Abraham and Lilly Malnik collection

Abraham (Abe) Malnik was born on January 31, 1927, in Kovno, Lithuania, to Josef and Feiga Malnik. Josef worked as a barber and Feiga as a beautician. The family was economically comfortable and took advantage of the cosmopolitan life in Kaunas. In 1941, after the German occupation of Kovno, the family was forced into the ghetto. The family managed to survive for several years, thanks to Josef’s efforts to hide and shield them from deportations and mass shootings. In 1944, the family was deported to Stutthof, where Feiga died. Abraham and Josef were sent on to Dachau, then Flossenberg and Leitmeritz, where they performed forced labor in a mine. In the spring of 1945, they were sent on a forced march to Theresienstadt, where they were liberated. Abraham made his way to the Landsberg displaced persons camp and immigrated to the United States, arriving on the Marine Flasher on May 7, 1947. He met and married a Belgian survivor, Lilly Appelbaum. Abraham passed away on April 3, 2007.

Lilly Applebaum was born on November 5, 1928, in Antwerp, Belgium. Her parents separated before she was born, and her father immigrated to the United States. Lilly, as the youngest, went to live with her grandparents in Antwerp, while Lilly’s mother moved to Brussels with her two older children and operated a workshop making raincoats. In 1939, when her grandmother died, Lilly moved to Brussels to join her mother and siblings, assisting in the raincoat workshop. The family remained in Belgium until 1944, when they were deported to Auschwitz. Lilly survived a forced march to Bergen-Belsen, where she was liberated in April 1945. She got in touch with her father and immigrated to the United States in March 1947. She met and married a Lithuanian survivor, Abraham Malnik.