Oral history interview with Irving Lebow
Transcript
- It is Sunday, October 12, 1980.
- And this is Stanley Bursch speaking
- at the home of Irving Lebow.
- The purpose of this tape recording
- is to preserve for the records of Temple Shalom of Wheeling,
- West Virginia, the experiences of one of its congregants
- during the Holocaust that so affected
- the Jewish people and their history in a manner
- comparable perhaps only to the exodus and the rebirth
- of the modern state of Israel.
- Here's what I think, I can't go right how it started, you know?
- I think I should go a little ahead.
- You know.
- Well, let's go back.
- Where were you living?
- Yeah, in Riga.
- You know.
- I can't start with my childhood, but that would be so long.
- And--
- What did your father do for a living?
- My father was a leather worker.
- He made saddles, saddles for--
- riding saddles.
- What was his name?
- Leibowitz.
- How many children in your family?
- We were six children, five boys and one girl.
- Did you live in a home comparable to this, one
- that we're talking about on Miller Street in Wheeling
- in '62?
- No, no, no.
- We lived in a shtetl, you know, in a shtetl.
- You know what, in a small town.
- And it was a, I would say, a ghetto, a little town.
- All the homes were made out of log cabins because it was--
- our country is an agricultural country.
- And there were plenty of woods and logs.
- Not only that, in my time, there weren't sawmills who
- could cut and form the logs.
- But some of the log homes were quite big and comfortable too.
- And outside, they fixed it up with finishing boards,
- you know, what they still get it, and which was expensive.
- And inside was with--
- how do you call it-- with caulk, with like cement, you
- know, smoothing the walls.
- Some of the homes were nice, but they were log cabins.
- And they were good because it was a cold climate,
- and it's good insulation.
- You know, log.
- So this.
- But if I would tell you all the details,
- you know, I remember from my childhood,
- from my early childhood and then--
- You erased some.
- You're erasing.
- You're erasing.
- OK.
- When I remember how I made my first steps or even before,
- I can't.
- I said I'm imagining, you know.
- And I remember when I--
- Maybe we could disconnect [INAUDIBLE]..
- Yeah.
- And so-- but here lately, you know how it came and I said,
- the father is right because there
- are such children, who are working with the well
- brains, who can't remember.
- I remember a lot.
- I remember how I was weaned.
- I remember how my mother used to diaper me and this.
- But let's not go into this.
- It was primarily an all-Jewish community.
- Yeah.
- All-Jewish community-- in fact, the mayor was a Jewish man.
- And the post office was government.
- So the mail carrier spoke Jewish like any Jew.
- You couldn't distinguish.
- And a few non-Jews who lived around the city,
- they spoke Jewish like Jews.
- They grew up with the Jews.
- What was the name of the city?
- Varaklani.
- Varaklani.
- It was there used to be a song Varaklani is nine [NON-ENGLISH]
- from a bahn.
- A bahn is a railroad.
- We were about nine miles away from the railroad.
- And here, 9 miles by car is nothing to--
- it is a home, you know.
- But there there weren't any cars.
- The first time I saw a car was when I was 14 years old.
- So at the railroad--
- I didn't see a railroad when I was about that age.
- A railroad, a steam engine I didn't
- see when I was about that age.
- So when we lived there, like it was little Israel.
- And there were about three synagogues.
- And it so happened that one synagogue, which
- was called the Green Beis Medrash because it
- was painted green, was across from my house.
- And when I was a toddler, or three or four years old,
- we kids used to play in that synagogue
- because there were no playgrounds
- from around the kids.
- And that synagogue was open all day.
- And that, the bima, what you used to read the scrolls,
- was in the middle, fenced in and elevated.
- And we used to run there and play.
- Were you being trained as a leatherer by your father?
- No.
- No.
- No.
- I started-- and here again, in the shul being
- near the synagogue.
- And in the synagogue, there used to be--
- the people used to study, the old people with gray beard.
- And I would always sit and listen.
- And then my father passed away when I was about five
- and a half or six years old.
- And I had a brother.
- And he was-- when I was about five, he was 15 years old.
- And he started to go to the Lubavitch yeshiva
- in those days.
- And my father, before--
- my mother used to tell me how my father would
- say now I'm working for to support
- this student in the yeshiva.
- And when my father died, he came home
- when I was about four and a half years old,
- four and a half or five.
- That was considered an honor, wasn't it,
- to support a student?
- Right.
- Right.
- For him, yeah.
- So he start teaching me pre-school,
- the alphabet, the Hebrew.
- And I was a kid, and I learned to read.
- And today kids, from television they went there.
- Three years old, they read.
- Some kids are now reading at four years old and five.
- They go to libraries already.
- In the olden days, it wasn't like that.
- So as a kid, a admired kid, and the old men
- used to come when I was come in shul, open the Chumash
- and say, come and read.
- And I would read, and they all open eyes.
- So this is my youth, went up like that.
- When I was about--
- yeah, when I was about six or seven years old, six years old
- to be correct, my brother--
- again, I didn't have a father.
- My mother was a housewife and at home.
- So my brother took over the responsibility of raising me.
- He took over me to school, and it was a public school,
- all the Jewish--
- Jewish, all teachers, all kids.
- There were no Christian.
- A non-Jewish kid couldn't go in because it was all in Yiddish.
- He took me over, and he mentioned to the teacher,
- you know.
- And there you prescribed--
- not prescribed-- brought the child to school, registered.
- You registered, had to register the child.
- So my brother, oh, he can read already.
- So the teacher takes out a book, and I read it.
- Oh, she said, oh, he can go in second grade,
- and I was six years old.
- Why, second grader were already eight years
- old because school started, in those days, and seven years.
- And then I felt already, as young
- as I was, quite proud on this.
- And before we left the school, the teacher calls back.
- She said, oh, maybe not.
- He'll-- maybe he should start in first grade with all the kids.
- The school was in Yiddish, you said.
- In Yiddish, all in Yiddish.
- Not Hebrew, but Yiddish.
- Not Hebrew, now, not--
- Yiddish.
- Did you have Yiddish newspapers?
- Yeah.
- It used to come from Riga, but very few people
- prescribed the Jewish paper.
- It used to go-- a paper used to go from end to end.
- I want to tell you that the living
- standard was so low there because every penny
- counted there.
- People didn't subscribe to a paper because it was costing,
- let's say, like here a paper $0.15 or $0.25.
- And it was only in the capital, Riga, came out a Jewish paper.
- Frimorgn.
- It was called Frimorgn.
- Was there a large Jewish population in Riga?
- In Latvia-- yeah, in Riga were about 40,000 people.
- How many in the village where you lived?
- About 2,500.
- When was the first time that you sort of
- got the feeling something was wrong in Europe?
- Oh, then we have to jump.
- The difference between Jews and non-Jew I felt very early
- already, probably as soon as I started to understand--
- 10 years old.
- How did you-- how did you understand that if you were
- living with all Jewish people?
- Well, listening, listening what they say.
- And then farmers, Christian farmers used to come in town.
- In town was a market place, and there they used to sell--
- the shtetl, you know, we needed wood.
- Burning wood, that was our fuel to heat our homes and to--
- hay for our cow.
- Each one had a cow, or two families had a cow.
- Hay and wood and chickens--
- I don't know why they didn't raise chickens-- and eggs we
- had to buy from farmers.
- Then, like peas and beans and this, from farmers, you know.
- It was in stores too, and it was back like here.
- It was.
- But people were-- potatoes-- also, we all had gardens.
- But for potatoes it wasn't big enough.
- So goyim used to come.
- Not only the-- Jewish people used
- to have a horse and buggy, go out in the surrounding places
- and buy and bring, or fish.
- There were fishers.
- There weren't Jewish fishers.
- But Jews-- there was a fish market or store.
- And we, as I said before, we lived--
- we supported each other, but it was small.
- For example, there was a store, herring
- only, herring and make--
- people ate a lot of herring.
- Or there were a stand from sunflower seeds,
- and these-- very poor.
- A hardware store, it wasn't like here.
- We had iron, you know, what a farmer need
- to fix this is wagon or sled.
- Then was a Jewish blacksmith, who
- was horseshoeing horses or building for farmers--
- cobblers, tailors, storekeepers.
- And the town was built and it had two churches,
- I think one Catholic.
- And I was too young to remember if the other, I think,
- was probably a Protestant church.
- And then between the churches was a big free place,
- and there used to be a market Friday.
- And the farmers used to bring all their produce, berries
- and this.
- And the Jewish people would buy and sell on that.
- When did I feel the difference between Jew and non-Jew?
- Hearing the conversation, and then we
- Jewish kids had to go out swimming.
- There was a little creek about a mile away.
- We had to go through farmer's territory.
- Sometimes farmer's boy would let their dogs on us
- or sometimes they would throw stones.
- And still, we knew it, that it was
- a different, a different feeling between Jews and non-Jews.
- Not only that, when I was older I
- felt that we are like guests in their place.
- They made us feel that everything that we live,
- we live--
- the store what we have, the goy would like to have it,
- the Latvians, because they considered nationalist.
- Latvia, it was their country, and we are like strangers.
- All the time it was a feeling.
- How long did your family live in Latvia?
- In Latvia, we lived until the Second World War.
- No, I mean before--
- In that little town?
- Yeah, I mean before.
- Before I started going to school,
- about when I was about 16 years old.
- OK.
- No, what I'm interested in, how long
- did your father and grandfather and his father,
- how long had they been living in Latvia?
- Oh, oh, oh, In Latvia?
- As far as I know, my grandfather lived in Latvia.
- So at least three generations.
- Three generations, right.
- Right.
- And I think, if I would tell you details, again it would take--
- I can tell you from six and seven and eight and 10 and 15
- years old.
- You began to feel the difference in the--
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- However, we were so used to it, it didn't bother us.
- Somehow, we knew that they don't love us.
- We knew we are like a second-class citizens.
- But we were built in our hearts that we are as good as
- or better as they are.
- In fact, we used to call them, as little boys--
- I didn't know the Latvian language, but one thing
- we would know, to call the Christian boys pig--
- pig shepherds.
- That was our-- when they did something to us,
- we used to run away and say "pig shepherd" or something
- to downgrade them.
- And so--
- How did you deal with the farmers and the Christians
- at the market if you didn't know the Latvian language?
- Well, I was little.
- Our parents knew somewhat.
- I see.
- But Yiddish was generally the language spoken.
- Only Yiddish.
- Only Yiddish.
- And Hebrew, what we learned is from the Bible.
- But we used to translate.
- We started on the Genesis.
- Each word we used to translate.
- In fact, you'll find in the Sholem Aleichem's books,
- he describes how a student, when he started cheder,
- it wasn't a shul.
- We had the shul and the cheder.
- That Hebrew we learned with a rabbi.
- And each word-- [HEBREW],, in the beginning,
- [HEBREW] created, Elohim, God, and so on.
- So that was all.
- However, after-- oh, yeah, when we got older, in our school,
- about when we got in the fourth, fifth grade,
- we had to learn Latvian.
- It was by the government.
- You have to learn the country's language.
- Then we were Russian because Russia were on our border,
- and so there lived a lot of Russians.
- In fact, 12% of the population were Russian.
- And Germans were on our other border.
- And then Latvia was ruled by Germany before 1918,
- before the First World War.
- So a lot in the big cities, not in our shtetl, spoke German.
- So in the fifth, sixth, seventh grade,
- we used to get always new languages.
- And Latvian, for example, we had an hour every day.
- Russian we had two or three times a week,
- and so with German.
- But in school, what we learned the language
- was not enough, the same as in America.
- In America, you start the foreign language
- in high school, French or Spanish.
- If they don't practice it, after two or three years
- it's forgotten or half forgotten.
- So that was with us too.
- However, here what happened.
- When I was about 15 years old, the same brother who
- was teaching me, I mentioned in the beginning,
- he left for Israel when he was about 18 years old,
- as a halutz.
- And in about seven or eight, he came for a visit.
- And at that time, I have graduated from public school.
- By the way, I was a first-grade student.
- But in my days, where we knew--
- the Jewish people themselves knew we have a Jewish problem.
- We are-- we are overpopulated by ourselves.
- The government doesn't absorb us.
- There was not a Jewish person, man or woman,
- employed by the government in a office or the railroad.
- The railroad belonged to the government,
- or post office belonged to the government, or telephone, which
- telephone didn't employ much in those days.
- But like here, you get government jobs.
- No.
- And at that time, actually, it was after the Balfour
- Declaration that England promised
- Israel to be a homeland.
- And not only that, before that even we
- knew we have to do something because our youth already
- didn't have what to do.
- And in a store in the small town,
- it wasn't enough for the father or mother to attend.
- So there were Zionism.
- In fact, in school, our teacher already was-- our principal,
- he was a Bundist.
- He was a leftie.
- And here what it was.
- There were two groups how to solve the Jewish problem.
- One said we should go and build Israel and be
- a nation like any nation.
- And others, and here in shul our principal
- was like that-- he said, the Jewish problem
- can't be solved with Israel.
- Israel is too small and so on and so forth.
- Socialism-- have to fight so that we should be accepted
- and all minorities should be accepted
- and be able to live with the goyim and be equal citizens.
- It appealed, you know.
- So a lot of the kids, we understood already it.
- Was lectured every day because it was
- a very, very acute question.
- So my family were Zionist.
- As I said, my older brother, who was 18 years old,
- went to Israel as a halutzim.
- I had two more brothers.
- They went to Israel too.
- What were their names?
- Named Morris and Louie.
- Are they still in Israel?
- No, no, no.
- They are all dead.
- They lived in Israel in the very hard times,
- and they came to America.
- But they died.
- See, I was the youngest.
- If they would be alive, they would be already probably 85,
- 90 years old.
- So these are-- my brother went to Israel.
- And he stayed there probably-- he went in '21,
- and he came for a visit at the time when I graduated.
- And here what it was.
- In those days, Jews too used to go to yeshivas and study,
- and study, and there was a--
- not to go to school anymore.
- Work is important, doing with your hands.
- And they would say, that's why we are hated,
- because we are-- we never do hard work.
- And the goyim used to think so too.
- So we were-- I was so saturated with that that I didn't--
- oh, yeah, and before graduating, this same principal
- gave us to write a theme, what I'm going to do after school.
- And I told him I'm going to learn a trade.
- So with me he was saying that--
- no education, but with me, he came to my mother
- and said, no, I should learn farther.
- I should learn.
- I should keep on studying.
- However, my brother came.
- And in Israel was too, he said, we need by hand--
- with hand to work because, he said,
- we have doctors who dig ditches and who work in [NON-ENGLISH]..
- And we have too many and other production of educated people.
- So it was decided that I should go to a trade school.
- And sure enough--
- I didn't have my opinion because, living in the town--
- and a lot of even kids who live in big cities,
- you don't know what you want.
- So I listened to my brother.
- And they took me to Riga, and I went to a trade school
- at daytime.
- And then I went to a high school in the evenings.
- And a lot of people couldn't understand how I can manage it.
- The trade school was from 8:00 till 4:00 or 5:00.
- And evening school was from 7:00 to 11:00, the high school.
- And the high school was a Latvian already, in Riga.
- And there I had-- for the first time,
- I had a hard time with the Latvian language
- because what I learned in school wasn't enough.
- However, I managed it, and I graduated
- about the same time, high school in evening school
- and a trade school at daytime.
- What trade were you being taught?
- Electrical-- electricity, wiring, winding armatures,
- transformers.
- And in fact, after I graduated I worked in a radio plant.
- And I had another brother, which was only about five years older
- than I am, who he was already in Riga and working in a store.
- In fact, when I graduated, I worked in the same place.
- It was a radio and photo store.
- And they started to manufacture radios.
- In those days, radios weren't like today.
- It was the crystal detectors, you call.
- It isn't for your time.
- There were no tubes.
- With a crystal, with a wire, you know, you touched.
- And anyhow, and this store developed very greatly
- because they were started from the beginning
- and were growing with the technology.
- And we used to import all our technology
- from Germany and England.
- And our country, and it was a agricultural,
- we exported butter and bacon and lumber.
- And we lived pretty good.
- And now we'll jump.
- So I graduated, and I got a job, and I was quite successful
- in my job.
- And then came the time when we had
- the conscription to the army.
- I had to go.
- Everybody had to go to the army.
- And I went away for two years to the army.
- How old were you?
- I was then about 20 years old.
- So for two years I went to the army.
- This was about in 1938.
- Was there any-- what were you?
- What was your job in the army?
- In the army?
- Well, we had--
- I was in the infantry.
- And in our army, in comparison what I hear here,
- it was-- here is like you live in a hotel.
- We had basic training all the time.
- For two years?
- For two years, yeah.
- It happened to be I was in a bicycle
- regiment in the summertime and a ski regiment in wintertime.
- We were two Jewish boys in the whole business.
- Were there any Jewish officers.
- No.
- No.
- No.
- There was one Jewish policeman in Riga, and that's all--
- no officers.
- No.
- In fact-- and there too, we were so discriminated
- but, as I said, we were used to it.
- For example, any Latvian who went to high school,
- after three months used to get a--
- it's called a strip that he was already--
- next to a soldier, what is that in the army?
- Maybe a private or--
- Private, something like that, automatically.
- Not the Jewish, you know.
- After 24 months, we didn't get it.
- And one, we had a lawyer and this-- nothing, you know.
- But we were used to it.
- As I said, in our hearts we thought
- we are as good as or better.
- In fact, we thought we are better.
- So after--
- Did anybody complain or say any--
- No.
- No.
- No.
- There it was not because it would not help.
- And we didn't want to rock the boat.
- No, there wasn't such a thing as complaining.
- Oh, yeah, and our system was a democratic.
- We had representatives in the-- and it's called the Sejm,
- you know.
- The representatives in the government--
- elected.
- And in fact, one was a very influential man.
- And his name is Dubina, and he was known all over Europe.
- He was with a beard and a rabbi.
- There was another, a rabbi representative, Nurock.
- He was then in Israel, in the Knesset.
- Nurock was a-- very old-timers probably would remember him.
- He was such an influential man, when
- the Russians came in they arrested him
- and he never came back.
- Well, Nurock was arrested too, but he survived and then went
- to Israel.
- There is a lot of things what I will tell you.
- We might go back later on because otherwise it
- would be days.
- We'll see.
- We might even write a book.
- You and your wife can take it over.
- You'll see, it will be interesting episodes.
- But this is, since you need it for the children,
- so we'll go now again.
- After, when I finished the army, it was 1938.
- You see, in '33, Hitler was--
- has taken over.
- And before [AUDIO OUT]
- That would be a good chapter.
- We will start how the Russians came into our country and then
- how the war started and how the Germans acted.
- The war, in general, started--
- this date I remember.
- Later dates I don't.
- In September--
- 1939, and the Germans attacked Poland and England and France
- then.
- He had a non-aggression pact with Poland,
- and they came to their aid.
- And the Germans had a very good success.
- You know, they conquered Poland within two weeks.
- And right away they went to Belgium and Holland and--
- and they finished them up within days, and then France.
- And France, we were reading the papers, and, of course,
- a lot of it we thought that the war is on,
- but they don't mean us because we were a little on the side.
- And the situation were pretty good.
- The economic situation was pretty good.
- And the fact that refugees came in Riga to save themselves,
- we thought that this is our--
- we are at a haven.
- You know, Riga is a haven for the, in those days,
- war situation.
- Where were the refugees coming from?
- From Germany.
- What kind of people were they?
- Mostly Jewish people and a few non-Jews--
- intellectuals, which were known as Democrats
- or that they are not Hitler sympathizers.
- And the war was--
- we, naturally we were sad with the German successes,
- but we didn't feel the danger yet.
- And then in 1940, while the war was on for about a year,
- the Russians came in.
- Where were you working at that time?
- At that time I was working in a radio plant.
- It was called Radio Pioneer.
- And I was getting good wages.
- And since I graduated from that trade school,
- I was considered a good tradesman.
- I was not in the trade.
- And I was born there.
- And I thought it is the homeland and we were safe.
- Of course, I was always a Zionist.
- Even my nickname as a child was "the Zionist"
- because I used to sing all the Zionist songs.
- And in those days till--
- Were your brothers still in Israel at that--
- or Palestine at that time?
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Then in 1940, the Russians came in.
- And they came in suddenly.
- We didn't even have the notion that they are coming.
- And only the night before we heard,
- and then those heavy propeller plane
- bombers or whatever they had, the airplanes.
- And they occupied the airport.
- And there was no resistance.
- We didn't even hear.
- And the next day, there was in the papers
- that since the Russians on over the radio.
- They had occupied the radio station.
- It was overnight.
- We all slept.
- That since the war is going gone,
- and Latvia is a neighbor and bordering with a sea,
- they cannot let their interest, the Latvia,
- to go over to guard the Russian interests by Latvia until they
- have to move in.
- And things will be the same.
- And the president was still the president.
- And in fact, he came on the radio
- and said everybody should go to work and not to worry.
- And he said, you go to your work, and I'll do my work.
- [PAUSES] However, in a very short time--
- not to go in details--
- the president was unseated.
- In fact, he was taken to Russia.
- And a high official, that Vyshinsky,
- he was the attorney general of Russia.
- But he was a very good speaker.
- And he came in the factories, organized the factories.
- And we had to go all to the square of Riga
- and demand that Latvia should become a Soviet Republic.
- And we demonstrated.
- It was all organized in the factories.
- And one day came.
- They were full of people, the biggest amount of people
- I have ever seen before.
- And we prepared the placards and signs.
- And the next day, or in a couple of days, it was in the paper
- that the petition was accepted, and Latvia now is not anymore
- Latvia as a Republic, that it's a Soviet Socialist Republic.
- And they had already a representative
- in the [RUSSIAN], that highest--
- soyuz of the Russian in Moscow.
- And it was a Soviet satellite.
- And then, our papers were full already with a Soviet line.
- And they praised Stalin, how clever
- and how foresighted he was that he made a pact with Hitler.
- And he said already, the capitalist Nations wanted
- that Russia should fight--
- to get in a fight, Russia and Germany,
- but Stalin outsmarted them.
- And now the capitalist countries are fighting Germany.
- Russia is completely peaceful.
- And we lived like that for about 11 months.
- Where was your mother, living still with--
- My mother was living with us in Riga.
- From the small town, the shtetl.
- We brought her to Riga because myself
- and another brother and my sister were working in Riga.
- They were working, and I, in the beginning,
- I was getting my education in Riga.
- I was up, by that time, 20 years old.
- So none of your family was left in the shtetl then,
- is that right?
- No.
- No.
- So we lived under the Russians for about 11 month.
- And the press was full of praises.
- And we did not have a notion that they'll attack us.
- However, once in a while, we used
- to listen on sort waves England.
- And we, especially the Jewish people,
- we were alert what's going on.
- And we read between the lines because, from the press
- and from the radio, you didn't get a good picture
- because everything was nice, everything for Russia was nice.
- And they were-- still they were putting
- the guilt on the capitalists.
- And they wanted the war, and America,
- it was still the same, the Cold War, the same language.
- So again, as a surprise, the next day
- we read that the Germans are marching on Russia.
- And I want to tell you that we heard over the radio, we--
- in fact, because I was working in a radio plant,
- and we had that shortwave, it wasn't so common like today,
- everybody can with the radio.
- Before, you could hear the station and that's all.
- So we heard that Churchill was warning Russia
- that the Germans are concentrating their divisions
- on the border with Russia.
- Where were all these refugees living?
- How did they--
- They lived among the people.
- They were-- they rent out in the old countries like that.
- Here for example, we have a house
- with so many rooms and some empty rooms.
- There, if a family had some empty rooms, they had borders.
- I see.
- So they lived in homes where there is one or two rooms.
- And mostly-- not family members came--
- mostly were couples or single people came--
- adults.
- So one morning, we hear that really the Germans
- are attacking the Russian.
- And they said already before, they were praising
- Germany, and not a bad word.
- And they call them all kind of names.
- But they said our forces are vigil,
- and they are giving them resistance.
- And they said everybody should go to work on this.
- However, in a few days, in a few days,
- we could see, when we were going to work, that the Germans,
- instead of going towards the front to meet--
- the Russians, instead of going towards the front
- to meet the Germans, they were going back.
- So, on the radio--
- television we didn't have yet.
- On the radio, they would say that the Russians are changing
- out their regular army with fresh forces, more who know how
- to operate more modern weapons.
- But we did see this all back.
- And it wasn't-- then they-- a few nights,
- the Germans bombarded Riga.
- And then Hitler called back the Volksdeutsche,
- you know, the German people who lived in Riga.
- In Riga, in Latvia, there were about 6% Germans
- because it's a neighboring country.
- He called back all the people to come back to Germany.
- And they grew up in Latvia and knew the language.
- So he dropped them as parachutists at night in Riga.
- They knew the town.
- And already, they went on the roofs, the Germans,
- the fifth column they were.
- And the Russians were paralyzed.
- And still they were saying that they were pushing them
- back and having victories.
- Not only that, they started to mobilize
- the soldiers, the Latvians.
- We were considered already Latvian to Russian.
- So they gave out all the names who
- were serving in the army from this
- and this years should report.
- So some reported, and some did not.
- Were you given a number to report?
- Right.
- Yeah.
- By alphabet-- and everybody had to report, who did service,
- let's say, from '37 to the end.
- And so what happened, they mobilized those, the Latvians,
- and they put them to guard the retreat.
- And their own soldiers, some cavalry and their guns,
- they were pulling back.
- But the Germans came so fast, they blocked them up,
- they got--
- Did you go when you were called?
- No, it wasn't my number yet.
- I see.
- I wasn't.
- And then we saw that things are bad.
- However, the Russians were broadcasting
- still good [INAUDIBLE].
- Were you still working in the factory?
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- And the factory was accessible.
- So-- oh, yeah.
- And we were already intimidated.
- For example, if I saw that it is the opposite what
- they are doing and what they are saying, you could not tell.
- Unless it's your closest friend, you
- could not tell They are not attacking, they are retreating.
- So in a few days, maybe a week, the Germans came in.
- Where were you the first time you saw a German?
- I was at home already.
- And all I could see is from the window, you know.
- And the radio right away changed it with the marches.
- And the Germans took over the radio station.
- And beside the march music, they said kill the Jews, you know,
- nothing else but the Jews.
- And the Jews made the war.
- And you know, it was already so--
- I saw that we are trapped.
- Why didn't escape?
- Why didn't run like a lot of Jewish people run, to Russia.
- And Hitler [INAUDIBLE].
- I'll come to it.
- And it was very sad.
- And there was already shooting, you know.
- They were extra to live.
- They shot a Jew here and there, you know, on the street,
- lying there.
- It was-- for Jews it was--
- However, the Latvians were jubilant.
- They went with them right away.
- And right away they had volunteers with the armbands,
- with German signs.
- And I saw them through the window.
- I lived on the fourth--
- first-- fourth floor, and I could see how
- the Germans were marching in.
- Was your mother still with you?
- No.
- No.
- My mother was already dead.
- I had-- my brother was with me and a sister, a married sister
- with two infants.
- But I was alone when he was there.
- When the Germans started to bombard Riga,
- my sister were with two kids, and we
- lived on the fourth floor.
- You had to run.
- And that was already still--
- the Russian power was, and they said everybody
- must run in the shelter.
- And every other house, or third got a cement shelter
- in the basement, where you could run.
- And we did [INAUDIBLE] families.
- And then you wake them up, and you cry.
- So my brother and I and her husband
- was still from a shtetl near us.
- And her husband, we decide like that.
- We knew our shtetl was far from a train
- or from a strategic road or so.
- And the First World War in our shtetl, there was fighting,
- but we hardly felt it.
- So we thought they should go back.
- And we had a house.
- They should go back and spend the time of the war in shtetl.
- And in that days, trains were still going.
- But the trains were going from Riga
- was west to east, to Moscow, in that direction.
- You didn't need even tickets.
- They let in.
- And the most were with army trains and a few carriages
- they had for us.
- And we lived not far from the railroad station.
- So we took the sister and her two children and her husband,
- and we put on the train to go to the shtetl
- because our shtetl was on the east.
- So here's what happened.
- And this I found out after the war.
- Instead the train should stop near our shtetl--
- our shtetl was about eight miles from the train anyhow--
- and let off passengers, they went right on to east,
- took them to Russia.
- And I didn't know it until the end of the war.
- When the Germans came in, I used to hear how they, in Riga, they
- didn't kill the Jews.
- They killed the ones, but en masse.
- But in the little towns, they gave weapons to the peasants
- and to all the Christians and said go and kill the Jews.
- And they were buried or burned in the synagogue.
- In my shtetl, they were all put together in those synagogues
- and put on fire.
- And one group with a rabbi from, they made it out to the woods.
- So that [INAUDIBLE] we again, a mistake we made.
- We put my sister and her family in the mouth of the lion.
- And after, as time passed by, I thought maybe
- that was the best.
- They didn't have to suffer because we'll all go under.
- And I was with the idea that they are not alive anymore.
- Now we'll go back what happened.
- When the Russians came in, right away the Jews and the Jews,
- they are--
- every day, over the radio and in the paper used to be laws,
- decrees that the Jews, for example, the first
- was that every Jew has to wear a yellow Star of David.
- Some didn't have the yellow cloth.
- And the next day, they said that in a certain address
- you'll get the yellow cloth.
- Everybody's allowed to go there.
- Oh, yeah, for the first day, no Jews are allowed on the street,
- for the first couple days.
- Then no Jew is allowed to walk on the sidewalk.
- All the Jews has to turn in their radios
- and cameras and their gold and silver, wedding
- rings and everything.
- So radios and cameras, they brought out the--
- jewelry, some gave a little and hit a lot,
- or they had good friends with the Greek Christians.
- They asked them to hide or something.
- But you had to go on--
- no radios.
- And every decree was like that.
- If you don't follow, you'll be shot on the spot.
- Anybody who is found with a radio
- will be shot, and always shot, shot.
- So then how about the stores?
- Jews can't go and stores and buy except for 7:00 till 8:00,
- in one hour.
- And it was very, very frightening and very dangerous
- because it wasn't only talk.
- There were a lot of people who were shot, a lot.
- Then a lot of people were taken out from the homes at night
- and arrested, and you didn't know what happened to them.
- Then after that, they said that every male Jew from 16 and up
- has to register for work in the prefecture, the police station.
- And everybody had to go.
- Whoever we'll find in the house, that they will be shot.
- And then I'll mention, I too, I went to register
- and they took me to hard work and such.
- And human behavior and this, I thought it is--
- What did you do, Irving?
- What kind of work?
- One time, for example, they put us
- in in a big Russian warehouse that had,
- the oats and fodder for animals.
- You had to load it, and load it on inside--
- no water and this.
- And you inhaled all the dust for a day.
- And it was bad.
- And you couldn't ask them for a little water, nothing.
- Word.
- Then we had to fill sacks and put it on the trucks.
- And another the day I was-- and that was the worst--
- I was taken to work near a railroad, where
- they had a depot and a lot of the railroad ties impregnated
- with chemicals.
- It was already windy and cold.
- And we had carried it for half a mile too.
- And, you know, the long ties, they are good lumber, squares.
- They were heavy too.
- And one-- one hour or two is one thing.
- But you have to work 10 hours.
- And I remember, I told you already.
- When the chemicals and the splinters fell in in your eyes,
- and you were sore, you know, your shoulder,
- and the next day--
- and no food.
- At the end of the day, they gave us half a loaf of bread
- to take home.
- And come tomorrow again.
- And some got beaten up.
- And you know, when a German, when he hits you,
- he hit to injure you.
- And I thought there is no use.
- And I wanted to commit suicide, I'll tell you.
- I mentioned it to you.
- I don't want it to be that way.
- Well, if you die, who knows which way is harder to die.
- And maybe there is a chance.
- Let's make it.
- Maybe it'll improve.
- Maybe, you know, always to get the benefit of doubt.
- And I did not go to work.
- And here's what happened.
- When the alarms were, and I had to go to a shelter--
- our building, where I lived, didn't have a shelter.
- So I had to go to a next building.
- And in each shelter, there were organized already
- by the Russians before the Germans came in.
- They had a older man who organized.
- And that was pretty good organized.
- They had even beds and mattresses
- for women or children.
- And the adults were standing or sitting down.
- There were no benches.
- But it was all from [INAUDIBLE].
- So there was a man, and he lived next door to where I lived.
- But before I saw him, but I never made contact with him.
- And so he was very friendly to me.
- What was his name?
- Sirius, Janis Sirius.
- A Christian, a goy.
- And so somehow, I used to come in.
- In fact, I was, I think, the only Jew.
- And I was standing in a corner, and the goyim used to talk
- [INAUDIBLE] and laughing.
- And they had one more than I was,
- and I knew what is going to go on.
- And I don't know if they know it, that I'm Jewish or not.
- But anyhow, we got a little bit acquainted
- during the few evenings when there was the alarms.
- And-- and when I didn't go to work, I start getting afraid.
- Oh, yeah, and they start giving out signs, walking signs,
- that if you worked, belonged to somebody,
- you can go on the street.
- And if they catch you you show you
- are working, all of us there.
- They can beat you up or catch you, anybody.
- So I started to work.
- So I thought, I'll go too, and I'll
- register myself for work again.
- So while going, I see next door to my building,
- some Jewish girls go in.
- And one kept--
- I know one.
- I went to high school together.
- So I asked her, what are you doing here?
- She said, oh, we are working here.
- She said the man brings us even food from a restaurant.
- That was an huge.
- So I thought, that would be a good job for me.
- It's next door, you know, because the walking
- was a danger, walking on the street.
- And I didn't know what had been, so I go in.
- And they said, yeah, there's the man.
- You can talk.
- I go in, and I saw that man, you know,
- who was the guard, the Ordungs holder, who kept order.
- And he is their boss.
- He hired them.
- So I go in, and I tell him, can he use--
- yeah, I can use you.
- So he goes with me to the police station and said--
- he leads me.
- And they were giving me a sign, and he keep me.
- Now, who was that man?
- Next to our building in town was--
- it was called a school museum.
- And what is a school museum.
- In America you don't have it.
- For example, in America, it's public school or high school.
- If they have an aquarium, they can have a fish aquarium
- or have a reptile.
- Or there is zoo not far away.
- You take your kids there.
- We didn't have it.
- So this, he had a whole floor of--
- And so he got me the job.
- He employed me.
- On the second day, and what--
- oh, yeah.
- So what was I doing?
- He was the student museum manager.
- And so kids used to come to the school museum
- so they could see how animals look or fishes or whatever
- when they were having botany or something.
- He had all kind of butterflies collections
- and so on and so forth.
- So when I came, I used to fix his-- he had a lot of doors,
- and doors wouldn't close.
- And and he had it locked under locks and keys.
- He didn't have keys and this.
- So on the second day, when all the Jewish people-- and he
- had a number of girls working.
- They had to clean the rooms and dust.
- And during the war or before, they
- were neglected, and on the floors too.
- So he asked me one, the second night, to stay a little longer.
- And he said, how do you get food?
- He was listening.
- And the goyim knew how bad it is for the Jews.
- And he had-- he was sympathizing.
- Where do you live, and how do you get food and this?
- And what do you eat?
- So I said, all I need is bread, bread and maybe a little piece
- of butter, and that's all.
- And I said, so I haven't got this.
- So he said-- and like that.
- And he find out--
- he knew that I live in the neighborhood,
- and I told him where.
- So my window, from my room-- and we had Venetian blinds like
- that--
- was across, you know, like this building.
- He said, come in tonight for a warm meal, to our place.
- And he said sometimes I have visitors.
- Nobody should know.
- But I'll have, he said--
- I'll put a piece of paper here, and the light
- will come through this, and you come in.
- So we came in.
- I came in, and it was already probably a couple of weeks--
- warm soup or this.
- I didn't have, but I didn't care.
- I was young.
- And as I said, bread, it was enough--
- bread water and a little piece of butter because you're
- aware the danger.
- You felt it's so great that the food was nothing.
- You didn't imagine.
- There is no enjoyment.
- There is-- you were obsessed with the future, what
- the morning will bring, what the next day or the next hour
- will bring because the radios from the goyim,
- they said that this shtetl is already judenrein,
- clean of Jews and this.
- And they were telling how Jews did this and that, all kinds
- of, that they found a family was murdered by Jews
- and-- you know, to incite hatred and wrath against the Jews.
- But he wasn't like that.
- So anyhow, I came in.
- And here his wife brought me a--
- I remember it was mushroom soup, something with milk.
- And I sat down.
- They were sitting, and she was crying.
- And he was sitting there.
- He said-- and you know the war was on already for a year,
- and Hitler had so much success.
- You would have to read the history of that time.
- He was going from victory to victory.
- And we were talking.
- I said, well, it looks very bad.
- I don't know what the future will be.
- And he said-- he was an old man at that time.
- I was 20 years old, and he, in my eyes,
- he was old because he must been 60 years old.
- He said, no, he said, justice will conquer, he said.
- And he said, that Hitler, he'll break his neck.
- He said he's taking one country after the other
- and suppressing them.
- But he said, one day the people will get--
- even if he'll conquer everything,
- he won't be able to hold.
- And to me it was, in a way, at that early age
- and I didn't know how things work out, it was unbelievable.
- But he said--
- And it did gave me courage, on the other hand, because I
- thought he knows what he's talking about.
- And then I stopped to think.
- And I stopped to realize.
- I'm thinking like afterward.
- He was the first man in those days I heard something
- encouraging because the Germans-- oh, yeah,
- the Germans had--
- the German soldiers who were working with us,
- they said, oh, Stalin is kaput.
- And it will be in Moscow.
- In fact, the Volksdeutsche, they had
- reached Moscow and Leningrad only the first 10
- days of the war, or two weeks.
- And Russia, it will fall apart.
- And we'll be all over and this.
- They were-- the Germans were--
- had so much belief in the führer and in the future.
- Anyhow, so I--
- I was there.
- Then I went home.
- And the next day, he said, we'll come again.
- Here what happened.
- One day, it was the second or third day, he said, sit down.
- Let's-- let's talk things over.
- And at that time, the ghetto was forming.
- What it means "the ghetto was forming," they already--
- the Germans set up a Jewish--
- a Jewish gemeinde.
- It means a Jewish rab, a Jewish advisory committee.
- And the Germans told them where there'll
- be the ghetto, in a suburb.
- It was called the Moscow suburb.
- It was a dilapidated suburb.
- Before, Jewish people didn't live there.
- But they took out, chased out the habitants.
- To some they gave Jewish places.
- And they were fencing it up, and the Jews
- had to move over there.
- And that-- so, yeah.
- So the ghetto was formed.
- And he said, listen, my wife is Jewish, the woman, you know.
- And he said, some people, my coworkers,
- knew that she was Jewish.
- And some reported her, that all the Jews has to go in ghetto.
- And he got a notification that he
- has to send his Jewish wife in ghetto.
- He said, what do you think?
- I don't know, I said.
- I can't tell you, but--
- he said-- I said, well, if the way you think,
- and the war will be over, maybe she'll be in ghetto
- till you get her out.
- Or maybe you'll be able to visit her.
- Oh, he said, no.
- Soon as I let her go, I won't get to see her anymore,
- he said.
- Anyhow, so here what he did.
- Since he was working with the schools, and in Latvia,
- it was a big, big position to have.
- And he had friends in the university.
- In the university, all the professors-- in those days,
- Latvia didn't have intellectuals of their own
- because Latvia was independent only 18 years.
- And they didn't produce any professors.
- So they were all Germans, the higher in the university.
- In fact Latvia, during their independence,
- they made the university.
- You know, it wasn't--
- in Riga, they didn't have a university.
- So he went those, the Germans, and talked.
- And with bishops he got papers that, yes,
- he didn't deny that she was Jewish.
- She was one eighth of a Jew, that her grandparents or part
- of a grandfather was a Jew, and [INAUDIBLE] So--
- so this man befriended me.
- And I had it--
- oh, yeah, he used to go in the store and buy, for me.
- He would bring me what--
- I would give him the money.
- Then, when we had to go to ghetto, in ghetto
- we had to leave everything.
- And I was living--
- my sister and I and my brother, we had--
- our apartment was on the fourth floor because it was next door,
- you know.
- So my sister had furniture and silverware and this.
- Everything was left.
- So he said to me, he said, well, the Germans will take it
- away. he said, better let's bring it here.
- And if you will survive, it will be yours.
- So sure enough, it was--
- and we gave him everything.
- And he had another goy, a helper.
- And I helped him, and we moved over all this stuff
- to that place.
- And he was so interested on the day I left to the ghetto.
- I went, you know.
- He went with me, and he said he wants
- to see how does it look there and how [INAUDIBLE]..
- So I told them already, I knew where I'll live
- and how many people are.
- So he went there.
- And I said that already they have
- guards in most of the places.
- In a few places, the fence weren't ready,
- so you could go in and out.
- But he insisted that we can.
- And he had a hard time getting out,
- exactly, because it was a--
- you know, I was from the last one to get here.
- And but he went out.
- You say your sister went with you There
- No.
- My sister we put on the train.
- Before you went to the ghetto.
- Before.
- Yeah, before the ghetto.
- Before the Germans even--
- Right.
- Before the Germans.
- So, who went with you to the ghetto?
- Your brother?
- No.
- And he was there, but wasn't coming.
- No, I was all by myself.
- When the war started, in fact, the last day,
- when the Russians were still in town, a lot of people
- used to come with them.
- Young people used to jump on their trucks,
- you know, troop trucks, and go, just like on the street.
- And I was busy working, you know.
- And I was reading the paper or listening.
- And I-- I remembered from the First World War what people
- were told, how--
- how, even the first--
- you are poor, but you have enough to eat to survive on.
- My heart wasn't to run because I knew the Russians.
- I observed.
- There is no order, no discipline.
- So somehow I told my brother, well, listen.
- World War we won before, and we won't have so much.
- But they won't kill people for just being Jews.
- You know, I didn't believe it.
- Then-- oh, yeah, another thing I argued with him.
- I said, listen, if we were communists,
- we should be afraid.
- But we were not communist, neither he or I.
- And everybody knows that.
- But he said, no.
- What I hear, and what people tell me is we should escape.
- So at that last day, I decided I would go.
- So we took blankets.
- And we didn't have, like here, every house
- had suitcases and this.
- But suitcases would have been bad,
- you know, because all the goyim, if the
- would have seen a Jew walks with a suitcase,
- they want to take away because it was--
- they were-- they were told whatever the Jews have,
- it is yours, for the goyim.
- So we did like a lot of people.
- We took a blanket, put on our clothing, what we have,
- and whatever we wanted to have with us.
- And we tied the four corners, made a pack, and we went.
- And we went to the railroad.
- And we didn't live far from the railroad.
- OK.
- There was a train, steam--
- steam engine.
- And it was no-- no engineer.
- And people are already packed.
- Some say that train won't go anymore.
- The Russians all went away already.
- It was chaos.
- The streetcars, the wiring is off,
- and on the road, all of the streetcars not going,
- no, no traffic.
- The only you see horses abandoned, you know.
- They were from-- evidently they were already worn out.
- They abandoned because the horses are--
- you drive a horse for a couple days and no food
- and no drink, he--
- so Russian horses.
- And people, you didn't see.
- You could see-- so some who left, who were left over
- and they want to escape, so we went to the train.
- We got there.
- And that train was full with people
- who are trying to escape, not only from Latvia.
- They were already from the neighboring, Lithuanians
- or from villages, some were bombed out
- or they want to go to Russia.
- And there were that all the men should
- give the seats to the women.
- And after a while, more people come in.
- It was not a place to stand.
- And I said to my brother, I don't know what we're doing,
- and we're doing right by escaping.
- I said, here we--
- we know the language.
- We know this.
- We know the character of the people.
- We might-- what it'll happen or [INAUDIBLE]..
- Here is a certain death.
- He knew more than--
- he was older.
- So anyhow, we are waiting there.
- We are waiting, and nothing is doing.
- Once I said, oh, that, the last train left already.
- This will remain in city.
- And all of a sudden, bullets start
- flying, like machine guns.
- And it flies over in the train.
- And I told it, the fifth column of Germans,
- they dropped overnight on the roofs.
- They were shooting in the train.
- And the people start jumping out of the windows,
- and they're spreading out, and spreading out.
- And some got injured and were crying and yelling.
- And not everybody could go out because of everybody wanted
- to go out through a door, you can't.
- And finally-- and you couldn't stick together already.
- It was such a panic.
- Anybody-- I don't know, I didn't see where he is, went out
- or where.
- And how, before all the people were--
- they went out, and they were running
- to hide away from the bullets.
- And there was continuing shooting.
- So after it calmed down, try to find Max, my brother.
- He's not there.
- So I figured, when it was shooting,
- maybe he went back home.
- We lived about two blocks away.
- Maybe he went home.
- So I take my-- no, the bags were in inside there.
- So I go home.
- I go home.
- I go in, try to look for him.
- He's not there.
- So I go back to the station.
- The train is gone.
- So Max [INAUDIBLE] and that was the last train.
- There were no more.
- In fact, I saw Russian women with children on their arms.
- And they said their husband told them to wait,
- they'll come to pick them up.
- You know, the street were--
- they sat down here.
- And they asked me, where is the way to Russia,
- to walk with a child in hand.
- And they went to it.
- I could see how.
- In those days, I was too.
- I was so compassionate, how they were left without.
- And so I remained by myself.
- And later on I heard what happened to my brother.
- That he was-- when that train came near the Russian border,
- the Russians sealed the border.
- They wouldn't let him any except the Russians.
- And he was left at the border.
- And there were other Jews from other places.
- And he said they were going without food.
- One man came back from that train.
- So he-- when I met him, I said something there.
- And Max, how he was worried about what happened to me.
- I was worried what--
- anyhow, and then I didn't hear from Max, from my brother.
- Here what happened.
- After I was liberated in Germany, and after a long time,
- I could not--
- I knew I have here another brother and uncles.
- And I wrote to them, and I didn't get any, any answer.
- I was liberated in Bergen-Belsen.
- And I thought-- and at that time,
- the Haganah used to come already in Bergen-Belsen.
- And they-- and they said all the Jewish people
- should go to Israel.
- And so I had registered myself to go to Israel.
- And at that time, the immigration was illegal.
- And if you read about it--
- you are young, and you didn't live at that time.
- The Haganah, the Jewish Brigade, part of it,
- used to come and organize groups.
- And they would come-- we would come under illegal immigration
- on boats.
- They hired boats in Europe and took them to Israel.
- And the English wouldn't let them off of the boats.
- So during the night, refugees used
- to wait on smaller boats from a bigger boat.
- And they used to swim to the shores.
- And if you read later on, the English used to the boats
- with the refugees and bring them to Cyprus
- and put them in camps until the United Nations decided
- to divide Palestine in an Israel and an Arab state.
- And it became legal to immigrate.
- But what happened?
- So I registered to go to Israel, because I wrote a few letters.
- I didn't know exactly the address,
- but I knew Bellaire, Ohio and Tulsa, Oklahoma, anyway.
- But I didn't get any answer.
- So I registered to go to Israel.
- One time, after-- that was already after the liberation.
- One time I had a girlfriend, a Hungarian.
- So I came to her barrack.
- And I see a little girl writes a letter.
- She writes a letter.
- So this friend of mine said--
- I asked her, to whom is she writing.
- She said, well this girl has a father in America.
- And she writes to him.
- I said, does she get any answers?
- So she said, oh, yes, she gets answers.
- So I said, do you think she would mind
- if I gave her a little note?
- Maybe he can find my relatives.
- She said, why not?
- So I wrote down the names of my relatives and this and that.
- And I give it to her.
- And you know, in a couple of weeks--
- In a couple of weeks, they called my name.
- In Bergen-Belsen, we had the English after the liberation.
- It was in the English zone.
- So all the letters or communications,
- they used to drive in a truck with a loudspeaker
- and announce what came in.
- They couldn't deliver letters like delivered there.
- They had at place, a little office.
- And that office, in fact, was an English chaplain, a rabbi.
- And they called my name too.
- In fact, I didn't hear it.
- And later on, when I met the same girl, she said,
- you know, she said, that they called your name.
- Did you hear it?
- I said, no.
- She said, yeah, they called a name for you.
- So I, right away, ran to that office.
- There were a line of people with letters for [INAUDIBLE]..
- And I glanced at the statement, and saw right away.
- I recognized my brother's handwriting.
- And so it came my turn.
- I got the letter and I open up.
- And he writes that--
- he writes to me.
- Probably you know that Hilda, my sister is alive.
- And it was, for me, like you know.
- And she and her husband have children,
- and they are alive in Siberia.
- They went.
- And then when I came here, after a year-- after the liberation,
- I came to the United States.
- And I asked about Max.
- So she said, yes, Max was alive almost the whole time.
- He was in the Russian army.
- You know, they mobilized it.
- And he got in touch, through other people, with my sister.
- I didn't know it, all the four years, that he was alive too.
- However, he-- at Stalingrad-- that was at the end, in 194t--
- he was helping to defend Stalingrad.
- And he fell.
- He was wounded badly.
- And then my sister didn't hear from him anymore to him.
- Evidently, something happened.
- But he was there.
- Right.
- So for me, it was entirely new.
- You know, I thought Max is gone.
- [INAUDIBLE] if this chapter.
- Now what happened to that Gentile, who were--
- who had the Jewish wife and who befriended me?
- And he helped me out quite a bit.
- When-- when-- now, when the Germans came in,
- and we were in ghetto, then in ghetto they sorted the people.
- We were 40,000 people in ghetto.
- They sorted the elderly, the women and children,
- in one ghetto.
- And the single, able-bodied man, and then which trades they
- are sorted, in other part of ghetto.
- In-- in one day, I don't know the date
- or when, but all the people who are
- from this certain part of the ghetto had to--
- and it was wintertime, I remember-- had to get dressed,
- take a minimum of the things, they said,
- and they'll be resettled in another place.
- And they called the name.
- There is food is easier, and space is easier.
- And who will be able to work a little bit
- will be able to work, and they'll resettle them.
- And people were going.
- And then they gave an opportunity
- to husbands who wanted to go out with their families come
- join them.
- And that was maybe 25,000 people, I think.
- Instead of resettling them, what they said--
- and a lot of people doubted.
- But they took them out.
- And what we heard later on, people
- who were going out of the ghetto,
- that they killed them in mass graves.
- After they took them out and quasi resettled,
- they brought postcards and letters from the people to say,
- we are having it nice.
- It is nice here, and roomier, and this and that.
- What the Germans did, they made them write postcards.
- Goyim used to tell us that it was a terrible thing.
- Goyim used to come and tell us that there
- was a massacre [INAUDIBLE].
- And not one was left--
- left alive.
- So the one who used to get the cart, and you know, everybody
- was high strung and nervous.
- And they would say, oh, why are you spreading panic and this.
- Look, there are postcards and this.
- And you know, the Germans mixed up the way of thinking.
- And [AUDIO OUT]
- Some are alive or some are dead.
- And meanwhile, the able-bodied people, they
- organized in groups for work.
- And work, that was allowed because they
- had cheap work and--
- and dependable work.
- The Jews, first, every Jew spoke German, not only Jews,
- because Jewish is similar to German,
- because in Riga, there were German schools.
- And all the Jewish people went to German schools.
- And it was the--
- instead of Jewish, in fact, when I came from my shtetl
- and where I worked, it was German.
- And we learned.
- So.
- So they organized in small groups.
- Not only that, if, in many cases,
- the Germans, the German units who needed
- the Jews kozemed them in.
- Kozem means they quartered them in in their places,
- so they didn't have to go back and forth to the ghetto.
- And the Jews who worked for the Germans felt safer.
- The others who did not work in the ghetto,
- then they forced, they work hard and killed and sent
- to concentration camps.
- There was a camp, too.
- The ghetto was a little somewhat better in Riga.
- I don't know how-- tell in a concentration camp.
- At that time, they took me.
- And in fact, how I got the job with the Ordnungspolizei--
- Ordnungspolizei mean the police who keep order on the town.
- But they weren't-- our policemen weren't the killers.
- You know, the killers were the SS, Hitler's troops.
- And they were supplying telephone and communications
- apparatus to the Eastern Front.
- So we were working there.
- In fact, we could listen to the radio, too.
- We were repairing radios, on shortwaves.
- And here what happened-- and that was forbidden,
- you know, forbidden for everybody under death penalty.
- I mean, when you--
- I don't know if in the present radios--
- if you tune in a station on shortwaves
- and there is another station-- in another house,
- another room-- it start to whistle, high-pitched whistle.
- In next room--
- I told you before how where we were working,
- there was a three-room apartment on the basic floor.
- In the front was the warehouse in the middle room
- where the Germans, in the last one where our workhouse
- where we were working.
- Where we were fixing the radios, we would just turn the needle.
- This would get a whistle all the time
- that the German-- you know, there
- were about four or five Germans, but one especially
- used to listen, especially lunchtime when
- the other Germans used to go away for lunch,
- he would tune in shortwaves on.
- And on shortwaves from England, they had, on every hour, news
- in German for the German people.
- At that time, in English, I didn't
- understand when I worked.
- So I would listen, and I knew what's going on on the Front.
- If-- so I would know.
- And then-- but it was so you had to watch out
- not to let them know that you listened.
- If somehow the Germans would find out from all the Jews
- somehow around the way that somebody listens,
- and it comes to the authorities, you would be shot.
- However, I had, in Riga, another few people from my shtetl
- who settled in Riga.
- And we were good friends.
- And one was so--
- and he was the most intelligent of my shtetl people.
- He was so interested in the news,
- he would wait for me near the gates when I come in.
- And he would come and put his hand
- on my shoulder-- little boy, what's what.
- And it was such a funny thing.
- I would tell him what and how.
- You know, the Germans would always
- report they drown so many boats and this and that.
- But the English would be truthful.
- They would say they loaded that much, they load.
- But they would say what they did to the Germans.
- And I would tell him right away.
- And he had another brother.
- And there was another two brothers from my shtetl.
- And right away when he would go home,
- he would tell these two people--
- they lived in the same.
- And there was always a little exaggerate,
- made a little better.
- But it was for us--
- they kept me like I was the radio.
- [LAUGHS]
- And I would tell him.
- And it was very important.
- It was to raise the morale, because it was--
- the Germans, if you would listen to the Germans,
- you would think you are lost.
- And we knew, also, what in abroad, in America
- or in England, what they report about the Jews.
- You know, we have, too--
- in England, English knew that they are murdering or they had.
- So I worked at the time for the police.
- And then it was--
- again, came from Berlin that no more--
- the German units cannot keep the Jews working.
- Yeah, they liquidated the ghetto and sent all the Jews
- to the concentration camp.
- And there were goyish too, you know.
- Irving, before we get to the concentration camp,
- how long did you work for the police?
- About eight month to a year.
- And during that time, I believe you told me,
- but we didn't get it on tape, about your experiences.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Would you mind telling--
- The torture.
- --me that again, so I can--
- Oh, I think like that.
- Let me tell you--
- let me go my way about the goy and my good goy.
- And this will make an extra--
- OK.
- Maybe an extra, right?
- All right.
- So here what happened.
- This-- we're taking--
- he took you to the ghetto.
- And that's where you left off.
- And he had a hard time getting out afterwards.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Right.
- And oh yeah, one time while I was worked for the police,
- here what happened-- the police there--
- we fixed radios.
- But also was going to go on the--
- one of the policeman, they had drivers driving trucks
- back and forth to the Front.
- And in wartime, gasoline was very--
- it was rationed.
- Private people couldn't get gasoline at all.
- So here what the--
- what one time, the driver from a truck--
- and he was the--
- he used to pick us up from the ghetto
- and bring us when he wasn't on the road.
- Asked me, he said he needs gasoline,
- but he cannot get gasoline unless he has the tachometer.
- the meter in the car, the mileage meter.
- I heard, you know.
- He asked me if I can do it for him.
- So and he said that he needs it.
- He said he-- well, let me see.
- So I got under and I screwed-- you could get--
- I took a drill machine, a hand drill.
- And I put on, and I drilled it like that,
- so he put on more mileage.
- He could get more gasoline.
- The gasoline they used to sell for cigarettes, for everything.
- So and he was a good goyim.
- So one time he said, I would like something to do for you.
- Do you know--
- I think--
- What was his name, Irving?
- His name was Weissner.
- He was a German from Germany.
- Oh yeah, with the Germans, we knew they felt sorry for us.
- In fact, one time one of the Germans there, a man,
- he was from Berlin.
- It was-- I think it was Christmastime or New Year's.
- He said, I wish the war would be over, and we have a good year.
- And he said, and for you, the situation
- would change to the good, too, he said to us.
- What was his name?
- His name was Master, Mr. Master from Berlin.
- He was the head of the, chief--
- Right, right.
- --of the police?
- Right, not of the police, but of this.
- This was a branch of the police.
- It wasn't the main.
- This was a branch.
- And they had to worry about the telephone and the radio
- for the Front.
- But he was a pretty good man.
- Not only that, in fact, the other boys--
- you see, the other boys were taking care of the building
- and heating and this.
- And they all used to go for lunch.
- One boy saw that he got a letter he put in his coat
- on the left side.
- He took out the letter, and we knew
- how the Germans feel in Berlin.
- So he had a wife and a daughter.
- And she wrote him how bad it is-- food is scarce
- and the bombardments and this.
- And she said that the war is lost, anyhow.
- And she goes, they wish it would be over sooner.
- But so after a certain period of time, all
- the Jews had to go to the concentration camp.
- However, it happened-- and I don't know how that one German
- took out specialists of the ghetto, and he moved over.
- And he quartered them in in a plant.
- It was a textile plant on the other side of the river.
- And the textile machinery-- the Germans
- didn't need the textile.
- They broke up in scrap and sent it to Germany.
- And there he made a tailor shop, but a big tailor shop
- and a shoe manufacturing plant and a garage they used to fix
- and a printing plant.
- Every imaginable trade, he placed there,
- because during the war there was nothing.
- Everybody was on the Front, or it was destroyed,
- or it wasn't important to--
- and there-- and he gathered them Jews with trades.
- And when I-- and they came in here.
- Then I said, who am I?
- I can fix typewriters, I can fix watches,
- I can fix electric motors.
- This was while you were working at the police station?
- No, that was in between when they closed it.
- No more-- that was after, a little after, a few days after.
- OK, you had been working at that police station for 11 months?
- Right, but I used to stay there, to sleep in there.
- And go back and forth.
- Go back In the morning, yeah.
- Not to go back by myself, but a German used to come,
- one of the--
- and pick up his Jews.
- And we'll come back at night.
- And it was a lot of groups like that.
- Would you mind telling the gun story?
- Now?
- Yes, while you're at the police station,
- so we don't jump ahead.
- Oh, OK.
- So well, we would have to jump a little bit back.
- While I was at the police station, I met him, the man,
- and I was known.
- Very soon I was known by the Germans
- that I know too more, this and that.
- So anything imaginable they used to bring me to fix.
- And one time that Master, he brings me--
- he said, can you clean my gun, I haven't cleaned it
- for a long time.
- I said, all right.
- In fact, he didn't-- can you clean, but he said, do it,
- you know-- it would--
- so I take it apart, and I clean it.
- And meanwhile, there was another boy.
- We were-- at this group, we were two, four, six,
- eight young men were working.
- There were two who were chopping wood and heating the rooms
- and cleaning up.
- And two were in the warehouse, loading and unloading
- there, some packing this.
- And two were with us.
- We were, myself and another, were fixing,
- repairing the things.
- So while I cleaning, so one--
- Abraham Field, was his name, Abraham Field.
- And I knew him before, I told you.
- We were the same age.
- And when we had maneuvers, he was
- serving in the army in a different town.
- And I was in a different.
- But for me and the Jewish people, I was in the army the--
- who blows the horn.
- You know, the--
- Bugler.
- Bugler, yes.
- So and he said, oh, how come a Jew, they let you be a bugler?
- [LAUGHS] And that's the way we got acquainted,
- because just as I said before, the discrimination was so--
- they were ashamed to let a Jew be a little higher
- than the ground.
- So he said, oh, you know how to do that?
- Said, well, I know, and I was in the army over there.
- So he tells me, we need you, I want to talk to you,
- come over to where I live in the ghetto.
- So I came over.
- I said-- so he tells, he said, there is an organization,
- we are organized where we are arming ourselves.
- And he tells me how he gets the arms.
- And you see, some Jewish people work,
- sorting the armaments they get in the Front
- from German soldiers who are killed or Russians.
- They put it all on trucks and bring it and dump it
- And it has to be sorted--
- which are good and decent--
- and oil and unpack them and put on tags--
- or they are of the same kind to put here, to go in that.
- You know, some are--
- So he said, these people, they take apart and bring in parts.
- And the Jewish police--
- at the ghetto were Jewish police who
- had to examine for the Germans-- you know,
- there was one German and 10 Jewish policeman.
- They examine that the Jews don't smuggle in food--
- bread and butter.
- You know, this, they were.
- So anyhow-- and there they are in connection
- with the Jewish police.
- And they make them that they are not examined-- and he said,
- we need to put it together on that time.
- So I said, I feel like it's so dangerous, I would-- oh yeah,
- and I asked him, what will you do with it?
- He said, we won't do anything.
- But he said, the Front is coming.
- And he said, it might come a time when the Russians are here
- and they want to take us, or they might want to shoot us--
- we'll shoot back-- no matter a small amount,
- maybe we will save them.
- So he said, they can do it, but provided I'm by myself--
- nobody, nobody knows about it.
- Because a lot from me will that come known,
- then everybody will know.
- But he said, yes, you come.
- And he showed me what they have--
- a little in the basement.
- And where they lived--
- the best boys-- in a house away, a little house.
- It was a one-family house, while I
- lived in the ghetto in a house where there
- were about six or seven floors.
- And we were packed like herring, like sardines.
- So he showed me here, and he said, you come.
- I said, all right.
- And I started to come in workroom.
- And there we put together-- start from-- would oil it.
- You know, some I was in doubt.
- I would try out, had ammunition.
- When it was ready, there was an outhouse
- with a double wall they would take it out to and bring me
- in a certain amount and watch as when I fixed this,
- there were others, again, with the outhouse.
- And there was nothing in.
- And I was going on, and It was a routine.
- How long did you do that?
- I did it for about three or four months.
- How did you test-fire the weapons?
- I would-- they had in the basement.
- And they would knock on, make noise, and it would go,
- you know.
- And one bullet I had test-fire, even one.
- I was afraid, sometimes, it may backfire on and explode, too.
- But I would-- they had a wall of burning wood prepared,
- evidently from the person who lived there in the house.
- I used to go behind.
- How many weapons do you think you repaired in that room?
- Oh, I would say probably about 35, 40.
- And some didn't have to be repaired.
- They showed me even a machine gun, a new one.
- And they had-- and I worked from one night.
- And it became a routine.
- I would come to my place and have a bite--
- whatever there was, you know--
- and go there.
- And I worked and go out.
- And I got acquainted with the other boys.
- But I don't know--
- only one or two I know their name.
- And the others I didn't know.
- And I didn't-- it didn't interest me,
- because I didn't want to.
- And the same, too-- it worked like a conspiracy we had there.
- So one night I came as usual.
- And I saw after peering around one-half windows not dark.
- And during the war, even the Front was far away,
- especially the ghetto had to be darkened, because they
- had orders to shoot.
- And they were trigger happy.
- Oh, if they had only--
- they didn't need an excuse, they could shoot.
- But this way, for the guards-- and the guards
- were Latvians, the Latvians who volunteered for to cooperate
- with the Germans.
- They were all, they were all-- it is all
- cooperated with the Germans, the Latvians
- were mad at the Jewish people.
- So I thought, something is wrong, all right.
- I want to go back.
- And you know, he calls me.
- He calls me in.
- He said, come back, come back, come back.
- So I start to-- he comes in.
- And I got in, I get in in the house.
- At that time, there were already half of the ghetto
- or two-thirds of the ghetto was divided up for--
- Jews from, not from Latvia.
- And there were Hungarian and Germans, mostly Germans,
- from Kehl, from different cities.
- And they have the--
- again, German Jews were these for entire ghetto.
- And that Roschmann somehow trusted then
- the Germans Jews policemen and the Latvian Jews police.
- So he sent in--
- in the Latvian ghetto, the German Jewish police
- at that house.
- And I see the house when he searched.
- And they keep on searching.
- And they said, you sit down, we have orders from Roschmann
- that anybody who comes in this house not to let go back--
- to arrest.
- And I thought, hmm, something is all wrong, I'm a lost man,
- I'm lost, because I knew it never happened that you, from
- ghetto should be arrested--
- is it for food or for stealing or for--
- and it should be free.
- He-- if they send him away to the city jail, to the--
- and what they do with them-- but they never come back.
- And I thought not only that, but that my-- if they found
- something or something that--
- if they are there, you know, it is for sure about this.
- So I'm lost, a lost a lot.
- And always I made--
- it's called a Heshbon Hanefesh.
- As somebody of life and somebody what's going on, I thought,
- the fact that I will die is nothing,
- because the chances to remain alive is very slim.
- But I thought, well, they'll start torturing.
- They'll want to get out, get this.
- And it can be terrible, and I heard about the tortures.
- And I thought the best will be if I can die,
- and how can I die.
- And I was worried and worried.
- But it wasn't a worry like you have a worry today--
- you made some mistake or you missed
- a train or you made a mistake or you lost money.
- It was a different worry.
- It's the worry about dying in a torture death.
- You don't know how it feels.
- And I know it will be torture.
- And nobody comes.
- And I wonder where are all the people that lived--
- our own group.
- I wasn't thinking about living.
- I was thinking about dying--
- how can I?
- And he-- they kept us until about 11 o'clock.
- And they talk.
- Roschmann is supposed to come.
- He said he'll come--
- nothing, nothing.
- And I thought I'd--
- and then a policeman comes from there.
- Then the Russians said they should lock there this place.
- And they arrested, taking the book.
- What did he say?
- They said, what should we do with that?
- He said, I don't know.
- Anyhow, I landed in the German ghetto in a bunker.
- A bunker was an arrest house.
- We called it a bunker.
- Why, I don't know.
- It was a garage with the windows.
- They put in blocks.
- It was a block building and cement floor.
- There was some straw.
- There were a few other Jewish people.
- And when I came in, I was envying those--
- OK, those maybe will die, too.
- But I didn't think they'll torture for--
- because it was for stealing or smuggling or--
- and I thought they don't want to give out all the--
- so I thought even in death there is different categories.
- I tried to hold my jack a little ways--
- maybe I can-- nothing else, I tried to hold my breath,
- he can't-- to commit suicide.
- I wish I would have something I could cut myself.
- Then I thought, maybe when Roschmann
- will come in the next morning, maybe
- when he'll come, I'll jump and grab his eyes,
- scratch his eyes.
- Or when he'll leave me, I'll try to run,
- and he'll shoot me the back or--
- And I-- it was cold then, but nothing bothered me,
- and no sleep-- none of it.
- About 2 o'clock, I heard that they come to open the door.
- And again from the German Jewish policeman said,
- the one who is arrested in [PLACE NAME]----
- it was the address there--
- should come up.
- So he get up.
- And I thought he was going to take me to the Russian, now.
- It was about 2 o'clock in the morning.
- He takes me out, locks the door of the cell
- and said, where do you live?
- I said, [NON-ENGLISH].
- So I'll take-- we'll go in from this ghetto, this,
- and bring me this.
- OK, they let me out.
- We go-- didn't ask me my name, nothing.
- Then I go up in the fourth floor, who are sleeping three
- in a bed, climb in, lie down.
- What's going on, here?
- Why this, why, though?
- Why didn't I seeing if the other boys are arrested?
- I didn't sleep.
- And I remember in the morning, I get up, and I will go to work.
- I didn't tell anybody, no.
- I was sleeping near--
- Kaplan was his name, my best friend
- who went to trade school together,
- and we worked together.
- I didn't say but I don't-- what is going on here something is.
- And the next morning I get up, get dressed.
- And we go out.
- We had a square where we used to gather a lot in the--
- a thousand people or more where we used to gather,
- and Germans who would come and pick up which is Jewish.
- And you'd come outside, come out where we would go.
- And a guard would open the door.
- He would take us back and this, this--
- some were big units with 200 people who were
- On that square there were a bulletin board.
- And on the bulletin was written--
- a lot of people were coming, and it says that Roschmann,
- that he's giving his honor, word,
- that if the people from that--
- from that [NON-ENGLISH],, and from that little house return
- voluntarily and he find them not guilty, he'll let them go free.
- However, if they don't report, he'll
- take 50 people from ghetto for each one of them,
- and will be shot.
- And everybody was worried.
- And a lot of people didn't know what it is about.
- But some knew where the people--
- and here what happened.
- Somehow, these people from that house
- find out that there will be a search or something.
- And they did not come to the ghetto.
- They hid in town.
- The town was easy to hid.
- You know, everybody could escape.
- However, for me, for example, there was nowhere.
- No, no, no Gentile would take in and save the Jew
- because, first, they didn't like them.
- Second, it was dangerous, dangerous.
- It was forbidden.
- If the Germans found that a Gentile was hiding a Jew,
- he was shot together with that whom he was hiding.
- Well, didn't Ferk work with you?
- Huh?
- Didn't Ferk work with you?
- Sure.
- Firk, yeah.
- Did he report to work the next day, when he was--
- No, no, no.
- Now, the day before, yes.
- You see, it was the evening.
- The next day he didn't report.
- I see.
- No.
- He wasn't-- and so what happened, they hid.
- They found out, and they hid in town.
- But some people, they were from Riga.
- They knew evidently what they were hiding.
- And they went out to talk to them and told them.
- And it wasn't-- they decided to come back, and they showed up.
- And Roschmann arrested them.
- Nobody of them came out.
- Not only that, they started, as the days went on,
- to arrest all the young people who participated,
- who were bringing it in.
- And I was thinking.
- I knew what is going on, because I knew this house
- and I knew what we were doing.
- And I knew my deal, that I was repairing this.
- And I thought Firk, for Firk my friend is there.
- And I knew the Germans were torturing them,
- and I better get out.
- And the fact that they were arresting others,
- and I was waiting for my turn.
- And again I though, what should I do?
- There is a chance I could escape and hide myself in one place
- there were--
- he had horses.
- There weren't trucks or cars like here.
- There were a lot of horse and buggies there.
- And I could climb up in his attic,
- there where he keeps his hay.
- But I thought, how long can I be there if nobody supports me?
- And I could, I thought, maybe by my benefactor, you know.
- Then I thought, but who knows if he'll want it,
- and who knows if it's right for me to put--
- he has a family.
- He had his wife.
- And he had a daughter with her husband.
- You had not seen him since that day he took you to the ghetto.
- One time I did see him.
- And I'll tell you about it.
- I was about to tell you before.
- So, and I always decided not.
- Then I though, where we were working,
- the Germans had a machine gun, a Russian, you know.
- And it was hanging like a--
- like somebody collects arms.
- And it was loaded with bullets, on the wall.
- And I thought, if I see Roschmann coming,
- I would mow him down, him and the Germans, all Germans.
- And still, it wasn't a fast decision
- because what will happen to the other Jews?
- This machine gun was where you were working?
- Yeah, and out of the ghetto.
- They let a loaded machine gun in there?
- Right.
- Because they trusted the Jews more than anybody.
- And I want to tell you another thing.
- Roschmann did not arrest any of the Jews anymore in ghetto.
- He wouldn't go in in the Latvian ghetto.
- All the arrested people, he used to go
- in the German units, where the Jews work,
- picked them up there.
- And it was there, a room, where I was working so situated--
- Was that because he was afraid that there were weapons there?
- Oh, yeah.
- Yeah.
- After he found out that his weapons, they were there.
- That I could see who comes in in the front door.
- First it was a bell.
- And I could keep open in our room, a little bit, the door.
- I was-- and I thought, I will open down on this.
- And it was, as I said, such feelings,
- such that the danger is here, that it--
- that it'll come to a point where, well, of life and death.
- And you were waiting for that moment.
- And I remember it was--
- it is hard to describe that feeling.
- We were-- our feeling in ghetto were
- like we are sheep in a slaughterhouse, where they'll
- pull out today you and today-- but there was an even worse.
- He never came to arrest me.
- And I don't know why.
- I don't know how.
- Probably Firk probably didn't give me out.
- He was the one who knew.
- And the other boys didn't even know my name.
- There was another man I knew who was arrested.
- And we worked together.
- He was a chemical engineer.
- And somehow he knew how to make the--
- not bombs.
- He would make powder, you know, something,
- gunpowder with cotton or something.
- And he was arrested.
- He was such a nice man.
- What was his name?
- Stober.
- Stober.
- And here it seemed to me I may be one more from the group who
- were active, I mean alive, and that's by miracle.
- Now, you continued to work at the police station.
- Who replaced Firk?
- Oh, yeah.
- Oh, here I'll tell you.
- That's a good question.
- Now, I knew what was going on.
- Firk didn't show up.
- So this German, our master, asked where is Firk.
- So we say he was arrested.
- You know what?
- He got dressed, and got in, and got to that--
- to the ghetto, to Roschmann.
- He said we need him.
- And he was a good boy, that man, very, very talented.
- He said we need him to work.
- And he said, I'll get him out.
- He says to us.
- And he went.
- And he comes back.
- And he said, I couldn't get him out, he said,
- because it isn't for stealing.
- He said they said it's political.
- And then he says in the same, he said, you know,
- maybe he was listening to the radio, and he was spreading it.
- And he said, you know, it is forbidden,
- even us, if they would find out that we
- listen on the radio, foreign radio, they would shoot us.
- So he didn't know.
- He thought it is from the radio.
- And they didn't replace Firk.
- There were orders.
- They gave over the--
- and shortly after, they liquidated the ghetto
- and sent us to the--
- Now, while you were working at the police station,
- did you see-- say you saw your next door neighbor?
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- That happened, I started to tell you,
- when we had a truck driver, you know,
- and he wanted to be nice to me.
- And he said, what can I do for you, sir?
- So I said, you know, I have a friend.
- Take me in the truck and let me off.
- I want to sit in for a while, and I'll come out.
- He said, yeah.
- So he got-- drove me up to that place.
- And I jumped out, and I came in.
- And I tell him, trust me.
- They didn't know of him, I'm still alive and this.
- And it seemed to me, you know-- and I
- don't know, is it true or somehow, or my imagination,
- that this woman, his wife said, if things get very bad,
- he said you come over here.
- We'll hide you.
- And this I don't remember that.
- Did she said, or didn't.
- You know, it was 40 years ago.
- But they were very pleased.
- And they asked me how, what.
- Oh, yeah, and she took out everything,
- what she had in the refrigerator, some [INAUDIBLE]
- and things like that-- loaded me up.
- I got in, he took me back.
- [INAUDIBLE]
- But then, next time, you know, I'll
- tell you that isn't finished with that.
- And then you continued to work at the police station
- until they liquidated the ghetto.
- And they liquidated the ghetto.
- How did your job end at the police station?
- They just tell you one day not to come back?
- One day, yeah.
- It was everything suddenly.
- And you never--
- In fact, they didn't have to tell me.
- No.
- It was from the ghetto.
- When we came to sleep, the ghetto is closed.
- They-- no more Germans can come to pick you up.
- It happened.
- They didn't know either, the police.
- Is that the last time you saw [? the master? ?]
- Yeah.
- You know, Irving, before we begin
- with after the ghetto was dismantled,
- you mentioned to me off the tape the last time that there
- was an incident where you had a gun, actually had a gun.
- Yeah.
- Would you please tell me about that
- before we begin with the dismantling of the ghetto?
- Well, I had the-- when I was repairing, I had guns.
- But I had a gun when we weren't even organized.
- And how did that happen?
- Next-- you have it on?
- Sure.
- Yeah.
- Next to my apartment lived a couple, a childless couple.
- And he was an elderly man.
- Was that the one you had worked for?
- No.
- No.
- It was a different couple.
- Yeah.
- What was their name?
- Katzen.
- Katzen.
- And he was working for a timber company.
- You know, in Latvia we had a lot of timber.
- So with the lumber men in the timber,
- he used to pay them their wages and this.
- So he had the gun.
- Usually, in Latvia, a gone, had only the police or officials.
- The population had no guns.
- There was no, not, no, no license like here.
- Very few who went hunting, they had probably small guns.
- But he had a revolver because he was
- handling money in the woods.
- So when the war broke out and he lost his job--
- all the Jews lost their jobs.
- So he had a gun, and he was probably 60 years old, gray,
- maybe [INAUDIBLE].
- So he said to me-- we were next door.
- He said to me, here, you want the gun?
- Do with it what you want or hide it from me.
- So for a while I kept it.
- Then I was afraid, you know.
- So I took it down.
- We had, downstairs-- it was an apartment building.
- In the basement, everybody had--
- Was this before your brother had left?
- Yeah.
- So he knew you had it too?
- No, no, no.
- that was not-- that is after my brother have left.
- No.
- No.
- So I had a gun.
- So the Nazis were already there when you had the gun?
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- The Nazis were there.
- But I thought sometimes maybe at night
- I will go out and kill a Nazi, but it was so--
- the responsibility was so big.
- If a Jew would have killed a Nazi,
- I don't know what it would happen.
- But later on, they used to take hundred for one.
- If a Jew committed a crime, they would take hostages.
- So that is a small episode.
- But the fact is, I hid it.
- And I thought I'll use it, and I decided against it, very easy.
- But naturally, I had guns later on when
- I was fixing guns in ghetto, when we were organizing.
- So that would be the episode with a gun.
- I consider it a small episode, just a chance.
- But I wasn't that brave, and nobody
- would be that brave because it would be a lot of trouble.
- So now let's-- so this chapter is finished.
- And now we'll start when they liquidated the ghetto.
- And that is very interesting.
- There are very interesting moments.
- And a story, you could write a book by this itself.
- So at that time, Roschmann was in Riga ghetto.
- And the order was to liquidate the ghetto.
- So what did they do?
- They put a few signs that some people
- with trades or on the ages, are registered there.
- Some people already were working for the Wehrmacht.
- It was the army, the German army.
- They were working there, should register with them.
- And I, at that time, was working in the ghetto.
- You know, I was an electrician and I employed a few people,
- you know, people who had shorts of this,
- small repair or appliances.
- So when the ghetto was liquidated,
- I started to look for a job outside.
- And it so happened--
- oh, no, no, no.
- You know, I'm mixed up.
- At that time, I was working for the ordnungspolizei.
- Right.
- Yeah.
- So entire job, the little jobs, you know, they stopped.
- But big jobs, where a lot of Jews worked with the Wehrmacht,
- they--
- it's called in kaserne, you know.
- Kaserne means kaserne.
- You know what kaserne means, barracks for army.
- So they took the Jews and gave them a barrack
- where the army was.
- And they were working.
- And there was a lot of work for the Jews, all kind of work.
- In fact, the Jews replaced the German soldiers from the front.
- And they had 100s, and 200s, and 300,
- and they utilized in offices, whatever you can think of.
- Behind the lines they utilized Jewish people.
- But here what happened.
- One German, and I don't know how,
- and he was a very interesting man.
- His name was Scherwitz.
- He put out that all Jewish mechanics and tradesmen
- should register separately.
- He was an SS man.
- SS, you know, that Hitler stormtroopers.
- So I went and registered there.
- Anyhow, he took over a Jewish plant.
- It was a textile plant.
- He took over.
- The machinery textile, the Germans
- didn't need for the war machinery.
- But they needed the cast iron.
- All the machinery-- and he took 1,200 Jews.
- And I was among them too.
- All the machinery, first we cleaned
- rooms, big rooms, textiles.
- It was a manufacturing plant.
- Broke the machinery throughout, and with a sledge hammer
- broke it, loaded it in the big tractor trailers,
- and they took it to Germany.
- And after the rooms were cleaned, with the Germans,
- you know, it was working fast, and trucks
- were coming on the newest and shiniest machines,
- broken down and made scrap.
- Then we cleaned out the rooms.
- So one big room they made for dormitories,
- were sleeping quarters.
- And there were a lot of good workers
- who built, the beds and--
- how do you call it in barracks, the beds?
- Bunks.
- Bunks.
- And some were making straw sacks, some blankets.
- And it was-- so he set up a big tailor shop.
- And the tailor shop used to repair clothing, German,
- for it, and make new ones.
- A big shoemaker shop, big--
- there were a lot of shoemakers, Jewish shoemaker and tailors,
- and printing, auto repair shops.
- Some they left over from the textiles to make socks,
- knitting.
- I was mechanical things, all kinds.
- I was assigned with a group to fix sewing machines.
- You know, tailors-- there were about 150 or more sewing
- machines.
- All the time it breaks.
- So one man was--
- he was with a seamsters, with the sewing people.
- And I was downstairs.
- We had a little shop.
- There was a goldsmith, you know.
- And he was a good man.
- He used to make some-- melt gold to make all kind fancy rings,
- fancy lighters, all for the Germans--
- and typewriters, bicycles repair.
- And I think that was all.
- And-- oh, yeah.
- And that Scherwitz-- and he was a marvelous man.
- In fact, we were wondering.
- Some gave him a nickname, "the Father."
- Some said he's a hidden Jew.
- He looked Jewish, black hair and--
- you know.
- And he was so shrewd, and his ways were--
- weren't German ways.
- You know?
- Then, food-- oh, yeah, then [INAUDIBLE] a washing machines
- he set up to wash clothing.
- He had a butcher, butcher's, you know.
- And we belonged actually to the Kaiserwald concentration camp.
- And there was terrible.
- There were-- the Germans brought from Germany criminals.
- And they were the leaders of the ghetto--
- of the concentration camp.
- So all the Jews belong still to the concentration camp,
- after from the ghetto.
- But we were like a state in a state.
- He used to bring, officially, the food.
- But always additional food we had.
- Margarine and meat even we used to have.
- And there were tailors.
- One time he brought bales of clothing, make for us uniforms.
- Before we were wearing, with a--
- jail people uniforms.
- He didn't like it.
- He didn't.
- He said, I don't want it here.
- And the tailors--
- Where was the concentration camp you were living in?
- No, I-- we didn't go.
- I didn't go.
- They, when they liquidated the ghetto, part--
- those they couldn't use went to the concentration camp.
- Those, the people who knew trades, went there.
- So you were living at the textile plant.
- Is that--
- Right.
- I see.
- Living at the textile plant.
- Some people who worked for the Wehrmacht, for the army,
- went with the army.
- But under arrest, went to the concentration camp.
- All right.
- So-- so we didn't wear anymore those clothes.
- In fact, later on, a high official from the SS
- came and he saw us.
- They balled him out, why he did it.
- And part of it, he had stopped making those uniforms.
- And we were working and had it real good.
- And he was-- and this German was living with us in the camp,
- only he had a separate little house.
- But he was there.
- And he had two more Germans, assistants.
- And around this was made a fence from boards.
- And on top, you know, with a wire.
- And outside were Latvian SS guards, the collaborators.
- But they were not-- he made so they were not
- allowed to go in, only outside.
- And there was a big, big rooms, maybe
- it were that place had 15 or 20 acres or maybe more.
- We walk around.
- We used to walk around after work.
- And all of us, we never suffered hunger.
- What was your job, Irving?
- I was in the shop for fixing typewriters and sewing machines
- what they brought down.
- And I will tell you what happened.
- And we had it pretty good.
- How did you learn how to fix typewriters
- and sewing machines?
- Oh, I went to a trade school before.
- And, you know, I--
- I thought it was electrical.
- Well, but I was a handyman.
- I learned this, and I fixed watches.
- And I fixed a lot of things.
- I see.
- So-- so we lived there pretty good.
- And there was one time, and he used to do--
- oh, yeah.
- And I'll tell it.
- He approached the Jews, you know, so close.
- There were a few from Riga who studied in Germany,
- and they knew perfect German and the German ways of life.
- He became with them friends.
- You know, he would talk to them.
- And all over this was a Jewish manager.
- His name was Sheinberg.
- Then there was another Jew, and his name was Rudolf.
- And listen, well that--
- that Jew wore a tie and a shirt and lived in a separate room,
- too, with his wife, on the premises.
- And he used to go out to the high officials.
- You know, in Riga it was a big center, but from Berlin,
- from the big shots.
- You know, Eichmann was there, and Muller used to come.
- If they wanted something special, suit or this,
- this Jew would go and take their measurements.
- Oh, yeah.
- And he was a German-educated too.
- His German was perfect.
- And his looks was perfect.
- So he was the middle man.
- And we lived pretty good.
- Oh, yeah.
- And that Scherwitz was acquainted
- with some Jewish people.
- And some rich people had probably hidden valuables
- in town, what they lived.
- He would send out somebody, and they would pick up valuables.
- And he would trade.
- And with the Germans, that Scherwitz, used to schmear too.
- When a big shot would come, and he
- needs some, the commander of the whole Eastern sector,
- he would bring them boots, new boots
- with fur, which during the wartime-- you know,
- in America you can buy it in every store.
- But during the wartime, it was--
- you couldn't buy anything.
- And nobody was making something special.
- In there we could order up all kind of their uniforms
- with fur inside.
- It was cold.
- And here what happened.
- One-- here I'm coming to an episode, what happened.
- Roschmann used to come.
- And he, with the Germans, he would come and see
- how we produce and make nice things.
- He would look like any other man.
- And-- and something we were building.
- They were building-- everything was going on.
- There were Jewish masons and building a building.
- And some from outside brought in gravel, sand and gravel,
- a load.
- This is what happened.
- And at that time, Roschmann, an assistant, was at Lenta.
- At our place was called Lenta.
- And when, to dump the sand and gravel, a box with eggs
- fell out.
- And for the Germans, that the Jews,
- first, they couldn't understand why we look--
- why we don't look undernourished there, you know.
- And when they saw it the eggs came out,
- oh, the Jews are trading this.
- So anyhow, they notified Roschmann.
- And he came on, and he said, what is going on here?
- And I don't know what Scherwitz told him.
- But anyhow [AUDIO OUT] the eggs.
- And it was a Jew from Prague, Czechoslovakia.
- We had some German Jews there because they brought to Riga,
- I told you before, Jews from all Europe.
- And Scherwitz-- so after Roschmann
- left, Scherwitz called in us together,
- and he used to make appells during lunch.
- And he would speak.
- So he said, Roschmann was here.
- And he said we made a bad thing, a [NON-ENGLISH],, a bad thing.
- And he said, Roschmann--
- --who send him, a Czechoslovakian Jew,
- to the concentration camp.
- And he said, that Jewish boy said,
- if you send me to that concentration camp,
- he said, I'll tell everything what's going on.
- You know, what's going on, that we were buying with Scherwitz'
- approval.
- In fact, he used to help us get the food additional.
- And that was for the Germans, for Scherwitz, it would be--
- it would cost him the job.
- And that job is like that.
- For him, the job-- he didn't go to the front,
- and then he was promoted so fast.
- You know, he started out like a sergeant.
- Within three or four months, he was already
- a lieutenant in the SS because he had a good tongue,
- and he was going to the high officials and [INAUDIBLE]
- the production.
- So he got scared.
- So about 10 o'clock, when we were in bed, the oberjude,
- Mr Sheinberg-- not the one with the tie--
- came in and he said--
- well, we were sleeping in a big dormitory.
- He said, you know what happened?
- I don't remember anymore the name from that Czechoslovakian
- Jew.
- He said they were working on the roof.
- He fell down, and he was killed.
- However, we found out on the next day that Scherwitz said he
- cannot send them to the ghetto, he said.
- Otherwise, the whole thing will blow up.
- And he ordered-- and he didn't want to kill himself,
- so he ordered--
- there were other German boys who were working.
- Oh, they are working with the masons, with the masonry.
- He ordered them to eliminate him, you know.
- And it was a very shock, but I'm telling
- about the whole episode.
- So I heard that Scherwitz made them work when it became dark.
- As a punishment, he made him work, him work,
- the whole group in the masonry, later.
- But he gave them a notion to kill that man.
- And when he was bending down, somebody--
- I know that man.
- I don't remember the names that hit him with the shovel,
- with the flat over the head.
- So that's one episode.
- Now, after that time was going on, and we were working.
- And it was pretty--
- still the best place.
- Well, did Rauchman, was he satisfied that the--
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Well, he said it was an accident.
- He fell down off the roof.
- They know we were working and busy.
- And you know, German-- the German,
- he had evidently told him he punished him.
- This he was sending him this, and he fell down.
- Oh, yeah, they delivered the body, and the body had a flat--
- and we kept on working.
- Now, what happened?
- You know, as time goes on, the German idea
- was to eliminate the Jews.
- So from all-- they had to make, they called it, judenrein.
- You know what judenrein--
- clean of Jews.
- So they used to--
- we were 1,200.
- They asked 200 people.
- So each sub-- and there were a lot of subs, as I said,
- printers and weavers and the truck repair and car repair
- and trailers.
- Each shop has to give a certain proportion to make up the 200.
- 200 what?
- 200 Jews to give out to the concentration camp.
- And there they eliminated them.
- All right, do you know what period or what time
- it was, what month or year?
- I'll tell you approximately.
- When I read many times the stories about ghettos
- with periods, with dates, I wonder how do they know it?
- How do they remember?
- Because the state of our minds was so
- I don't know how anybody could remember dates.
- We did not remember dates.
- And why?
- Because we were equal to a bunch of sheep who are
- brought to the slaughterhouse, and we
- are going to be slaughtered.
- One part is today.
- When will be our line?
- And I don't know.
- Unless there were some people who were either--
- I was not.
- I don't remember dates.
- If I want to, I have to approximate.
- We didn't from any holidays or this.
- It was work, work, and waiting for when
- you are going to be called.
- And three, four months past, another 200.
- And again, each shop, each shop had a foreman.
- He would give the names.
- And it used to be we would entreten.
- We would line up in a line in the morning.
- And then Scherwitz would come, and he would
- say the one who are the list--
- the list who were called should go four or five steps ahead.
- And we would go, and they would go away.
- And, you know.
- We knew a lot of executions and this.
- And the one who went didn't know where--
- if they are be eliminated right away.
- There were already beaten, and in all kinds of places
- where people were eliminated.
- And it-- to 200.
- And it went up.
- It came to about 600, when I was still there.
- And here what happened.
- This is a very touchy episode.
- This was already about, I would say, in 1943, end of '43.
- And in our shop was--
- the manager was a Mr. Lippert.
- He was an engineer.
- And he had, before, a bicycle and typewriter shop.
- He was there, and he had a son about 18 years
- old, asthmatic, very tall, slender,
- you know, but a sick boy.
- So he was the manager, and his boy was working with anybody,
- giving a hand.
- Then was a Mr. Adamson, again, a father and a son.
- And they were in the type repair business.
- They had a shop like here an office.
- So there was a goldsmith, a very good specialist.
- His name was Khan, Mr. Khan or Kagan.
- Then was a family of three engineers, three brothers.
- And a Mr. Henkin and Gafanowicz, all that did--
- that Henkin was an electrical engineer.
- And-- and here what happened.
- And I was working with electric appliances
- and sewing machines what they brought down.
- You know, I used to make by hand parts if necessary.
- So that Mr. Lippert and Mr. Adamson, they had--
- it was a father and son, a father and son.
- And we had to send away people.
- So Lippert wouldn't send his son, you know.
- And that Adamson said, if he sends his son,
- he goes with him.
- And they were in--
- and somehow, they were personalities,
- they were always fighting.
- So when many people were sent away,
- so Lippert wanted to send Adamson's son.
- And they were almost--
- he want to fight.
- And he knew Lippert got--
- he cannot do that.
- So what does he do?
- He sends both away, the father and the son.
- And he comes to me.
- And he knew I was in the-- he said, Mr. Leibowitz,
- he used to--
- you'll take over from now on the typewriter repair.
- Your name was not Lebow there, it was what?
- Leibowitz.
- I see.
- Yeah.
- So I took it over.
- And we were working, and then he saw
- how handy I am and this, and everything was nice.
- Not only that, one time he brings me-- and that Lippert
- himself didn't have good hands.
- He was a businessman with a lot of practice in business,
- or he knew about things.
- He was an engineer, but to do the things he--
- and he respected me and this.
- One time, Scherwitz brings from town--
- and Scherwitz is the German manager.
- He used to go in town to--
- on big-- talk to the big shots.
- He brings, one, a calculator.
- It was a Mercedes calculating machine
- from a German, a big one.
- And in that time, we didn't have any the electric
- or the-- now the electronic things or anything.
- It was like a computer in those days.
- And it wasn't working.
- You know, they had--
- Germans had offices, and the war machinery
- is a lot of accounting business.
- And they had big offices with girls and with men.
- And it didn't work.
- So he brought in, and Lippert was very [? handstand up ?]
- a little bit.
- Lippert was very-- a little nervous.
- And he said, he said, Mr. Leibowitz, maybe you
- can fix this.
- I haven't seen in my life such a machine.
- For me it was like telling me to fix a computer.
- So I told-- I told, well, I said, let me take a look.
- So he gave it to me, and I turn it over.
- I screw the back.
- I look, and I look, I didn't even--
- an electric calculating machine, I never have seen it.
- I see in a corner is like a couple,
- a little angle with a screw is lying around.
- Oh, and this I thought--
- and I look, and I look, and I look, and I see where it is.
- You know, where it's missing.
- And I put it together, and it works.
- We tried it out.
- But that Scherwitz evidently asked who fixed it for him,
- for Scherwitz to do things.
- And with the big shots in town was, for him, a big thing
- because he was coming and telling him
- that he was fighting for us, that he needed the Jews
- and they are productive and they are specialist and all of this.
- And this one thing, so--
- and here what happened.
- It comes-- in a couple of months,
- again Roshman needs more men, more men, again 200 men,
- yes, big shot.
- And here, we had three brothers Kreunitz.
- They were all engineers.
- And how they get in?
- You know they didn't do anything,
- just because they were famous people evidently in Riga.
- I wasn't born in Riga.
- I was a-- and evidently, with protection they were there.
- And there was another engineer from--
- he studied in Grenoble, France, an electrical engineer,
- Mr. Henkin, nice people.
- And again, they were looking on how I work.
- And we were talking.
- So those three engineers, each one-- our shop
- was from the smallest one.
- So he gave one brother Kreunitz, and another brother Kreunitz,
- and three brothers Kreunitz.
- And then it remained like that.
- Mr. Lippert and his son, you know,
- his son I wouldn't even expect to send-- nobody
- to send away his son.
- The goldsmith was one, and he was very important
- because Scherwitz used to bring them gold, what
- the Germans robbed or all this.
- They would melt it out and make all kinds of beautiful rings
- you don't see, or cigarette lighters
- and whatever, all kind of boxes.
- There was a Gafanowicz, who was repairing the sewing machines
- upstairs in the--
- he could.
- And it was I or Mr. Henkin.
- And here, Mr. Henkin wasn't a production man, productive.
- However, here was the oberjude.
- You know what the oberjude is, the manager of the whole shops.
- You know, Mr. Sheinberg, he was a brother-in-law
- of Mr. Sheinberg.
- Oh, yeah, Mr. Sheinberg had two separate house with his wife.
- And lived, you know, and then Rudolf.
- And he was a brother-in-law.
- And I know for Lippert was a big decision to make.
- And I know, you know, Scherwitz used to give a couple of days
- to--
- and Mr. Henkin was very--
- Mr. Philipps, what was his name?
- Was very sad--
- Mr. Lippert was very sad.
- And I could see.
- And I was said too.
- Oh, yeah, and in my times already, in the last time,
- they tried to erase the mass graves
- that you used to dig out the killed people
- from the mass graves and put wood, you know,
- and put the corpse and burn them.
- It was already at the end.
- And even the smoke used to cover all Riga.
- And they used to do it about 10 miles away from Riga.
- You know, in Salaspils was where they
- used to kill off the people.
- Well, how did you know what they were doing?
- Through outside-- outside people used to bring in, like,
- he brought in the sand and gravel, and people--
- oh, yeah, firemen, for example, used
- to come and check our sprinkler system,
- from outside, firemen with the--
- firemen used to come.
- And he too, he used to do business
- with the Jews for valuables.
- So he used to come quite often.
- So he needed young people.
- And we were better fed.
- Strong people he would take from our people
- and dig out the corpses and burn them.
- And that was-- this too we found out.
- They didn't want to leave any witnesses.
- And people would work on that job about two or three weeks.
- And either you would get a scratch on handling the dead.
- You would get all kinds of poison, or from starvation.
- So these people used to leave-- they dug in a big hole,
- and there they would sleep.
- And they couldn't get out without a ladder.
- At night they would pull out the ladder.
- And boy, again, and I thought, who will he take.
- And oh, yeah.
- And we didn't know until--
- the whole business, we would line up in tent.
- They would read when Scherwitz was there and a representative
- from the Kaiserwald, from the concentration camp.
- They would call, and we would have to go out.
- We didn't know in the last minute.
- And I-- and I knew Henkin is his brother-in-law.
- And my gosh, here what happened.
- The day comes.
- It comes.
- But with this I used to make up my mind, who
- knows how many will survive or if any, will survive.
- But that's the day.
- However, we had one hope that something in Germany
- will happen because at that time, at end of the war,
- the Germans had--
- had the [NON-ENGLISH].
- How do you say it in English?
- Had the-- well, they didn't have a lock on the front.
- We're bombarded them, and we knew that maybe Hitler
- will be killed.
- We hoped that the war will be over suddenly,
- and maybe we will be saved.
- Then another thing what, for example, I didn't
- want to do this bad work.
- I still die anyhow.
- A sudden death, I was prepared and all right with.
- So he called when it comes to the shop.
- He calls me out.
- The masters used to call out or, all right, or a German.
- I don't remember.
- And I go out.
- And well-- And after we were lined up,
- the one, Scherwitz, used to go over and look at everybody.
- And usually he didn't interfere.
- He can do-- we have-- he has to give 200 Jews.
- Who goes?
- The masters, if they picked out--
- and you know, that was the first time.
- And he comes to me, and he grabs me from my button.
- And he said, no, this is a good worker.
- He said, there is a guter arbeiter
- and pushes me back and pulls out Henkin.
- Naturally, it wasn't--
- I would go, he would go, then who knew?
- But meanwhile, I was saved.
- And how was I saved?
- Because he found out who fixed that Mercedes calculator,
- and he remembered.
- Usually there were a lot of people, you know.
- And I was working in a little shop.
- I never thought he laid an eye on me.
- But he remembered.
- And he said, this is a guter arbeiter.
- So I don't know.
- I think he remembered, unless Lippert told him or something.
- Or maybe even the oberjude, his brother-in-law.
- Anyhow, so I was saved there.
- Of course, another one got on my place,
- but that was so unusual--
- usual, you know.
- Yeah, another thing what I want to tell you--
- the psychology of that life, of that period, was so tough.
- In peacetime, you cannot imagine how people think.
- The same, you can't imagine, for example,
- in normal days that a family, a father
- will give up his children, you know.
- But I saw it.
- They said-- and already, when they brought the German Jews,
- you know, and I thought that they brought them
- with families.
- But they said children separate and then parents separately.
- And the children, they put already in a van,
- you know, in an automobile.
- And they said any parents who want to go with the children
- is all right.
- Some others went.
- And I-- this I saw, when a mother wanted
- to go with her children, the husband holded them,
- and he said, wait.
- We don't know what it will happen.
- He said, if we will go out alive,
- we'll have children, something like that.
- They were crying.
- But this psychology, you save what you can.
- It was so inhuman.
- All human life was shifting, like you feel a battle of corn,
- you know, and one will fall out on the side and sprout again.
- And the others are grounded up in flour--
- the same.
- People were saving themselves if they could.
- Although, they didn't know what it will be there in the future.
- So that is one.
- So we have that one episode with the Czech Jews,
- with the Czechoslovakian Jew.
- You know what are these.
- And oh, yeah, then comes another episode.
- It gave them very, very--
- I would say it tension, with a lot of tension.
- We were-- at that time, we were already 600.
- And we were working.
- Oh, yeah, and Scherwitz comes and he
- said he doesn't give out any more Jews.
- And he said, I have papers.
- And he's-- and he tells that his--
- the commander of the Eastern Front is his friend,
- and he has papers.
- He said, that we are-- nobody will touch us.
- And he said, well, in fact, he has
- papers to take us to Germany.
- And he said there we'll go over with the machinery,
- and he has a boat already reserved.
- And he said, we'll set up a shop.
- And he said, you won't have to wear the Magen Davids.
- We wear those stars, and we have them,
- he says, in us, in us in German.
- We have them in our back.
- I said, we'll live.
- Nobody will know that you are Jews.
- And we'll survive the whole war.
- This man was a rather unusual Nazi, wasn't he?
- Right.
- An unusual Nazi, right.
- We don't know.
- And I'll tell you about--
- I'll tell you.
- I know the whole history about him too.
- And here-- and we kept on working.
- And really, every-- we were happy because we are still
- alive and there.
- And we kept working.
- And Scherwitz, he brings all kind of committees
- with German big shots.
- And they go over and look.
- And he tells us in advance.
- He said, when he's bringing somebody,
- and the machine should not come this.
- And thought, you know?
- And he was there.
- At that time, I don't know again the date, but the Russians--
- it was past Stalingrad, and the Russians
- started around Leningrad to free themselves.
- Leningrad, you know, is in the north.
- You know what Leningrad is.
- You have an idea.
- Isn't that where your brother Max was killed?
- No, he was in Stalingrad.
- Stalingrad.
- Stalingrad is south, but Leningrad was Petersburg,
- where the czars lived.
- And that's in the north.
- And that's not far from Riga.
- And this is near Murmansk, you know,
- when you see the European map.
- And the Russians broke through.
- And you see, Leningrad was surrounded.
- And they were starving and cannibalism, everything was.
- But the Russians broke through the front.
- But they started coming towards the--
- to liberate the Baltic States.
- Scherwitz was in town.
- He used to be in town, always with the big shots.
- And he was an organizer.
- He could get things, even for the kitchens.
- Food was, for the Germans, were--
- were food too scarce, you know.
- He used to go in the country--
- he had a car--
- and bring sometimes meat or a calf.
- Here's what happened.
- The Russians broke through the front
- and started to come into Riga.
- They came so close, about eight miles from Riga,
- that we could hear the bombardments
- from cannon bombardments.
- And Scherwitz is in town.
- We see a lot of the German army with cars and trucks,
- that they are going back, you know.
- And we knew that something here is--
- so the whole-- with the Jews, you know.
- And at that time they were killing.
- Our place they didn't touch.
- But other places, where the Jews were spread out and living
- with Germans as workers, that they're
- eliminating and eliminating and this and that.
- And the concentration camp is almost empty already.
- And we didn't know.
- We always were suspicious that they
- won't leave us for the Russians, that they will kill us off.
- And in fact, that was the idea, that they wouldn't leave us
- as witnesses or as helpers.
- If we are there, the Russians can
- take over and start working.
- We'll work for the Russians.
- So here we take-- we hear and we see
- that something is happening.
- So people start organizing.
- And they said they may come and take
- us, and take us to Salaspils, you know, where this is like--
- They told us in a Russia place that the Russians may come over
- at any time, and the Germans may come to take us out.
- Or they may want to even shoot us on the place.
- But we have to organize.
- And here was, we are going to do it-- was worked out a plan.
- And they tell us fast and go from place to place.
- And they worked out a plan.
- Somebody, they were-- we had a lot of intelligent-- the cream
- of the crop in our place.
- They are all young and a lot of educated people,
- because usually in Europe, we didn't have college educated,
- as many as-- in America every child goes to college.
- There were a few.
- And they worked out a plan over teletype.
- The people there were repairing trucks.
- And we'll go with the trucks.
- And there was a wooden fence and push it down with the truck.
- In the fence, you go and push down
- the fence to open the fence, and the others should run.
- In case we-- the few Germans came, or they--
- till the Latvian guards from around, you know,
- [NON-ENGLISH].
- We should have-- anybody should have arms, not arms
- like firearms, but hammers.
- You know, the shoemakers have hammers, have files, and bars.
- Whatever anybody can, we should have something.
- Could be a hand for hand fight we'll have to fight.
- And there'll be-- we had a siren for alarm.
- They said when the minute comes, push the button.
- Over on the side will come, everybody should go out.
- The trucks will push down.
- They told us which wall-- you know, a whole side of it--
- all the trucks.
- And there will, right away with trucks, and whoever will,
- there will be-- they said some will fall,
- but some will save them.
- We'll go towards the Front to save ourselves or to hide
- or whatever we can.
- And it was, here again.
- It was such tension and such--
- it is hard, it is hard for a person or for me, now, to--
- it was, again, here is the moment of life and death,
- of decision is coming,
- And we knew that it won't be easy.
- And you know you were looking on whatever.
- Some get pipe pieces, some this-- whatever anybody and--
- and it was very tense.
- And you know-- oh yeah, on the other hand,
- you see that the end is near.
- You hear that it's--
- they're, the Russians are coming, they're here.
- And on the other hand, we knew how weak
- we are in comparison to them.
- But some had courage, and they lifted us up.
- And it was the decision.
- I remember I had something, too.
- And like everybody, waiting.
- What did you have?
- I don't remember.
- Something like a little piece of iron bar or something.
- And here what happened.
- All and this stems from Scherwitz come,
- comes from down, Scherwitz And in the army, the German--
- oh yeah, some army are going back and forth.
- Scherwitz come, and he's excited, too.
- And he had some, among the Jews, good friends with whom he's
- better off and with whom he was joking and talking.
- And evidently, that's what I was told.
- And [PERSONAL NAME],, I understand he is now
- in Israel--
- talked to him and told him the situation.
- And they said to him, you stay with us,
- and we'll save you, because you were good or decent,
- and if you want so the war can be over for you--
- we'll-- nothing will happen to you,
- because we'll kill the Russians.
- So here what it did.
- Scherwitz made an Appell.
- And it wasn't lunchtime.
- Usually, he would talk in lunchtime or after work.
- It was, like, 3 o'clock in the afternoon.
- We were working till 5 or 6.
- An Appell, and we--
- on Appell, we had that alarm when you--
- everybody comes to the big dining room.
- You know, it was in, like in army.
- And we came.
- And Scherwitz came out, when they see him, like that--
- I know everything what you think and what is going on here.
- And he said, don't make any dummheit.
- Dummheit mean dumb things.
- Are you listening to me--
- don't make any dumb things.
- And he said, here I have the papers-- he takes down.
- He said-- and here what happened.
- I promise you, and I guarantee you,
- if we see the Russians inside--
- if the Russians are coming--
- when we have them inside, he said,
- I'll take the Latvian guards, and I move away.
- And you'll be free, he said.
- And if not, I have the papers, and we'll go to Germany after,
- if it comes down.
- And he said, don't make any dumb decisions.
- And he said-- oh yeah, and he said that the-- then he
- said I should stay with you.
- And this, he said, that's a bad idea for me.
- He said, they would zerfleischen.
- It means, in German, they would cut me up in pieces.
- And somehow, we quiet. down.
- He said-- and he repeated it, again.
- I take the guards, if I see the Russians are coming,
- I take the guards away.
- And they come with me, and you will be where you are,
- ready to come down.
- Then it proved that the Germans sent new troops,
- and they stopped the Russians.
- In fact, they push them back.
- And that would happen in the Front with the Germans if you--
- they had the Second World War--
- they would go back, come again.
- And that is this episode is.
- But it is so engraved, like, in my mind
- or in my heart of the days of, the hours of excitement,
- the hours of decision.
- And while there was, from one side the sun were shining up.
- Going up, there were the clouds there.
- And you didn't know where you will finish, in the darkness
- or in the light.
- And we survived.
- Now, one more episode for there.
- So the Russians-- we have still time, yeah.
- So the Russians were held back.
- And in fact, and it calmed down.
- However, the Germans weren't sure what's going to happen.
- And our plant was, in Riga, was like here with Berlin.
- Riga was between--
- Riga was divided into parts by the Dvina, a river,
- a big river, almost as wide as the Ohio.
- And it was for shipping.
- So usually-- and this was in before in previous wars--
- we were on the eastern side of the river.
- If the Russians would come, they would come first.
- And the river then is a barrier for, again, for war operations.
- The bridges, they blow up the bridges,
- and you cannot come over.
- On one side would be one army, and the other,
- they shoot at each other, and you can't pass.
- So the Germans didn't know what is going to happen.
- Here what would happen--
- so Scherwitz wanted to save us.
- So in a few days after we come down,
- about a week, all of the sudden, Scherwitz
- says we are going to evacuate this site,
- and we are going until we get the boat.
- Yeah, until we get the boat to go to Germany,
- we are going over in Salaspils.
- In Salaspils where the-- you know, like Babi Yar,
- where they were killing all the Jews--
- and nearby was a concentration camp for Latvians,
- for non-Jews.
- And again, how can you believe, you know.
- [TELEPHONE RINGING]
- So one morning, again, we--
- he made an Appell.
- And he says, we are going to Salaspils.
- And he said, don't worry.
- He said, we are just--
- we want to be safe there.
- And as soon as a boat comes, he has all arranged.
- We are getting all the machinery.
- We'll get on trucks, and we're taking over, and don't worry.
- And I don't know how other people felt,
- but I did not believe in-- you know, it could be.
- Anyhow.
- We got up in rows like soldiers, eight in a row.
- And we were marching.
- It was about 8,10 miles and with a lot
- of guards with the machine guns, with the SS.
- And we didn't know--
- is it-- the Germans were famous with telling stories that--
- when they were taking out women and children and the elderly,
- that-- he said, they want to take them out from Riga,
- and they are taking them to somewhere to the--
- where there is more food-- it'll be easier to food,
- and it won't be so crowded.
- And they were taking them and killing them.
- We knew, already.
- We didn't know what it will be.
- So it was.
- But you could not-- there was no way to do--
- run from, when there are so many with many machine guns,
- they're machining you, gun down.
- A few boys hid in the building.
- And when we came back later on, they
- were shot, because the Latvians were there.
- And they tried later on to get out of the building and--
- So here's what happened.
- I remember when--
- Salaspils were in the woods, I remember when we came,
- and we had to go through the woods.
- There were no roads like here.
- And the woods were woods.
- You had to walk through the woods.
- There wasn't made the roads for cars, though.
- And I remember.
- I thought maybe we should run, and then we
- could save ourselves.
- But on the other hand, if you do something prematurely, you--
- so--
- Were the woods like our woods?
- Where they as thick as our woods or--
- Thicker.
- Thicker?
- Thicker and no roads.
- And you come in in the woods, it's dark.
- And the land was pretty rich there,
- and the lumber were growing.
- However, the brush were cut out.
- There weren't so many brush or blackberries
- with the stickers-- we didn't have at all.
- So anyhow, we came with him up there.
- They brought us to the concentration camp
- from the Latvians.
- We had a free big barrack.
- And Scherwitz came with us.
- And we saw how they, in the concentration camp,
- how the Latvians, they had to carry big hunter bag, big rocks
- and this and put it away.
- Some would pick it up from the same pile and go a big circle
- and drop it off and rest and pick it up, again.
- And here is a barrack.
- And it wasn't-- this I remember, it was in April, end of April,
- because the sun was warm.
- The snow was melted.
- And Scherwitz comes in, and he calls in the Germans--
- which, again, were the criminals who
- were taking care of those concentration camp people.
- From the Latvians, it was more like a jail for Latvians
- who were arrested for crimes.
- And he tells them, to them--
- the people who were supposed to take care of us-- he said--
- and he was already Oberleutnant, you
- know, a big chin and tiny mouth.
- And he said, any things what they do, you don't punish them,
- you tell to me, and I'll be here every day--
- Scherwitz and Germans.
- Over this concentration camp was a Mr Krauzer.
- He was before in the ghetto over here--
- Krauzer, too, a murderer.
- He was a very--
- like Roshmann, even worse, I think.
- And here what happened--
- Was he a German?
- Oh, sure.
- Yeah, he was a German, an SS.
- And he was there.
- Was he have lower rank than--
- That Scherwitz?
- Yeah.
- But after Scherwitz left, he comes in.
- And you know, he was such a mean one,
- he was pretty mild with us.
- Not only that, he goes and tells to take food
- from the Latvian prisoners and bring over here.
- They brought so much bread and grease that--
- all kind of fat, you know.
- Then he said to us, why should you be indoors, you come out,
- the sun is shining, get a little sun.
- And we were there about three or four days like that.
- This, the murderers, that Krauzer and the others,
- which they were terrible, they were nice to us.
- And after a few days, the Russians, evidently,
- who were pushed away back, were coming back to Lenta.
- You know, Lenta was our place.
- And really, he came with the trucks.
- We start loading the machinery.
- And they loaded us up in boats.
- It took a couple days-- first, the machinery people
- were hauling, the sewing machines
- and all of what we have.
- We had a lot with the garage tools.
- And we came.
- And they put us in a boat, in a cattle boat, you know.
- It was-- the manure was there.
- And I remember I got so seasick.
- Everybody got seasick for-- and they
- had barrels where women and men were together.
- You have to make, urinate and this.
- And they have a few barrels.
- It was like a big barges.
- And I remember I was so seasick.
- I have no food.
- And I thought if that boat would sink
- that would be a good thing.
- It was, again, too bad.
- And oh yeah, and before we left, Scherwitz
- said, see you in Germany, and as I promised you,
- we'll have a shot.
- And he-- we landed in Gdynia--
- Gdansk where now is the Polish states, what they started out
- with Gdansk or Gdynia.
- You were, you're in there, Poland.
- Right.
- We landed there.
- We didn't see anymore Scherwitz.
- We came on that land.
- And Germans took us over, and we landed in that concentration
- camp, Stutthof.
- But then I'll tell you the other story.
- Was that the last time you saw Scherwitz?
- Right, but I heard about him after the liberation.
- What did you hear about him?
- He was caught after the war in Brussels, Belgium.
- A man from our people recognized him.
- And about, too, it would be an interesting story.
- He turned him over to the authorities, that American.
- And he said that he wants to go to Israel or any place
- to be judged by Jews.
- He knew that he have offense.
- And then I don't know what happened.
- But I'll tell you why that man turned him
- over to the authorities from a Lenta man.
- That man was, again, he was married to a non-Jewish woman,
- and she went with him to the ghetto.
- However, I don't know what he was from occupation.
- He was quite intelligent and knew very well German.
- And his name was Jan Kolovich, but he changed his name
- to John Kolovich.
- And he was saying to authorities always that he's not Jewish.
- And they brought him in our place [RUSSIAN],, as bookeeper.
- Oh yeah, he was a bookkeeper.
- And he kept the books, because we were producing.
- And then In Germany, you had to.
- So he was.
- So John Kolovich.
- And he had it better being a bookkeeper and in the office.
- He knew Scherwitz well.
- And evidently he had something against Scherwitz,
- because the other Jews--
- I would let him go.
- In fact, there was, in the Jewish papers from New York,
- was write-ups about Scherwitz and about
- the story after the liberation.
- So that was--
- You don't know whatever happened?
- I don't know what happened.
- But I knew when I met, when I met refugees, or in Israel when
- I met something, and we were talking from the same--
- so they told us about Yankelovich.
- Now, when we landed, we landed our 600 people landed together.
- Were there women and-- as well as men with your group?
- Yeah-- no, not many there were.
- Because for example, in--
- seamstresses were women in our place.
- So from our 600 people, we landed at a unit in Stutthof.
- In Stutthof, we came.
- We were in two barracks that are small barracks.
- And I remember the first night when we landed,
- we had to lay on the side on the floor.
- It was floor, a little bit of straw,
- because you couldn't lay like that and take up so much room.
- We-- put us like sardines, they put us in.
- And after being there in Stutthof for about six weeks,
- they used to send us to work until we
- got lice and flea and bedbugs, German bedbugs or Polaks.
- You never saw a bedbug, probably, or lice and things.
- And anyhow, parts, again.
- What happened-- after about six weeks,
- industrialists came to that camp.
- And they came to us and used to ask--
- Was this IG Farben, by any chance?
- No, no, no, no.
- I don't know if--
- I heard there was speaking about.
- What we landed is in Magdeburg.
- It was a big factory for aluminum pots and pans
- that they converted it in making ammunition
- for flack, such big--
- these have somewhere for cannons.
- So the mechanics, this, they took out.
- But the tailors and the others they didn't need yet.
- So I know from my shtetl and from other, a lot of my friend
- remained there, and typhus broke out.
- And they closed the these.
- And the others perished.
- But from Lenta, I didn't count them,
- but I know from friends and here,
- and some are spread out in America, a few in Israel that
- were, we remained alive, yes.
- After Stutthof I went to Magdeburg.
- And then I'll tell you about Germany.
- That is a big story.
- Right after then went to--
- on the way to Germany.
- You came from Poland, is that right?
- No, to--
- Your ship--
- Oh, we were shipped already, yeah.
- Yeah, yeah, we landed at Gdynia Harbor in a barge
- where we were.
- In the barge we're put in that, there
- was no room to sit down, one by one.
- And the barge usually is high, about 8 feet.
- And we couldn't see what's going on with us.
- However, there was-- part of the barge had a roof,
- and most of it was open.
- And it was, you get tired standing up.
- We were pressed together.
- And the trip took, on the barge, I would say, 36 hours or so.
- And some-- you were sleeping standing up.
- But I remember, during the night,
- I managed to get on the roof, and I fell asleep on the roof.
- There were several people on the roof.
- And it was in April, and the weather was so cold that from--
- we didn't sleep for a long time.
- When I fell asleep, I woke up and was so cold and stiff,
- practically stiff.
- And finally, we arrived in Stutthof.
- And Stutthof was a small camp which had
- a camp for Jews and non-Jews.
- But each nationality were divided up.
- Was that in Germany?
- No, that was still Poland.
- Oh, maybe I am mixing up a little.
- Oh, I think that we had already.
- I see.
- From Stutthof, I think Stutthof--
- where I was, Stutthof-- and we worked there a few weeks.
- And then German industrialist came to Stutthof
- and were picking out young, able men to work in their factories.
- What were you doing in Stutthof?
- In Stutthof, just a concentration camp.
- And sequence, they took to the oven.
- They had a crematorium.
- And if we work there in Stutthof, we were to the woods,
- preparing the lumber, firing wood.
- We have to carry out from the woods trees.
- And there there were a lot of shoes
- from the people they killed off, mountains of it--
- and clothing we had to carry it from one
- warehouse to the other and clothing and something.
- And there were some shops.
- Some people were repairing those shoes or whatever.
- But it, mainly it was a concentration camp.
- And in a few weeks the industrialist came.
- And they sorted, again, people with trades.
- They took what they're interested.
- Because at that time, it was already 1944, and the Germans--
- their own people they mobilized.
- The Russians were coming already.
- I think they were already in the German territory.
- And it was after the invasion.
- So they shipped out their own people and brought in.
- So but they didn't take everybody.
- But I was lucky with--
- from our-- I think we arrived about 600, 700, maybe a couple
- hundred they picked out.
- And I was among them.
- And they brought us to Magdeburg.
- And there they put us to work.
- There was-- in Magdeburg, first, we landed in a camp
- from barracks with barbed wire.
- And on the next day, they took us to work.
- They brought us to a plant.
- And there they were making shells, shells for guns--
- all kinds, some for to fight, to shoot at airplanes.
- Some were about a foot long.
- Some were 20 inches long, big shells.
- And each machine was-- first, there
- was a German and then a Jew, a German on each machine.
- And after some times, they took away the Germans,
- and there were only over, in the whole room, one or two Germans.
- And the Jews worked it.
- They taught them how to play it.
- You know, it was each had a small job, but on the machines.
- So and we worked there for about a year,
- almost til the end of the war.
- And here what it used to happen--
- we worked in shift-- two shifts, 12 hours and 12 hours.
- And at that time, the Americans and the Allies, I would say,
- started, was bombing Germany.
- It was in full swing.
- OK, it was Magdeburg in Germany?
- Yeah, Magdeburg is in Germany.
- It is near the Elbe.
- In fact, this town is where Eisenhower met with Zhukov.
- The Russian and the American army met.
- And there is the Elbe River.
- And in fact, the Americans broke the Front.
- And the Germans wanted the Americans
- should occupy most of their territory,
- so that they didn't resist in that area.
- And they did not.
- There was a bridge, you know, and they
- didn't destroy that bridge, because they thought
- the Americans will come.
- But Eisenhower already made the--
- Eisenhower, the American government
- made a pact that the Russians go-- the Americans go up
- to the Elbe, and the Russians go farther.
- And so they waited for--
- of Germany was in full swing.
- In fact, over--
- I don't know in--
- where the Allies used to go, but they
- used to fly over Magdeburg.
- And whenever the Allies' Air Force
- used to fly over Germany--
- there it used to be-- over Magdeburg
- there used to be an alarm.
- And they had for us, under the plant, they had dug a ditch,
- and inside they put in big cement pipe, what
- you use for under highways.
- And it was about 5 and 1/2 foot.
- Were 5 foot in diameter, because I could walk in the middle
- without bending.
- Tall people had to bend a little, stoop a little.
- And they put a long pipe under the plant, you know,
- a long pipe, maybe, I would say, 800 feet long.
- And in the time of the alarm we used to go in.
- And a guard would stay on one side and a guard another.
- And that was they--
- the protection.
- If bombs would fall, I don't know if it would break the pipe
- or not-- you know, the heavy cement.
- But there we were.
- We would leave the plant.
- And for months it was going on.
- We used to have the alarm.
- And for us, the alarm--
- the Germans used to fear of the alarm.
- For us, it was-- first, we interrupted working,
- we could catch on our sleep.
- And it was a pleasure to hear that they are getting beaten.
- And but usually it would last sometimes an hour,
- sometimes 20 minutes, sometimes a little longer than an hour.
- The alarm would be called off, and we'd go back to work.
- Oh yeah, in time of the alarm, they
- would shut off all the electricity
- to darken the place.
- And one time--
- I think it was in April--
- that was already next year of April.
- The first was '44, that was '45 in April.
- I think it was the 11th of April,
- the alarm lasted from about 11 o'clock to 4 in the morning.
- And we knew it is--
- in fact, the pipe would vibrate.
- We knew it is--
- the town was bombarded.
- You see, our plant was on the edge of the town.
- It was an industrial site.
- And we knew it.
- Oh yeah, there were still with us Germans working.
- So they started to run away.
- And only the guards remained at the end of the pipe-- you know,
- the SS, we were under the SS guard.
- The SS were the storm troopers, Hitler's faithful garrison.
- And about 4 o'clock--
- and it was never a call-off of the alarm--
- we got out.
- And 4 o'clock in April, it's still dark.
- We come out, the sky is red.
- And we could see, because the city was about 7 miles away.
- Everything is burned.
- And the Germans were so sad and disheartened, even the guards.
- And they said, we are going to the barracks.
- We come to the barracks.
- And the barracks from the plant was still
- about a mile away or more.
- There was no water and no electricity.
- And when daylight broke, they said,
- who wants volunteer-- we have to bring water with buckets,
- do with a bucket.
- And in those days, I was young and strong,
- and I wanted to see it.
- So I volunteered, too, among others.
- They had probably 20 buckets or 30 buckets.
- And we went.
- And they had near--
- again, near the edge of the town,
- but you could see a lot of the buildings--
- there was a hand pump.
- And Germans were in a line, too, to water.
- And people are pumping.
- And then out of our line came, and we got the water.
- But I was observing the Germans.
- And the Germans were looking at us, and some with pity
- and some with rage, because some thought that--
- Hitler told them that the Jews made the war, you know.
- So they thought-- and they knew that we were Jews,
- and here they are.
- And some knew, and some were with pity.
- We looked terrible in those days, because we didn't
- have enough food and clothing, nothing to wash
- and nothing decent--
- it was torn.
- So we got the water.
- And we could see buildings collapsed and were smoldering
- and some were burning with a flame.
- And we came back to the barracks.
- And from the water they warmed up coffee.
- They used to give us black coffee with a piece of bread.
- That was our breakfast.
- And they sent us to the barracks.
- And we sat down there and waited.
- The next day we didn't go to work either.
- After the next day, they started--
- they were telling us that the plan is we can't work,
- because there is no water and electricity.
- So they started making it in columns of about 100 or so.
- And beside in that plant and in that place
- where we worked there were other people, non-Jews.
- There were about 1,200.
- But the Jews, they start sending on fortification work.
- What was the fortifications?
- About 4 or 5 miles away, they made a line
- over meadows and fields.
- We were digging holes and putting in parts of rails.
- And they was digging this way and that way across and very
- close together, about 2, 3 feet.
- And it was supposed to hold up-- back tanks or--
- and we were doing that.
- And at night, we used to come to sleep.
- Oh yeah, food was a little better, because we
- were fed by the Wehrmacht.
- Wehrmacht was the German army, not the SS.
- Before we were guarded by the SS.
- And one time like that, being in the field,
- there was a big alarm.
- And on the field work, a lot of SS men used to guard us.
- And some were young or some were even boys.
- But in the uniform with guns there
- were 13 or 14-years-old boys, and some were tall.
- There was an alarm.
- And all the guards, they knew already
- something They ran and left us like that.
- So somehow, we find out that the Front,
- that the Americans broke the Front through,
- and the Germans are running.
- And we were always--
- we Jews, we were always, at that time when
- we see the war is at the end, we were afraid.
- What will they do with us, because we
- knew how much they killed, and they didn't want anybody
- to survive.
- So we knew the war, it won't last long.
- But what we were afraid--
- at the end, these SS men will open fire on us.
- And if they run, so we thought we are free.
- And evidently, a few said that you are free.
- So we start crying and hugging each other
- and thought we are free, we are alive.
- And oh yes, and so we started to go to town.
- And hungry we were.
- And there was a--
- this order to get some food.
- And some went in bombed out houses, in cellars.
- And some found some food or something.
- But and that happened about 11 o'clock in the morning.
- Towards evening when it started to get dark about 6, 7 o'clock,
- German civilians came and said we should go all
- and we'll have it--
- they'll-- we should go all in, back to the barracks.
- They'll take us home.
- They'll feed us.
- So we went.
- Because we are in a strange place, we couldn't escape.
- We couldn't hear what happened on there.
- We went there to the barracks.
- And on the evening, the SS came back and took us over.
- You know, the civilian were without guns.
- The SS are at this, and they're mean.
- And we didn't-- we thought, oh, we made a mistake to releasing
- to them.
- And maybe now, they'll take us and kill us.
- But we are already in the barracks,
- we are surrounded with barbed wire and guards and that.
- And here-- that what happened.
- The Americans came to one side of the Elbe.
- And all the bridges-- they did not, evidently,
- by order from the German leadership,
- not to explode the bridges.
- It was ready for the Germans to come to Magdeburg to--
- like, going over from Bellaire to Wheeling.
- And they didn't go.
- So the Germans evidently found out.
- And they came.
- guarded that.
- However, in those days, the Front were moving.
- And the Russians were pressing, and they
- didn't want to let us fall in in Russian hands.
- They started to march.
- And Jews here, all the Jews or all non-Jews were marching.
- All the foreigners which worked in Germany--
- and there were millions of them, French and Italian
- and Hungarians they brought in as workers to replace
- the Germans--
- they were marching.
- So they start to march.
- They march us, too.
- And here comes a very interesting episode.
- And we marched, and we never came back.
- We went forward.
- We used to sleep in barns.
- And they used to feed us in potatoes.
- In each little town, they had already arranged.
- Before a little town, there used to be big bales of tomato--
- potatoes, you know, cooked potatoes with the peeling.
- And they would give three or four small potatoes, three
- or four potatoes--
- eat, march.
- Towards the evening, again, we would come to a small town,
- and then potatoes.
- And we were marching several days like that.
- At night, in a barn.
- And one time, one marching, they let us rest in a tennis court.
- You know how tennis court is?
- The ground is plastered to here or here with a fence, usually,
- not a high fence.
- And they got us in.
- And it was April.
- And the sun-- April in Germany at daytime,
- it's like the climate here-- not severe winters and not too hot
- summers.
- And in April, it's nice.
- So I'm tired.
- We are-- usually were.
- They let us rest, and we lie down, sit down
- on the grass or there.
- And we fall asleep.
- While we sleep, all of the sudden, a
- bombardment without warning.
- Until today, I don't know-- and the other people don't know--
- who was shooting.
- At the beginning, we thought Germans were shooting.
- And we thought, here is the place what they'll mow us down.
- Some say that there was a lot of bombardments going
- on, that enemy fire, their enemy, German enemy
- place-- you know, Allies.
- So a gathering of people, they threw down some bombs.
- And in the place--
- for me, first, it-- something fell, a grenade or something.
- It covered with mud, you know.
- And it fell just like that.
- And I felt pain here.
- And I take a look.
- My coat was open, but there was no time.
- And I touched if it's blood--
- nothing, it's dry.
- And it was everything happened so fast.
- And I look around.
- There was screaming.
- Women we had too, you know--
- blood and this.
- My gosh, and it was--
- I thought that's it, that is the Aktion, the Aktion what
- we used to call it, the Aktion, you know--
- that the killing off.
- And but screaming, and the guns are from outside.
- And everybody was pressing towards the gates.
- Everybody wants to run out.
- And I think the guard made it.
- They ran away.
- The gates, people could go--
- come out.
- But we were many.
- And I thought as fast, my gosh, if the Germans are doing it,
- they'll throw a bomb here, where there is a big crowd.
- And somehow, I start running in the other end.
- And there were two more boys which run after.
- And we come, there was a little, a door.
- These were, with two guys you could
- go in with a car or a truck.
- But there was, like, a door from wire to-- and it is open.
- And the three of us run.
- And from far away, you could see is it was a park or a woods,
- you know.
- And as tired and as weak and as--
- notice to where, somehow, we got so much strength.
- I remember the way I felt-- it is now or never.
- And we started to run.
- And I was the first running on--
- to the other boys.
- And I-- it was I said, let's run, let's run.
- And like in the army, where we were zigzagging.
- And they-- and I didn't hear and didn't want to hear.
- I thought if they'll shoot on us and get us,
- it's better this way as to beat them.
- And we ran, and we ran.
- And pretty soon, we felt that we are-- they had rifles,
- but we are out of range with the rifles.
- And it was over meadows, like pastures.
- And we slowed down.
- Before it was running.
- But I remember the chest started to hurt.
- And we slowed down.
- And then we came to a thicket of trees.
- And we come therein.
- We saw there were trenches dug, like for soldiers.
- And we came in, we jumped in.
- And nobody was there.
- And we came in and we tell we're alive.
- And we thought, what are we going to do from now.
- And we decided we should do nothing--
- stay there, because if--
- while it is fresh, if they will see us,
- if they want to gather us-- or even civilians--
- they'll turn us in.
- Were the other two boys with you Jews?
- Yeah, yeah.
- What were their names?
- One was Kovnak, and the other was Baron.
- Did you know them before?
- Yeah, yeah
- Were they from Riga?
- One was from Riga, and one was from a little town--
- in fact, where my grandparents were born, from Dankere.
- And we decided to stay there in the dugout--
- what do you call the trench.
- And we stayed there.
- And we don't know what happened with the others.
- We stayed there overnight.
- And you know, April, the days are nice,
- but nights are cold, again.
- But we were together, pressed together
- to keep each other warm.
- And we fell asleep.
- And I remember about when it started,
- the day started to break, we woke up, cold
- and like ice, teeth and damp.
- And we thought the best would be to come out.
- And the sun started to--
- and get what the sun is shining-- it was shaded.
- And we stay.
- And we don't know what to do.
- And again, we wouldn't be-- we would stay to steal.
- People would have food.
- And another thing, for example, today,
- if you don't have food for a day or two, you can fast, easy.
- Our organism was so run down that it really-- we
- needed food.
- The hunger was terrible.
- But we don't know what to do.
- We're-- we think to go, and maybe we'll run in the house,
- in a German, and ask for food, a bit.
- And here, what happened-- while we were thinking, we debate,
- and we--
- what we should do--
- a German soldier came over, an elderly man in a uniform,
- an elderly, about 40, 50--
- not from the SS, but the Wehrmacht.
- And he comes, and he said to us, oh, you are from the--
- yesterday's raid.
- And we said, yes.
- So he said, you go this way, go this way--
- and then gives us directions.
- He said, there are guarded, the people are guarded,
- and they'll be led away.
- And here, again-- and he walks by.
- Oh yeah, first he asks, are you wounded, are you wounded--
- do you need medical help?
- And he said, if you are--
- medical help, he said, there's ambulance,
- a field ambulance is there, not too far, and you go there.
- So we tasted already freedom.
- We thought, here we are away, but we are away
- from the SS people.
- And we decided, as soon as we'll be out of his sight,
- instead of going there, we'll go in the opposite direction.
- And so we did, and so we did.
- And again, our main problem is how to get food.
- And we walk.
- We go by homes.
- We are afraid to go in and ask--
- we'll be reported.
- Oh yeah, from the camp, they had-- we could wear hair,
- but they cut out with--
- as far as clippers are--
- here, we looked like Mongolians, you know,
- so we could be recognized.
- We didn't have hats.
- And we walk, and we walk.
- And we-- finally, another German run into us, a uniform.
- You see, on the Front, we're very close.
- And he said, if you are from the escaped people
- from the foreigner or this, then we
- have orders to bring you to the commandant
- of that little town--
- I don't know the name.
- And he brings us there.
- And he brings us there.
- And he bring us in, and some of the people
- said, here, here is a guard.
- They takes a soldier with a rifle
- and keep them there outside near a road.
- And he said, he'll call.
- The SS will come and pick us up.
- So we thought, again, we are in the lion's mouth, again.
- And here what happened--
- we stayed there.
- And he said, within an hour or so, that SS will be here.
- The SS didn't come for an hour, two hours, three hours.
- And that soldier who was--
- he was a young soldier who was guarding us called--
- and we are, I think, near the City Hall or somewhere.
- It was a big building--
- called another soldier.
- He said he should change him up, because he
- has to go on and have lunch or breakfast, and these remain.
- Then it was when the SS didn't come.
- And about 3, 4 o'clock, then the guards
- started to change regularly, every two or three hours.
- And we waited.
- And we asked for food.
- We told them we were hungry.
- We didn't eat since yesterday.
- My gosh, they brought us out food,
- and it was the best food we ever had.
- It was a soup thick with meat, with beans or peas
- and a piece of bread.
- And we wait like that.
- And it was 4 o'clock, 5 o'clock.
- And a German who we could talk, and we were talking-- maybe
- we should tell him we are not Jews.
- And because they had other foreign people, Christians
- and these.
- So here what it said--
- what we tell that one soldier-- we said,
- it was a misunderstanding, we're not supposed to be with the SS,
- we were here, foreign workers.
- And it was a bombardment, and we escaped.
- And here we are, we are not Jews, we are Latvians.
- Oh, he thought, oh, if it's so he's
- going to tell the commandant it was a misunderstanding.
- So sure enough, he goes in, and we were called in.
- And there sits a German.
- And he was an amputee with a uniform, a young German,
- about 35, but from the Wehrmacht, not from the SS.
- With the Wehrmacht, we were much easier.
- The SS were the real indoctrinated haters,
- ignorant haters.
- But these were Germans, or some were--
- in fact, some maybe had sympathies with Jews,
- with us or with anybody and had an antipathies to Hitler,
- you know.
- So he called us.
- He said, if you are not Jews, how did you get there?
- And when we were passing by, we saw
- Latvians were working under a bridge, some doing some work.
- We recognized Latvians.
- We said we were working there, and it
- was a bombardment, and we--
- How could you recognize Latvians from Germans?
- And you can.
- [LAUGHS] You can.
- If you come, for example, in Ireland,
- and you'll see Americans, you'll recognize Americans.
- But I couldn't recognize an American Jew from an American--
- No?
- --regular person.
- Well.
- You could recognize a Latvian from a Latvian Jew?
- Right, right.
- Did you wear any kind of badge or anything?
- No, no, no.
- And then we talked.
- And we heard them talking the language.
- They were talking Latvian.
- And we said, we were working there and there.
- And then the land came, and we got lost and this.
- And even he said to the guard, take him over to that school.
- There are gathered Auslander, you know, foreigner.
- They took us out, three off of the door.
- There's we see-- and there were Auslander--
- French and Italian, Hungarians-- everybody who were marching.
- Everybody was marching Auslanders away from the Front.
- But there were no Jews there?
- No, no Jews.
- Did they recognize you as Jews?
- No, no, no.
- Here were there-- some maybe did, but we never got together.
- We-- that was our--
- we should be spread among them.
- When here that was trouble started for us, but not as big.
- They let us in.
- And they were--
- Oh yeah, and I think that school,
- they decided that they left him.
- The Germany got small, because the Allies
- were coming from one side, the others from--
- and there were no marching farther.
- And they were settled until the war will end.
- And it was probably in the end of April.
- In May, May 15th was the end of the war, the middle of May.
- So here what happened-- and they let us in.
- And we used to come--
- I think, well, I think we are saved,
- they won't shoot these people.
- You understand?
- We still thought that the Jews, they'll annihilate us.
- and I thought, it looks like we are safe.
- They let us in and with this-- and it was a big crowds.
- And I said, they won't shoot these people.
- And we are with them.
- So when time came and everybody was sleeping on the floor,
- in a corner.
- We didn't care.
- The main thing, we thought we'll be alive.
- And we thought we are the only one.
- We didn't-- the only ones.
- We didn't know what with the rest will happen or happened.
- And these foreigners, they had rationing cards for food.
- And the next morning, there was a field kitchen.
- And everybody was coming with this card.
- They got bread and this.
- Then they cooked coffee.
- At lunchtime, they had, like, a soup--
- everybody with a card.
- And we don't have it.
- And to go to press in, we were afraid
- that we'll be recognized.
- And you don't know who what's what.
- So again, with the hunger.
- What it did happen--
- what, how did we do?
- First, sometimes at lunchtime-- in fact, the first lunch,
- after everybody got this, his portion, there were,
- it's called a nachschlag.
- They were giving anybody who wants a refill,
- they were giving without the card.
- We were first.
- Then when they were preparing the food--
- peelings, potato peelings, or a half a rotten carrot
- or half a rotten--
- they would throw out, and there was a, like, a garbage pile--
- we would go and pick out.
- Could you stay together?
- Together, yeah, together.
- And we would go out.
- And it shouldn't be suspicious that we managed.
- One by one, we would pick out.
- And there was a big pile of thrown out vegetables, so
- would pick out some potatoes and hand held the peelings.
- And we had, like, from a coffee can, like, jars.
- And they, too, they had jars, some of them, plates--
- the foreigner.
- And we used to bring it, the peeling,
- put in in a coffee can.
- And outside they had to-- they used to make fires,
- because some used to organize baking.
- And we would cook these peelings and fill up our stomach.
- So we were pretty happy about that--
- and wait until after they would feed these,
- wait for the nachschlag.
- You know, if there is leftover, they did this,
- we would be the first in that.
- They would call out if somebody wants that.
- So we lived like that till the liberation.
- Till the liberation we lived there in school.
- And I think we did move to other schools.
- They moved us around.
- But it was the same, and we had already a modus vivendi.
- The liberation had its dramatic moments, too, but here's what--
- we just went to bed, and we knew something is going to happen,
- because--
- and that the Front is closed.
- Because here what happened--
- a lot of Polish people, mostly, used
- to go and go through the line, go to the Americans.
- The Americans were there.
- And with the Americans, they would
- give them chocolate and these and come back.
- And the Germans would let them through.
- They would let the communication between the civilians
- and the American Front--
- not so with the Russians, because the Germans actually
- were begging.
- They wanted to be occupied by the Americans,
- not by the Russians.
- They were afraid of the Russians.
- And here what happened-- we went just to bed--
- not to bed, on the floor lie down.
- And In the morning, people come in-- the Russians are here.
- Russia came in when we were liberated.
- And it was, it's called Burg instead of--
- Burg near Magdeburg.
- That's a town.
- And that town was famous for-- they had shoe factories.
- And they said the Russians came in.
- And here what happened--
- a lot of the foreigners, as soon as they
- heard the Russians are there--
- went to the-- went to town, to downtown,
- and broke in and started to get material, to rob,
- or how do you call it when--
- after a riot?
- Loot.
- Loot, yeah, were looting stores.
- And the Russians would let them.
- And the Russian soldiers did the same.
- We, the three Jews, we were afraid, because our life,
- we saved it.
- We didn't want-- we stayed there.
- And they used to bring in.
- And then they said that the Russians wouldn't
- let them anymore doing.
- And they were shooting, in fact, in the air,
- not to let them loot.
- And we were staying.
- And we stayed there at the school till about 12,
- 1 o'clock.
- And the most of the people got out to the street and these,
- we were.
- And again, here, we went out.
- And we-- then we went already, three together.
- And again, we needed food.
- Somehow, it was disrupted, the feeding business and this.
- And they're going.
- They used to go and loot or, I don't know, they had money.
- They weren't-- we didn't have anything.
- We were like prisoners.
- So we thought-- and we knew the Russians came in.
- The best is to meet a Russian, a Jewish Russian soldier.
- They would start walking, and a lot, when occupation,
- there's a lot of soldiers on the street and going.
- And we look at their faces.
- We look at their faces, you know.
- And here, we detected one.
- You know how a Jew look-- his black hair,
- face with a little nose, maybe or--
- [LAUGHS]
- Semitic?
- Semitic features.
- And here we detect one.
- And we go over.
- And we speak Russians, too, Russian, too.
- And we said, are you Jewish?
- And we are the only one-- the Jews who saved ourselves.
- He said, no, I'm not Jewish.
- But he said, my commander who is the commandant of this town
- is a Jew.
- He said, and said, I'll take you over.
- And sure enough he brings us with--
- to a house.
- And he goes up.
- And here comes out the Russian Jewish commander.
- What was his name?
- I don't know.
- But I'll tell you what he said-- that is--
- and he said-- and when he looked at us,
- he was so stunned, like that.
- And he said, he said, you are the first Jewish people
- I encountered.
- And he says, you know-- and he put his hand around us.
- And he said, and that's important.
- Listen, he said, [NON-ENGLISH]---- that he speaks Yiddish with
- us--
- I'll set you up well, and I'll feed you well.
- And [NON-ENGLISH] means I have them in the ground--
- not of the Germans, of his Russians, and [NON-ENGLISH]..
- And he said, [NON-ENGLISH] on his Russians--
- [NON-ENGLISH].
- He felt that he, too, is hated by the Russians.
- And he said, they knew that I am--
- know that I'm Jewish, but I don't
- care, the hell with them-- about his Russians.
- And he said and I'll set you up, he said, in this house,
- together with me, I'm going to tell the landlady.
- It was like a little apartment.
- They should fix a room for you, and you'll be with me,
- and he said.
- And he talked, and he said how and then oh, he said,
- what they do to the Germans, the [NON-ENGLISH]..
- [NON-ENGLISH] mean the SOBs.
- And he said, we'll give them.
- And he said, [NON-ENGLISH].
- And he said, I'm going to tell the landlady to fix a room.
- You'll stay with me, and you'll have it good, he said.
- And he said, meanwhile, go to town and find--
- I want a good photo camera--
- if you find a photo store, you come and tell me,
- and I'll go in and I'll get a camera.
- It was still on the next day.
- And the next day, that looting and this
- is allowed by the army and these,
- and especially, the Russians were so mad at the Germans.
- But the population, the foreigners,
- they gave them a few hours until they wanted everything
- for themselves that they would--
- and they had to--
- probably, it was orders not to let them.
- So we went to town, and we look for-- oh yeah, another thing.
- And before we left, we told him we are hungry.
- So he goes in and brings out an American can with armor-made
- you know, American--
- he was a Russian, but the food was American--
- and gives that conserved meat, a loaf of bread.
- And for us, it was good, and it tasted good in those days.
- When I came to America-- it taste so good-- when I came
- to America, I asked for this.
- I want to see, did they sell it?
- And they said, yes, and I open--
- it was salt, too salty.
- And it wasn't-- but then it tasted like cold chicken
- or something.
- And we were so hungry, and we were eating it
- in a small slice with bread.
- So and we went, and we found a camera store,
- and we're trying to tell him.
- It took us a couple hours.
- And he said, he'll go over, but he said,
- I have some news for you.
- He said, you can't stay with me.
- What is the news, he said, it's an order--
- the war isn't over yet.
- You see, the war was over in that place.
- We were liberated, but the Germans were still resisting.
- And he said, there is an order-- since we are Latvians that
- are Russian citizens, because Russia occupied Latvia
- before the war started, so that all the Russian citizens have
- to get in uniforms and help fight.
- And nearby was a movie theater.
- And he said, here is the gathering place.
- And [LAUGHS] and in we go.
- And in we went, and out you couldn't go anymore.
- And there were already Polish people and not Latvians.
- And Russian people, somehow, where they lived.
- And we are to be.
- And we lost contact with him.
- That was the first and the last we saw of that guy.
- And on the next day, they started--
- so that was towards evening.
- And we slept over there.
- And they had, like a movie, the soft chairs, almost
- like on the chairs.
- And it was a good, probably 150 people there or maybe more.
- On the next day they put us out in rows like young recruits
- and were marching with us with the Russians.
- And the Russian soldiers over--
- Did they give you uniforms?
- No, not yet.
- They were marching us to a camp.
- And they march.
- But the others were, you see, workers, ,
- and they were fed well, well enough to go on living.
- You know, they looked right.
- And we were already so worn out.
- And they march us, and we were marched together.
- And we said, eh, that this no, not for us.
- Finally, and they marched fast.
- And we were weak already from those marches
- and not eating that.
- And then our spirits were low-- who
- wants to go and fight again?
- We barely remained alive on the--
- so and one of us, the Kovnat really got, like, diarrhea,
- and he had some ulcers, and he got sick.
- And we say to the guards, leave us, we'll come.
- We know where it is, we'll ask the Germans, and we will come,
- we can't keep up.
- And there were a few who wanted to carry us on their shoulder.
- They said, we help one if we can, we can.
- But finally, that other one, Kovnat, got so sick.
- And we said, we'll come, and they let us stay.
- And it was in the country.
- Where were you staying?
- They let us on the--
- Highway?
- Stay on the highway, of the highway.
- It was a smaller country road.
- And we went-- after we rested good, we walked, and we walked.
- And we saw a house.
- We came in in the house.
- And we thought it is a farmer's house.
- And here, we came in.
- And it was a house, all right.
- And there were Danish people, Danes.
- Our group-- and they organized themselves to go home.
- And young people with--
- they had the, like scouts wear, the bags on their shoulder,
- shoulder bags.
- And here what they were doing-- in the kitchen,
- they had a killed pig.
- The Germans escaped from that area and leave.
- And cattle were roaming around.
- Later on the Russians got them in trucks
- were taking them to Germany--
- to Russia with a sign-- this is a gift, [NON-ENGLISH] from--
- to this and this-- kolkhoz.
- A kolkhoz is like a-- you know what a kolkhoz is?
- A communal, like a kibbutz and this,
- like cows and a bull and a sheep and pig.
- But they had killed a pig.
- They were butchering it and making--
- because they were marching home.
- There were no communication.
- And they're young.
- So they-- we came in, they were pretty nice to us.
- So the head of the pig, if you want, they would cook.
- And oh yeah, they had a German kitchen.
- It wasn't with an electric stove.
- They have with the firewood.
- And they-- so it was hot.
- And they-- and they told us--
- they were talking German--
- that they this, they'll cook it, and they'll
- have food on the way, they say, if you want to.
- So oh yeah, and we told them, we are hungry.
- They gave us little pieces of the cooked food already.
- And so we stayed there.
- And the next day, I think, they left.
- We remained.
- Finally, we find out that the Russians had some headquarters,
- and Yugoslav soldiers worked there
- a lot, which were fighting with the Russians.
- And the Yugoslav soldiers that-- they are distributing
- food for foreigners.
- And they were having already oil there and meat, distribute--
- and bread.
- Because here what it is, the little towns
- were all full with some German inhabitants.
- But on the outside, the Germans left.
- They were crowded in--
- and a lot of foreigners there were.
- And people have to eat.
- And they organized right away.
- Well, how did you find this out if you were in this farmhouse
- that the Danes had just left?
- Yeah, well people used to--
- people were on the march.
- We used to go out and ask for this.
- And we came to a little town.
- And again, we came to--
- and there was the commandant was Jewish we
- didn't see anyone who was--
- But they sent us to the Yugoslavs.
- And the Yugoslav were very sympathetic to us.
- They find out that we are Jewish people-- we're only three.
- So for the bigger groups, they would weigh the food,
- and then us they used to give a piece of this.
- They would-- didn't bother weigh,
- because they have those scales--
- the big scale, you know, what you would weigh--
- and give us oil and from here.
- So oh yeah, so they said that we should go and find
- a place where to live with a German family.
- And we were walking and walking, and we find a house
- where a German, he had, he had in the backyard,
- like we have garages, they had a little, like, a workhouse.
- He had there all kind of supplies.
- And in the front, by the way, he was a storekeeper.
- He had a store.
- And he let us stay there.
- Well, did you just knock on each door?
- Right, right, knock on each door.
- And they-- oh yeah, that, that-- they said that the Germans have
- orders to take in foreigners.
- And if they'll find out-- yeah, that was an order-- if they'll
- find out that they had the room and didn't take in,
- they'll be punished.
- Always was with, always with punished--
- that was the German way and the Russian way.
- If you don't do that, you'll be punished.
- So they let us in and assigned us a place in that little room.
- And we lived.
- And here what we did--
- since we used to bring food, meat and oil,
- and we arranged that a--
- the storekeeper's wife used to cook for us
- when we used to give her.
- And she was probably glad to do it.
- And she would knock at the door and bring us in a meal
- from the food we got.
- Did she know you were Jews?
- Oh, I'll tell you a story, too.
- No, she did not know.
- She did not know.
- And in that, in that, where we lived--
- so in the evenings, we would go out and sit near,
- between the garage and this.
- And a lot of Germans used to come over.
- And they knew that we are Latvians
- and that we know the Russians.
- They wanted favors.
- We should-- for example, there was a lady,
- the Russians took away her sewing machine.
- We should go with her to reclaim her sewing machine.
- And how the Russians will be and oh, they were so afraid.
- And as soon as the Russians came in in the store,
- he would run and bring us-- we should talk to the Russian,
- because they were afraid the Russians would take something
- for nothing or this.
- Then he's afraid-- in fact, he told us,
- that man, that he was an SS man, SS, he said.
- But he said everybody had to be SS--
- means a Hitler.
- And the Russians were trying to find out who worked for that.
- And always they want--
- and we didn't know that we are Jews-- they didn't know that.
- We lived there.
- And we had, in fact, we had pretty good a rest place,
- and they had--
- What was his name?
- I don't know.
- Even when I lived there, I didn't know,
- or maybe I did know.
- And such things I don't keep in mind.
- Only I knew the Germans, we worked together,
- and in Riga, I know many names.
- So and then a bath we could take there.
- There wasn't hot water.
- Again, you had to heat up water, put in,
- and it was a wooden tub.
- And we lived there until--
- oh yeah, we lived there for quite a couple of months,
- probably.
- And here what, meanwhile, happened--
- that all the foreigners could repatriate.
- Italians went to Italy, Hungarians
- to Hungary, Romanians and Czechoslovakians,
- everybody were.
- And we thought-- we told the Russians, instead
- of being Latvians, we told them we are
- from Palestine, Palestinians.
- And you know who gave us-- this gave us, a little,
- a young soldier from the Crimea, a Russian soldier--
- young, you would think that's assimilated--
- but he said, don't tell them you are a Latvian,
- tell you are Palestinians.
- We ourselves couldn't say it.
- And we saw it, and it went.
- So they used to gather all the foreigners in groups of 120
- and put them on a train, whatever communications
- they could, and send them to.
- With three Palestinians, they didn't even know.
- A lot of Russian soldiers, if you say we are from Palestine,
- he would say, where is it?
- In fact, one time, two soldiers said, where is it.
- They said-- [RUSSIAN],, don't you know we were fighting there.
- The Russians weren't fighting in Palestine,
- but [LAUGHS] you know.
- So anyhow, then it came that the whole town
- emptied of foreigners.
- And the Yugoslavs left, too.
- And the Russians moved us to another place,
- and before moving, you know.
- And in fact, we had to gather in a certain place, so one
- of the German women which, she looked very sympathetic, too.
- She was afraid of the Russians, but of Hitler--
- some places-- still Hitler.
- So when we took--
- lived there, we told her we are Jews.
- And here what happened--
- Kovnat was a tall, slender and blonde.
- And I was-- I don't know if I look specifically Jewish
- or not.
- But to have another one, he was shorter than I am,
- and he had curly hair.
- And he looked, we called him the Negus.
- You know, the Negus was the Ethiopian King.
- He looked like him.
- You remember the King of Ethiopia?
- I remember Haile Selassie.
- Haile Selassie, how he looked.
- He looked like that, curly hair.
- So he said, he said--
- she said to me, we didn't know, but she said,
- of that little one, he said, we thought maybe he is Jewish.
- [LAUGHS]
- So but we treated him good.
- And, and we told her, you see what hatred
- and what Hitler did, that he thought
- the Jews are devils or the worst of everybody,
- because we got a good name on account
- we used to give the food to the lady,
- and food was scarce when the Russians came in.
- Did you tell the Russians that the fellow was an SS man?
- No, no, no, no.
- But he told us, he said, I belong to the party,
- but he said, I'll go and talk to what we can and then--
- and we were sitting there in the place,
- and we could see that he is not an active--
- he wasn't a Jew killer or this.
- And if you, as a sympathizer to Hitler--
- they were, all of them.
- You know what happened once in Russia--
- in Germany, and I don't remember at what time, but anyhow,
- we were already close to leave Germany.
- And we were in the country.
- And an old German was sitting near the river,
- and I think he was a shepherd and had there
- and was taking care of a herd of cattle.
- You see, in Europe, isn't like an America
- there is plenty of land, and you have a fenced-in,
- and the cattle graze by themselves.
- There you need a shepherd, because there
- is no fenced-in from one farm to the other,
- or the cattle can go in the corn or other.
- So there is a shepherd.
- And we talked to him.
- And he was a shepherd, because he was old.
- And he didn't know that we are Jewish, too.
- And the Russian, it was in the Russian zone.
- And he said, and we're talking.
- And we tell him, did you see how destroyed,
- and why did Hitler start the war,
- and why did the other Germans--
- how did all the Germans follow Hitler?
- You know what the guy told me-- he didn't know we are Jews,
- it didn't come to his mind-- he said,
- there wouldn't be any war if not for the Jews, he told me.
- They were so-- that Hitler, he was a devil.
- But he knew-- and I know this in all the dictators--
- he knew how to lead the people to--
- and to believe all what he says.
- That is-- Nasser was like that.
- Nasser was-- were for talking about the Jews
- or about Americans or this or what
- is Khomeini, now, or a few of those fanatics.
- They know how to lead the people in believing all the bad.
- Another thing what they do is you seed with hatred.
- You can feed the masses until they accept it better,
- you know, willingly, more than with love, with hatred.
- And that was all the dictators.
- So you were the three Palestinians getting back
- to the--
- Yeah.
- --in this little town, and the Yugoslavs left?
- Right.
- And where did you do the--
- And here then the Russians took us over in another camp.
- What was the name of that?
- That was Furstenwalde.
- And it was like the camp was made from a--
- in a villa of a rich German family.
- There were real impressive buildings, brick buildings, 2,
- 3 floors and a lot of buildings for their help--
- smaller buildings.
- It was on a nice hill.
- And we lived there with other people.
- And there were Yugoslavs and Polacks and some Italians.
- But they lived already, they had already a band.
- They were dancing and living it up.
- And then a Yugoslav man said--
- and we got acquainted, and we told him we are Jewish people.
- And he said, you know what I heard,
- that in Berlin, they have a Jewish center,
- like a Jewish Gemeinde, it's called.
- And Berlin was 60 miles from that place.
- And it was civilians couldn't use the railroad yet--
- only for soldiers, for the Russians.
- And the war was still on somewhere.
- It wasn't.
- So here what happened--
- oh, I remember.
- No, it was already after the liberation,
- because it was already--
- Berlin was already divided into four zones-- the Russian,
- French, English and American.
- So we decided that we have to see what is in Berlin.
- We cannot sit there.
- So I was the one, they sent me to go to Berlin.
- And I got in into the train.
- And the train was filled with Russians.
- But I told them I'm going to--
- I have to go to Berlin or somehow.
- We-- I got about 10 or 20 miles until they got me out of it.
- I talked to men, and then I had to walk.
- And I remember I was walking and walking.
- It was so hot already.
- It must have been May.
- And I remember my face was soaked.
- I was sweating.
- And when I came to Berlin, I remember my hair was bleached.
- I couldn't recognize when I saw my hair.
- I had not very dark hair, but I couldn't recognize,
- it was so bleached.
- And I remember, I was going by, and I saw a little, like,
- a puddle where kids were swimming there out of this.
- And I thought, oh, if I could go in--
- and maybe I should go in with the clothes.
- Since the sun shines anyhow, it'll dry up.
- And I was afraid.
- I would have done it, it was so hot.
- Finally, I came to Berlin, to that place.
- And I saw Berlin, you know, where a lot of buildings
- were destroyed.
- But what impressed me more, I never
- knew or saw the underground subways.
- And here were holes, and you could look in and see the rails
- underneath.
- And I came.
- The holes were where they were bombed out?
- Right, from bombs, yeah.
- And finally, towards evening, I came to that old synagogue
- where they had the Jewish Gemeinde.
- Gemeinde means the Jewish circle.
- And I'll show you--
- I think I have a document what they give me.
- I think let's, let's finish this with today.
- And I'll show you the paper what I got from.
- All right.
- OK.
- So we were in a camp, Furstenwalde,
- the three boys of us.
- And it was a Russian camp.
- There were Polish refugees and Italians.
- And what the Russians did--
- and meanwhile, the war was over--
- so the Russians used to make groups of 120 people and put
- them on a train--
- it was in Europe--
- and sent them by train--
- Hungarians to Hungary, Polacks to Poland,
- and Romanians to Romania.
- But we were three boys, and we existed as Palestinians.
- And they used to tell us, well, when we'll get 120 of you,
- we'll send you, too.
- And we were just sitting or sitting.
- And we see it was like a camp where they send home everybody.
- And everybody is going, and new are coming.
- And they make groups and send them home.
- And nothing, no results with us.
- So it happened to be there Yugoslavs, too.
- And we talked to them.
- And he said that he was in Berlin,
- but there is, in Berlin, there is a Jewish Gemeinde.
- Gemeinde means a Jewish community.
- And they have-- they are doing something
- for the Jewish people.
- So we decided that we have to investigate.
- So it was decided that I would go there.
- And the two will stay, because we can't go out of the camp,
- and then we will be nowhere.
- You see, we couldn't be on our own.
- We didn't have any money.
- We didn't have nothing.
- And it was after the war, and there were no order that--
- nothing.
- So that I'll go.
- So how did we go?
- We were getting food, too.
- And our food was the main thing.
- You know, it was after the war, but we, for us, food
- was scarce in Germany, and especially for us.
- And we lived from that-- what the Russians gave to us.
- And in that camp, the Yugoslavian--
- Yugoslavs were managing for the Russians that camp.
- So while sitting there we had enough food.
- But as soon as we get away from the camp, we are out--
- nothing, no papers, no nothing.
- So it was decided that these two boys will stay there,
- and I will go.
- There was a train from that place.
- And I went on the train, but it was only for military.
- And I went to the next station.
- They got me off of the train, so I had to walk.
- But as I said, it was 60 miles--
- I don't know.
- I walked.
- I think I slept on the station, and the next day
- in the morning, I start to walk.
- And I walked the whole day.
- And it was July.
- And the sun was heating, and I was hot.
- And I couldn't go in in a place.
- It was on the highway, first off.
- Even in a house I couldn't go in.
- Even I would look for a restaurant.
- I didn't have any money.
- Money, we didn't know what it is.
- So I was walking, and I had a bag with a bread.
- And I remember I passed by a pool, like a mud hole,
- and kids were swimming.
- And I thought, oh, if I wouldn't be afraid,
- I would go in with my clothes and then it will dry.
- I was so hot and sweaty.
- And when I arrived--
- at the end towards evening, I arrived in Berlin.
- And after asking people where that what I am looking for,
- the Jewish Gemeinde, finally I found it.
- And it was towards evening.
- I remember when I saw that--
- myself in a mirror, I couldn't recognize myself.
- My brows, my hair was blond.
- Before it was a brownish color, but it
- was like bleached from the sun without a hat.
- And that Jewish Gemeinde was in an old synagogue.
- And towards the evening would came--
- the janitor was a German, a husband
- and wife, two elderly people.
- And they lived there.
- The synagogue had a little house for the janitor.
- And we told them--
- and I told him I'm a Palestinian,
- and I'm going to Palestine.
- Listen what she said.
- She said, we are Germans, but when there was the synagogue,
- we had a daughter.
- And one of the members, a Jewish fellow
- fell in love with our daughter, and they
- are in Palestine in Acharya.
- She said, I'm going to give you a letter along.
- She thought we are going.
- It wasn't so simple.
- But so and the next day-- so we stayed over.
- In the synagogue I stayed over in the synagogue.
- And the next morning, the man who managed that came.
- And he said, what--
- we don't have a camp that you can come here and stay.
- He said, we give only help, advice to German Jews.
- So but I said, how can I get back home?
- So he said, wait, we'll give you a sign,
- and maybe that will help you.
- And he gave me this.
- And when he asked me the name where I was born,
- and I tell him in Riga, Latvia.
- He said, oh, we have only the power
- to take care of German Jews.
- So he said, well, we'll put you in that you
- are born in Hanover.
- That's why.
- And I was going back.
- He gave me some additional bread and food.
- I thought I would walk home.
- And I thought to go back.
- Here what happened-- the Russians--
- Berlin was already divided in four zones--
- the English and this.
- But around the city, you see, were the Russians.
- And the Russians had roadblocks out of the city.
- And here I go out of the city about three or four or five
- miles.
- And you have to walk roads-- are Russian,
- and the Russian, there were a couple of them standing on.
- He said, where are you going, who are you?
- So I took out the this.
- I don't know-- did he know German?
- He reads, and he reads.
- And he said, where are you going?
- I said, I'm going to Furstenwalde.
- And I tell him for-- in a lager.
- So he push me away on the side.
- And I thought, my God, here I am arrested by the Russians.
- And here what happened-- and meanwhile, the Russian,
- the communication or on the roads
- were only Russian trucks, Russian carts.
- It was after the war, which they load
- the trucks on empty trucks.
- And these guard at the roadblock block examined every truck.
- He wanted signs, where they're going.
- And evidently, he found a truck who is going to our place.
- When he got the truck, he calls me in
- and tells me to go get on the truck.
- And they brought me there back.
- And I told the guys what the reason--
- What were their names, Irving?
- Kovnat one was, Kovnat.
- And the other was Baron.
- Were they both from Riga?
- No, Baron was from Riga, and Kovnat was from Dankeri.
- Dankeri was a little town.
- In Latvia?
- In Latvia, yeah, famous little town.
- So we came, so we came back.
- And we thought, what are we going to do, and what are--
- then we heard that, in the English zone,
- in Berlin is something, they do something.
- And sure enough, we walk--
- oh yeah-- no.
- We went somewhere again, or we heard
- that the English people, the English army and the English
- were bringing over refugees who don't want
- to return to their country, Eastern Europeans,
- especially Polacks like us.
- So they get them out of the Russian zone,
- and they take them over to there, so.
- And we want our-- what our-- sure enough, they put us
- on tractor trailers, like.
- And that's the first time I saw that trailer.
- You go in, it's like a room, the American tractor trailers.
- In Europe, they didn't have.
- And they put us in, put on with a lot of refugees
- and was taking us.
- I didn't know where, when, but to move at least.
- So again, and the Russians were around.
- And the Russians kept that trailer, too.
- They kept that.
- And evidently, the papers weren't right,
- and they want to look in-- what is in the trailers.
- And they-- and the Allies have with them-- it's none
- of their business, evidently.
- And they wouldn't let look in into the trailers.
- And the cop kept us for 6, 8 hours.
- And we were very, very scared--
- what's going to happen?
- But finally, they let it go.
- And we were brought in the English zone.
- And again, they put us in in a camp, the English,
- again, with foreigners.
- How did you get out of the Russian camp onto that trailer?
- What did they do, just ask for people?
- Yeah, yes.
- Somehow, it was facilitated.
- And we find out that they take out people.
- And the Cold War was on.
- And the English-- evidently, people
- they were not supposed to take out, but they did not let them
- inspect what they have in the trailers.
- And it was they had a big quarrel.
- Evidently, they had to go to the higher commandant.
- And finally, we were free, and we went out.
- And they put us in a camp.
- And it started almost the same story,
- with all the other nationalities go home,
- and we-- as Palestinians, they don't know what to do with us.
- So finally, we knew that we are not far from Bergen-Belsen.
- So and in Bergen-Belsen, we're neutrals.
- From the English people, from the English soldiers
- who used to come, we find out that there is Jews left.
- And there we decided already that we are moving just away.
- So one day, we got up.
- And we start walking and to, towards Bergen-Belsen.
- In Bergen-Belsen, there was quite
- a number of Jewish people there, the refugees.
- And some already were familiar with the area.
- They were going and coming.
- And there were--
- Hanover wasn't far from that and another little town, Celle.
- And they were going to town there.
- And some started even trading and doing business.
- But we were ignorant in those.
- And so, oh yeah, on the road, I remember big trucks would go,
- some empty tractor trailers with flatbed and a lot of refugees.
- And there were bands.
- When the truck would slow down, they
- would jump on it, when have a ride, take a ride.
- So we saw the other do it, we got on a truck,
- too, on a truck.
- There were sharp bends on the road.
- And we-- and I remember--
- so some, used to be they would let them off or this.
- We didn't know.
- We got on a truck, and when it came toward we wanted
- to get out, we were afraid.
- We were told that we are now about 10 miles
- from Bergen-Belsen.
- We were arriving right, and then we decided we have to go down.
- And that truck wouldn't stop.
- And we begged him, and he just to start faster.
- And I remember we had bags with food, with or whatever.
- We threw it down, and we jumped then.
- And I realize now-- you know, we were younger--
- it was so dangerous to jump off of a running truck.
- When we jumped off, nothing happened.
- So on the way we walked, again.
- And on the way, we met a Hungarian girl.
- And we talked to her.
- And we tell her the story.
- And she said, oh, in Bergen-Belsen,
- you'll be all right.
- We tell her all what--
- she said, we are in the right place.
- And she said, you come with me, and I'll
- show you where to register, there is an office.
- And so finally, we came.
- And we went in, and we-- there was an office.
- In the office were managing two rabbis from England.
- One was Wilansky, and one was Baumgartner.
- They were army chaplains.
- They were wearing the English uniforms, young rabbis.
- And we came in, and we tell them.
- They register, but shows us the place.
- So here what happened--
- in Bergen-Belsen was the camp for the Jewish camp.
- And there was a lot of Germans who were living in
- a camp, oh, a block away.
- And the Germans had brick buildings,
- nice 2-story buildings.
- Over on this was the Jewish camp were barracks from the war.
- And it was, when we came, it was burned down, everything.
- And there were mass graves.
- And they showed us that here was buried the ashes and these.
- And but it was try to level out.
- And we lived there.
- And so from there, from there at that time, the Jewish Agency,
- the Israeli wanted--
- and the American government, in fact, Truman made the English--
- England should let in 100,000 Jews to Israel
- from the, left over from the Holocaust, left over.
- But England, at that time, the Secretary
- of State Bevin in England resisted.
- And the English Government resisted,
- because they didn't want to get in trouble with the Arabs.
- And Ben-Gurion came there once and spoke.
- And in Bergen-Belsen there were, meanwhile, a lot of other Jews
- come together, like myself.
- And we had demonstrations.
- And Bergen-Belsen was under the English,
- in the English part of Germany.
- And I remember when Gurion came--
- and this I will always remember when he said to us,
- he said the world knows what Hitler did to the Jews.
- That he said like that--
- that Hitler didn't have to kill the Jews like he did, he said.
- If the Nurembergs laws, what they gave out,
- would be enough to kill all the Jews.
- He said, there was an Aryan should not
- have any contact with the Jewish people.
- And he said the Aryan--
- a German or whatever it is-- cannot trade with the Jewish
- people by himself, and they can't do any service
- for the Jewish people, and the Jewish people can't do any
- service for the Aryans.
- He said, that would be enough that Jews couldn't exist,
- But he said, in Israel, is a difference.
- So he said, all of Europe Jews would
- perish if the Aryans would actually obey Hitler's laws.
- That he said, in Israel, if they gave out such a law,
- he said, it wouldn't hurt the Jews,
- because he said, we produce our own food,
- we have our own manufacturing business.
- And he said, we can live for a very, very long time,
- because we don't need the others,
- we can deal with ourselves on own.
- [COUGH] But anyhow, that was the speech.
- And it was, in Israel and in the whole America
- were fighting that they should--
- Palestine should absorb those refugees.
- But they, in England, couldn't give in.
- Finally, under the pressure from the Allies,
- England decided to send a commission
- to inquire to the Jews if they want to go to Israel.
- Because in England, said not--
- there aren't so many who wants to go to Israel,
- mostly want to go to their own country.
- And this is true, too.
- There were a big amount of Hungarian Jews.
- And the young kids who were already assimilated--
- some Hungarian Jews were speaking Yiddish, you know.
- But there were already a higher class,
- especially from Budapest.
- So they wanted, they were begging to go back to Hungary.
- And the same was with Romanian, and the same
- was with all, a lot of different.
- Some wanted to go to Israel, and some wanted to go home.
- So there was that Rabbi Wilansky.
- He was the chaplain.
- And he was a Zionist and a really fine Jewish man.
- And he spoke Yiddish.
- So he came, and he said to the--
- and we had there a big movie house.
- He used to call together a big hall.
- And he spoke.
- He said, a commission is coming in about a week.
- And he said, no matter who-- whoever wants to go home,
- we'll send home to Hungary or to Poland.
- And but at least from the commission
- come and enquire, send all who want to go to Israel.
- And here what happened--
- on the next Saturday the Hungarian kids, especially
- girls, caught the rabbi.
- They thought that he messed up the chance of going back
- to Hungary.
- And they dropped him on the floor
- and took off his coat or something.
- And some say even they beat him up, I don't know.
- Anyhow, the rabbi called, again, a meeting.
- And he said, among other things, he said, I'll consider--
- I need the coat, my coat, I need-- and I'll
- consider whoever returns it to me, that the coat,
- you don't like me.
- He said, I couldn't say, of Jews,
- that they took it from me or something.
- And so that happened Yeah, so meanwhile,
- the England with the commission came and with their inquiries.
- But still they hold tight that they
- wouldn't allow any Jews to emigrate to Palestine,
- because they had, before they had already a white paper
- from a previous government to stop immigration
- on account of the Arabs.
- And at that time it started the illegal immigration.
- And how-- what did consist of?
- There were Israeli, Israeli soldiers,
- which were in the army in the English army, the volunteers.
- And they would come in secret and make contact
- with the Jewish young boys.
- They would take them to Italy, and in Italy or to any harbor
- and put them on boats.
- And they would go to Israel and get them to Marseilles
- to southern France.
- And there was a secret organization.
- That's when the exodus started.
- And but there were other many boats.
- And I myself registered, too, with the Israelis.
- However, I had here a lot of relatives in America.
- And but I didn't know their addresses,
- because I was a youngster at that time.
- And my mother and my sister used to correspond
- with the other side.
- Was-- so but I remember the Simon Lebow, Bellaire Ohio.
- So I wrote a few letters, and they didn't count.
- I didn't know the exact address.
- I didn't realize, of course, if you
- send a letter in normal times to Simon Lebow, Bellaire, Ohio,
- he would get it without any--
- I didn't know then--
- numbers or box number.
- But he's known in Bellaire, he would get a letter.
- But in those days, I didn't get an answer for about two,
- three months.
- Irving, what year was this, are we--
- That was '45, '46.
- And you mentioned earlier a Hungarian girlfriend?
- Yeah, that-- I'll come back to it.
- All right.
- Good.
- So and I didn't get any answers.
- It passed by three month or four month, and I--
- nothing.
- So one time-- so I gave up.
- I thought maybe they died, maybe they moved.
- And in Europe, if you moved and you
- didn't make good arrangements, it is like you disappeared.
- Maybe in America, too, if you don't leave a forwarding
- address, you go away somewhere.
- So I gave up, and I settled myself to go to Israel.
- And here what happened--
- and yeah, I was to go to Israel.
- And I already contacted the people,
- and I would go on illegal, illegally,
- like, like everybody was doing.
- And here what happened--
- if you remember, when I said when we,
- we're on the way to Bergen-Belsen, a girl,
- we met a girl.
- And we talked to her.
- And she said, you come, and you'll be safe and everything.
- And a really-- she did for us, and we got acquainted.
- What was her name?
- Her name was Eleanor Weiss from [PLACE NAME]..
- And we got acquainted.
- And in such a case, you get acquaintance, and you get help,
- you feel it ties you together.
- And she told us later on about her,
- how she was brought to the camp.
- She was really in that camp all the time.
- What camp was that?
- Bergen-Belsen.
- I see.
- Yeah, she was brought from Germany in Bergen-Belsen.
- And she was taking care, she said.
- She is called the mother of very young girls--
- 13, 14-years-old girls from her neighborhood,
- about six, eight girls.
- And she said, in the camp she was with them.
- And now, she lives in the barracks with them.
- And we got acquainted with her.
- And I used to come in in the barracks.
- And you know, young people-- and she was quite religious.
- And at that time, I wasn't religious at all,
- because we grew up in Riga.
- And in Riga was under the influence from Russia.
- And not only that, in the influence from our growing up,
- when I grew up, it was, the Jewish question was so imminent
- that we were taught in school that learning Torah,
- it's called squeezing the bench, sitting and doing, it is not--
- it is just learning is nothing, doing is the main thing.
- And that's why we have our problem.
- We are too much, we have too much intelligence,
- but we are not used to work.
- And that, in fact, the Goyim, used
- to accuse us that the Jews don't work, can't work,
- don't want to work.
- They just want to trade or the professionals.
- That was their accusation.
- And somehow, we were so sensitive
- that the Jewish people, we thought really they were right.
- And when I was growing up, it was
- that we have to learn to work on the Zionism were blooming.
- But in Israel, we'll go, and we'll work the land,
- and we'll work this.
- So we were inclined to accept that the Torah learning,
- that's not good, or too much intelligence is not good--
- work, deeds are--
- on doing things.
- So that's why I said I wasn't religious.
- Now, shtetl, in spite, there was three shuls we had.
- And I happened to live in shul across from the street
- and spend my days in school, in shul,
- because we didn't have playgrounds
- or, like you have here, or a swimming pool.
- It was around shul where we got together.
- And that girl, she was very smart and very intelligent.
- And somehow we took a liking of each other, unnoticed.
- And I told her that about America--
- I have so many relatives-- brothers and uncles and things.
- And she said, if you find about them, will you take me,
- I would go with you.
- I said, yes.
- So anyhow, but then nothing came out of that.
- So one time I was at her place with--
- in the barrack.
- And one of her girls, the young girls she takes care of,
- 13 or 14-years-old girl, writes.
- I said, what is she doing there?
- She was writing.
- She said, oh, she writes a letter
- to her father in New York, in New York.
- So I said, oh, maybe I'll put on a little note in her letter.
- She said, go and ask her.
- So I asked the girl, can I put in a little note
- about my relatives.
- She said, why not?
- Oh yeah, and I asked her, the--
- she was called the mama, the--
- my girl, the Eleanor Weiss.
- She said, yeah, put in a--
- So I write a little note like that
- that I have relatives in America, Simon Lebow and Joe
- Lebow and in California somewhere.
- Maybe he can find out and get, connect me with him,
- in English.
- And I put it in, and I forgot about it in a couple of weeks
- Oh yeah, so one day when I come to the girls,
- she said, did you hear, they called your name?
- And I were-- how it was distributed,
- the mail in Bergen-Belsen, the camp,
- the English had a truck with a loudspeaker.
- And he would go along and call the mail.
- And then the people would run out.
- He would go slow, you know, and deliver the mail.
- And I don't know where I was, I didn't hear.
- She said, it seemed to me, for sure,
- that they called your name.
- So oh yeah, and the letters the English did not deliver they
- left with their office, with the chaplains, you see.
- The camp was managed by the English government,
- by the English army.
- And the chaplains were part of their army.
- Army chaplains, they were.
- So I went there.
- I went there in the office, and I go in
- and Rabbi Baumgartner was there.
- And I went.
- There was a line of people-- they always have something
- there--
- letters or other business complaints--
- or demand something.
- So I have a look on my--
- I was 10 closer, about 3, 4.
- And I look up there.
- I see what they-- it-- there is a letter for me.
- And I recognize from whom it is, you know.
- And there was already a letter and an affidavit
- for me to come to America.
- And here what happened--
- this Hungarian girl father was in New York.
- They lived in Hungary, but he was in New York.
- He was from the ultra Orthodox people,
- and he was a collector for a yeshiva, collecting money.
- Now, we have the United Jewish Appeal, but in those days,
- each yeshiva had their man to send out.
- And he was going from door to door, collecting money.
- And the money they use to send to Europe to the yeshiva.
- And he was here.
- And it so happened that this man-- he
- used to come to Bellaire, too.
- And I had an aunt in Bellaire.
- And she was kosher, so he used to eat there.
- And Uncle Simon was a contributor, so he knew him.
- What was his name?
- I, I forget it.
- Oh, Schecter or Schuster.
- I'll remember.
- In fact, before I was still in-- yeah, remember.
- Were there any yeshivas left in Europe to be collecting for?
- Well, he was caught in the war, and I
- don't think he could go back.
- Oh, he was there the entire war in New York?
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Now, Schuster, Schecter.
- Anyhow, so he called up, right away.
- And he said, here, I have a note that Irving Lebow, your--
- is alive and in Bergen-Belsen.
- Now--
- Simon was your uncle?
- My uncle, right.
- So I got-- and my brother was here then already in Bellaire.
- So he went to New York, got me papers and everything.
- Now--
- What was your brother's name, Irving?
- Joe, Joseph.
- So here what happened--
- my brother thought that if there is anybody alive,
- I have chances, because I--
- he knew who I was.
- I have a slow temper, and I'm pretty in good health,
- and I have a trade.
- So he thought if anybody would be alive, I would.
- But here, month went by, and they didn't hear,
- so he thought maybe I perished.
- Then I had a sister in Riga.
- And here what happened-- we got--
- Was she the one put on the train?
- Yeah, yeah.
- OK.
- She was on the train.
- And here again, after the war--
- and she remained alive.
- You know that story.
- No, the last time you mentioned her, she was put on a train
- and being sent to Russia.
- Right.
- We send her.
- We put her on a train, my brother and me.
- Right.
- And we thought she should go to our little town
- or a ghetto town, but the town--
- But the train didn't stop?
- But the train didn't stop, and they went to Russia.
- And during the war, America and Russia were friends.
- She, my sister got in touch with these brothers in America.
- Simon?
- Simon and Joe.
- And they were corresponding.
- At the end of the war, my sister, from Russia--
- they were sent deep in Russia near Siberia--
- she came back to Riga and expected--
- and some survivors came back to Riga.
- And she asks some, and they said that I was in ghetto in Riga,
- they told her.
- And she didn't meet anybody who would,
- who could tell that I was in Germany or alive.
- They didn't know, because a lot you didn't
- know from each other much.
- Was there still a ghetto in Riga then?
- No, no, no, no.
- But survivors arrived from Germany.
- You know, it was after the war already.
- And she said, she went there to talk to them.
- Not only that, there were lists of survivors made and brought
- to all places, to a lot of places.
- But still it wasn't with a system.
- And she wrote to my brother here that it's such a pity
- that, evidently, I perished.
- And my brother later told me, he wrote to her,
- no, we shouldn't lose hopes yet.
- And in that letter when I got in Bergen-Belsen
- was that you evidently know that our sister is
- alive with her family.
- And this was to me such a surprise,
- because when we send her, we thought
- she land in [PLACE NAME],, that in [PLACE NAME]
- they brought the rabbi, took the whole community to the shul
- and burned alive there about three shuls.
- Whatever they could pack in the shuls, they put it on fire
- and burned.
- And then the rest were taken out to the woods and shot.
- So in the beginning, I did not believe that they will do it,
- but we heard that, in Riga, what they did in the provinces.
- And they, in Riga, they didn't do it yet like that.
- They were shooting at night 4 or 5 people, 10 to intimidate or--
- we thought.
- But so for a while I thought, well, we
- sent them to the, in the, to the mouth of the lion.
- When the things got worse--
- and it bothered me so much.
- But on the other hand, I thought, who should know?
- Nobody could know.
- When things were got worse, and they were already
- starting mass execution and annihilation, I thought, well--
- and when I wanted to commit suicide,
- it was a time I thought, well, maybe they had it better.
- If it came, why did they have to suffer so much?
- It's over with them.
- And so I got the papers.
- Where was she living at the time?
- At the time she was already returned from Siberia to Riga.
- And she was living in Riga?
- Near Riga, yeah.
- With her child?
- Yeah, with-- she had two children.
- Two children?
- And a husband.
- And the husband was in the Front.
- He was wounded but all survived.
- Her husband was not on the train with her at the time?
- Yes.
- Oh they--
- Yes.
- --put him on the train?
- Yeah, on the train, too.
- And then he was mobilized in the army and did that.
- Yeah.
- So here what happened--
- so I got the affidavit.
- And they told me, in the office, what I have to do.
- And they said it'll take time, because the transportation
- alone--
- before I get the visa, transportation alone
- is not for civilians.
- There isn't such a thing, because the American army
- was returning soldiers.
- And it was millions of people.
- And all the boats and planes were basically with soldiers,
- and they had the priority.
- The Americans had the priority in those days.
- And here, when I got the affidavit, I come to my girl.
- And I showed her, and she said to me,
- you know what, she got a letter, too.
- From Hungary, she got.
- And she told me that she had a [NON-ENGLISH]..
- You know what a [NON-ENGLISH] is?
- A boyfriend with whom she planned to be married.
- And she thought, too, that he was for sure, he perished.
- And she said she got the news that he was alive.
- And she said to me, you wouldn't expect
- me to leave her boyfriend and her youth friend and this.
- And she said she's going back to Hungary.
- And that was-- and I said, yes, I understand.
- And I start the work to get to America.
- So to get to America, there in Germany were no English Consul.
- I had to get a visa that they send me.
- From the camp, they send me to France, again, by car.
- Everything went by my car or a bus.
- They had, evidently, more like I am on-- with them
- they got a small bus, like a school bus they had.
- And they took us from Bergen-Belsen first to Belgium.
- We were driving, and they brought us to France.
- In France, they had in, an old grade school, they
- had a camp for refugees, like whoever had papers
- and that want to go home.
- They put me there.
- And I had to go to the English--
- to the American Consul.
- And I came, and I showed him I have an affidavit.
- And they said they cannot give me a visa till I have
- transportation.
- I used to go to transportation, to companies.
- They said they can't book me until I have a visa.
- And I was going from one place to the other.
- And in each place when you came, you had to stay on line.
- I would come out in the morning and be there in the evening,
- just to say me, no, it's--
- have to wait and wait.
- I was waiting.
- And yeah, I was waiting there for a whole year.
- And meanwhile, I lived in a camp.
- And they fed us.
- But I was a watchmaker, and I got there work.
- I got acquainted little by little.
- I used to get a watch to repair.
- And later finally, I got work, and I was working and living
- there for a whole year.
- And I would maybe have stayed there much longer.
- And here what happened--
- my, again, Uncle Simon wrote the letter,
- and he, evidently, some lawyer must've
- put it up that we are a big family here and all
- from the rest of the family perished in Europe,
- and only one nephew has remained alive.
- And it is something-- a pity or something that I can come here.
- He send my financial statement-- you know,
- how much he pay taxes and his assets.
- And one time, I came, and the Consul called me in,
- and he opened a folder and said, who is Simon Lebow.
- I said, he is my uncle, he's my father's brother.
- Oh yeah, and I heard a young fellow--
- I didn't know what English, a word English nor French.
- There in the consulate, I--
- English or French you could make yourself understood.
- So they gave me along a young fellow, a Frenchman.
- And he knew a little English--
- a little Yiddish.
- He was from Jewish parents.
- So I used to talk, and he would explain to them.
- And he was-- I could hear, according to this.
- And he-- the statement, he said, he's
- a wealthy man or something like that.
- And that helped.
- And he said, come next day.
- He gave me an appointment.
- And my gosh, I got the visa.
- I-- it was after a year, I got the visa.
- When I got the visa I went to a airlines.
- I think it was Air France or American, I don't remember.
- Somewhere I think in my citizen's papers,
- they found out how I came to America, the transportation.
- I have citizen papers, that is when I come on.
- And I had enough money saved up from my watch repair,
- and I bought a ticket.
- And I came here.
- And my brother knew I was--
- that I'm about to come, but I didn't know how
- to wire or this.
- You know, I was from a small town
- and without a language in a strange country.
- And I come, And on the plane, they took--
- they registered already.
- And I came on a permanent visa that, when
- I got off of the plane, I said, what do I do now?
- He said, you are an American, you can go wherever you want.
- [LAUGHS]
- Oh yeah, in France, I was started
- to take English and French in night school
- at the Berlitz School.
- And for refugees.
- It was free.
- So I took English, and I learned pretty,
- I would say, pretty fast.
- At the end of the year I could make myself understood.
- Irving, what happened to the other two fellows that you--
- Oh, we-- see, after I got the affidavit, we parted.
- And I knew Baron went to Israel.
- And I don't know what happened to Kovnak had,
- in Ireland, had some relatives.
- And he said he would go to Ireland.
- So I don't know if he got in touch
- with his relatives or this.
- When you got off the plane, and they told you
- you could go anywhere--
- Yeah, so I said, I don't know, I don't--
- Was that different than what you had--
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- And it was different, but still I was in a strange land.
- I was in New York at that airport.
- Were you-- you were used to people telling you where
- to go--
- Right, right, right, right.
- And I was so scared.
- And evidently, that person who told me so how it was, I said,
- I don't know where to go or what.
- So he asked about relatives.
- So I told him I have in Bellaire, Ohio.
- What's his name-- he got him in a telephone book and called.
- And I was so surprised.
- So he said, here, there is my brother on the other end.
- He said, oh, you are here.
- He said, you know what, you stay there,
- and I'll take a train or a plane,
- and I'll come to pick you up, he said, at the airport.
- I said, tell me how I should get--
- why I don't-- how I'll somehow get myself.
- I'll take a cab or something.
- And he didn't want that.
- Then I said, if you'll tell me where to go, and I'll get it--
- on a train, or--
- He said go to the Pennsylvania Station and get a train,
- ask for a ticket to Wheeling, West Virginia.
- And somehow, I don't remember how I got it--
- by a cab or something.
- Oh, and this I remember.
- A cab or a porter got me to the station.
- And he brings me to the where I buy a ticket.
- I ask him where to buy a ticket.
- You know, it was so strange with so many people.
- And I didn't know.
- So he brought me, and he said you buy a ticket.
- And I buy.
- And I go, and I ask a ticket for Wheeling, West Virginia.
- And the man in the window-- and he stays with me.
- And he asks me, one or two.
- And I wasn't used to listening.
- When you don't know the language, you know.
- I said, yes.
- So he gives me two tickets.
- But that guy didn't sit at him-- gives me two tickets.
- I bought two tickets.
- And I had to wait about five or six hours or more
- on this station.
- And I was sitting around.
- And at the same time, I'm afraid.
- I see a train comes--
- I shouldn't miss my train.
- And I go I'm tell him, will you tell me
- when the train comes on there?
- And I look at the ticket.
- I see two identical tickets.
- And I-- why do I have two tickets?
- And I got-- and I had so much time.
- And I got two, and I went after three, four, five hours.
- And I said, do I need two tickets,
- or I need only one ticket?
- And that-- in the window, he got quite mad.
- He said, if you need one, why do you buy two or something?
- He-- I didn't understand.
- But anyhow, he gave me money back.
- And so and I remember I was asking, asking--
- each train which come, is this to Wheeling, West Virginia.
- And finally I-- it was the train.
- And I got on, and I came.
- And that train to Wheeling and over there,
- well, near the river.
- And I remember I came about 8 o'clock in the morning.
- And here is Wheeling--
- I see, saw the sign.
- And the conductor I asked he should tell me
- where Wheeling is.
- And I looked through the window, came with my brother.
- And he arrived.
- Well, with the girl, as I said, there is--
- we got acquainted.
- And we start to go out together.
- And I used to come to her place.
- And she was a real nice girl and a very, very, such a,
- you know, a real European girl, a nice and intelligent
- and this.
- And we thought we'll get married.
- We'll go to Israel together or America together.
- And here what happened--
- that she find in the same day or in a day
- apart that she find out that her old boyfriend is there
- and have family so much there.
- And she decided she will go to there.
- Irving, do you have any conclusions, advice,
- or any thoughts, having gone through this whole experience?
- Well, no.
- I think we'll need another meeting, I'll tell you.
- I have some other--
- maybe, what time is it, now?
- It's only 10 minutes till 11.
- Oh, oh, oh.
- So here's what I'll tell you.
- OK, I'll tell you another episode
- what happened in America.
- There is a lot of details.
- When I came to America, I was, again, scared,
- and also, I had a trade, you know.
- But still it's a strange world.
- And I saw hardships, but I settled.
- In fact, first I worked in Pittsburgh.
- And I got a job.
- I learned.
- I stayed with my brother for three, four weeks,
- and I learned here more English.
- And I learned, I got used to the-- to hearing it.
- And I went, and I was going from jewelry store to jewelry store
- and hunting for a job.
- And I told him I know also how to fix typewriters.
- And at the end of the day, somebody sent me over.
- And it was Penn and Highland Avenue.
- Penn and Highland of the corner, there was a stationery store.
- And he was fixing typewriter.
- And I got the job.
- And I got the job, and he was very happy with me.
- I was fixing typewriters.
- And that man in the corner of his store
- he rented out to a watch repairman, an old man.
- And after I was working there 3 or 4 month or maybe 5 month,
- he used to-- he told me that that watch repairman, that he
- is a Swiss from Switzerland.
- But he's an American, and he's getting older, retiring.
- And he wants to quit the business.
- And that man for whom I was working,
- he didn't know that I repaired watches, too.
- But when I heard that he's going out of business, so I tell him,
- I am, actually, I am a watch man more than a typewriter man,
- and I would like to take it over.
- And I said, will, for your typewriters,
- will take in a young boy, and I'll teach him how to do it.
- And I'll supervise, and you'll be
- sure your typewriters will be fixed
- and this, because watch repairing in those days
- was a good trade.
- And for typewriters I was making--
- he was paying me $35 a week, which, in those days,
- was wages.
- And he found me a place to live.
- And I remember it was an old bathroom.
- You know, you could see where the pipes are,
- and it was for a bed.
- And you could have the squeeze in yourself.
- And at the end was a little table.
- And I don't think it had a window even.
- And I lived there, and I would come home weekends here.
- But when I saw this, I thought here it's I have a chance.
- Working $35 was enough for me to live.
- In fact, I used to come here by bus,
- and I still saved money from it.
- Where was the store located?
- On Penn and Highland Avenue.
- In what city?
- In Pittsburgh.
- That's the city.
- Highland, yeah.
- So and here I--
- am when he said to me, that man, he said,
- I think it can be worked out.
- And I thought, my gosh, I knew from watches, to clean out
- or to fix, they used to charge at those,
- in those days, $4, $5, $6 a watch.
- And that would be I can make a living.
- And I can-- a nice living, I can plan even
- to get married if I have this.
- And I thought that's my opportunity.
- And here what happened--
- I had-- and I was very overwhelmed with hopes,
- high hopes, because I couldn't wish any better--
- to have this, to repair watches.
- And I planned even then I would bring in some bands to sell
- and this and that.
- And I thought that will make it.
- On the other hand, I had, in Los Angeles, four uncles,
- brothers of my--
- one two, three, four, four uncles--
- brothers of my father.
- And I have never seen them.
- What are their names?
- Lebow, Harry Lebow, Ralph Lebow, Sam Lebow, and David Lebow.
- And after surviving, people are very sensitive about relatives.
- You know, I have lost there a lot of family
- in the old country and here--
- and very sensitive.
- And I wanted to meet my uncles.
- So and here I think, if I take this over,
- you have to tend the job here, you
- have to tend the job with the typewriters.
- So I come to my boss.
- He was an Englishman from England.
- And I remember he would try to talk the way I talk.
- You know, he thought I'll understand better.
- He would try to talk to me in a different English.
- But anyhow, I was learning English,
- because necessity is the best master, because I needed it.
- And so I come, and I tell him, listen,
- I have relatives, uncles, in Los Angeles.
- And before I settle down and this,
- I want to take off about a week to meet--
- and if I can do it.
- He said, oh, sure, but he points, like that,
- but be sure to come back, he said.
- Be sure to come here.
- So I-- and I had--
- I think I had $200 on those days saved up from $35 a week.
- And I got to take a plane.
- Yeah.
- And I go to Los Angeles.
- And it was wintertime, you know.
- It was, I remember, the snow and slush
- and the snow around Pittsburgh in those days with that,
- from the mills.
- And a lot of homes were heated by coal, coal furnaces.
- Of course, it was black.
- Even it was blacker and dirtier like in my shtetl because there
- the snow was white and slushy.
- You get, you know, and I came to Los Angeles.
- And it was around 11 o'clock.
- And one of my uncles came to me.
- When I came down the steps, I come
- in the airport, and the high ceilings and everything white,
- with tiles around the walls, and the floors are white tiles.
- And I go out, and the sun-- the sun is shining,
- and the weather is exactly--
- here it was cold, and here is was exactly
- not too hot, not too cold.
- And I see the people are dressed up entirely, different than we.
- We, wintertime here, with the coats and the--
- oh, I thought, my gosh, it looked to me so like paradise.
- And my uncle met me.
- And he was 53 years old, a bachelor--
- one of them.
- And he said, here, I'll take you over--
- he has an apartment--
- I'll take you over to Uncle Ralph.
- He has a big house, and you will stay with him.
- And he takes me over--
- very nice.
- And they were very, very friendly, and very touched by--
- and I was, at that time, young.
- And already I was dressed up nice.
- So the first day, we had dinner together, these two brothers.
- And the older brother had a family, with his children.
- And as the day went by, they showed me a room
- where to sleep.
- And the next morning, this bachelor uncle came again,
- and he said, well, you want to go?
- And this uncle, with the other uncle where I stayed,
- were partners in business, in pipe business, the same.
- So he said, you want to go--
- The same business your brother, Valera, was in.
- Right.
- Right.
- And he says, you want to-- do you want me to drop you off
- at the business?
- The house were empty there.
- The kids left.
- Or do you want to go with me?
- I have to go downtown.
- I have to stop at the bank for about half an hour,
- and then we'll-- you know, do you want to be with me?
- I said, I'll be with you.
- So he went, and he brought me to downtown Los Angeles.
- You know, they lived away from Los Angeles.
- And he said, here is the bank.
- You want to come in with me, or want to wait for me
- and look around?
- I said, let me look around.
- And I start walking the block.
- And I see how it is divided.
- You know, LA downtown is quite in circles.
- You have this and this.
- It doesn't go like in Pittsburgh.
- You know, it goes away this way and that way.
- Pittsburgh isn't laid out so--
- Los Angeles.
- And I look around, I make familiar.
- And he said, if you are not--
- you be here after half an hour or so.
- So, I marked myself the way, I shouldn't get lost.
- It was squares and this.
- And I go-- and for fun, I run in the jewelry stores were.
- So I go in, and I ask--
- I'm a refugee.
- I'm looking for a job.
- I had already done it the way I looked in Pittsburgh.
- And I have to make a living.
- I'm looking for a job.
- So, man, he said, stay here.
- We take out [INAUDIBLE] and this and make us, before the time--
- before the time, somebody says, you see,
- go over across the street.
- I think their watch repairman left them about a week ago,
- and they might need.
- And I go in, and sure enough, they need a watch repairman.
- And-- and they asked me, how much do you want?
- And I knew in Los Angeles everything is--
- I said $60.
- And I was making $35.
- And I wasn't--
- I just did-- for sure I wanted to test how it was.
- And he said, well, you come Monday.
- It was, I think, during the weekend.
- And we'll see. and if you know your business, you'll get $60.
- Then I still went in another story, you know, another store.
- So the other store said they have a branch in Long Beach,
- and they can use a watchmaker their, Long Beach.
- I don't know.
- I said, how do you get there.
- He said, oh, you take the streetcar.
- You know your streetcar in Riga, I was--
- there were streetcars.
- A streetcar was going maybe two or three miles at the most.
- And here what happened.
- And Long Beach is 30 miles from Los Angeles.
- And I got in, and I thought two or three miles,
- and I had still a lot of time.
- I didn't realize it.
- I got in in the street, and the streetcar
- goes, and goes, and goes, and goes, and goes, and goes.
- And I see my time is running up, and I got so worried.
- And I don't know how to-- what I should do.
- Should I-- anyhow, and I always-- and I start asking,
- is this too far?
- And they said pretty soon, pretty soon.
- Anyhow, I arrived in Long Beach.
- And while I was--
- and it so happened, when the street car stopped,
- the jewelry store was maybe a-- it was--
- they showed me where it is.
- You could see it.
- And I went in.
- And they said, yeah, if you want to.
- And we'll-- and I asked, too, $60.
- And they said, we'll pay you.
- And meanwhile, and I get back in the-- in this, on and on.
- And I thought, 30 miles, you know,
- takes you 30 or 35 minutes, that I'll be late so much.
- And I was so worried.
- And I came.
- And my uncle was-- no, my uncle was so excited, you could see.
- Well, he said, what happened to you?
- And I tell them the story.
- I thought in a streetcar, five, 10 minutes the most.
- And here-- anyhow, when I tell them the story,
- I looked and I found jobs.
- And I like it so much here, maybe, maybe.
- And I have to--
- in one place there.
- And I said, what is better, where to take it?
- He said, well, I don't know.
- He said, downtown you'll be closer to the relatives.
- There is--
- So I decided that there is so much opportunity.
- So we were talking.
- Well, I'll take the job.
- And I took the job.
- And I wrote him a letter, and I felt bad
- because he said be sure to come back.
- But I thought, here in Los Angeles
- I have a lot of relatives too, and they
- were pretty nice to me.
- And it's a nice place to live, just the climate
- and this impressed--
- cleanliness it was.
- And I took the job.
- And I worked for two years.
- I got an apartment, a room.
- No, first I had rooms with families, once or twice
- in two years.
- And I got a--
- and I worked there, and they were happy with me
- and I with them.
- And not only that, at the end of the two years, my uncle,
- this bachelor uncle--
- I wanted-- I saw too that working for somebody, always
- a watch repairman.
- Not only that, if you work for somebody
- and you have to deliver a lot of work, your eye gets tough,
- and it is--
- And I am-- not only that, I was figuring, I work for somebody.
- I was making work for $50 or $60 a day.
- And I was making $12.
- You understand?
- So we were discussing.
- And he was trying to help me.
- And he told me that here is new communities.
- You know, in Los Angeles, the immigration there,
- like now Florida, more.
- Everybody was going to that area--
- that there are contractors who will build new communities.
- And after it's ready, they rent out homes,
- and they'll have already like a little shopping center.
- So we looked in some places.
- And in one place I liked it very much.
- It was like in a corner store, a jewelry store.
- Not only that, they have people.
- In those days they had when jewelry people
- used to set up a jewelry store, with everything for sale.
- That was their business.
- And each new community, jewelry people or others,
- they would set up their business or a laundromat,
- everything ready.
- And then sell it as a business.
- And in one place--
- I don't remember the name--
- I liked it, and I was about to buy something for myself.
- And I thought, I'll fix watches and have little bands and this
- and gradually increase it.
- And I could make a living and get married.
- I'm not like the best for some bachelors are--
- I have time.
- I wanted to get married and to settle down because I
- understood life, you know.
- And I saw my uncle.
- Here is an uncle 53 years old and a businessman
- and could afford to have a family or a companion,
- and he lives by himself in a bachelor's apartment.
- And all he does is watch television or radio--
- there wasn't television yet--
- radio, and go fishing.
- And he had-- his kitchen was--
- had so many fishing rods, with all kind.
- He could-- an army of fishermen he could supply.
- And I said, that's not life.
- And then I used to think like from the old country, what
- you--
- you get old, you are by yourself and this.
- You have a family, a companion, and that's life.
- You are born and live, and then you get old
- and you leave children.
- It's like the rotation, the circling in a garden.
- And that's what our people-- and with the animal world,
- you know, you--
- and only in the beginning I couldn't.
- If you can't before--
- if you want to, but if you can't afford, you can't afford.
- So this time-- before, I thought when I will be a watchmaker
- and I save money and I--
- I'll tell you, I made an investment,
- and it brought me in $90 a month.
- I thought, my gosh, that's so good.
- Not only that, the fact that you can take money in a bank and it
- draws interest was to me such a blessing because while I was
- in the old country and in Russia, there wasn't.
- In Russia, the Russians came in and I lived in there
- for a year.
- There isn't such a thing as saving money and getting
- interest, you know.
- You could keep the money in the bank
- as safekeeping, but no interest.
- And this alone, it was a blessing.
- My gosh, I thought like that.
- If a person lives for two or three years very, very--
- he tights his belt, you know, and saves up money,
- he has a helper working for him.
- The money is help.
- That's a blessing.
- And as I said, I made-- after the two years,
- I made an investment.
- My uncle sold me a little bit of [INAUDIBLE],,
- and I had profit $90 a month.
- I thought it's a lot of money.
- However, I thought, if I can save up
- to get one more $90 a month, then
- I said, first, if even you are a watchmaker,
- it covers you for a rainy day or if you get sick.
- And this, if you--
- not this helps you live better and helps
- you save a little more.
- You know, my ambitions wasn't high.
- But then I got the idea of getting that little store.
- And I was already looking for it.
- And I had set on one which I liked.
- And it so happened, my brother was working here.
- And he had a-- we had another brother, you know.
- And he was helping him, and he passed away.
- And he calls me up, and he tells me the brother died.
- And he said, I don't think to the funeral,
- if you come, what will you do.
- You'll come, and you'll go back.
- But he said, you wait.
- I might need a helper.
- And you think about it.
- Would you want to come and be?
- And he said, I know the big city, Los Angeles, is better.
- But maybe you want to be here.
- As far as money is concerned, he said, this I can guarantee.
- You'll make out as good or better
- than you make with watch repairing.
- So I thought for a long time.
- And I thought I'm in a stage where I'm-- my job--
- usually, I respect the jobs.
- Now, many times I wonder when my kids get jobs or other people,
- they talk, if not I'll go another job.
- You know, I was still-- and I'm still
- like in that same old country, a job was a very valuable thing,
- if you got a job.
- For example, in Riga I had one job because you stick to it.
- And so there too, my job, I valued it.
- You have a good job, you stick to it
- because you don't know if you'll get another.
- That was my psychology.
- In America it's different.
- People will leave jobs and look for something better.
- And they'll quit before they have another job, you know?
- So I thought, the job I will give up because I'm--
- if I don't like it here, I'll come back
- and then we'll buy a little store.
- And I said it to my brother.
- I'll come, and it'll be a tryout.
- If I like it, I'll like it.
- He said, yeah, that's the right idea.
- And I came, and I settled here.
- So, How much more time do we have?
- We have plenty of time.
- Tell you another story.
- What time is it?
- It's only a quarter after 11.
- Oh, OK.
- So I settled here.
- I came here, and I stayed with my brother,
- with Miriam, for about two years.
- And then I got married.
- And this is a chapter by itself.
- But what I want to jump over to a chapter, which
- is interesting, something.
- I was living here, then I got married, had a family.
- And everything was fine and dandy.
- But one time in Bellaire, while I was in Bellaire,
- I have an aunt in my-- still my father's sister.
- She's the only one who is still now alive, in Marietta, Ohio.
- And I went there several--
- many times.
- And one time my aunt calls me.
- She used to call me to find how I am and how she is,
- for a conversation.
- And she said she has a daughter, a married
- daughter in Columbus, Ohio.
- And they are religious.
- They're going to shul, and they go there every--
- like you and I are now.
- So she said that Esther was there,
- and you know, she brought the rabbi from Columbus, Ohio.
- And Sadie, she is considered a smart woman, religious too.
- And we had a nice time--
- from Columbus, Ohio.
- And she said, he's a very Jewish man.
- He's from England.
- I said, from England, what--
- what's his name?
- She said, Wilansky, you know?
- Said I, Wilansky from England?
- Maybe, I said, when I was in Bergen-Belsen in the camp,
- we had a Rabbi Wilansky.
- I wonder if it is a son or a relative, or maybe nothing.
- She said, do you know what?
- I'm going to call Esther and find out.
- So within an hour, within the hour, she said--
- she called me back.
- You know, she said, that is the Wilansky.
- He was in Bergen-Belsen, she said.
- And he was the chaplain, a young man.
- And there I was, you know.
- How small the world is.
- Anyhow, and I called him right back in Columbus.
- She called me and said, and the next day, I called.
- And in Columbus-- and sure enough.
- And then I came to see him.
- And it was a--
- you know, we were like father and son.
- He was older already, with a great beard.
- So he came, and he was a rabbi, an Orthodox rabbi in Columbus.
- And we met and--
- However, after a few months, they
- did not renew his contract in that synagogue.
- And he emigrated to Israel.
- So all I saw him is once, and I talked to him
- a couple of times.
- So that's something.
- Isn't that a--
- Yeah.
- I just wonder if you have any conclusions or advice
- or anything, having gone through these--
- Let me.
- --experiences.
- I think we should have another--
- yeah, I-- sure, I have.
- I have.
- Let me think about it and have a clearer mind because one time
- I have been thinking about it, the conclusions
- or what to leave for the future generations
- about the experience.
- In fact, I feel that I didn't go through systematic.
- And were so many things what I left out.
- You know, the life, a base life in the ghetto or a base life
- when the Germans came, how we were worthless [INAUDIBLE]
- in one--
- with one law.
- In fact, who made the laws?
- Hitler gave them notions, and that a whole Jewish community
- of 30,000 or 40,000 like Riga become worthless.
- And anybody can kick you or spit on you or kill.
- You know, if you kill a dog, you'll be arrested and fined.
- In those days, if you killed a Jew, nothing, nothing.
- Do you see any similarities, anything here that's--
- I don't.
- I don't.
- I don't.
- And the system in America is different.
- However, I am a person now, with my experience,
- that everything can happen.
- It doesn't look like it will happen today
- or in the very near future.
- It would have-- in America, it should go through such
- repercussions because I don't know how a Hitler could grab
- or a--
- can you envision?
- It could happen if totalitarian should take over.
- But with our elections, it could not
- happen because there is a two-party system.
- There will be always somebody who will fight back.
- However, if a good speaker came, a good agitator,
- he can persuade that the Jewish communities is this and that.
- And we get excluded because Hitler didn't fight,
- in fact, half of the world.
- He fought only the Jews.
- However, today that is a superficial one to say.
- We have still sympathizers.
- We have this.
- However, look what happens, for example, what I notice.
- Before the Jews and Jewish leaders
- were in esteem in America, here comes Sadat
- and he wins the hearts of America, Sadat.
- Sadat will go a long way in America.
- You watch and see.
- Before, for example, the Jewish financial support,
- Israel was on its first place.
- They gave them this.
- And the Arabs used to get little support.
- Now they even-handedness, it starts.
- Now, it could be a time when Egypt will get more.
- In fact, they get already as much as the Jews.
- And the Jews will get less.
- Then another thing, for example, the sympathy,
- how the Arabs worked it out.
- When they get from the PLO sympathy, they get equal.
- They compare to the Jews.
- Here, the Jews didn't have a land,
- and we became Zionist and worked for the land.
- And here the Jews made homeless the Palestinians,
- which is not the truth.
- They don't recognize, for example,
- that Israel belongs to the Jews and they were just expelled
- for a long period of time.
- And the Arabs, another thing what,
- the Arabs came to Israel after the Jews start settling there.
- Because at the time of the Balfour Declaration,
- only 300,000 Arabs lived in Israel.
- And as soon as the Jews started building up,
- they came and lived from on the Jews [INAUDIBLE]..
- Or before the Arabs had their oil,
- Israel was attracting them because they were building,
- rebuilding.
- And the Arabs were asleep.
- And now, while the Arabs are getting the wealth and power,
- they're getting sympathy together with it.
- And the Jew sympathy somehow disappears
- We have what we suffered and we went through for the 2,000
- years or the last--
- or the Holocaust is little-- is little by little
- it's forgotten.
- So--
- Would you do anything different?
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Considering your experiences, what would you do?
- Yeah.
- Well, I don't know is it because of my age or of the experience.
- I personally am not a fighter.
- I don't want to say I'm a hero.
- You know, I cannot kill anybody, and I wouldn't like to be
- killed myself.
- But I think the Jews made the mistake.
- We didn't fight back.
- Of course, it was a mistake that nobody
- could foresee because nobody--
- we had a lot of enemies in our 2,000 years
- history who threatened us.
- But there was never such an annihilation treatment.
- For example, the worst was in Spain.
- But they give you a choice--
- leave the country or become a Christian.
- When you say fight back, you mean physically.
- Physically.
- Physically.
- I don't know what the outcome would have been.
- But if we would be big fighters, maybe the results,
- and they would have changed their tactics.
- It was so-- of course, there we didn't have weapons, arms,
- shooting arms.
- But they would knock on each Jewish door, you know.
- And sometimes a German would come unarmed,
- and he would-- or have a stick.
- And whatever he said, he said go out of the house.
- Go out and leave it.
- This house is not ours.
- You have to leave everything and go out.
- And they would acquire it, use this, and use--
- if you have your valuables, take away,
- and then you had to go and go to a friend or relative
- or go somewhere and be outside.
- And somebody would let you in to stay over.
- And when they had a ghetto, you go to the ghetto.
- And you had to press in, force in yourself.
- Some Jews were here in a room, would be two or three
- families asleep on the floor.
- Would you recommend then that Jewish people be armed?
- I'll tell you.
- I'm sure.
- In fact, I am, for example, Kahane, the Jewish Defense
- League leader, you know, I'm a sympathizer of him.
- However, he is, by the Jewish community,
- he has some followers.
- But the majority are against him.
- We can't do that.
- We can't.
- I am a sympathizer.
Overview
- Interviewee
- Irving Lebow
- Date
-
interview:
1980 October 12
- Credit Line
- United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Marilyn Stack
Physical Details
- Language
- English
- Extent
-
6 CDs.
Rights & Restrictions
- Conditions on Access
- There are no known restrictions on access to this material.
- Conditions on Use
- No restrictions on use
Keywords & Subjects
- Personal Name
- Lebow, Irving.
Administrative Notes
- Legal Status
- Permanent Collection
- Provenance
- Marilyn Stack donated the oral history interview with Irving Lebow to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum on January 3, 2017. The interview was recorded on October 12, 1980.
- Funding Note
- The cataloging of this oral history interview has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.
- Special Collection
-
The Jeff and Toby Herr Oral History Archive
- Record last modified:
- 2023-11-16 09:40:24
- This page:
- https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn555355
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