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"I had false ID and wore a cross." | |||
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Sabina Szwarc Born 1923 Warsaw, Poland 
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Sabina grew up in a Jewish family in Piotrkow Trybunalski, a small industrial city southeast of Warsaw. Her family lived in a non-Jewish neighborhood. Her father was a businessman and her mother was a teacher. Both Yiddish and Polish were spoken in their home. In 1929 Sabina began public school, and later went on to study at a Jewish secondary school.
1933-39: On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland. Four days later, German troops streamed into our city. After one month of occupation, my father had to give up his business, I had to give up school, and our family of five was forced into a ghetto that had been set up by the Germans. We shared an apartment with another family. From blocks away we could hear the sounds of German patrols and heavy German boots on the cobblestones. 1940-44: In 1942, as the ghetto was being liquidated, my Polish girlfriends Danuta and Maria got my sister and me false Polish ID cards. On the eve of the final roundup, we escaped and hid in their home. Two weeks later my sister and I took labor assignments in Germany where nobody knew us. I was a maid in a hotel for German officers. One of them asked me whether there were Jews in my family. He said that he was an anthropologist and that my ears and profile seemed Jewish. I looked offended and continued to work. Sabina was liberated in Regensburg, Germany, by American troops on April 27, 1945. She emigrated to the United States in 1950 and pursued a career as an ophthalmologist. |
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Gitla Zoberman Born 1917 Sandomierz, Poland 
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Gitla was the second-youngest of four girls born to observant Jewish parents. They made their home in Sandomierz, a predominantly Catholic town on the Vistula River. Her father owned a small bookstore across from the town hall, selling school texts and novels. Gitla attended public school before enrolling in a Catholic girls' high school. In the winter, Gitla enjoyed skating on the Vistula.
1933-39: In 1937 I moved to Katowice, a large town on the Polish-German border. There, I enrolled in a business college and lived with my sister, Hana, who worked as a pharmacist. In August 1939 we heard that the Germans would invade Poland. Hana and I decided to return to Sandomierz, where we thought we would be safer. On September 1, 1939, the Germans invaded Poland. They occupied Sandomierz two weeks later. 1940-44: After one year in the Pionki labor camp, my father and I escaped to Warsaw. My sister Irene, whose Aryan features and good Polish let her pass as a Christian, arranged our way to the city, aided by a Polish man she'd hired. In Warsaw, I stayed locked in Irene's apartment while she worked. After we dyed my dark hair blonde, I got a job as a dishwasher. I had false ID and wore a cross. My disguise failed. A boy on the streetcar pointed at me and yelled "Kike," an insult for Jews. I never left the apartment again. Gitla was deported to Stutthof and Gross-Rosen camps, before being liberated by Soviet forces in January 1945. Her sisters, mother and father all survived. |
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Barbara Ledermann Rodbell Born 1925 Berlin, Germany 
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I went into her ballet school and took classes, and I was then asked to join the company. And I asked if, the underground, was it all right? Oh yes, because you got fantastic papers when you went there, into this company, uh, because the company traveled, you got papers to be out after curfew. And that way I could help shift people from one hiding place to another, or, like American soldiers, shot, shot down people, other people who were underground. Uh, and let me tell you how this was done. Um, there were no more taxis, there were very few cars because there was no gasoline, uh, for them to use. So what they had was people on bicycles pulling--you know, like in Third World countries--they would pull little wagons behind them. Some of them were covered, so that when it rained, which it does a lot in Holland, you know, people wouldn't get wet, and others were open, all sorts of various ways of transportation. And the few people that I moved were moved in the middle of the night, you know, I mean, after curfew, with them being the bench, and me sitting, you know, sitting like this, bent over, and me sitting on top, on, sitting on their backs, with a rather short skirt, and, uh, my very good papers, with makeup on still from the ballet. And when the Germans stuck their, or when Dutch police stuck their head in there and saying, "What is this? Curfew is on." You could, I would have a smile and papers. And I shifted a lot of people that way. | ||
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Leah Hammerstein Silverstein Born 1924 Praga, Poland 
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At, at another time I was sitting in front of a big basket with vegetables, cleaning it, and the sun rays came on my head and one of the girls said, "Look, her hair is reddish like a Jewess." And everybody laughed, and I laughed most hilariously, you know, but inside, you know, the fear was gnawing on my insides, you know. At another time the kitchen chef, uh, grabbed me and put my head on the table. He was preparing the, uh, the sausage for the evening supper. And he put this long knife to my neck and said, "You see, if you were Jewish, I would cut off your head." Big laughter in the room, and I laughed most hilariously, of course. But you know what it does to a psyche of a young girl in her formative years? Can you imagine? With nobody to con...console, cons...console you, with nobody to tell you it's okay, it'll be better, hold on. Total isolation, total loneliness. It's a terrible feeling. You know, you are among people and you are like on an island all alone. There is nobody you can go to ask for help. You can nobody ask for advice. You had to make life-threatening decisions all by yourself in a very short time, and you never knew whether your decision will be beneficial to you or detrimental to your existence. It was like playing Russian roulette with your life. And it was not only one incident. It was this way from the moment I came on the Aryan side. | ||
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Raszka (Roza) Galek Brunswic Born 1920 Sochocin, Poland 
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And they said to me, "You have a choice to go either on a farm, to an ammunition...uh...uh...fabrik [factory], or to hotels. I thought for myself to be...to be safe, would be the best thing to go on a farm. Because I knew it'll be a lot [of] hard work but I won't meet so many Poles. I was afraid to meet Poles. That was the idea. I still had my false papers as a Christian girl. Sure. As Maria Kowalcik. Maria Jadwiga Kowalcik. The middle name was Jadwiga. As such I came to Germany, as Maria Kowalcik. And I thought for my own sake, I probably would be safer to be away from everybody. And I thought on a farm, Poles would probably not likely go to a farm. They might want to go to a hotel, to some offices, to some...any other place, but I thought for myself, I'd rather go to a farm. First of all, I was emaciated. I was...I was about eighty, ninety pounds, skin and bone, when I came to Germany. Skin and bone. And...um...as such I came to Germany. They told me where they are going to bring me, to Krummhardt, near Esslingen. It is a small farm, that the man that owns the farm is paralyzed, but he has a son-in-law by the name of Karl Beck, and a daughter Louise. She was just married to this Mr. Beck. And I was brought to Krummhardt. That's how I came to Germany. Okay. I was a city girl. I never knew what means...what work means because at home we were wealthy. We had maids, and...we had everything. I never even knew how to boil a glass of water. Very spoiled...very...really very well taken care of, and I had no idea what a farm means...work on a farm. Anyway, but I adapted and adjusted very well. I knew that that's the way it is. That's the way it's going to be. I better make the best of it. | ||
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Bertha Adler Born 1928 Selo-Solotvina, Czechoslovakia 
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Bertha was the second of three daughters born to Yiddish-speaking Jewish parents in a village in Czechoslovakia's easternmost province. Soon after Bertha was born, her parents moved the family to Liege, an industrial, largely Catholic city in Belgium that had many immigrants from eastern Europe.
1933-39: Bertha's parents sent her to a local elementary school, where most of her friends were Catholic. At school, Bertha spoke French. At home, she spoke Yiddish. Sometimes her parents spoke Hungarian to each other, a language they had learned while growing up. Bertha's mother, who was religious, made sure that Bertha also studied Hebrew. 1940-44: Bertha was 11 when the Germans occupied Liege. Two years later, the Adlers, along with all the Jews, were ordered to register and Bertha and her sisters were forced out of school. Some Catholic friends helped the Adlers obtain false papers and rented them a house in a nearby village. There, Bertha's father fell ill one Friday and went to the hospital. Bertha promised to visit him on Sunday to bring him shaving cream. That Sunday, the family was awakened at 5 a.m. by the Gestapo. They had been discovered. Fifteen-year-old Bertha was deported to Auschwitz on May 19, 1944. She was gassed there two days later. |
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