Oral history interview with Marcia Loewi
Transcript
- You said a question, see.
- This is a United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
- interview with Mrs. Marcia Loewi on January 8, 2016
- in Borough Park, Brooklyn, New York.
- Thank you, Mrs. Loewi, for agreeing
- to meet with us, to speak with us today.
- I'm going to start our interview from the very beginning
- and ask the most basic questions.
- And from that, we will develop your story
- and share your experiences.
- So my very first question is, could you
- tell me the date of your birth?
- September 23, 1926.
- And can you tell me the place you were born?
- I was born in Landsberg an der Warthe.
- Landsberg an der Warthe?
- And so, is that part of Germany?
- Yeah, that's there.
- It was under Russians, so we couldn't go back,
- and you couldn't get anything.
- But my parents emigrated to Poland
- because it started in the '30s, the beginning of '30s
- they started the movement.
- And they were scared, so they moved to Poland.
- And we lived in a Lódz, Poland, after this.
- OK, I'm going to step back a little bit.
- [PHONE RINGING]
- Let's cut.
- OK.
- Could you explain something for me
- because it's not clear to me.
- You say you're born in Landsberg an der Warthe.
- Landsberg am Lech, that's near--
- it's in a different place.
- Mm-hmm, but Landsberg an der Warthe,
- this was part of Germany, did you say?
- Yes, yes, and when I was born.
- But later on, the Russians took over.
- Do you mean after the war?
- After the war, yeah.
- After World War II.
- OK, so it was in the part of Germany
- that became East Germany, the German Democratic Republic.
- Yes, yes.
- OK.
- What large city was it near?
- Lódz was a big city.
- No, no, no-- Landsberg an der Warthe.
- I don't remember.
- How old were you when you moved?
- Like six years or so.
- Oh, I see.
- So your parents were really German Jews.
- Yes.
- And they moved to--
- No, my mother was from Poland, but my father was from Germany.
- Ah, OK.
- So tell me a little bit, then--
- another question, a basic one, that I need to ask.
- What was your name when you were born?
- Marcia Jacobowitz.
- Jacobowitz was your name, your maiden name?
- Yes.
- OK.
- And did you have brothers and sisters?
- Yeah, we were nine children.
- Oh, wow.
- And your mother and father's names, could you tell me?
- My father's name was Shlomo--
- Solomon-- and my mother's name was Sara.
- She's named after my mother.
- Ah, your daughter, that we just met?
- Yeah.
- I had a son, my older son.
- He passed away, like, six weeks ago.
- He was named after my father.
- His name was also Shlomo.
- Yes.
- My condolences.
- That must be very hard.
- It is.
- Was special person-- special, wonderful, very learned,
- very educated person, very talented.
- It's a loss.
- No one wants to bury a child.
- No.
- But he left five wonderful children--
- very good children, very wonderful people.
- That is a legacy, as well.
- Yes.
- That was my son.
- and his wife.
- We'll look at his picture later.
- It was his wedding.
- Let's talk first now about your parents.
- And tell me, how did your father support your family?
- You say it was nine children.
- Well, first, he, for five years after he got married,
- my mother's family supported him.
- And he was learning, like in a college, for Judaic studies.
- But later on, when they had three children,
- so he had to do something.
- He couldn't be supported anymore.
- So he was being supported--
- He sat by there for five years by my mother's family.
- And he was learning in a college.
- To be a rabbi?
- No, just to be a learned person.
- Not everybody has to be a rabbi.
- But even when he was working, he was still
- studying a couple hours every day.
- But that's the way the families are brought up,
- that you should--
- when you're young, you learn first.
- So you get the basics of life.
- And then, you know how to behave.
- Because people that learn behave different than people--
- and they have different interests.
- Learning opens up a world.
- Studying opens up a world.
- Yes.
- Yeah, you look at people and your judge people
- different than people that are just absorbed with themself
- and the things that they need.
- You a little observed with the outside world,
- and you notice people that nobody else notice,
- and you try to give them a hand.
- Was your father that kind of person?
- Yes, he definitely was.
- Was he a reflective person?
- Even when the horse and buggy, if the horse fell,
- he would go over.
- He didn't care if it's a Christian or Jew.
- He went over to help to get the horse up.
- And tell me, when he had to interrupt his studies
- and he had to work, what kind of work was he doing?
- Oh, he was in business.
- What kind of business?
- He was buying often in factories.
- It was a textile city, Lódz.
- So he bought off the raw material that
- was left from manufacturing.
- And then, he sorted it--
- had people to help him.
- Then better wool, or better qualities of better thread.
- And from this, you sorted to make thread
- to manufacture textiles.
- So you bought from factories the leftover, the--
- what do you call it?
- How would you say?
- Well, it's the leftover--
- The scrap, like scrap.
- The scrap, yeah.
- And from this, they made a little profit.
- And later on, it developed that he did very well.
- Oh, really?
- Yeah?
- Yes, yes.
- He even helped other people.
- They were poorer people.
- His brother was not well, so he helped marry off his daughter.
- My mother always said they're open home.
- And if somebody-- you know when you go to the synagogue,
- and sometimes people come.
- They don't have where to go.
- He would always bring somebody home.
- And my mother, prepared or not prepared,
- she always had enough food.
- First, she gave to guest, and the children,
- they give a little less.
- And you yourself, you eat less.
- If there isn't enough, but they're poor person that comes,
- you have to treat him like a king.
- Well, what a wonderful model to see as you're growing up.
- What a wonderful example.
- Yeah, we did, too.
- OK, so tell me a little bit about your mother.
- I mean, that's the idea of being religious
- and have a background with it.
- If you have no background, you don't know it.
- You didn't see it.
- You could be a good person, but you never saw it.
- So you don't know how to act.
- You see he's not dressed nice.
- He's an outsider.
- You don't know who he is.
- But if you treat people nice, this
- gives you satisfaction, too.
- And if somebody goes away smiling, has had a meal
- or didn't have where to sleep, you find place for him.
- You put the children on the carpet.
- On the floor, you put the mattress.
- And you give a stranger, a guest, you give the bed.
- And that used to be how your mother--
- In the family, that's how they behaved.
- Tell me a little bit, then, paint a picture for me,
- if you can, about what your home looked like.
- You had nine children.
- Did you have your own home?
- First, in the beginning, we didn't have a--
- it was a big apartment house, and it
- belonged to my grandmother.
- In Lódz-- or no, in Germany.
- No, in Lódz.
- In Lódz, OK.
- And when my father didn't make a good living,
- we lived on the fourth floor--
- I remember this-- on the fourth floor in one room.
- But when it got better, we moved to the third floor.
- We got two apartments.
- But my mother always helped him, too.
- Even the business, she was involved.
- What did she do?
- She went when you had to buy the stuff.
- In the factories, they had, like,
- a supervisor or a manager.
- So she went, and she spoke to him.
- And she would deal with them.
- And she spoke Polish better than my father.
- What language did you speak at home?
- Oh, they spoke Yiddish and Polish.
- We didn't speak because we had to go to school,
- and the people outside spoke Polish.
- So we spoke Polish.
- Children adapt languages very fast.
- They do, they do.
- Now, your father was from Germany,
- and your mother was from Poland?
- Yes.
- OK, and they left Germany because of--
- Of the times that were changing.
- Ah, because it was right before Hitler came to power.
- Yes.
- It was because of this reason?
- Yes.
- OK.
- And when they left, had your mother
- been living with your father's family in Germany,
- or was it they living on their own?
- On their own.
- On their own.
- I don't remember too much what happened there.
- Do you have any memories of Germany at all?
- Not much, no.
- OK.
- How many children were born in the family before you moved
- to Lódz?
- Three.
- Three.
- And the others were born later.
- So are you the oldest?
- No, I'm the third child.
- You're the third child.
- Could you tell me the names of your siblings?
- Yeah.
- The oldest was Abraham.
- And then was Hilda, my sister.
- Hilda?
- Two of us.
- They called her Hanya in Polish.
- And I was Masha.
- I was the third one.
- And then I had a brother.
- His name was Yakov Moshe, from both grandfathers.
- And then there was a sister.
- Her name was Gurtha.
- Gurtha, all right.
- Yes.
- She was-- and then was Gurtha.
- Then was a little brother, Yitzhak.
- Yitzhak, OK.
- And then was Yehuda Arya.
- Yehuda Arya, that's seven.
- And then was Eliyahu.
- Eliyahu.
- And then was Aaron.
- He was born 1939, Aaron.
- Aaron was born in 1939.
- You know, they were religious.
- They had children right off.
- But it was throughout the 1930s, while you were in Poland,
- that your mother had most of her children.
- Yes.
- OK, OK.
- And tell me about religious.
- You mentioned it earlier that you don't see.
- How did your parents live their religion?
- Religion because you study.
- You lived according to what God expects us to live like.
- That's what you study.
- The whole study is about how to live and how to behave.
- And was your father the one who brought this to the children
- more, or was this your mother?
- It was together.
- It was together.
- They were good team.
- My mother was busy was the children.
- And the on certain days, she had to go and help my father.
- Tell me, how did they meet, if they
- were from different places?
- She's from Poland, and he's from Germany.
- Yeah, but through people, through friends.
- That's how they met.
- They came to Poland once.
- And they met my mother.
- And that's how it happened.
- They didn't get married right away.
- They got married years later.
- Do you remember what date their marriage was?
- I don't remember.
- It must have been in the early '20s, you know, in 1920.
- Yeah, '22, '23.
- '22.
- For my oldest brother--
- no, even-- maybe '21.
- Something like that, yeah.
- Because my oldest brother was born in January.
- Of 19--?
- 1922.
- I see, OK.
- What kind of personalities did your parents have?
- Can you tell me what kind of personality your father had,
- your mother had?
- My father was very kind and always with a smile.
- And he explained to the children everything.
- Like it came for Passover, so we have to say the--
- I don't know if you know what it is.
- I know.
- On Passover, you tell the stories what happened in Egypt
- and why things happened and what happened.
- And that's the history that got punished.
- The Egyptians, they thought who was God,
- they believe that they are God.
- So God showed them.
- So he sent Moses to tell them to stop torturing the people.
- [BUSY SIGNAL]
- Let's cut for a second.
- So my father explained that there was one thing.
- God gave the Spanish man all the plagues.
- There were plagues that the water sent to blood.
- Because they didn't want to stop this.
- [PHONE RINGS]
- So your father would explain these stories,
- these biblical stories.
- Yes, because we were children.
- So he explained it so that we could understand.
- And I still remember this today.
- And your mother, did she also--
- My mother was more involved with keeping the house
- and keeping the house, helping my father,
- taking care of everything.
- Well, that's a lot of work.
- Nine children is a lot of work.
- Yeah, but we had--
- you know, in Poland, you could get, for, like, $20 a month,
- a young girl that help took care of the children,
- helped a little around the house, did the ironing.
- And she got food, and she got some money.
- Because the people were pretty poor in Poland and especially
- in the small towns.
- And so they would come to a big place like Lódz to look
- for work.
- To get work.
- And the child got--
- when the girl was, like, 15, 16, 18--
- after school-- they didn't go to college.
- So they couldn't afford it neither, probably.
- So your mother has, nevertheless, her hands full.
- She has nine children.
- Yes, she took care.
- She kept a very clean home, a very nice home.
- When they were better off, they furnished it beautiful.
- Was very, very nice.
- And she had a sense of elegance.
- She knew how to make things look good.
- Tell me a little bit about your home.
- I want to understand the level of modern life.
- Did you have electricity?
- Did you have--
- Electricity we had.
- We had a telephone.
- Oh, you had a telephone?
- Yes.
- And we had water running in the faucet.
- So you had plumbing.
- But we didn't have a bathroom.
- Because the house was built, like, 1918 or 1914.
- I don't know exactly.
- Was a big building-- four stories and on every story
- were three apartments.
- Was a room and a kitchen, nice size.
- And then, the third apartment was two-bedroom apartment.
- So when your parents were better off--
- Then we took two apartments.
- Then you had the fourth floor and the third floor.
- No, we didn't have the fourth.
- Somebody else lived on that floor.
- We got two apartments on the third floor.
- I see.
- And we made it into a kitchen, a living room, and two bedrooms.
- And your grandparents, did they live in the building, too--
- your mother's par--?
- Yes.
- No.
- She lived in a small town not far from Lódz.
- All right.
- And was your home, this place on the third floor,
- was that in the center of town or in a residential area?
- It was more on the out, not in the center
- but on the quiet, small streets.
- Was it a wooden--
- The street was a main street, going from the center,
- but was, like, from one to 93.
- We lived 93, was quite a few blocks down.
- Do you remember your address?
- Yes.
- What was it?
- Pomorska 93.
- Pomorska 93.
- Yes.
- What was the outside like?
- Were there trees and parks, or was it really city-like?
- No, it was a streetcar.
- When you walked out of the house was like a courtyard.
- And then was a gate in front, so people--
- at night, it was locked.
- Like a gate.
- And there was the source in front of the building.
- And there was a gate between--
- it was a small--
- on one side were two stores, like a shoemaker and a grocery.
- On the other side was a store that
- was selling food for animals, for horses.
- Did your father have a car?
- No.
- No.
- How did he travel?
- Transportation.
- There was a tramway, a streetcar, that went.
- And it stopped every few blocks.
- I see.
- And that's how he would get around?
- He would get around like this.
- If he needed, there were taxis, but they were expensive.
- Uh-huh.
- Was the neighborhood a mixed neighborhood?
- Horse and buggies you could rent.
- They were standing by a car station, by a--
- what do you call it--
- by a station.
- [PHONE RINGING]
- --we start?
- So yes, you were talking about horse and buggies.
- They would be outside.
- Yeah, you see, there was the driver.
- Like on 57th in Manhattan.
- Uh-huh.
- Oh, like they have near Central Park?
- Yeah, yeah, yeah, Central Park.
- So you pay them.
- And they would be like taxis.
- They called it [IN POLISH].
- [IN POLISH]
- OK.
- And was your neighborhood a mixed neighborhood or a, you'd
- say, more Jewish neighborhood?
- It's mix.
- It's mix.
- It was mixed.
- We had neighbors in the same building, also not Jewish.
- OK.
- Did you have any contact with the Polish people,
- the non-Jewish people.
- Yes, yes, normal, yes.
- Yeah, all the people that were in our neighborhood.
- Because I went to school.
- And when I came home, I helped with watching the younger
- children and did homework.
- I was good in math.
- So I sometimes had a girl that wasn't so good.
- So they gave me the girl to help her.
- We had to help the children.
- They couldn't afford other things,
- so the teacher assigned you to help.
- Help the other child.
- Yes.
- Did you go to public school?
- Yes, public school, yes.
- Tell me a little bit about what that was like.
- In Lódz, the public school was not mixed.
- There were only Jewish children, and on Saturday, we
- didn't go to school.
- Oh, really?
- And on Sunday, we had music lessons and religion.
- There were subjects, but the population in Lódz had to pay
- a tax to the Jewish Gemeinde because they were hiring.
- The rabbis were paid by the Gemeinde.
- The taxes that we paid supported it.
- So if I understand it correctly, people--
- everybody-- in Lódz had a tax, and it was to the municipality.
- And the municipality then distributed it to the Gemeinde.
- Yes.
- We had to pay maybe--
- yeah.
- And the Gemeinde also supported the private schools.
- Because there were people that couldn't
- afford to pay for the boys.
- And the boys was mandatory.
- Religious children had to go to learn.
- And the Gemeinde, in English, would be like community--
- the community.
- Yes.
- Yeah, your community, like a Jewish community.
- And they paid the rabbi.
- When there were-- what do you call it--
- disputes among Jewish people, so they went for the rabbi
- to straighten it out, like you go to, if it was not a public
- but was a private thing.
- So you didn't go to court.
- They needed to live, those people.
- They spent their time, and they spent the effort.
- So they were supported.
- So it, first of all, it was sure they didn't take sides.
- That they would be fair.
- Fair.
- Yeah.
- So explain to me, too, if you remember, Lódz,
- how was the population split up in the sense--
- It was 300,000 Jewish people in Lódz.
- That's a lot.
- That's a lot.
- Yeah.
- The whole population was 600,000.
- And the rest were all Poles?
- The rest were mixed.
- There were Germans.
- They were people from all over.
- Because to a big city, people come to make a living.
- Yeah.
- And you mentioned textiles were a huge--
- Yeah, was a very huge textile.
- There was one man that gave work to a lot of people.
- He was very wealthy.
- And he built the hospital.
- His name was Koznansky.
- Koznansky?
- Yes.
- And there was a hospital by his name.
- He had people that should have paid.
- Was he a Jewish person or a Polish person?
- He was Jewish.
- He wasn't very religious.
- But he gave work to girls from religious families.
- It didn't make any difference.
- But he gave a chance that they could get work.
- There were a lot of poor people, and there were rich people,
- like all over the world.
- And amongst the Jewish community in Lódz,
- were many very religious?
- Yes.
- Or were there many secular people, as well?
- Yeah, very religious.
- And there were even--
- there were two gymnasiums that were not religious.
- They even went to school.
- Only they only kept Yom Kippur.
- You know about Yom Kippur?
- Mm-hmm.
- And maybe Passover.
- They didn't keep but certain--
- New Years, Yom Kippur, and those holidays they kept.
- But they didn't even keep Shabbat.
- OK.
- So they were more--
- They're mixed population, yes.
- What are some of the memories that you have?
- I mean, we're talking about pre-war time, about Lódz.
- Was it a pretty city?
- It was a very pretty city.
- It was pretty.
- And there was divided in different sections.
- It was a big city.
- On the main street, what memories I have,
- it was a nice city.
- On the main street lived, it was called Piotrkowska.
- Piotrkowska, OK.
- Piotrkowska.
- And over there were the fancy stores, very elegant.
- And the wealthier population lived there.
- Were there cinemas?
- What?
- Were there cinemas?
- Cinemas-- movies, movie houses.
- Oh, yes, yeah, there were movies.
- Did you go?
- Yes.
- We went to movies only on occasions,
- when they went, like, with the school or with supervision.
- I see.
- Because--
- What about-- you were going to say something?
- No, no.
- If you want, next question.
- OK, next-- did you have a radio at home?
- Yes.
- You did?
- Yeah, but my father--
- my parents-- listened.
- We were children.
- We didn't listen to it.
- We didn't listen to the radio.
- But we had a telephone.
- How did you heat the house?
- What?
- How did you heat the house?
- Oh, there were tile ovens in the court.
- Oh, the coal ovens.
- Tile.
- Tile.
- But you put coal.
- Yeah, the coal.
- You put coal.
- And on top, it had a door where you kept the food warm.
- My father worked late.
- That was how we kept--
- it was fed on the bottom of the oven.
- And then, there was going through the chimney,
- it warmed up.
- In the kitchen was also a tile oven.
- And it had a metal plate.
- On the side, it had a warmer for hot water to wash dishes.
- We had a sink where the water came out.
- It was a big--
- on the top floor was a big reservoir.
- And the water was-- well, like a big tank--
- and it came into the sink, the water.
- So you had indoor plumbing.
- Indoor plumbing, but the bathrooms were downstairs.
- You had to go down.
- So were they outside the building, the bathrooms?
- In the courtyard.
- There were two bathrooms, like six bathrooms on each side.
- And was there a bathhouse somewhere in town?
- Oh, yes.
- OK.
- And is this where people would go to take baths,
- or did you do it at home?
- No, we did it at home.
- I don't remember if there was a shower.
- No, there was no bathroom.
- In the kit-- we had bathtubs for the younger children
- and for the older children.
- But we washed off at home.
- We're pretty clean.
- I'm just interested to know what did life look like.
- You say it looked very nice.
- You walked in.
- There was a bell.
- You rang the bell.
- It was a nice door, was a hallway.
- And there you went the kitchen, then was the dining room,
- then was another hallway.
- There was, like, a dinette, a small table.
- On the dining room, we only ate on Saturday.
- But during the week, we had this small dinette, like a dinette.
- Uh-huh.
- And that's where people would take their meals?
- Meals in the kitchen, too.
- The kitchen-- the kitchen.
- The room size was large.
- So the kitchen was big.
- There was place for a--
- yes, it was like a big tap.
- But you took the water from--
- you had to warm it up on the stove.
- Was big kettles.
- And was tile on the kitchen walls and on the--
- Who did all the cooking?
- My mother, my mother.
- Your mother, your mother.
- Was she a good cook?
- Yes, she was very good, very neat, too.
- She cooked, and she baked.
- She did everything.
- I wasn't interested in cooking.
- I was too young.
- Now, did your parents talk much about the events of what
- was going on in the world?
- You know, they had left Germany because of what
- was happening in Germany.
- Yeah, well, you see, we weren't interested.
- We're children.
- So we weren't involved with it--
- like, me.
- Maybe my older--
- I don't know.
- My sister, she was a little older than me,
- like two and a half years older.
- But I don't know.
- They were involved with friends and with children.
- They weren't involved with--
- during the war, of course.
- It's different.
- It's different.
- We'll come to that.
- We'll come to that.
- The house was a nice home.
- We had friends come.
- And there was a big park not far from us.
- So we went with the children, with a carriage, to the park.
- And there were sandboxes, and beautiful park, it was.
- What about school?
- The school was-- the school was rented in a private home.
- Oh, truly?
- OK.
- Yes.
- And did you learn about Polish history?
- Oh, yes.
- About European history.
- Yes, we learned a lot about Polish history.
- We had biology, even the younger grades, like five, six.
- We had biology.
- We made experiments with plants and--
- Did you like school?
- --history and poetry.
- And we learned a little about the world history.
- Because in the lessons of religion,
- we learned about old poets and what was going on
- in the biblical times.
- We learned poetry.
- We learned a lot.
- We knew a lot.
- Did you go to synagogue a lot?
- Because my father was Hasidic, so they
- didn't take the girls, only the boys.
- I see.
- So you never--
- We didn't go a lot, only on holidays.
- But you went on holidays?
- Yes, yes.
- We prayed.
- I fasted because I was ready after 12.
- So I fasted on the fast days.
- We were brought up, and we had, even, a private teacher
- to teach us Hebrew.
- So you knew Yiddish.
- You knew Polish.
- And you were studying Hebrew.
- Yes.
- Were there any other languages that you were speaking
- or that you were learning?
- Not now.
- Later, after the war, I learned more languages--
- after the war.
- So if there was any news of the outside world, in your world,
- in your life in the 1930s, growing up--
- No, we weren't involved.
- It didn't have an impact?
- No, we weren't involved.
- And your parents, as far as you knew,
- if they commented on things, it was just to one another?
- Among themselves, not to the children.
- OK.
- Can we cut for a second?
- Oh, OK.
- Now it's good?
- Now it's better.
- Do you remember anything from the last summer of 1939--
- Yes, I do.
- --before the war started?
- Yes.
- Tell me about that.
- What was that summer like?
- My parents, we used to go to--
- like here, you go upstate--
- to the country because there were trees
- and there were woods.
- So in summer, we used to go, for the summer months,
- up to the mountains.
- And that year, my parents went to a spa.
- And it was the last months before the war broke out.
- And when the war broke out, we were alone.
- And they had to come back to Lódz.
- They were someplace in the south, near--
- Carpathian?
- Karpates?
- What?
- In the Carpathian Mountains?
- No, it was near Romania.
- You know, in the south of Poland, towards the east more.
- We knew the map.
- We knew not only the map of Poland
- but of the whole world, the globe.
- They taught us a lot.
- Geography.
- Geography, history, too-- geography, history, biology.
- We learned a lot.
- So tell me, where were you?
- What happened to you?
- When the war broke out, how did you find out?
- We see-- they said that the Polish police--
- the Polish army, it was a soldier marching in the city.
- And when the Germans came in, they all were gone.
- And we had to go home.
- And when we came home, the Germans occupied, already,
- Lódz.
- And they already started taking off people, especially
- religious people that they knew they Jews.
- They captured them and told them to dig holes.
- And then they threw them in the hole.
- So the population, the men started
- running away because they were killing a lot of people.
- They told them to dig the holes, and then they threw them in.
- So they cut off their beards.
- They tore off--
- Did you see these things?
- Yeah, I saw it.
- But then, we stayed home.
- We didn't go out already.
- There were some bombardments.
- I don't remember where.
- But when we came, we were staying home.
- And we started to prepare.
- People are running to Russia, to the protectorate.
- Warsaw was still under the protectorate.
- But before we get there, when you said the Polish police,
- or the army, disappeared--
- No, the Polish army, they ran away.
- They ran away.
- So there was no protection.
- And were you in Lódz when the war started?
- We were in the country.
- But we had to go to Lódz.
- And my parents were in Stryi, somehwere.
- I don't remember the city.
- Let's cut for a second.
- So just to clarify so that I understand,
- you and your siblings were away from home, in the mountains--
- With the maid, with the girl.
- --with the maid when the war broke out.
- Yes.
- And your parents were in a different place at a spa.
- Yes, a spa.
- For two weeks, they went, or so.
- I see.
- To be together.
- No, they had arthritis or something.
- So they went to the spa.
- To heal a bit.
- To heal.
- OK.
- And do you remember hearing about the war breaking out?
- Do you remember how you heard of it?
- They were talking.
- But we were in the country.
- Nobody was-- we didn't know.
- But when we came back, we notice because it was September
- when the war broke out.
- And then there was the holidays.
- So we couldn't go to pray because they
- would come and kill the people.
- So somebody was standing out on guard if they were coming,
- or something was happening, so people could run away.
- It must have been a shock.
- It was a big shock.
- And then, a little later, they started
- evacuating and attacking the neighborhood,
- the rich neighborhoods.
- They tried to plunder, to take stuff.
- And by the end of the year, they evacuated already
- the Jewish people from the expensive neighborhoods.
- So people were running away.
- OK.
- And they were trying to run eastwards, is that what you--
- Eastwards.
- But when they went eastwards, they sent them to Siberia.
- Because they thought they spies, or they said they spies.
- Maybe they saw they're not spies.
- But the Russians weren't too wonderful, neither.
- So they sent them to Siberia.
- And over there, my husband came from a different neighborhood
- from the south.
- And their whole family ran away.
- Because they had two grown-up boys and their father.
- So my mother-in-law with--
- they have one more child, they have only three children--
- they ran to the other borders.
- And then, they sent them to Siberia.
- So was your husband, whom you married later,
- was he from Lódz, as well?
- No, no.
- Where was he from?
- It was called Sanok.
- Sanok.
- Sanok.
- Yes.
- In this south, in the southwest it was, I think, yes.
- Now, this is something you learned
- when you met your husband, and he told you
- about what he'd been through?
- Yes.
- But at the time, when the first months of the war and people
- are leaving, was there any news of what
- was going to happen to them when they
- get into the territory controlled by the Soviets?
- Did you know, in Lódz, what was happening in the east?
- They didn't know.
- Everybody was running.
- All the young people were running.
- I see.
- What about your brother?
- My brother was only 17.
- He wasn't so old.
- It was 1939.
- So he stayed with the family.
- He was studying out of town, but he came home for vacation.
- And he didn't go back when the war broke out.
- So he stayed with the family.
- And as a matter of fact, when, years later, in 1944,
- they evacuated the-- started evacuating the ghetto.
- There were raids before.
- They came to take young people.
- And they took children and mothers.
- We didn't know what was doing and where everything was.
- Obviously, my father had the radio,
- and he knew more than we knew.
- So this is going into--
- So in ghetto, I worked.
- We'll come to that in a minute.
- Right now, I still want to talk about those first months.
- It's the first months.
- Then, we also tried to go away.
- So my father, we hired, you know, like--
- what they use to transport merchandise.
- So we covered it with a canvas.
- And we went to the protectorate.
- That was not far from Warsaw.
- It was Lowicz.
- And over there, we came.
- And we came to a family.
- It was Saturday.
- We couldn't drive anymore.
- And in Lowicz, they came to a family.
- And my youngest brother had croup.
- So he couldn't-- and then, they started evacuating to Lódz,
- the city.
- And they started the ghetto.
- So we came back.
- And my father, it was called Lom-Fém.
- And they needed the raw material to make, for the army--
- what it called-- uniforms for the army.
- So they had to buy the material.
- And they allowed some Jews that gave material,
- they gave a green band.
- We used to have a band with the Juden on the arm.
- So you'd have a green band.
- We had to go with the band.
- Were you in the ghetto already, or were you
- still in your own home?
- We were still in the city.
- But then, they started evacuating to the ghetto.
- And my cousin knew somebody who lived in the area.
- And he gave him his apartment.
- And the Polish man that used to be his customer
- gave him his house in the ghetto area.
- And we moved, together with my cousins, to the ghetto.
- But my father stayed in the city.
- He had the permit, a green band.
- So this place that you moved to, what
- was that like, the place you moved to in the ghetto?
- Was like two bedrooms and a kitchen on the first floor.
- Smaller.
- It was a small house.
- And they used to have a barn for the horses downstairs.
- And my cousin took the downstairs apartment.
- We took one upstairs.
- It was a small house, like a private house.
- They had barns outside, around the house.
- Was small, like on an outskirts, not like in the city--
- small houses.
- Once you moved into the ghetto, were you ever able to leave it?
- No, there was a barbed wire around the ghetto.
- But later on, they gave work.
- And there was, the highway was why it was barbed with wire.
- But in one place was a bridge to go
- to the other side of the ghetto.
- And when they took us to work-- there was no school--
- so they took us to work.
- And I worked.
- And it was called Klein Mabel Fabrik.
- Klein Mabel Fabrik?
- Yeah, they made, for the kid, for the children--
- what do you call it--
- the playpens, children's cribs.
- So it was small furniture for small children.
- Children and also handles for a pail,
- you know, the wooden handles, like, the carved wood.
- And I helped there because I was a Jugendlicher.
- You were a youth, then.
- You were a teenager.
- A teenager.
- So I was working there.
- And there was a supervisor for the kids
- to see how they treat them.
- So of course, the people that work,
- they were also tired and hungry.
- Because in the ghetto, already started not the same food.
- We couldn't buy food, only what we got.
- And was there any possibility to keep kosher at all?
- No, we couldn't.
- We were happy to get some barley.
- And potato was a big deal.
- And we got already the portions of the bread.
- But you had to pay for it, too.
- So we worked.
- They payed something, not much.
- In the ghetto, there wasn't food already.
- So the first year, when we had to heat the house,
- no, we didn't get any coal to heat the house.
- So they had the barns.
- They boys broke it down.
- We used the wood.
- And the next year, in spring, we turned the ground,
- and we took the eyes from the potatoes.
- You cut out the eyes from the potato,
- and you put it in the ground upside down.
- And we turned the ground.
- And there was a pump downstairs.
- So we got to work.
- And when I came home from work, I
- was taking care of the garden.
- I was the gardener.
- So we did potatoes, little tomatoes.
- We planted things.
- Of course, there was no gates, so people stole.
- They were hungry.
- But the potatoes on the ground was a big help--
- I can imagine.
- --to get what to eat.
- Yeah, yeah.
- And unusual that you'd have a plot of land
- to be able to plant it.
- No, because we broke down the-- we needed the wood.
- You needed the wood.
- And so, the land the barn was on.
- Yeah, on the ground, the ground.
- Yeah, on the ground.
- And we didn't have horses or cows.
- No, but your father was allowed still
- to go in and out of the ghetto.
- Inside the ghetto, we could go, yes.
- My father worked in a straw factory.
- I worked in the furniture factories, Klein Mabel.
- That was over the bridge.
- We had to go to the other side of the ghetto.
- What about your older brother and sister?
- They also worked.
- Where did they work?
- They didn't work the same place I did.
- I think they worked were you straw or something else--
- to be honest.
- You don't know, huh?
- You don't remember?
- I don't.
- No, my sister worked in an office.
- And my brother worked in a factory someplace.
- Your mother, did she also go to work?
- Or did she stay home with the other children?
- With the babies she stayed home.
- There were little babies.
- So you couldn't leave them.
- The seven-year-old they took to the straw factory.
- They did work.
- And my father, there was a problem because Saturday,
- he didn't want to work.
- So the meat, there was horse meat.
- Now, horse meat isn't kosher.
- My father never ate meat in the ghetto.
- He never ate.
- But the children, they were hungry, and they're growing.
- So he permitted, to what they gave, we ate.
- But my father didn't eat the meat.
- The Lódz ghetto was one of those that existed the longest during
- the war.
- And it was run by Chaim--
- Rumkowski.
- Rumkowski.
- Did your family have any dealings with him?
- Did he touch your lives in any way?
- No.
- They made up, even, songs, like some that were sarcastic.
- Rumkowski Chaim
- [YIDDISH] means badly.
- It was like the manna that God gave in the wilderness.
- So he felt everything in the manna.
- Because there was no food, but it fell down from heaven.
- Like the manna did, yeah.
- Yes.
- So they made the joke, like he gives us barley.
- He made the ghetto.
- It was [INAUDIBLE].
- And he says it is gerecht.
- So that was like his song, like his satire.
- Did people, then, not like him very much?
- No.
- But it wasn't his fault. He did what he had to do.
- Did you ever see him?
- Yeah, we saw him, not very much, not very much.
- But there were stations where you picked up
- the bread for the week.
- And the bread was so heavy because should weigh more.
- So wasn't very well baked.
- But somehow, we bought, because my father was in the city,
- so we had some extra money to buy on the black market.
- There was a black market.
- In the ghetto?
- No, people that work buy food, like it's all over.
- So they tried to take something home.
- They didn't have money to buy out the card, the rations.
- So they had the money.
- So they had some flour so you could
- buy little flour so my mother baked something on Friday.
- So we were a little better off.
- So your father, was he able to--
- That's till 1940.
- When the Russian war broke out, everybody went to ghetto.
- Then it was finished.
- Oh, that's what my question was, that he was only until--
- it was 1941.
- '41, when the Russians went to war with Germany.
- Then he had to be in the ghetto, as well.
- We were in the ghetto till 1944.
- August 24, 1944, we left the ghetto.
- Tell me some other things about ghetto life
- before we get to that point.
- You're in the ghetto, then, for a good four and five years.
- That's a very long time, from the time
- that you are 14 years old till the time you're 18 or 19.
- No, I was 18.
- You were 18?
- Yes.
- So I worked there.
- And then, the man came from the school department.
- And he said that I am good.
- So they took me to the office to do the evidence.
- Every morning, when you came to work in the factory,
- had to go to the office to report--
- Yeah, that you're there.
- --that you're here.
- And you had a cell number, the floor number where you worked.
- And everywhere, you had the number, a registry number.
- I happen to have a good memory.
- So I work in the evidence.
- After a year or so, they took me to work in the office.
- There wasn't a registry office.
- So it was a little easier.
- Because I remembered so it went fast.
- When people came to work in the morning, they had to register.
- And they registered, then, with you.
- Yeah, there were more than me just.
- There was some other girls, too.
- Were the conditions easier in the office?
- Yes, you had to carry the heavy wood pieces.
- They were heavy sticks for the furniture.
- And also, you have to chisel.
- It was hard on the fingers.
- And office work is easier.
- Much easier.
- Was it warmer?
- Did you get any extra food?
- No food extra, no.
- You got the soap, and you got a piece of bread.
- [PHONE RINGS]
- That's all you got.
- Let's cut.
- OK, we were talking about office work and work
- in the factory itself.
- In the factory, yeah.
- I want to ask a larger question.
- Were you always hungry, or were you
- not so hungry in the ghetto?
- You see, it was harder for boys.
- Because I didn't grow too much anymore
- because there wasn't the food what teenagers need.
- But I wasn't so hungry because they used to give kohlrabi.
- I didn't like it.
- But I was occupied here in the garden.
- I had this, but the boys were hungry.
- I could have used another piece of bread.
- But you couldn't complain because what could they
- do, the parents?
- It was much harder for the grown boys.
- Were there many Germans soldiers in the ghetto?
- Did you see many of them?
- In the ghetto?
- They were guarding by the wires, by the barbed wires,
- that people shouldn't run out from the ghetto.
- But they didn't patrol the ghetto?
- They patrolled the borders.
- OK, so you didn't have any real contact with them?
- Oh, the Germans came every so often.
- They came to grab people, whoever they could.
- They took them to concentration camps.
- Before us, we were the last transport.
- And they took children.
- They took men.
- I had an aunt that lived from my mother's side.
- When they had the rations, they came,
- and they went into every house to see if there's people.
- And they took out whoever they wanted--
- old people, young people.
- So my father-- it was a small house.
- And under the steps was a place where you could go in.
- So my father opened the floor.
- He cut the floor open, and he made
- a hiding place they shouldn't come.
- Because they took children and everybody to take for killing.
- So when there were the rations, we lived on--
- it was like you see here.
- The streets went like this.
- So like, you lived on this side of the street.
- On the other side, there was a small place
- that you could go through to the other street
- without going around.
- So this place, when they were [INAUDIBLE]----
- Where they were taking people away?
- People away, my brother got a band as a policeman.
- And he came to warn us we should hide in the hiding place.
- So your brother was working as a ghetto policeperson?
- No, he just--
- He just got the band.
- He just got the band.
- He wasn't a policeman.
- He just got the band from the police station.
- And those days, you paid something, you know,
- like a loaf of bread.
- And so he came.
- So we went down with the children.
- Also was an old lady.
- They were also afraid they'd take the old people
- for killing, too.
- So he dug a hole.
- And from the sand, he made two, like, benches to sit--
- you put a piece of board--
- so the people could hide.
- And we knew that if we heard the steps,
- so we locked the children's mouths
- so you shouldn't hear noises.
- And when they went away, so my brother
- came that we could go out, ready to go into the houses.
- And did this happen a lot?
- It happened.
- Did you happen to look in your home?
- It happened.
- But the last time it happened, my mother
- was so scared because there were shots outside.
- And she imagined that they killed my brother.
- So we gave up, and we went away.
- But there was already the end.
- Two weeks later, the whole ghetto was evacuated.
- I see.
- So that's at the end of the time.
- But throughout the ghetto time, I mean,
- you had so many small children in your family.
- It was a risk.
- Yes, so we had to hide.
- Yeah, it was a risk.
- Because they took away--
- they had no use for small children, so they killed them.
- They killed them.
- We don't know where they took them.
- My aunt, we heard, she had two boys.
- Her husband went to Russia.
- And she stayed with two boys.
- So she lived not far from us.
- And we took her in whenever she was all alone.
- So she also was hiding there.
- And we heard that they took them to the ocean,
- to the Baltic ocean, and they threw this transport of people
- into the ocean, alive.
- We didn't know what happened.
- But then we heard from people--
- Later.
- --after the war.
- That's what happened.
- So she had two boys.
- One was nine.
- One was 11.
- And the husband died in Russia.
- He never came back.
- In the ghetto, did you see people starving?
- Did you see people dying in the ghetto when you were there?
- Well, going.
- Now it was closed after a certain time.
- In the beginning of January, February 1940
- was close the ghetto.
- No, no, no, what I mean is within the ghetto,
- during the years that you lived there--
- If you met people, yes.
- After work, there wasn't--
- people that lived in the area you saw.
- You didn't have time to go because we worked.
- My question was different.
- My question was, did you see people dying?
- Did you see people hungry?
- Oh, yes.
- You saw people like skin and bone
- because they couldn't live from what they lived.
- And sometimes, they were all the people,
- they didn't even have the money.
- You had to pay for it, too, to buy it.
- So they sold.
- And it happened that people kept the corpse to get the food.
- They kept the corpse after they died to get-- they were hungry.
- So they got the food, that they could live.
- So they were starving.
- Yes.
- They were starving.
- It was very bad.
- We were hungry in the ghetto.
- There was a joke that--
- it was a song--
- I have for you a good thing, a roll with butter,
- that this would be the best thing for you,
- you know, like a little something.
- So the other boy answered, I cannot laugh because if I look
- at my sick father, I cannot laugh,
- and I cannot enjoy anything.
- You know, a child conversation was--
- in a song, they made up jokes.
- But it was not a joke.
- Yeah, it was through tears.
- What?
- A joke through--
- Through tears, yeah.
- Did your parents' personalities change at all
- through these types of hardships?
- Of course, they change.
- But your main thing in a Jewish family is your family.
- That's what you live for, for your family and to help people
- if you can.
- A person isn't born just for yourself.
- You are born here that sometimes, I need you,
- sometimes you need me.
- But people need people.
- I don't know if I'm expressing myself right.
- Oh, absolutely perfectly.
- I'm just wondering how your mother and father took it, how
- they were able to handle this.
- Because they have nine children.
- Oh, yeah, but my brothers-- my brother was already big.
- And the ones that were over 10, you
- know, you grow up faster in a big family.
- Over 10, 11, 12, you already people.
- You had responsibilities.
- In a big family, somehow, everybody's close.
- You care for each other.
- Did that help you survive, do you think?
- Yes, yes.
- It helped me survive.
- You know, sometimes people ask, how did you survive?
- Honestly, I don't know.
- God wanted it.
- It was the way that, when they sent us to Auschwitz
- and when they shaved our hair, I couldn't
- recognize my sister next to me.
- My other sister went with my mother straight off.
- And I saw through the bath house where we took the baths
- and when they cut us, off the hair, we were standing.
- There was big windows downstairs.
- And there were people standing out line.
- And I think I saw my father with the two--
- all the boys, like, eight--
- eight, nine, 10.
- And my mother, we never saw.
- Since we left the train that brought us to Auschwitz,
- I never saw her.
- But the kapo that took us off was the Jewish police.
- My sister went with my mother.
- So he told her, don't go there.
- This way, they going to kill you.
- They gas you, and they burn you.
- So she said, no, it's my children.
- I want to go with them.
- They told us that the mothers will
- take care of the children, which wasn't true.
- Was it true?
- It wasn't.
- And on the way, when we went from the baths to the barracks
- where we stayed, there was a big road that was pebbles.
- And they didn't give us shoes, so we walked on the road.
- Oh, you're leaving?
- Yeah, I'm leaving at 2 o'clock.
- OK.
- Let's step back a little bit.
- I want to hear everything that you have to say about this.
- But let's step back and paint the picture in the sense,
- you're saying that the last time you
- hid under the stairs in the ghetto, your mother
- was frightened because she heard shots.
- We heard shots outside.
- So then, what happened?
- So she said-- she was very-- she got hysterical.
- And we were still in the hole there.
- This, the last time, we didn't see.
- Until we saw him, we didn't know that he's alive.
- So my mother said to my father, if we cannot take it,
- what could be?
- Said, it looks like the end.
- So my father knew something about Auschwitz.
- So we went on those--
- you could only take a bag, a duffel bag, on the--
- So you left your hiding place.
- --with nothing.
- Well, after the hiding place, went upstairs.
- We ate something.
- And when they came next time, we were there.
- They took us.
- So it wasn't that time, but it was the next time.
- Yes.
- And they took you to-- to Auschwitz.
- This was August.
- About two weeks later, the ghetto was liquidated.
- So this is August, 1944.
- Yes.
- We left on the 24th.
- Were all of you together, all nine children?
- All were together.
- We struggled to be together.
- But we all went.
- And then, when the train stopped, my father went down.
- And he saw this sign Auschwitz.
- He knew about Auschwitz.
- We didn't know.
- How do you know he knew?
- What?
- How do you know that he knew?
- Because he told my brother and my oldest sister
- don't tell Mommy anything.
- It's not good.
- And he gave us--
- when he sold the merchandise from when the Germans bought
- the merchandise.
- So he bought diamonds.
- Because you couldn't run with the merchandise, and you
- couldn't run with money.
- So he bought diamonds.
- So he gave all the children, he gave each one a diamond.
- And I had a wisdom tooth here.
- I had the cotton over.
- So I put one diamond-- he gave me two--
- one diamond here and one here.
- And I didn't know whatever he gave me.
- He said, if you have to save your life, give it away,
- or if you need to get food or anything.
- He knew something what was going on.
- So he gave all the children, the three older, for all children,
- for all the children-- my sister, too.
- Was this in the train going to Auschwitz?
- Before we went off the trains, he gave us.
- We were already in Auschwitz, yeah.
- So you were on the train.
- I see.
- He gave us this.
- So I put one here.
- But the night-- so we went to the barracks, on the way,
- we saw in the distance, in white uniforms,
- a band was playing Vienna waltz.
- And in the background, we heard the screaming.
- To deafen down the screaming, so the band was playing very loud.
- But you could still hear something.
- And then my throat got so dry.
- And I wasn't hungry.
- I wasn't thirsty.
- I was just feeling like I'm choking because I
- knew what's going to happen.
- He told us open that they gas you and they burn you.
- So I imagine all this.
- And then, we went to the barracks.
- You're tired.
- We didn't eat, and we didn't drink.
- And the first night, we slept on the floor.
- Was the whole family still together?
- No, no, just me and my sister.
- The older sister?
- The boys went-- my younger sister.
- My older sister went with my mother.
- So when you got off the train, you were split apart.
- We were all together on the train.
- OK.
- But when you got off the train--
- They selected-- left, right, to work, or mothers and children
- on the other side.
- And your father, too.
- And father, too.
- My father was a little away, too.
- But he told me not to tell Mommy anything because she
- shouldn't be a shock.
- What happened that night on the way, we didn't get shoes.
- We just got some-- they took away everything we had,
- and they cut off the hair.
- And we waited there.
- They put some sanitizer on top of the.
- I didn't recognize my sissy, who looked different without hair.
- But we were standing there by the big window,
- and we saw outside, lined up, the men.
- And we were only girls here, on this side.
- So and I heard them singing.
- I felt I'm choking.
- But what can you do?
- We can't do anything.
- We came to this Lager.
- The first night, they didn't send us to the right place.
- And another lady were, like, lying down.
- And on top of you was another person.
- The next day, they sent us to Lager 20 or 21.
- And we got already bunk beds--
- on straw.
- But was an improvement on laying on the floor.
- And then, every night at 2:00, they came.
- We should coffee [INAUDIBLE]--
- to drink coffee.
- So some girls went.
- And that night, we were already a few weeks in--
- maybe six weeks in Auschwitz.
- And the diamonds were always in your mouth.
- One I lost right away, the first night.
- But one I saved.
- The better one, I lost.
- But this one, I saved.
- And when we got to that room, I was afraid to drink or eat
- anything.
- I didn't realize that I lost this one.
- So the diamond-- there was a girl,
- she came to the same place where we had the bunk beds.
- And she knew how to--
- so I was very scared.
- I was watching it so much. because my brothers gave it
- away in Bergen-Belsen for food so they could get something.
- We didn't know, but after the war, we met.
- And after we drank coffee, 2 o'clock at night,
- we had to stand outside lined up in five--
- and it was already cold in Poland--
- without shoes.
- Some girls got, like, Dutch wooden shoes.
- So I put the foot a little on the back of their foot.
- I shouldn't stand on the ground so much.
- My legs got frozen.
- Because over there, the climate is different than here.
- And then, in beginning of October,
- they sent us to a working camp, to Sudetenland.
- In Czechoslovakia.
- In Czechoslovakia.
- But you went under quarantine.
- Under quarantine?
- Yes, quarantine.
- Because they had to make sure that we healthy to go to work.
- It was at an ammunition factory.
- Did you have shoes by that point?
- Or were you still barefoot?
- I had a cold.
- I think, then, they send us--
- they gave us-- in Auschwitz, I didn't have shoes.
- But I think when they sent us out to Halbstadt,
- I think we got shoes.
- And my friend cut off from the nightgown a piece
- to cover that we were without hair,
- so to put like handkerchief on the head.
- So we went.
- And I was sick.
- And I pinched my sister, she should look healthy.
- And I was scared, too.
- If you didn't look healthy, they wouldn't send you to work.
- And we were happy to get out.
- And my friend, we so friendly.
- We stayed all the time till the end of the war together.
- She knew how to sew.
- And in that working camp, there were French working, also,
- in the same factory, in the ammunition factory.
- So they brought us a needle and thread.
- And I sewed it into the nightgown
- because I was always so scared that I lose it.
- So you had it in your mouth until you went to Halbstadt,
- and then you sewed it into the nightgown?
- Yes.
- It was very tough.
- I didn't have, when I ate, I took it out.
- Yeah, because you could swallow it easily.
- So explain this to me.
- What was the name, first of all, of your friend, the one
- that you were--
- Ruth Berlinska, but she got married.
- After the war, she went to France.
- And she married there a boy from Lódz.
- But they lived in France.
- And when we came back after the war,
- we went back to Lódz to look for family.
- We'll come to that.
- I want to ask, at this point, when
- there was the selection when you get off of the train,
- at that point, it was your father--
- The whole family was.
- Yeah, but your father was selected.
- Your mother was selected.
- No, they took the whole family.
- They put us on the trains.
- I understand.
- I'm saying, when you get off in Auschwitz,
- and they're making the selection,
- who was sent to the gas chamber, and who was not?
- One to the right, one to the left.
- The mothers and children the one side.
- So from your family, it was your mother--
- [PHONE RINGS]
- And three-- OK.
- So I'm sorry.
- We were interrupted a little bit.
- Who was it that was sent to the chambers right away
- from your family?
- From my family, my mother, my sister--
- Your older sister.
- My older sister and the two youngest children.
- The young boys, the young babies?
- Yeah, Aaron that was born in '39 and the one--
- Eliyahu?
- Two years, he.
- Yeah.
- Eliyahu.
- Yeah.
- He was three years old.
- I found a picture in Belgium from this little boy.
- Excuse me?
- We found a picture after the war.
- My grandmother's sister came before the war to visit,
- and we gave her some pictures.
- So she gave us after the war.
- Because we didn't take anything along.
- We couldn't.
- So it was your mother, your older sister--
- And the two little boys.
- --the two little boys.
- And my father had the other two little boys.
- But what happened with him?
- They also sent him, with the children.
- They took care of the children.
- They didn't take care of the children.
- Nobody saw my father no place.
- So it was five of the children--
- your sister, two little boys with your mother,
- and two little boys with your father.
- Mother, father, and five children.
- Five children.
- My sister, they begged her not to go.
- Because they knew.
- And she was beautiful, blonde, very pretty girl.
- And she wanted-- you know, we didn't know all this.
- Maybe if she knew.
- Maybe it wasn't so good that we didn't know.
- Because then-- but this Kapo, the one
- that was taking off the people off the trains, he told her,
- don't go.
- Don't go.
- To your sister?
- To my sister.
- And you heard this?
- [INAUDIBLE]
- I heard it.
- You heard it.
- And what was the chairman at the time.
- I forgot at this moment.
- I don't remember the name--
- the one that took the people off the wagons, that
- did the selection, getting people off the trains.
- I don't remember his name.
- So he also sometimes said, don't go.
- Leave the children.
- But which mother leaves her children?
- So when you were in Auschwitz, you realized what had happened?
- Yes.
- And they told us, you know.
- Because the people that work there.
- But you still, you know--
- subconsciously, you hope that maybe they made it.
- Maybe they will live.
- But with my mother, I knew right away,
- and with my sister and the two younger children.
- I knew it right away, that it's not good.
- But you helpless.
- What can we do?
- What could we have done?
- [BUZZING]
- And even in Auschwitz, there were also wires--
- Hang on a second.
- Excuse me.
- I'm sorry we were interrupted.
- That's OK.
- So you were saying about--
- you had hope.
- You knew about your mother.
- You know, but subconsciously, you say maybe, maybe, maybe.
- As long as you don't know positive,
- you still believe that maybe.
- Yeah.
- So in the end, it was you, your younger sister, who was--
- And my older brother.
- Abraham.
- And my younger brother, the Yakov Moshe.
- Yakov Moshe.
- For my oldest brother and then the one younger than me.
- OK.
- So it was Abraham, Yakov--
- And me and Gurtha.
- Gurtha-- Gurtha, OK.
- So it was the four of you.
- But you weren't together when you were in Auschwitz.
- Yeah, we two were together.
- And when they-- sometimes just closed the gate
- when they gave the coffee.
- You escape.
- We shouldn't be separated.
- Yeah.
- Did you know what happened to your older brother and younger
- brother at that point?
- No, we didn't know until after the war, no.
- Did they survive the war?
- Yes.
- They went in Bergen-Belsen in Germany.
- I see.
- So they were in Auschwitz, and then, from there,
- to Bergen-Belsen.
- Bergen-Belsen.
- They sent people different places.
- They were working there because they were young.
- So they could work.
- You are in the Halbstadt.
- Yeah, and my sister, too.
- Sister's in the Halbstadt.
- Did she get any diamonds?
- She also lost one.
- She didn't-- she was young.
- He gave her one.
- But she lost it--
- swallowed it.
- Maybe swallow.
- Go look in Auschwitz.
- You had to go to the bathroom.
- You had to report.
- You couldn't go to the bathroom when you wanted.
- There was a time, and you had to report.
- Every time you have to go.
- Go to the bathroom, you had to report.
- When you were in Halbstadt--
- Yes, was different.
- Tell me about that.
- Tell me about what it was like there.
- You see, it was a small town.
- Was an ammunition factory there and a Weberei.
- Some girls were sent--
- in the same building where we stayed, or two floors down,
- was a--
- what do you call--
- a weaving company.
- And some girls were sent there, some of the girls.
- I met one after the war once.
- It was in our hotel, in the lobby.
- I saw people, they looked like similar.
- So ask, where are you from?
- She said, I'm from Lódz.
- So I say, where were you during the war?
- She was in the same place.
- We slept in the same place.
- But she worked downstairs.
- But we knew each other.
- There were 500 girls altogether.
- And what did you do?
- What was your job?
- I was cutting with a stencil machine.
- It was such pieces that you use for the aeroplanes.
- And they had, like--
- so it was machine.
- You got the case around.
- And the piece was cutting out, like when you move gauges.
- Like in a car, I guess, in an aeroplane.
- There was a small piece.
- And you just--
- You cut ridges in it?
- It was a machine.
- You had to get it down and cut out.
- It wasn't easy work.
- I was hard work but better than Auschwitz.
- In Auschwitz, you didn't work, but you
- were standing hours outside at night, instead of sleeping.
- Here, at least, you could sleep a little.
- And on Sunday, you could get a shower,
- and you could wash your clothes.
- You had a Sunday.
- It was more humanely.
- And even the people--
- I mean, one [IN GERMAN] was nasty.
- One guard was nasty?
- Yeah, nasty.
- And one night, I fell asleep by the machine
- because there was no work.
- So she came over, she knocked out two teeth.
- Because I fell asleep.
- Their supervisor didn't care.
- He saw there was no work.
- And she came over.
- And when we had to go to the bathroom,
- we also had to report to her.
- And she was always nasty.
- And there was another one, Ursula.
- She was a sweetheart of a young girl.
- And she was also German.
- But she was sweet and nice.
- You had to go, she left you go to the bathroom.
- And the French people used to bring us sometimes an apple.
- to Ruth.
- Ruth, she was very pretty girl.
- I don't know if he fell in love with her, but he was kind.
- So but I worked by his machines.
- By the French person's machines?
- Yes.
- So when we got an apple, we went to the bathroom.
- We shared it.
- How long were you there?
- We went in October till May 5.
- So you were liberated there?
- Yeah, we were liberated.
- But a week before we were liberated, or maybe a few days,
- they told us that we going to go someplace else.
- We should be ready.
- But they wanted to send us, and what happened,
- the Russians came faster than you thought.
- And they didn't send us.
- But then, we found out--
- the French told us.
- They knew more than we did because they had the radios
- and they lived with families together.
- That weren't like we because they
- were from the border between Germany and France.
- Aha, OK.
- Now, were these French military people?
- No, no, they worked like we did.
- I know, but--
- They were also prisoners but with families.
- Like where we lived in the ghetto, they lived over there.
- But the French prisoners, were they all men?
- Or were they also women and children?
- The men worked.
- We didn't see any French women.
- Only the men worked.
- But they had families there.
- Their own families?
- Yes.
- They lived in there.
- But they didn't come to work.
- The men came to work.
- Ah, I see, I see.
- And we were only girls that worked there.
- Some girls were-- maybe one was 25, one was 26, 27.
- Those were the older girls.
- But otherwise, they were young girls working.
- Did you have any sense that the war is coming to an end,
- that the Germans are losing?
- No, we didn't even realize when they told us that we
- going to a different place.
- The French told us there's mines on the road,
- and they wanted to send us to test the mines
- before the Russian came.
- They wanted to test if the mines are working.
- So they wanted to send us as--
- As mine blowers-up.
- And if you blow up, well, that's too bad.
- It wasn't a big thing.
- It was just Jewish children who was it.
- But, you know, God leads the world, not the people.
- Even the big people don't lead the world.
- That's people that believe believe
- that God leads the world.
- Did you pray when you were in Auschwitz and in this place?
- Did you have any--
- Yeah, we prayed by heart, what we knew how to pray.
- We didn't have books.
- Did you have any conversations with God?
- Yes.
- Did you ask, why is this happening?
- Well, we were bitter.
- We were very bitter, even after the war.
- Why did it have to happen?
- Those children never sinned.
- They were little kids.
- They never did anything.
- Some people lost their faith because of that.
- Yeah, we lost for a while.
- We weren't so religious for a while.
- What did it take for you to get it back?
- We saw that God took care of us.
- We were like lost sheep.
- We didn't have where to go.
- We didn't know.
- Even when the war ended what choice was it were.
- We thought that if the war would end,
- everybody would run and try to help us.
- There was nobody to help.
- No, I wouldn't say--
- the Czech government wasn't bad.
- They gave us money to go home.
- And when the war was over, the French came in.
- They sent the [IN FRENCH].
- And they said, the war is over.
- But where did we have to go?
- So it wasn't the Russians--
- We didn't have money.
- --who liberated you?
- It was the French?
- The Russians, but they were drunk.
- And they came from Afghanistan and Caucasus.
- They were Russian-- very wild, drunken soldiers.
- It was scary.
- It was very scary.
- Were you frightened of those soldiers?
- Yes, yes.
- There was one major that came from Minsk, from a big city.
- And he said that I am Jewish and try to get out of the way.
- Because they're not out for any good.
- Because they were drunk, and they
- wanted to have a good time.
- What were they interested in?
- Did that happen with many Jewish girls?
- Yeah, one girl ran away.
- She was very tall.
- Then we ran away from that place where
- we stayed in that factory.
- Because the Russians came in and to them,
- you know, they are on the way.
- They wanted to have a good time.
- We were very scared.
- So we found a house that the Germans
- left, just like we left.
- Because they ran away, too, from the Russians.
- So we were hiding there.
- And there, once, a Russian came, too.
- And he picked the tallest girl.
- And it was already night.
- And we didn't know.
- So she ran to a place where little rabbits hide.
- And she was very tall.
- She said she doesn't know how she do it.
- He was drunk.
- She ran away.
- And all night, she stayed in this place--
- Rabbit hole.
- --in the rabbit place.
- And in the morning, when it was light,
- she saw he isn't there anymore.
- She came back to the house.
- And then, we got scared to stay there, too.
- So we went to Prague.
- The authorities-- I don't know what the story is.
- I can't even remember.
- We stayed in the place, in that factory place,
- where we slept for a while.
- But then this Russian came.
- And we were scared of them.
- There was no place where to go, what to do.
- Then we went some--
- but they told us we could go to--
- they gave trains to Prague.
- We stayed all night one night.
- And well, scary for young girls to be anyplace.
- You were alone.
- You weren't safe anyplace.
- So when you got to Prague--
- To Prague, they gave us money.
- And then we went to Poland to go home.
- So we went with trains.
- They gave money for the trains.
- And they took care of our papers.
- So I don't know.
- Was this the Czech authorities, or was this the--
- Jewish Czech.
- The Jewish.
- OK, OK.
- I don't know if it was only-- the Czech were very nice, even
- the supervisor in that factory.
- He was also very nice.
- He was Czech?
- Yes.
- He spoke German, but he was--
- they behaved different-- different people.
- We weren't so scared.
- They were normal, kind people.
- They couldn't do anything for us,
- but at least they didn't scare us.
- Did you make it back to Lódz?
- Did you get back to Lódz?
- We got back to Lódz.
- But we didn't have much money, neither.
- The first little town we got, coming
- over the border from Czechoslovakia to Poland,
- there's some Polish ladies by the station,
- one of the first station.
- And they said, so many of you are still alive?
- We were three girls--
- three.
- I don't think there were more than three girls.
- But then, we met somebody told us that our uncle--
- my mother's brother-- is alive.
- And they told us already they went back
- to look for their family, their two older girls.
- And they took us for the night to their house.
- And they were so nice.
- They called us children.
- So they got out of the beds, and they slept on the floor
- and gave me and my sister the beds to sleep
- and gave us money to go to Pabianice to see to my uncle.
- Pabianice is close to Lódz?
- Yes.
- OK.
- And this was an uncle on your mother's or your father's side?
- On my mother's side.
- On your mother's side.
- Yes.
- So he got freed in April because he was in a different place.
- And he got free either March or April.
- The Russians came in before.
- Then he went home.
- And they used to have a bakery.
- So he bought his bakery.
- And they had what to eat.
- And they took us in and took all the--
- what do you call it--
- children that lost their families--
- orphans-- they took.
- They were also teenagers.
- But they took them in.
- And they took us in, too.
- And so you stayed with your uncle.
- Well, for a while.
- And then, my aunt was pregnant.
- She was expecting a baby.
- And we were scared to be in Poland.
- Because in small towns, they killed Jews.
- Lódz was a bigger city, was not so dangerous.
- But we were scared.
- And then, we found out--
- when you came to Lódz was like a big board,
- and your registered who's looking for whom.
- So my brothers registered from Bergen-Belsen
- that they are looking for family.
- And then, they stayed.
- The younger brother stayed in Germany,
- and my older brother came back.
- And he came back to look for us.
- So he came to my aunt.
- But I was sick.
- I went to some place with my uncle to buy flour.
- And then I got the typhus, and I was in the hospital.
- So when my brother came back, he couldn't see me, only
- through the window because--
- Right, you were quarantined.
- Yes, I was under.
- But your sister was there?
- My sister was in the house.
- And I was in the hospital.
- So tell me, at that point, did you still have your diamond?
- Yes, yes.
- You still had it?
- Yeah, and then, when we all got to Germany, to Berlin--
- my aunt had the baby in December.
- She also left?
- Your uncle left with your aunt.
- Yeah, he sold the bakery.
- Whatever the money they got, we had to pay money to smuggle us.
- We were on trains with coal.
- And we paid the people working.
- And they put trust between the coal.
- And why did you need to be smuggled out of Poland?
- We didn't want to stay there.
- It was dangerous.
- Yeah, but why couldn't you just freely leave or go on a train?
- No, you couldn't.
- Why not?
- Why not?
- You couldn't because they wouldn't let us in.
- Germany wouldn't let you in, or the Poles wouldn't let you out?
- The Poles would-- the Poles might--
- I don't know why.
- They took care of it.
- They paid them.
- And we ended up in West Berlin.
- I mean, one of the reasons why I'm asking
- is that I suspect it's because it
- was occupied by Soviet forces, and they weren't letting people
- out--
- I suspect.
- But I wanted to find out whether that's the case.
- Yes, probably the Russian.
- The Russians wouldn't let us out because the city
- was divided into French, English, Russian, and American.
- You're talking about Berlin?
- Berlin, yes.
- Which section did you arrive into?
- In American.
- Uh-huh.
- You go to the American section.
- OK.
- We could go to the French, but we had plans,
- either we go to Israel or to America.
- There was no other places to go.
- So it was that your brother came back to Lódz.
- They found you.
- One brother.
- Then we went back to pick up my other brother.
- He was in Germany.
- And then, we stayed--
- the government, the Gemeinde gave an apartment to my aunt.
- It was the first Jewish child born from those people.
- And the American gave my uncle a bakery.
- So he begged for the Americans.
- And this was in Berlin?
- Yeah, in Berlin.
- And there was a deaf boy between those orphans,
- was a boy, a deaf boy, from that city
- where my uncle lived and three girls.
- And my aunt's two girls got married.
- And the deaf boy stayed in Berlin.
- I don't know what happened.
- One girl went to France.
- She had an uncle there.
- And the other one had some family in Israel, so they went.
- We couldn't go to Israel.
- They wouldn't let us.
- I have a question here.
- You have four children who survived--
- Yes.
- --your older brother, your younger brother,
- your younger sister, and you.
- Did you end up living together again?
- Yes.
- So you didn't stay with your uncle and your aunt?
- You lived separately?
- After a while, we lived separate.
- We didn't go to the DP camps.
- We lived in the city.
- OK.
- You lived in Berlin.
- Because of my aunt, yeah.
- OK.
- And I think you told me--
- At this point, we sold the diamond.
- We were on our own, and started doing something.
- OK, so you sold your diamond in Berlin.
- I gave it to my brother.
- They took care of us.
- Because the girls, you know, it's different.
- And so, did your sister still have a diamond
- to give to him, as well?
- She didn't, actually.
- She lost hers.
- She didn't have.
- She lost it.
- And I lost my second one, too.
- But nobody worried about it.
- That was helpful.
- It's what your father would have wanted.
- It's exactly why he wanted you to have them.
- And it was a good thing.
- Because who would give you anything?
- It's good the uncle and the aunt took care of us.
- But you know, they had already a baby,
- and they took care of the other.
- The deaf boy was a little helpless
- because he couldn't speak.
- But then, I don't know, maybe somebody in the Gemeinde
- took care of him.
- Now, you're in Berlin.
- And I think you told me.
- What section of the city were you living in?
- In Kreuzberg.
- In Kreuzberg.
- How long did you stay there?
- Five-some.
- From December '45 till '51.
- I got married in 1951.
- Oh, so you stayed six years in Berlin?
- Yes.
- I went to school.
- I learned languages.
- I learned to prepare manicure, makeup.
- I don't know.
- They were from the HIAS.
- They helped us.
- So you had some training.
- But even with this, we were-- what could too much?
- We could not.
- And my sister went to a nursing school.
- She finished high school.
- And she went to a nurse school.
- She was younger than me.
- Then she wanted to go to medical school.
- And I got married.
- And we got permits to go to America.
- How did you meet your husband?
- In Berlin, I met him.
- How?
- Through friends.
- I see.
- And how did he get there?
- How did he leave the Soviet Union?
- He was Soviet Union.
- They came home to Poland with his mother.
- And the brother was sick.
- He had TB on bone--
- TB.
- So my husband worked very hard to get him to Switzerland.
- They had a sanatorium there, too.
- He healed.
- Did he?
- Yes.
- He got better?
- Yes.
- My husband had already a heart condition.
- I didn't know.
- But somehow he lived.
- And God gave us four children.
- And he took care of us.
- Now that's why I believe in God.
- Because we see it, that we were very helpless,
- and who helped us?
- Is there something else you would like
- to add to your story for today?
- We've talked about an awful lot.
- And in a few hours, you can never
- get the full story of a person.
- But here, we're close to the end.
- And I wanted to ask, is there something else
- you would want people to know about what you've gone through,
- what you experienced, and how you came out of it?
- The only way I could explain that God took care of us.
- Because we, by ourself, we had no way to go to Israel.
- Because children transport weren't allowed
- to go in the time when we.
- We didn't have where to go.
- And we didn't know what to do.
- And somehow, God showed us a way.
- We didn't do it by ourselves.
- So whatever happens to us, it's not that we so smart,
- that one is smarter than the next one.
- Some people are smart, and it's not
- meant for them to have anything, and they struggle.
- Some people get very rich.
- And some people are not so rich, and they happy,
- make the best with what they have.
- But the main thing in my life is whatever I did anything good,
- that I helped somebody when you needed me and whenever I could,
- I was able to, I'm not sorry.
- I'm only sorry that I maybe didn't do enough.
- But we tried to do when we could.
- Did you tell your children about your experiences
- during the war?
- Did you share this?
- Not when they were young.
- Now I did.
- Now, when they understood, they were ready, I did.
- My husband spoke more about it, what he went through.
- But he injected the belief, and he showed me many times
- in life, I thought it is not going to work,
- it's not going to be good.
- My husband was sick, and I was pregnant with my third child.
- I didn't know because, in the beginning,
- we struggled plenty, too.
- But everybody does.
- So he told me--
- I said, but he was sick.
- He had a small heart attack.
- He was in his 30s.
- So he said to me, don't be scared.
- See, God takes care of us.
- And if God will want me to live, I will live.
- And don't worry.
- God provides for everything.
- And he injected into the children the believe and trust
- in God, and believe that's the truth.
- And it's a true thing that you could only trust in God.
- Because he takes care of us.
- Because ourselves-- we think we smart, we can do.
- It's not.
- And what happened that night, a friend of his
- went to a wedding.
- And he passed across the street to the subway,
- to get the subway from East Broadway.
- And a motorcycle came.
- And on the spot, he was dead.
- So he said, there is no insurance in life for anything.
- If you're supposed to live and you have to live,
- God helps you.
- But if you supposed to die, in one minute, you're dead.
- So then I say, whatever it was, we manage.
- And life, it's what you want from life.
- We not here just for our pleasure.
- We have to be here for other people.
- And whenever we had a friend--
- or my son went to school away, to Switzerland, and a man came.
- He was also a Holocaust survivor without a hand.
- And the principal directed him to our house.
- It was holiday.
- So he came and wasn't an easy person with one hand.
- And my younger daughter had to take him across the subway.
- He was scared.
- But my husband said, he is a guest.
- You have to treat him better than yourself.
- And if he needs your bed, you give your bed to him.
- Those are the values.
- So he injected it into the children, too.
- And thanks to him, we have good children.
- I think not only thanks to him but probably also
- thanks to you.
- Yeah, but-- yes, I did, too.
- And whenever he brought somebody home, I never said--
- I always took him with a smiling face and made them feel good.
- I guess I got it a little from home, too.
- Yeah.
- Well, Mrs. Marcia, thank you so much.
- I've appreciated that you've taken the time
- to share your story with us.
- Yeah, but I appreciate you.
- You're such a wonderful person.
- There isn't many like you.
- And I really admire you as a person.
- I didn't know you, but I wish you all the best.
- Thank you.
- Thank you so much.
- They claim to say that Holocaust survivors have the power
- to bless people because they went through--
- that's what the rabbis say--
- because they like.
- Well, thank you very much.
- Those are very kind words.
- So I wish you a long, happy, and good life.
- And you should have joys that life should bring to you.
- Thank you.
- Thank you deeply.
- Yeah, I don't if it's the right thing.
- It was absolutely beautiful.
- It's a real gift.
- Thank you.
- And I will say, with that, that this concludes
- our interview, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
- interview, with Mrs. Marcia Loewi on January 8, 2016
- in Borough Park, New York.
- Thanks again.
- Thank you, thank you.
- Thank you.
- It's a pleasure.
- I learned from you a lot of things.
- Because there isn't many people like you.
- But thank God there is people.
- Thank you.
- That's very kind.
- OK.
- This is a United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
- interview with Mrs. Marcia Loewi on March 6, 2016.
- And this is in addition to the interview
- that we conducted with Marcia Loewi
- earlier this year in January and should
- be considered as one interview.
- In this edition, Mrs. Loewi would
- like to add some information that she forgot to mention
- during our first interview.
- So now I'm going to turn it over to you, Mrs. Loewi.
- Tell me about these points, these things,
- these experiences that you wanted us to record.
- And give me a little bit of context of what happened.
- I worked in a small furniture company.
- Yeah.
- And one day, we came to work.
- And at night, if the night--
- This was in the Lodz ghetto already?
- Yes.
- OK.
- And the night shift-- how do you say it?
- The--
- The night shift is perfectly fine.
- Yeah.
- The night shift people were sitting and crying.
- We came in, like, 8 o'clock.
- And there was blood in the street.
- There was a hospital for mentally ill next.
- And it was next to our factory.
- OK.
- So at night, the Germans came and evacuated the hospital.
- There were children.
- They came with trucks.
- And they threw down the children like objects with their heads
- down.
- From the windows.
- From the windows of the hospital.
- It was called the [? Visola ?] Street Hospital.
- It's for mental ill.
- And they said what they saw happen,
- animals wouldn't act like this.
- Innocent children and people that were not capable--
- They were-- mm-hmm.
- They were mentally--
- They had mental illnesses.
- Yes.
- And that affected us very badly, because what is a human being?
- You take and throw it out with the heads.
- You break the heads and scalps of innocent little children
- that were born with a defect.
- Did anybody have family members, perhaps,
- who had been in that hospital?
- Did you know of anybody who had a dear one or a relative?
- You see, I was a teenager in those times.
- I was maybe 15, 16.
- So we didn't--
- I wasn't connected.
- It was a different area where we lived.
- I see.
- We lived on the other side of the bridge.
- I see.
- Out from there, in the center of the city, was a round thing.
- And there was a [NON-ENGLISH].
- How do you say?
- A statue?
- A statue.
- There was a statue.
- And from this round circle were different streets--
- this way, this way.
- And that's how the city was running.
- And we lived on this side of the city.
- And it went down to the lowest streets, to the--
- not so center.
- You're talking outside the ghetto, when you had
- [INAUDIBLE].
- No, outside the ghetto.
- Oh, outside the ghetto.
- Now, how--
- So I don't--
- I didn't know people that effectively.
- You had to go up and reach to the other side of the road.
- And the middle was barbed wire.
- And there was a bridge that was there
- that you shouldn't have to go through the traffic.
- It was a highway.
- And was it one part of the ghetto connected
- to another part of the ghetto?
- Out of the ghetto, yes.
- But I think this bridge probably was built before the war,
- because it was a big bridge.
- It was pedestrian--
- You went up steps.
- And there was a wall.
- What was the name of the hospital?
- Do you remember?
- [? Visola. ?]
- [? Visola. ?] And had it been a hospital before the war?
- I'm sure.
- I don't know.
- But I'm sure they didn't build hospitals during the war.
- Oh, no, but a building could be taken over
- and made into a hospital.
- I think it was famous.
- That's how they called it, [? Visola ?] Hospital.
- And our the factory was on beside.
- So it was one next of the other.
- And there was also a cemetery in back of our factory.
- It was a big cemetery.
- Sometimes, we used to go there in recess time.
- So we walked and we talked.
- But I didn't have connection with the people.
- We just heard it.
- And it was a terrifying thing.
- Of course.
- The way they explained they tore down the kids with their heads
- down.
- And do you know, was this also Polish children, as well
- as Jewish children?
- Or do you think it was all Jewish?
- No, that was part of the ghetto.
- OK, so it would have been--
- So I don't think [COUGHING] that the Polish children were there.
- OK.
- OK, about the hospital.
- Yes.
- Yeah.
- So--
- Yeah, I don't think they were only children.
- They probably couldn't stay home.
- And they needed the attention of--
- medical attention.
- Well, of course, the Germans had this euthanasia program
- within Germany itself for Jews and non-Jews.
- But--
- The ghetto was separate.
- The ghetto was separate.
- The people moved from the city.
- The Jewish people there, they evacuated and took off
- everything, the stars.
- There was a lot-- it was a big city of 600,000 population.
- That's right.
- And 300,000 were Jewish.
- There were a lot of hospitals, big hospitals,
- that the rich Jews donated to build the hospitals.
- There were three student hospital.
- There was a very rich man they called Poznanski.
- And this Poznanski built two hospitals
- in different areas of the city.
- And all of that was taken over and--
- Taken.
- --stolen, basically.
- Taken over, and everything, they pushed out.
- And you see people are mean, too,
- because when we were in the ghetto, before the war,
- my parents build up--
- they were wealthy.
- Yes, I remember.
- We had nine children.
- But if God wants, he gives you.
- He gives you to make a living.
- You could do more and work, and nothing happens.
- But if it's God's will, whatever you touch goes.
- So my parents had a beautiful home right before the war.
- One thing I am--
- I feel my father went to a Rabbi.
- I'm going to-- excuse me.
- I'm going to pause again just for a second.
- --talk about it.
- OK, but it was a very--
- It's just--
- It's very important.
- It's just that everybody was so shattered by it, what happened.
- You couldn't imagine that people did things to--
- Other people.
- --innocent, sick children like this, to kill them.
- Mm-hmm.
- Mm-hmm.
- Not to see them as worthy of any kind of consideration,
- or dignity, or anything.
- And then you see this picture.
- We had in our bedroom, my parents' bedroom, a picture.
- This particular-- uh-huh.
- Now, this picture was a picture.
- There was once a court.
- And King Solomon was a very smart man.
- And he came there with two mothers.
- And the mothers had a fight.
- Yes.
- One child was missing from the hospital or from whatever.
- And each one claimed it's their child, it's her child.
- So the King said of the child--
- and you see it on the picture--
- We're going to cut the baby in two.
- And you get to half the baby.
- And you get half the baby.
- So he wanted to see their reaction.
- And one of the mothers went-- how do you say it?
- Give her baby.
- Don't cut the baby.
- So he said, you are the mother, and she got the baby.
- I remember that story.
- You remember that story.
- I remember that story.
- Yeah.
- And we had the picture in our bedroom.
- And this was left.
- And I don't know.
- But my mother said she ordered it.
- It took a couple years to paint it
- because there a lot of detail on it.
- Yes.
- Yes.
- And the expression on the faces was
- very good-- you know, the way.
- And the mother was darling.
- Yes.
- Don't do it.
- Stop it.
- Don't hurt the baby.
- Yeah.
- You heard that story.
- And we had this painting.
- [INAUDIBLE]
- You had it at your home in Lodz.
- Yes, in Lodz.
- OK.
- And did you lose that painting when you lost everything else?
- Everything we lost.
- We came back.
- There was nothing ours.
- Nothing was belonging to us anymore.
- Somebody lived in our apartment, but they hardly left us any.
- Really?
- Mm-hmm.
- And they were neighbors before.
- They lived on the fourth floor.
- And we lived on the third floor.
- They weren't nasty, but they just weren't very happy
- that we came.
- But they had taken over your apartment?
- You see, the expensive furniture that we have,
- we took to the ghetto.
- There were two-- they had a place
- for horses and for cattle.
- So the people that lived there were friends of my cousin.
- He had a store that was selling wheat and food for horses
- and animals.
- So he exchanged the houses.
- So we took that expensive dining room set.
- We took it to the ghetto.
- But once, somebody was showing--
- somebody showed who was rich Jews and who might have money.
- Well, they came to the house.
- And they looked in the whole house.
- The children were standing.
- And my father told us, don't look in the direction
- where I have some-- the older children.
- They younger didn't know.
- So we had medicine cabinet.
- In that medicine cabinet, my father--
- because somebody denounced that we were rich.
- So he said, don't look in the direction
- where I have something, because they look in your faces.
- That's right.
- And then they follow where everybody is nervous about.
- So in the bathroom, in the medication,
- we had some diamonds, because my father--
- when he gave up the business, for the first year,
- they needed textile factories to make uniforms.
- And they paid for it something.
- And my father had raw material, not finished textile.
- So they paid something for it and let him
- stay in the city for a while.
- And this search was still in your original home,
- not in the ghetto--
- when he says, don't look in their direction.
- It was in the ghetto--
- It was already in the ghetto.
- --because the kripo, kriminalpolizei--
- Kripo.
- --went to look for rich Jews.
- Jews.
- All right.
- And they were--
- Kripos is kriminalpolizei--
- Kriminalpolizei.
- OK.
- So my father said--
- we had two rooms.
- How much did we have in the ghetto?
- We had two rooms-- we're nine children--
- and a kitchen.
- And they didn't find the diamonds.
- No.
- We tried to look out the window.
- But they took away the expensive dining room set.
- It was gorgeous.
- You don't see it, really.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Who knows where it's ended up?
- Who knows?
- No, they took it.
- I know.
- I know.
- And then they called my father once to the kripo.
- And they beat him up and said, what he has, he should give.
- So he thought that dining room was in the office of there
- where they took him in.
- He already saw it.
- Yeah.
- They took it out from the ghetto and from the warehouse.
- And they took it-- it was built for unusual.
- It was African wood.
- And the mahogany veneer was laid out like lions' heads,
- and because that African wood has a--
- Pattern, like a zebra pattern.
- A pattern.
- Mm-hmm.
- Patterns, yeah.
- --like I have on my--
- This is Sarah, your daughter, saying that--
- Like that's on my vanity, crouch mahogany
- you're talking about, or like zebra wood.
- You see, this is a copy.
- I bought the door that we had.
- It's deep, dark mahogany.
- It was gorgeous.
- Right, like crouch mahogany, like clay mahogany.
- And the doors where lined with marble.
- It what was like a winery where you
- tap the bottles of wine liquor.
- And it opened this way, on hinges.
- It came apart when you opened it.
- Like a wine rack, like a wine cellar, like a wine rack.
- Oh, well, you--
- Like cages.
- See, sometimes you have hinges you pull out.
- Hinges, and you can see that it becomes a surface.
- It comes out like a table.
- OK.
- So let's finish up with that point then.
- So your father then sees this dining room
- set at the kripo headquarters.
- Yeah.
- Yeah, because they came once to the house.
- And they looked all over, and they found it there.
- Probably, people--
- Pointed it out.
- They told them about it.
- They probably paid them something
- to say who the rich people were, people who have,
- where they would take things.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.