
    This, in the labor camp and in Auschwitz too, but in the labor
    camp.
    And everywhere dead, always dead.
    Do you mean you actually saw the people dying?
    Yes.
    The dead people?
    Of course, I did.
    And there was a young woman.
    She was not so young because she was around 30 year old.
    So she wasn't so young to us.
    She had epilepsy.
    And one day she had a seizure.
    As it happened, it was on a Tuesday
    because every Wednesday the truck
    came from Stutthof, where the crematorium and the gas chamber
    was.
    And they took her.
    She was happy.
    She was a very lovely, intelligent woman.
    But she has epilepsy, so she had to die.
    Everywhere death.
    Were there any instances when a whole group of people
    was held responsible for the act of a single person?
    Yes, many times.
    Could you tell us about one specific incident?
    Somebody overslept or wasn't there
    for Appell, mostly overslept, fall asleep or something.
    Then we were there till 11:00, 12 o'clock, no eating, nothing,
    standing outside in the cold or heat or whatever.
    And we were punished for one person.
    Yes.
    Or something happened in the work.
    Auschwitz mostly because somebody slept, overslept
    or something.
    But in the work camp, I don't know.
    Little things, little things happened.
    Like somebody left their--
    how do you call it?
    What you use the--
    The shovel?
    Shovel-- there in the work, where they work.
    The whole, whole camp, everybody had to stay outside till 11:00,
    12 o'clock.
    Sometimes they didn't even gave us our little soup.
    In the early morning, next the early morning, five o'clock,
    we had to be outside again for Appell because the work start
    at seven o'clock.
    We had to be at our work, wherever we worked by 7:00.
    Yes.
    Oh, yes.
    Were there any children in the camp?
    No.
    Not our children.
    Here in the arbeitslager, I first heard Ave Maria.
    There was a girl from Praha.
    She wanted to be an opera singer.
    And she was singing for the Germans,
    the whole little village, the Praust was there.
    And they don't know anything.
    The German people don't know anything
    about the concentration camp.
    And before Christmas, she was singing--
    Nina.
    She died too, in the death march.
    She was frozen.
    Yes.
    Was there any attempt to conduct educational
    and religious activities?
    Oh, no.
    Yom Kippur-- you Yom Kippur.
    There was a girl who knows a little prayer,
    some part of the prayer.
    So we prayed.
    After the light went out, we all prayed.
    I used to know more.
    Prayers.
    Were there any non-Jewish prisoners in the camps with you?
    No.
    No, not with us.
    Not in Auschwitz and not in the arbeitslager, the labor camp.
    Were you able to get any news from the outside world?
    Yes.
    You know how?
    Two girls was working for--
    cleaning the SS rooms, this kind of thing.
    And this is how we got some news.
    Yes, through them.
    What were the first signs for you
    that the war was coming to an end?
    Was in a death march.
    You know a death march.
    And middle of the road, somewhere--
    it was in the Danzig corridor because we was there.
    All of a sudden--
    no, wherever we went, always the SS and everything.
    All of a sudden, no more SS and soldiers.
    And then we heard bombing and everything.
    And then a German [INAUDIBLE] soldier came in a motorbike.
    And he told us.
    We were only about 20 or 22 of us.
    And he told us to run to the first village,
    not to stand there because this was a no-man's land.
    This is going to be fight there.
    We heard the fighting, the guns and whatever it was.
    So he told us to go to the nearest village, which wasn't
    far, he said, where we are now.
    And go in the basement and stay there.
    And next morning, early morning, the Russian came in.
    So you took part in a death march.
    Could you tell us more about that, where it began
    and what happened and how much you remember about that?
    No.
    It's begin after New Year's, right after New Year's, like
    2nd, '45--
    January 2, 1945.
    Evening we started.
    Many of us, hunger, cold, sickness--
    many of us died all over.
    We always-- they always took us in the back roads
    for some reason.
    Wherever you were there, there was dead bodies.
    And when we came to the- to a--
    oh, god.
    Once we went by garbage, where the people throw their garbage.
    And one girl saw rotten potatoes.
    And she went.
    She bought it, and she was shot.
    She still was holding the potatoes.
    I stepped out of the line.
    I took the potatoes.
    I don't remember her name or face.
    I remember the blood coming.
    You know, I swallowed it.
    I didn't even give to my sister.
    Yes.
    [INAUDIBLE] This can't even be explained.
    We went by a little village there.
    And the people wanted to give us--
    I don't know.
    I was the end of the line.
    But who was further ahead told us,
    some people, the village people, wanted to give us
    some soup or something.
    And the SS chased them away.
    They didn't let the people to give us anything.
    And so many girls, who just sit down because they
    had to go-- you know?
    And they were shot.
    They were shot, you know, here, [INAUDIBLE] everywhere.
    So many, so many young girls--
    but we didn't look young anymore.
    We were dirty, filthy.
    No, we wasn't filthy.
    They were filthy because they didn't let us.
    We didn't look anymore young.
    So you started walking on the evening of January 2.
    And you walked all night.
    And how long did it continue?
    And next day.
    They always let us sit down for a few minutes
    because they were tired too.
    Did they give you anything to eat?
    Once in awhile, a piece of bread.
    And then we went the middle of nowhere.
    There was a big barn.
    And we was there about four weeks.
    And in this barn was a-- it was cold, very cold there.
    You know what, wheat?
    They wasn't, you know, stealing the--
    stealing in the--
    Before they thresh the top off.
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And we ate it.
    It wasn't [INAUDIBLE].
    We ate all this.
    You know how good it taste?
    There was grass, some grass too, even though it was dead.
    And we picked some grass.
    I don't know what we ate, but we ate this kind of thing.
    It kept us going.
    There wasn't Appell anymore.
    Were the SS still with you then?
    Yeah.
    Oh, yes.
    They killed us.
    And who couldn't walk-- after four weeks, we started again.
    Who couldn't walk, the SS and 10 girls--
    we brought 10 girls back.
    The SS killed all of them.
    And the 10 girls--
    and we buried them--
    Jewish girls.
    They gave us-- they gave them double portion, not because we
    wanted to do anything.
    To survive, to be alive now and to bury
    those who was left in the barn.
    But the SS killed them with revolvers.
    And the 10 girls, and one [? Ukraine. ?] And this
    was near somewhere, a village or something.
    There was a young boy about 10 or 11 years old.
    And he had this, like the--
    something.
    You know when they use, the cowboy used for the--
    The lasso?
    Yeah.
    Yeah.
    And he beat us.
    The SS sent him in.
    And the boy loved it, this 10 or 11-year-old boy, to beat, to--
    He was from the village?
    They brought him in?
    And how many women would you say were with you in this barn?
    At that time, it wasn't too many.
    Many of us-- every day in that time, we--
    about 100 of us.
    Don't forget, this labor camp where we was was about 1,000
    or 1,200 of us.
    But by the time we were liberated,
    I don't think 200 was alive.
    So when you left the labor camp, 1,200 of you started the march
    together.
    And by the time you reached the barn,
    there were only a couple hundred?
    And what did you do at the barn?
    You just stayed there.
    Stayed there.
    That was all?
    That was all.
    And after the four--
    Hungry, lice, and fear--
    you don't know the fear.
    You can't even-- sometimes they didn't even
    let you go out to do your personal thing.
    So there were no lavatory facilities?
    No.
    There was no--
    No.
    No.
    No.
    There was no water.
    We had snow.
    And this, this is how we washed our face a little bit.
    With the snow.
    And if you have enough energy to do it--
    and drink.
    I mean, it's for--
    instead of drinking, we had to eat the snow.
    And how did you keep yourself warm?
    Always together a bunch.
    And there was this wheat, this helped to--
    So you covered yourself with the wheat.
    --it was cold, and close together-- we
    kept each other warm.
    I don't know how we did it.
    It's not-- it's unbelievable to me.
    Sometime, and very seldom when we
    talk about this with my sister, we don't believe ourselves.
    How can-- how can you believe it?
    How can the world believe it?
    How can anybody believe it?
    I don't know how I am here.
    I don't know why.
    I am here, and I don't understand why.
    What happened at the end of the four weeks?
    Then we started to walk again.
    And then all of a sudden, one day, no SS.
    And we were somewhere near a big forest.
    It was quiet.
    As I said before, like no-man's land.
    And there was a dead horse.
    And one of the girls had a piece of-- not knife,
    but a piece of something.
    Yeah.
    We are going to cut from the horse and eat some meat from it.
    And then came this Wehrmacht, this German soldier
    on a motor bicycle.
    And he stopped.
    And he said to us to go to the nearest village
    and go in the basement because the fight is
    going to start here.
    Otherwise, we are going to be shot.
    We were about 20 or 22 girls together
    because when the SS wasn't there, everybody was--
    Everybody scattered?
    And this-- so much lice.
    You know, it was so thick, my eyebrows-- not only mine, ours.
    Licey it was.
    I never knowed lice can--
    terrible.
    And we was liberated by the Russian.
    And I remember-- and I got typhus fever.
    This was after you were liberated?
    After, yes.
    And the Russians took us in an empty school, and no doctor.
    Again, so many dead.
    And one day, they just put us on a wagon
    and took us end of this town or village, wherever.
    And they said, OK, go wherever you want to go.
    The people lived there.
    This was, whatever, in Ukraine, this.
    So we started to walk.
    I was so--
    I couldn't hear after the typhus.
    And my sister was with me--
    and again, wearing blankets and cold.
    Again, not too many of us, just--
    I don't know-- from different camps too.
    By then we were mixed [INAUDIBLE].
    And the Russian, the Russian, they
    didn't have truck, the Russian army.
    They had with horse, not carriages.
    But they brought the--
    like whatever the soldiers need.
    And in the end, always was food, in the end of the carriage.
    And always we were standing at the end of the road
    with our hand out.
    [RUSSIAN], this we learned.
    [RUSSIAN] means something to eat.
    [RUSSIAN] is like a brother or whatever in Russia, Russian.
    And one day, we are standing as usually end of the road.
    And always, those who looked terrible first.
    And usually the driver or whoever, the soldier,
    throws out a bread or a piece of kolbasa or whatever they had.
    And one day, just like any other day, we're standing again.
    Our hand is, you know, [RUSSIAN].
    And a soldier, probably, probably, I don't know,
    he went or whatever, on a horse, he was the [INAUDIBLE].
    He was on a horse, on horseback.
    And he stopped.
    He asked who we are.
    And we told him we was in the concentration camp,
    and we are Jewish.
    I'll never forget, never as long as I live.
    He said, never.
    He just [INAUDIBLE]
    And then we didn't want to go home.
    There was nothing to go home to.
    I was like-- oh, yes, they again shaved my head because it was
    so much lice and everything.
    So my hair was shaved again.
    Well, what town were you in when--
    How should I know?
    Somewhere around in the Danzig corridor, somewhere.
    I know when we were near Kyiv.
    Then was somebody told us, you better turn around and go back
    to Germany.
    As terrible as it sounded, we all
    wanted Palestine, the road to Palestine.
    I see Israel again.
    Because when I was first time, I was only
    in the Hadassah hospital.
    But this time, I go for me, something.
    So anyway, went back to Germany because I
    wanted to find my brother.
    How did you get back to Germany?
    That time, they gave us a truck.
    You know, soldier were--
    and they took us to the German border.
    And then again, the Germans was very polite.
    They went out of their way to help us.
    And I ended up in Bamberg.
    And my brother--
    I was looking for my brother.
    You know, wherever you went, always knows
    there, like Lilly and Erzsebet Rubin,
    looking for their brother, Jack Rubin from Vary and so forth.
    Our father, we was looking for, Daddy and Mother too.
    Can you believe it?
    We were still looking for our parents.
    And then my brother was very sick.
    He was young.
    The Germans shot his--
    through his legs.
    And a man who used to know our parents, he saved his life.
    He was the blockalteste, alte man.
    And he saved his life.
    Was this in Auschwitz?
    No, it was also in a labor camp, but is man labor.
    And somehow he got back to Budapest.
    So one day we find a note there--
    Jack Rubin from Vary, he is in Budapest.
    So then we went to Budapest to look for my brother.
    And again, start everywhere to go where he is there.
    So we find him in a hospital.
    And then he got better.
    He was so young, his legs never had grown, this that they shot.
    Anyway, but he's alive.
    And we went back, with my brother,
    to Praha and back again to the DP camp.
    Yeah, my brother went back home.
    And there was nothing.
    They took our home, everything, our house.
    Was nothing, nothing left.
    So there was no reason.
    Where to go?
    I mean-- And you know, the "Hatikvah,"
    I only know in Hungarian.
    And I didn't want to learn in any other language
    because the word, you sing this.
    And all our hope, everything, this kept us going, these words,
    these Hungarian words in the "Hatikvah."
    You know, [NON-ENGLISH], but in Hungarian.
    What DP camp did you reside in?
    What camp were you in, DP camp?
    Bamberg.
    This where my baby was born, my first baby.
    And how did you get to the DP camp?
    How did I?
    For asking, for going [INAUDIBLE].
    They tell you to go.
    I don't know.
    I don't really know.
    Because there was other kind of camps, not Jewish camp.
    And somehow we never even stopped.
    We only wanted to be with each other, never even overnight was.
    How did you manage to support yourself in the camp
    and before you got to the camp?
    Stealing.
    I mean, not stealing, stealing, but things the German has.
    They are so obliging, so kind, so good.
    They give you.
    They gave you food.
    And there wasn't too much this--
    you didn't have to work anymore.
    There was railroad.
    It was almost normal life, at least for the Germans.
    It wasn't so, you know--
    We said that we was coming back after we
    went to find my brother, went back to Budapest and Prague.
    That time we had already had this
    where to go because some of our friends
    was already in those camps.
    And in Czechoslovakia, you have to--
    through the border, and you have to watch.
    They will catch you.
    It was already-- it wasn't so easy.
    It was 1946 already, end of 1945, early spring or late
    fall because it was still cold.
    I don't remember exactly.
    I was not married yet.
    And what was your life like in the DP camp?
    Well, we was not hungry.
    We can wash ourselves.
    We were clean.