My Father's Holocaust Memoir

My name is Joseph Rosenbaum. I was born on October 30, 1922, in Radom, Poland, into a middle class family. My parents were already blessed with five children – three sons and two daughters – ranging in age from eighteen to as young as two. My father, Isaac, was seventeen and my mother, Sarah, sixteen, when they married. I was about five years old when my mother sent me to a cheder (Jewish private school) to learn to read and write in Hebrew.

Several years later I started public elementary school, where I had a difficult time. My Polish schoolmates were vicious anti-Semites and I often came home in bad shape, after being forced to fight for my life while the teachers looked on in silence. The school was open every day, except Sunday. My father, a religious man, would not let me violate Saturday – our day of rest – so I missed a lot of school. I had a hard time keeping up with the rest of my class.

My parents began feeling harassed and pressured by Polish right-wingers. During the Great Depression of 1929 a vicious campaign was launched against Jewish businesses. The law required stores to close at 6 p.m., but in reality, policemen’s watches were always set ahead, and the store would be forced to close early.
Eventually, the leaders of the boycott began to switch from hate leaflets to bodily force, and the situation worsened. The general population, fearing violence, avoided Jewish shops, including ours, and a lot of people began to use the situation as an opportunity to avoid paying their bills.

After a few years of increasing abuse and suffering, both morally and financially, my parents closed their men’s apparel store and moved to Lublin, where most of my mother’s family had lived for many generations.
Lublin had a very rich history of Jewish cultural life because of the large world-famous Yeshiva (Jewish university) located there. Under the leadership of the great Rabbi Shapiro, young orthodox men studied to become rabbis. We settled in a beautiful apartment overlooking a giant garden with old trees.

My oldest brother, Leon, had moved to the large industrial city of Lodz. He married a young lady from the city of Radom, and was living happily, working as an independent real estate administrator.

My second brother, Rubin, began studying chemical engineering at the University of Vilno in Poland, but due to the rising anti-Semitism there, he was forced to leave. He continued his studies at the University of Cannes in France.
While still in school he played on the college soccer team, performing well enough to be promised a well-paying position with a professional team. But he injured his knee before graduating and was unable to continue playing. He then tried to find work in his field, but French law did not allow non-citizens to work without a special permit. He tried to work there temporarily, under tremendous pressure, but eventually decided to return home.

Actually, we were very happy to see him again, and it was easy to tell that he was also thrilled to be reunited with his family. This was just a few years before the German invasion, and because of our family’s connections, Rubin was able to find a decent job in his profession. In a short time he married a young lady whose father was a very successful real estate businessman.

In 1938, Rubin’s wife gave birth to a beautiful baby girl, so gorgeous that they called her “Lala” (doll). They lived within walking distance from us and we saw them quite often. After the war began we lived on the same street, Lubartowska, only a few blocks away.

My oldest sister, Helen, was already married and settled in an apartment building also owned by my parents.
Now our family in the new apartment in Lublin consisted of our parents, my brother, David, four years older than me, and my sister, Henia, two years my senior. Our close ages made our relationships much more intimate.
My parents and I were quite happy with my new Jewish school, although it meant I worked much harder in all subjects, especially French, which I had not taken before. The school was co-educational and closed on Saturdays, but open on Sundays, which pleased my parents. I did not mind attending school on Sunday, but the Poles sought us out, throwing stones, using obscene language, and telling us to move to Palestine and leave their country to them.

I now wish that all Jews, including my parents, had taken these threats more seriously at the time. The anti-Semites became even more arrogant after Hitler became the leader of Germany, a nation that had been admired until then for its love of freedom and high cultural and economic standard of living. Despite the difficulties with our unfriendly hosts, however, life seemed quite normal and good to me. I had a beautiful, close-knit and loving family; my only worries were to do well in school.

The best part of my day was when I returned home from school at about three o’clock and smelled the delicious aroma of soup and meat cooking. Our mother was a great cook.

Everybody in the household sat down to enjoy dinner, following the blessing recited by my father. We used this time to discuss our school day, sharing our achievements and our failures with the people who cared so much about our well being. We were blessed to have a father willing to listen to our everyday problems and usually able to come up with ways to solve them.

On weekends we would go see a good movie, or read an interesting book. We did not have television, but we did have a very nice radio. Many times during the late night hours we listened to broadcasts from the United States. Quite often my father played dominos and other games with me, most of the time letting me win to make me happy.

As the youngest child in the family, I accompanied my father every Saturday to the neighborhood synagogue, which was in one small room on the ground floor of an apartment building. I can still see it now. The only window looked out on the backyard. And the ark, where the Torah was kept, faced the members, who sat on wooden benches.

Most worshippers were older men and a few young lads like me who came with their fathers. Not wanting to stay cooped up inside the shul, we young boys tried to sneak out where the Polish kids were playing. At first we didn’t realize we were not wanted, but a few bad bumps and scratches convinced us otherwise, and we began to feel unsafe in our own country, the birthplace of our ancestors. Newspapers were full of anti-Jewish propaganda and reports on what a ‘wonderful job’ Hitler was doing handling Germany’s ‘minority problems.’ This was several years before Hitler’s invasion of Poland.

On September 1, 1939, when I was 16 years old, I remember the night German troops crossed the Polish border. The Polish army did not even have enough time to call up the reserves. The German air force bombed the country day and night, turning cities into ruins with little resistance from Polish forces.

At the same time the Russian army crossed the eastern border of Poland, where they, too, found little resistance.
Lublin was very close to the eastern border, and it began to look like the Russians would occupy the city. After a few days of negotiations with the German command, however, the Russians announced they would withdraw and turn over the city to their partners in evil.

We were given the choice of either staying behind in the occupied city, or leaving with the Russians who were retreating to a strategic point behind the river Bug. It t was not a great distance by car, but a very long walk.
My older brothers were very anxious to take advantage of that offer, but my parents would absolutely not agree, citing many mundane excuses not to leave home.

My father was certain that, somehow, we would make it through the war, remembering that his parents survived World War I in Radom while the Russian army occupied the city. True – there were sporadic incidents of pogroms and vandalism at that time, but it was nothing like what was about to happen to us now.

Even at the beginning of the invasion, the German Luftwaffe (air force) had a great time bombing the civilian population of defenseless cities and villages. They flew so low that we could see the planes clearly as they strafed us with machine guns. Shrapnel hit me on my right index finger as I lay on the ground in an empty garden across the street from our house. The plane was flying so low I could see the pilot’s face.

I note with a heavy heart, that the anti-Semitic Polish hooligans made it much easier for the cruel German barbarians to achieve their horrible plans.

At the same time, there were also quite a few terrific Polish heroes who sacrificed their own, as well as their family’s lives to hide Jews. We will never forget these people, and we cherish them for their good deeds. More Poles might have helped, had they not been handicapped by their own neighbors, who usually did not hesitate to inform the Gestapo to collect a reward for turning in each person who helped a Jew, dead or alive.

The winter of 1939 was very cold. Jews were forbidden by a new law from entering all non-Jewish establishments. The Polish population received coupons for food, clothes, and heating supplies. Occasionally, my siblings or I tried to sneak into a distribution line with coupons purchased on the black market. Our own neighbors would then point us out to the German soldier guarding the line. Immediately he would run us off by hitting us with his weapon.

The Jewish stores had few supplies. We had to use ration coupons supplied by the Judenrat. The Judenrat, a committee of Jewish elders appointed by German authorities to mediate Jewish affairs. They were responsible for fulfilling all the vicious orders, which announced daily. The demands and pressure placed on the Judenrat soon became so intense that not many of the committee members survived long. The decent ones – who were unable or unwilling to collaborate with the enemy – either committed suicide or were sent to the death camps.
It would be impossible to remember all the hated regulations listed daily in Polish, Yiddish, and German. Anyone who disobeyed these orders was killed by shooting, hanging or sent to a death camp.

Jews were not allowed to use public transportation, courts, schools, parks, banks, stores, or any other places used by Poles. We had to turn in our radios, gold, jewelry, fur coats and everything else of value.

Jewish properties were confiscated and put under German or Polish management. The real estate my mother inherited from her parents was confiscated and my parents were forced to pay rent for their own building.
After a few months, about the end of 1939, we became prisoners in our own homes. Men could not walk the streets without fear of being caught by the military police and sent to so-called ‘’labor camps,’’ which in reality turned out to be death camps.

The cold, snow and ice were in full force. Because of the restriction against Jewish men, my poor mother and sister were the only ones in the house who could venture outside. If they were lucky, they might bring back something for us to eat.

They put themselves in great danger every time they did so, by concealing the white-and-blue armband marked with the word Jude (Jew). Any Jew stopped without the band risked a death sentence.

One evening two civilian Gestapo men entered our house, handed my father his coat, and took him away without a word of explanation. The next day the Judenrat told us that the Gestapo was rounding up all ‘rich’ Jews, taking them to jail, and demanding an astronomical amount of gold for their release.

After a few days one of our tenants who was working in that jail put us in contact with our father, but the news was sad. Father, who refused to eat the non-Kosher meals provided to prisoners, was surviving on bread and water. After a terrible few weeks, a ransom was raised and given to the Nazis, and my father was home again.
But he was not the same proud, happy person he had once been. He became very restrained and kept his silence for days, unwilling to talk about his experience. As days and months passed, our situation grew worse. The German devils decided to completely segregate the Jews from their Polish neighbors. The whole Jewish population of Lublin was ordered to move into a ghetto located in a mostly poor Jewish section of the old city. We were given only a few days to move. We were very unhappy to be squeezed into the ghetto, but the bandits threatened to shoot and Jews found outside the few streets designated as living quarters for us, so we had no choice. Meanwhile, our Polish tenants were permitted to move into the apartments vacated by Jewish property owners. By that time our own big apartment was mostly empty, except for a few beds, a table, and a couple of chairs. Volks-Deutsche (German residents of Poland before the war) admired our furniture so much that they tore through our belongings, taking items without paying for them – or even asking our permission.

By the summer of 1940, the situation grew worse with a steady influx of people from nearby small towns and villages. Two and three families were forced to live together in one small run-down apartment in very unsanitary conditions. The days were very hot, and at night we did not dare undress because we had to stay alert. German soldiers often knocked on ghetto doors in the middle of the night. Any men found inside were taken away to the labor camps. When we heard their shouting we immediately headed for special hiding spots we had built.
But one morning we were not so lucky. The soldiers came in and found our brother Rubin still in bed. They ordered him to get up and dress, and then stepped outside for a few minutes. My brother David, who had been working as a medical assistant for the Jewish Red Cross, had been given an official card protecting him from being taken away. He followed the soldiers out and took Rubin’s place.

The Judenrat was notified and promised to try to help David. To our horror, we were told that his transport group was being sent to the death camp at Belz, from which there was no return. What a surprise it was when David returned home after a few long weeks of misery in the camp. It was the first good thing that happened to us since the Nazi invasion began. The Elders kept their promise. David’s release was secured on the basis of his medical experience in fighting the diseases that were now spreading to so many ghetto homes.
The winter of 1940 was upon us with its mighty power of snow and frigid cold, making our lives even more miserable. Rubin finally found a job as an interpreter at a German warehouse that supplied household items to military offices, hospitals and officers’ homes. His job was to translate from Polish to German and German to Polish. Rubin spoke German well and became very popular with his Polish co-workers, who acknowledged his importance in their daily contact with the oppressors. Even the Germans respected him, seeing how well he managed the unruly workers and easily solved many of their problems.

After a few months he succeeded in getting me a job there. Now our whole family ate better food and more of it, since the two of us could obtain provisions (not always legally). Many times we risked terrible consequences if caught with such items.

One day, while we were walking home, a German military policeman directing traffic at a busy intersection stopped me. He asked where my armband was (which every Jew was required to wear on the left arm). I tried to find it, but to no avail. The policeman then told me that, as soon as he was relieved from duty, I would be taken to the Gestapo.

Rubin intervened and the policeman ordered him to leave or face his gun, but my brother was not willing to give up. He kept begging for my release until the solider finally softened up and let me leave with my brother. This was only one instance of Rubin’s many heroic deeds during the war.

The winter of 1941 was on the way and promised to be just as brutal as the previous year. Our conditions were unbearable. The enemy continued to announce daily victories on the front. My brother Rubin and I were still working for the same company, but in different branches and sections of the city.

Then on December 7, 1941, my life changed forever. A Gestapo man, accompanied by an armed Ukrainian unit, arrived and wasted no time in rounding up all the Jews employed at my place. Trucks were already waiting for us, and we were ordered on board. After a half hour ride, we found ourselves in the suburbs, passing empty stretches of land with barbed wire. Finally we reached an open gate, which closed behind us after we entered.

We had come to Majdanek, one of the most notorious death camps of the Holocaust. It was equipped with the most modern tools of torture, enabling the German butchers to kill and dispose of thousands of human beings over the course of the war. This death factory, we were to discover, was used twenty-four hours a day, 365 days a year.

We were ordered off the trucks and ‘encouraged’ with Ukrainian rifle butts to form straight lines, arms stretched out, and hands placed on the shoulders of the person standing in front of us. The weather was frigid. The snow, combined with the extreme cold, froze my body so badly that I was numb.

We were still standing at attention and it was nearly dark, when another truck arrived. I saw Rubin and a few other people descend and join our group. After a while a Gestapo officer, accompanied by a giant dog, appeared and began a ‘welcoming’ speech.

“From now on,” he told us, “this will be your home. Anybody trying to escape will be shot on the spot.’’
I noticed my neighbor moving his arms to the side and I tried to whisper a reminder that his hands should rest on the shoulders of the man in front of him, as we had been ordered. The German devil heard my whisper, but did not know who had spoken.

He ordered the culprit to approach him but nobody moved. He told us to point out the offender immediately. If we did not, we would be forced to stand at attention all night long – and in the morning every tenth inmate would be executed by a firing squad.

Everyone pointed at me, even before he finished speaking. I was ordered to step forward as he insulted me with all kinds of bigoted epithets. Then I felt the touch of his whip ripping through my skin; my eyeglasses were flung to the ground, a mess of broken glass. Afterward the guards pushed us into a nearby barrack furnished with long rows of wooden bunks in tiers up to the ceiling. Instead of a mattress or a pillow, each bed contained only thinly spread straw. There were no covers at all.

I can’t describe my reunion with my brother. We hugged and shed a lot of tears, but when I learned that he could have avoided capture, my heart began pounding very hard. His polish co-workers offered to hide him, but when he was told that my section was rounded up first, he decided to help in my time of crisis. The barrack was very cold and we had to cling close to each other in order not to freeze to death.

It was still dark outside when we were awakened by our Ukrainian guards, ordering us to send a few men to pick up our ‘’breakfast.’’ Hitting and yelling accompanied their orders. We had not eaten since lunchtime the day before and everybody was starved. Our long awaited meal finally arrived and consisted of watery coffee and a slice of stale black bread. We did not even have enough time to eat, but were told to “Machen Shnell!” (hurry up!) and run outside. There we would be counted again to make sure no one was missing from the night before.
After the count, we were broken up into several small work details for building more barracks. Only a few of the barracks were finished. They housed us and a group of Polish political prisoners who wore red uniforms.

Our job was to dig into the icy ground and remove the earth where poles supporting the structure would be placed. We were given inferior shovels, which kept breaking against the ice, but when the sun finally came out in full force, it became a little easier to unearth some of the spots.

A few days after our arrival we were marched out from the camp, guarded on all sides by Ukrainian soldiers armed to the teeth, and led by a few German officers swinging their whips with great efficiency. It took at least an hour to reach the First of May Street in the downtown area of the city, just across from a building Rubin owned. We were pushed inside a communal bathhouse for poor people and ordered to undress and run to the showers. We had not been able to shower since arriving at the camp, so we were happy to oblige. We suspected nothing.
We were temporarily delighted at being clean again. That feeling did not last long. Coming out of the showers, we discovered that our civilian clothes were taken away and replaced with brand new bundles of clothes, laid out on long tables. Our new uniforms resembled clown costumes, with white and blue stripes, consisting of paper-thin pants and jacket, a hat, wooden shoes a few sizes too big and no underwear.

We were so stunned by the sight. We became numb, at first not feeling the punches our oppressors delivered to our naked bodies. Eventually, our skin tore and dripped fresh hot blood and realized this was not some nightmare that would end when we awoke! This was all very real. Everyone began grabbing anything he could put his hands on.

I wound up with clothes either too big for me. I looked at my dear brother and began to understand how much he had sacrificed to be here with me. He was six feet tall and everything was so short on him that he looked unreal. My heart began to ache for him. After all, I thought, this was my fault. Rubin was in this situation because of me.
Outside, a big unfriendly crowd gathered to yell insults at us. Just a short while back these people had been our friends and neighbors.

We were shocked to see our sister Henia standing in front of the crowd, as white as a sheet of writing paper, and unable to show her sorrow. She was not wearing a Jewish armband, and we realized she was posing as a gentile. She had long blond hair and was tall and very slim, so it was quite easy for her. If she were caught in this deception her punishment would be instant death – or a trip to one of the many concentration camps.

Rubin and I did not exchange one single word on our march back to the camp, as we pondered the same questions uppermost on both our minds: How much longer can we survive? Did our sister arrive home safely? Is the rest of the family still in the area? We would have asked so many questions of Henia if we could have, but we kept quiet in order not to endanger her.

My brother waited until we were alone to entrust me with his biggest secret. Before entering the shower he managed to hide his beautiful expensive watch in his mouth.

Polish political prisoners became our supervisors, and wasted no time assigning the biggest bullies as leaders of our barracks. These Jewish capos had to have hearts like stones in order to function to the satisfaction of the Poles. They were responsible for the day-to-day operation of the barracks, as well as for the prisoners’ activities. Even the smallest infraction was usually punished by shooting or hanging the culprit in front of all the other prisoners, who were forced to witness the execution while standing at attention. Our original transport of more than four hundred men was cut in half in a matter of weeks.

The largest and heaviest inmates were the first to succumb to hunger, hard work and disease. They simply could not survive and function on our meager rations of dry bread and watery soup. Christmas and New Year were celebrated by drunken guards with extra shootings and beatings.

Our problems were multiplying every day. I was always hungry. My brother would save half his nightly bread ration, and give it to me in the morning. While working I was forced by diarrhea to empty my stomach constantly. However, the trip to the latrine – really just a hole in the ground – was very dangerous. Trigger-happy Lithuanian soldiers would permit someone to leave the area, but while the poor guy was walking away, he would be shot in the back by a smiling devil! Seeing that, we waited until we returned to the barracks or relieved ourselves in our pants. We solved the problem by acquiring extra clothes in exchange for food. By wearing double pairs of pants, we could wash the soiled pair at the end of the day.

By the middle of January our original transport had been reduced to a few dozen survivors. A lot of the new barracks had been completed and occupied by Russian prisoners of war.

One morning I was assigned to a very hard job and had trouble keeping up with the rest of the group. The German officer noticed my difficulty and began constantly pulling me out for punishment. He started calling me “Josephine.” At each of our many encounters he ordered me to bend over, using his whip very efficiently.
I had a hard time making it back to the barracks, and had to lay all night on my stomach. I was in such great pain that I told my brother Rubin I wanted to end my suffering by touching the barbed wire loaded with high voltage electricity. Rubin responded by hitting me in the face and forbade me to talk like that ever again. That was the first and only time that my brother, normally a gentle soul, hit me.

Following this incident, Rubin decided to use his remaining card, the gold watch. He found a capo who accepted a bribe to keep us out of hard labor, promising to give us easier work around the camp instead. He agreed quite willingly, saying that ‘’it does not pay to fight to live a little while longer.’’ I will never forget him telling us that a Gestapo officer had assured him that all European Jews would eventually wind up in the death camps.
The worst times for us were the twice-daily inmate roll calls. All the people who had died the night before would be spread on the ground in full view. If the count was not correct we would have to stand at attention for long hours, sometimes at night, covered with snow and chilled to the bone. Most of the time there was just a mistake in the count, or the missing culprit would be found lying dead inside the barracks. Our chances of survival in the camp seemed to diminish by the hour.

By the middle of February, there were only a few people from our original transport still around. We all looked more like skeletons than human beings. Then, a miracle happened. A German officer called off our names and we were taken away to a waiting truck. After a long trip, which felt like an eternity, we passed the gates of the labor camp at No. 7 Lipova Street.

We got off the truck and were taken into a room, told to shower, and given back our civilian clothes to wear. Still in disbelief, we were handed over to two members of the Judenrat, who delivered us to our home in the ghetto. Our family’s reaction was impossible to describe. Finally we found out what happened that day we were taken away from our jobs to the Majdanek concentration camp.

On December 7, 1941, the same day Japan attacked Pearl Harbor and the United States declared war on the Axis nations, there were roundups of Jews in Poland in response.

Now we tried to figure out why we were suddenly released from that hellish camp. It turned out the local Judenrat had a Gestapo man on the take, and for a large amount of gold he was willing to get us out.
My father was lucky enough to find a Polish businessman willing to buy one of our confiscated properties from him. The Pole hoped that if the Nazis were defeated we would be able to turn over the property to him legally. They signed a secret agreement, for which my father received a large number of gold Russian coins. I do not know how many. We did not as, nor were we told.

March 1, 1942, was Rubin’s birthday, but the occasion was overshadowed by our father’s illness. He had spent the time of our absence praying and fasting. Now the change in him was unbelievable. We felt we must get him to a specialist, but Jewish doctors were forbidden to practice medicine – and Polish doctors were not allowed to treat Jewish patients.

Finally we found a doctor willing to take a chance for a large payoff. My father was diagnosed with stomach cancer, a condition that made him lose weight and all desire to eat. Medicine was only obtainable on the black market for a fortune. Nothing could be done for him, we were told, just one for a fast end to his misery.
My father died a few weeks later. My dear mother was at his side, holding his hand until the bitter end. We woke up in the morning to find her still holding him and still sobbing. She told us he knew quite well about his approaching end. He seemed to cherish the thought of eternal peace, and his only worry was what would happen to the rest of us. He was only sixty years old, but lucky to leave all his troubles behind.

It was only after we had lost our father to this dreaded disease in March of 1942 that we realized the depth of our love for him, and what a terrible void his passing would leave. To this day I only hope that I learned enough from him to be able to perform my parental duties as well as he performed his.

Burying our father was another dangerous “adventure.” Although the new ghetto cemetery was not far from Rubin’s apartment, the trip was still dangerous. Even while walking behind a casket, there was always a chance of a funeral-goer being caught up in a ‘’round-up.’’

My mother, my two sisters, and my brothers Rubin and David all attended the funeral because they all had working cards. I was the only one forced to stay home because I lacked working documents. Luckily, the trip went forward without incident. I can’t express my feelings of relief when my family returned and opened the door to our apartment.

A few days later a new order from the Gestapo was posted in three languages. The notice said that because of the hostility of our Polish neighbors towards us, it was decided, for our own safety, to let us occupy Polish homes in the suburbs. The inhabitants of these homes would then move to the apartments in the city being vacated by the Jewish population. It was a sheer lie, and another bid for confiscation, but we had no other alternative except to obey. We had very little furniture left. We still had a few good furs and clothes that our mother left for safekeeping with a Polish woman who had always been very friendly to us.

Although our intuition warned us to be ready for more trouble, our hearts were hoping for a miracle. The clouds were already so dark. We had been punished more than enough, while merciful God, to whom my dear departed father had prayed so often, was still failing to help.

We hired a man with a horse and wagon, loaded the few most necessary items, as well as ourselves, and began a journey filled with fear and very little hope. On arrival, we were assigned a small apartment with very little space for three families. By this time our city’s 80,000 prewar Jewish population had been reduced to only several thousand men and women able to work and a few hundred children still living with their parents. Our group consisted of my mother, sister Henia, brothers David and Rubin with his wife and their two children, and our other sister Hela with her husband. So far our family was one of the few lucky ones that remained intact, except for my father’s passing.

April arrived and the beautiful aroma of spring was in the air. Some of the more adventurous birds were coming back, spreading their colorful wings in the air. They flew in flocks, their cheerful chirping sounded as if they were all saying:
“Don’t give up, redemption of your people is coming.”

How much I wished I could transform into a bird and fly off to better places! Reality prevailed, however, and my thoughts returned to our dreadful situation.

We were living in an area called Majdanek Tatarski. It was separated from Majdanek, the concentration camp, which was to be the last destination of Jews from the city of Lublin, by a few miles of thick forest. We, too, felt the camp was going to be our final trip, but there was no way to know when. Each day might make a difference between death and survival.

Despite German efforts to keep us isolated from all news, we knew that the stories about transporting Jews to the freshly occupied Russian territories were lies. All transports were to the death camps for a ‘’final solution.’’ The Nazis did a terrific job of isolating the Jews of each ghetto from contact with Jews in the other ghettos all over Europe.

Then came the episode that changed my life forever. Nothing can ever erase the void this tragic incident brought with it. Nearly half a century later it is still fresh and haunting my memory. As much as I try, I cannot rid myself of the heavy burden of facing the reality that nothing in the world can reverse the cruelty inflicted on my family by Nazi Germany.

The guilt is overwhelming. One always speculates on what might have been, on what would have or could have happened if we had acted differently at that tragic moment. It might not have been a permanent solution, as you will see later, but at least we might have achieved a temporary victory in our fight for survival.

April 19, 1942 seemed like all the other days we had endured since the brutal Nazi invasion of Poland. It was a working day for most of the remnants of the Jewish population – still hoping for a miracle despite the terrible odds.

On this unforgettable evening we ate our meager dinner and my sister-in-law put her two children t bed. The rest of us finally decided to put our worries on hold and get some rest as well. In the middle of the night, however, we were awakened from a sound sleep by the familiar shouts of the Ukrainians and the Germans: “Alle fefluchte Juden raus!” (“All filthy Jews outside!)

We had only seconds to grab our clothes and dress while hurrying out the door. Everything happened so fast that we did not have time to hide in the alcove of the room, as we had done successfully many times before. I am not sure it would have made a difference on that tragic night, but that nagging feeling of ‘’maybe’’ always remains on my mind.

Outside the guards used their rifle butts and swung leather whips with great precision to herd everyone along with all speed. We were hurriedly assembled on a large, empty lot near the gate, with bright lights overhead. Then the dreaded ‘’selection’’ process began.

There were two lines: one for people with working documents, and a second line for those not so fortunate. A stupid piece of paper decided in a moment the fate of the person. In our family of eight adults and two children, only my mother and my brothers Rubin and David had the life-saving forms.

My mother, thinking quickly, handed her valuable paper to me, knowing quite well what the consequences of her heroic deed would be. With her face showing no fear, her last words to me were: “I have lived enough…you are young and must survive.’’

She then gave her jewelry to Rubin, knowing full well that it would be of no further use to her. As I was directed into the ‘’right’’ line, her face lit up, although she quickly covered her emotions, obviously not wanting to give me the opportunity to refuse her decision.

As the selection went on, she was the first of our family to walk away, followed by Rubin’s wife carrying her baby son, my sister Henia, carrying Rubin’s little daughter, and my sister Helen and her husband Isaac. The little group passed the gate and headed on foot toward Majdanek concentration camp.

Our mother was a wonderful person determined to keep us happy and well. She was full of life and love and dedicated with all her heart to her husband and her children. She was the only authority we turned to for advice or to whom we took our complaints while my father was busy during the day, trying to eke out a decent living. I was not fortunate enough to have her as a mother and good friend for very long, but her smiling face and her good deeds remain with me always. I still feel pain and remorse, knowing that she chose to sacrifice her own life to save mine.

We were devastated and cried for a long time. Some men followed the group at a distance, and we were certain that the people selected did not even reach Majdanek, but were shot to death in the forest leading to the camp. For the next few hours we heard many gunshots but we did not know if they were directed against stragglers unable to keep up, or the entire group.

The Poles in the area would never talk about these incidents, insisting they were unaware of any killings. Their ignorance was impossible, however, because of the proximity of their homes to the ghetto. Many Poles, in fact, were construction workers at the camp during the day, returning to their nearby homes at night. Form our confined areas we could look through the barbed wire and see their single-family houses with beautiful gardens, and a busy, functioning railroad.

Now it was just the three of us left. We had to give up our larger apartment for a much smaller one, to be shared with an older man and his adult daughter. The father was extremely proud of his experience in producing authentic looking fake documents. I wished we had known him earlier. Maybe then we could have saved the rest of our family. We received one piece of good news. Our brother Leon and his wife Frania escaped from the Lodz ghetto, and reunited with her family in the Radom ghetto.

Summer came and passed, and fall set in, with much colder weather. With the change of seasons, rumors about the imminent final deportation from Majdanek Tatarski intensified. Polish police warned Jewish police that even they would not be spared this time, since the entire Jewish population would be removed, regardless of working status. No one was able to pinpoint the exact time of departure, but we had seen the Nazis were bringing in extra military help. More Ukrainian guards were posted around the barbed wire perimeter, and only a few people at a time were allowed to leave the ghetto for outside jobs.

On the night of November 22, 1942 rumors concerning transport became reality. The ground was covered with a blanket of beautiful pure white snow, as the enemy struck our helpless people once more. As before, they awoke us in the middle of the night, knowing that most people would be fast asleep and unable to react quickly.
The Ukrainians conducted their evil job very efficiently, removing people from their homes, and “encouraging” the slow-moving crowd to run faster with guns, boots and fists. The Germans’ drunken collaborators fired their weapons constantly, and confusion was great. David and I became separated from Rubin. Now we were on our own.

David had some friends, twin brothers who made a good hiding place in their alcove. Having no other choice, we ran into their building and headed for the secret cover. The twins were already there. They had bread, water, a blanket, and a couple pillows.

We still did not know what happened to Rubin. Was he able to hide someplace? Or did he wind up in that God forsaken Majdanek again?

The night was over, and daylight filtered in to our hiding place. The sounds of weapons that began with the “roundup” continued, and there was no way we could tell how long it would last.
The day seemed to last forever as we discussed our next move. The brothers decided to take a chance and break out during the night. We knew it would be impossible to stay in that tiny place for long. Our provisions were meager, and we had to remain in a prone position most of the time. There was a great chance of being discovered and shot on the spot. We knew that the Ukrainians would stay around for a while, conducting house-to-house searches and looking for valuables, which usually were exchanged for alcohol and cigarettes with the help of the local population.

After nightfall the twins left, with our sincere prayers for their safety. Following their departure we heard sporadic bursts of gunfire, and all we could do was hope our friends made it in one piece. The next day we agreed to try our luck as soon as it got dark, no matter what the outcome. If we were able to make it through the fences, our next objective would be to reach the house of a couple living past the railroad, because they had been quite friendly to us since we had been living in the ghetto.

We did not even dream about staying there any longer. But we took a couple of hours to get dressed in more appropriate clothing and eat a good meal. We went outside at nightfall. Surprisingly, it was very calm all around. The guards, after having consumed great amounts of 100 proof whiskey, were lying dead drunk on the ground.
We crawled on our stomachs close to the ground. The new white snow was mingled with streams of human blood. This was a horrible sight for us, since we did not know if our brother’s blood might be here as well. I was convinced that under no circumstances would he allow our persecutors the pleasure of catching him alive. We had spoken about that possibility many times before, and he always had given the same response. He would rather be dead than suffer a slow degrading death.

We found many breaks in the fence large enough to crawl through, and as soon as we were outside, we ran away from the ghetto as fast as possible, never looking back. In no time at all we reached our friends’ house, and knocked on the door. They were surprised, but seemed genuinely glad to see us in one piece. They gave us the wonderful news that Rubin was still alive! He had stopped at their house after escaping with the young woman who had shared lodgings in the ghetto.

The man of the house worked for the railroad, so he had been able to supply Rubin with a set of clothes worn by railroad employees. Our brother was at that very moment looking for us in the various hiding places we used many times in the past. As we were talking, one of the twins, who successfully escaped just a few days earlier, showed up. After a lot of hugs and tears, he told us that he knew where Rubin was hiding in the city, and that he would deliver the good news to him right away.

Soon Rubin came in an a new round of hugs and kisses began. He kept touching us, as if to make sure that this was not just a dream. He admitted that, for the first time in his life, he was ready to accept defeat and head for the forest in order to join the growing number of active partisans.

After the overwhelming excitement passed, the nagging question of what was going to happen came back in full force. We really were out of ideas, but to our surprise the lady of the house told us her plan. The couple, who were gentiles, had two daughters, ages fourteen and nineteen. The older daughter was in love with Rubin but he was unaware of it. Although Rubin was a good-looking man in fine physical shape, he was thirty-three years old, much older than the daughter. He was also Jewish, and being hunted by the Nazis because of it.

The mother offered us a place to hide if Rubin would agree to marry her daughter. This was a wonderful offer and hard to refuse. But knowing Rubin as I did, we predicted his answer. The woman was shocked when he said “No,” but Rubin tactfully explained to her his reason. He was truly honored to be loved by such a pretty young lady, he said, but he still felt bonded to his wife and two children. He was hoping they would be reunited.

Although the mother was satisfied with the explanation, at the same time she revoked her offer to give us a safety net. She had been prepared to take the colossal risk of being discovered and executed with us, just to see her child happy. Now that was no longer a possibility, she was unwilling to take the chance. A short time later we were back on the street, with no place to call our own.

It was the end of November 1942. The weather was nippy with a lot of snow and ice on the ground. After a long walk we reached a large cellar, which ran underground for miles in the old part of the city. Pipes were used to supply hot water to the numerous apartments in the large building above. Heat was generated the old fashioned way, by burning big blocks of wood in tall ovens located on the wall of each apartment. The cellar was warm, though damp. One day we were shocked: We found several dozen people hiding there already, spread out on the ground, and using newspapers and pieces of cloth as sheets and covers.

A few days after our arrival we had an unexpected visit, which turned terrifying. A couple of Polish hooligans came into he cellar while we were asleep, and claimed to be police detectives. They ordered us to disrobe completely and hand our clothes and shoes over to them. Rubin realized that obeying their orders would be suicide so he took a chance. He warned them about the sin of delivering defenseless civilians to a mutual enemy. He also tried to impress them with the names of the many important Poles he had known from before the war who were still active in running the social and industrial affairs of the city. His effort was rewarded with a partial compromise. They would leave us with our clothes and shoes, but we would have to give up our valuables.

Rubin decided to take advantage of the heavy traveling period during the day to try to get to Warsaw. At the same time, David and I would try to join a group of Jewish prisoners of war and some civilians still working at a labor camp in the center of the city.

It seems strange now to say that we chose to talk into the lion’s mouth voluntarily, but it was the only practical thing to do. We were playing a dangerous game, and praying for miracles. Rubin hoped to get in touch with some of our relatives still living in the Warsaw ghetto, and at the same time to get the financial help we needed so badly.
He walked with us up to the gates of the labor camp, watched us joining a group of returning workers, and just stood there until we entered the gates of hell. As we were about to enter our ‘’safe haven’’ Rubin assured us that as soon as he settled down in the new place, he would try to bring us over. I kept thinking that our mother’s final sacrifice must and would triumph over the evil forces of Hitler’s Germany.

At the end of May, while we were marching to work outside the camp, a middle-aged man managed to get close enough to tell us that Rubin wanted us to try to escape as soon as possible. The man claimed to be our brother’s tenant and told us to stop at his house after we had escaped.

Feeling the need to share this pressure with somebody, we entrusted the news to a friend. This mistake almost sealed our fate forever. Our friend “spilled the beans” to anybody who cared to listen, and, as a result, David and I were forbidden to line up for outside work at the same time.

Just when our situation seemed most hopeless, the unexpected happened. By chance we found ourselves outside the camp, working side-by-side. We were near a wall separating us from the big and beautiful Saski Park, which held so many pleasant memories from the past. We knew we probably wouldn’t get an opportunity like this again, so our decision was made for us.

It was a muggy summer day. Around midday the skies darkened and it began to rain. The downpour was so heavy that the Ukrainian guards deserted their posts to take cover inside the partly demolished building. Without hesitating, David and I made our great escape, knowing this might be our last chance. The wall leading to the park was very tall and when we jumped over it, we landed in the muddy ground. We had to run a long distance to the exit gate leading to the main street of the city. When we finally reached the gate and came out onto the street we faced the difficult task of hiring a dorzka (horse and wagon).

We looked very bad, wet from top to bottom, and our shoes were covered with mud. We approached a driver and asked him to take us to our destination. After looking us over very closely, and getting the directions, he finally started to drive away. We took care to give him an address not too close to our real destination. After paying the fare we walked the remaining distance until we reached No. 13A First of May Street. Wacek Kusmirski, the man who had agreed to take us in, lived on the second floor.

It was a very small one bedroom apartment with a tiny kitchen and no bathroom. A huge pot served as a toilet, and was taken out several times a day and emptied out into a giant waste dump in the backyard. A large round barrel was our communal washtub. Our main nourishment was large amounts of boiled potatoes, served at least twice a day, and a slice of bread that was a few days old.

The family, husband and wife and four young children, was very poor. The oldest daughter was quite pretty. Although she was in her early teens, she looked much older. While we stayed in the apartment her actions had a profound impact on our lives, especially for David and me.

Kusmirski worked on and off as a maintenance man, but the family’s financial situation began to improve, especially when Rubin started mailing checks and cash to us from Warsaw. Also before the liquidation of the ghetto at Majdanek Tatarski we had filled up the shoulder pads of David’s new suit with Russian gold coins, and left it with the Kusmirskis for safekeeping. When we inquired about David’s suit we were given all sorts of explanations: it had been confiscated by the Nazis; stolen from the house by unknown thieves; or they were forced to use the money for their own needs. Our present circumstances gave us no choice but to pretend we trusted them, or risk finding ourselves homeless.

Our days and nights were filled with real and false alarms about the movements of the Gestapo. German units were constantly searching homes and buildings for Jews or underground resistance groups trying to sabotage the German occupation forces.

The punishment for this “crime” was either death on the spot, or, even worse, torture at Gestapo headquarters while being interrogated, and then being shot by a firing squad. Many people began carrying poison pills to swallow as an easier way to end living hell of torture.

Our hosts and their children slept in the bedroom facing the street, and David and I slept in a single bed in the kitchen by the sink overlooking the backyard. Kusmirski often came home in the middle of the night very drunk and cursing everybody, especially the “F----Jews” in a loud voice. His wife would become frightened, fearing he would alert the neighbors we were there. Many were civilian informers paid for each “illegal” person delivered to the Gestapo, dead or alive, no questions asked.

Eventually, he would fall asleep, and his wife would order us out of the house, saying the safety of her family took priority and sooner or later we would all be caught and shot. On those nights David and I would leave the house, but not the building, not daring to violate the curfew. Only people with permits issued by the military could use the streets at night.

On nights like this we had no choice but to use the cellar in front of the lobby. In the morning Kusmirski would bring us back upstairs after begging his wife’s forgiveness. He would explain that this was just his strategy to confuse his neighbors and make them believe he was an anti-Semite, as well as a good Christian and citizen.
Meanwhile, another dangerous episode took place. The teenage girl was a big flirt. One day, while looking out from the bedroom window facing the street, she smiled at several passing soldiers. She caught their attention. They started up the stairs to visit her. She panicked and ran out of the house to the backyard, but David and I were stuck in the kitchen. The only hiding place was a large wooden closet. There were not many clothes hanging inside so we were actually quite visible, especially our shoes.

The soldiers asked the mother about her daughter, and she told them the girl had left the house. The soldiers didn’t believe her, and began searching the house, one in the bedroom, and the other one in the kitchen. A soldier opened the closet and I have no doubt he saw us, because we could see him quite clearly. I do not know if at this moment our Almighty God in Heaven made him temporarily blind, or for some strange reason he did not want to see us. In any case, he did not raise the alarm, and we were spared.

After about nine months of hell, being thrown out and taken back in again, we decided to risk taking the train to Warsaw in order to reunite with Rubin. Kusmirski decided to travel with us, hoping to collect extra cash for escorting us. We were sure his presence on the train would be of no value to us, because we knew quite well that if we got in trouble he would not hesitate to walk out on us.

The winter of 1943 was coming to an end, but there were still a few more weeks of cold and snow before spring would appear. The bad weather was an advantage, since we were able to wear more clothes and reveal less of ourselves. The trip actually went quite well, except for a routine document check. Our fake documents were of excellent quality, and nobody paid much attention to us. We reached Warsaw and proceeded to the house where Rubin was staying, and were greeted with a lot of love and tears.

My brother was staying with a Polish woman, Wanda, who had visited us in Lublin. She was alone, had a beautiful apartment in the heart of the city, and was also very pleased to see us. She was not assisting us for the money, since Rubin did not have much, and David and I came without a penny to our name. She liked Rubin a lot and was trying to help him save his two beloved younger brothers. Wanda was a very sensitive Christian, hoping to save a few human beings from the German devils.

The first night after falling asleep I had a beautiful dream. I was finally reunited with my family and we were hugging and enjoying the wonderful feeling of freedom. On awakening I realized that this was only a wishful dream. Our lives had taken a turn for the better, but we were still imprisoned in the house twenty-four hours a day. We still had to be careful with the neighbors. Every time the doorbell rang, we immediately rushed for our hiding place.

Rubin had a lot of news for us, some very good, some extremely sad. He had arranged a hiding place for some of our relatives living in the Radom ghetto. Our oldest brother’s wife Frania was renting a room from a Polish family using false documents. She did not look Jewish and her command of Polish was flawless. At a different place she had her mother, sister, brother-in-law, and her sister-in-law (her brother’s wife), living with a poor family and paying a lot of money for that.

As usual, the good news had to be followed by the bad. Our brother Leon, after escaping the Lodz ghetto, had lived with his wife and her family in the Radom ghetto. In the latter part of the summer, the Gestapo had come for Leon’s father-in-law, a prominent citizen. Finding Leon in front of the house, they decided to take him away instead. While being walked to the car under guard, Leon tried to flee and was fatally shot in the back.

He had chosen instant death over long torture and slow demise. If caught, I personally would have done the same in order not to give the Nazis a chance to see me suffer. His wife was pregnant, and after delivering a beautiful, healthy, baby girl, the infant was placed with the same couple whose house we had used after escaping from Majdanek Tatarski. Rubin was involved in the arrangements, and it seemed to be a good solution. Rubin also told us about the intensive punishment the Warsaw ghetto had withstood, being subject to daily forced deportations to the death camps. To emphasize their hatred for anything Jewish, the Germans timed the last deportation “ action “ in April 1943, to take place at the beginning of Passover, the Jewish celebration of freedom after years of slavery in Egypt.

The beleaguered young men and women of the ghetto had put up a tremendous fight, despite the overwhelming Nazi forces. The resistance fighters had only old hand guns, homemade Molotov cocktails, and a small number of grenades, but they were ready to offer their lives to show the deaf-and-blind world real Jewish heroism. As soon as the invaders crossed the gates, they were greeted with a hail of fire. The Nazis suffered quite a few dead and wounded to their surprise, and retreated in a great hurry and in tremendous shock.

The defenders appealed to the world conscience for help, and begged their Polish brother partisans for guns and ammunition, but to no avail. Even worse, the ghetto defenders purchased a lot of equipment from the Poles, only to discover much of it did not work properly. It was no surprise. As much as they hated the invaders, the Poles had no great love for the Jews. These were the same people who, long before the war began, boycotted Jewish businesses and welcomed anti-Jewish laws.

The Nazis had tanks, grenades, and planes. They bombed each building, which became infernos, in some cases forcing the defenders to jump from windows to their deaths below. This massacre went on for several weeks in full view of the festive Polish mob, which showed its approval by calling the poor victims “burning cockroaches.”
Now, a year after the burning of the Warsaw ghetto, we were still being exposed to the same dangers, as we had since the very beginning of the invasion of Poland by the Germans. Polish police and plain-clothes detectives searched the city for hidden Jews.

Wanda became increasingly concerned. The police were becoming steady “guests” in her apartment, which seemed have been exposed as a hiding place for Jews by the other tenants of the building. Besides us, she was also hiding Rubin’s friend, with whom she had become romantically involved. Wanda decided to abandon the apartment, and find a smaller place for the two of them. Rubin had no choice but to start looking for a new smaller hiding place for the three of us.

Meanwhile, we had more sad news. Leon’s widow Frania had received word of the death of her infant baby girl, who she had left in the care of the Polish family in the city of Lublin. She was very upset about the loss, especially knowing that her slain husband, Leon, wanted a baby so badly. Now after his tragic, untimely demise, his only child was dead. We were never told how the baby died.

Rubin searched for a place to live, but to no avail. One day, while he was out walking the streets of Warsaw, he encountered a bunch of teenage Polish hooligans who kept calling him “Zyd” (“Jude”, “ or “Jew”), apparently trying to arouse the suspicion of passing Germans. Finally a German officer stopped, but instead of arresting Rubin. He ordered the hooligans to leave. When they refused to obey, he made them run by threatening the bunch with his revolver.

To gain Rubin’s confidence, the German offered to help find a new hiding place for his family. Rubin was to bring his family to meet him next day, at the same place. We never learned his real intentions because Rubin was too frightened to keep the rendezvous. It might have been a trap to round up the whole family, or the man could have been a member of the Polish or Jewish underground. There many rumors of people posing as Germans in order to save hiding Jews, but no one knew if that was true, or just a foolish hope of the remaining survivors.

I refused to allow myself to think about God, because of the question that haunted me:
“Why is He allowing this to happen to us?”

After all, hadn’t I learned in my earlier years, from both my parents and from my Jewish teachers, that God is the Father of every single being in the entire world, and He is the loving protector and healer of all His people?
“Why is He not helping us now, in the time of our greatest need?” I reflected. “What have we done to deserve such a terrible fate?”

Just when everything looked bleakest, our good luck held, and Frania found us a place to stay. I took some time to reflect on our situation and to thank our perished family members for watching over us.
In June 1944, we were very encouraged to hear that the Allied forces invaded Normandy on the western coast of France. At the same time, the Russians were advancing toward our city of Warsaw. Even our Polish hosts, listening to the forbidden radio news, seemed more comfortable with us in their house.

In our situation, however, every second counted. Each knock on the door might be fatal for us. Even the knowledge that the war was lost did not persuade the Nazis to give up their incessant pursuit of the Jews.
On July 23, 1944, we heard that Soviet troops were fighting the Germans in the streets of Lublin, our native city. After a day of fierce battle, the city was liberated and the German army was in retreat toward Warsaw.
We asked ourselves some difficult questions: Should we have waited another four months in Lublin, where we would now be free again? If we had, how would we have felt not knowing the fate of our brother Rubin, as well as the other members of our family? What was going to happen to us now, as Russian troops relentlessly pushed the retreating German army toward Warsaw?

On August 1, 1944, Polish resistance fighters rose up against the mighty German war machine - and we received the answers to most of our questions.

The underground right wing hated the German invaders, but they despised the Soviet Communists even more. The Nazis, taken by surprise, evacuated Warsaw. But at the same time, they also put up a containment ring around the city, effectively cutting us off from the rest of the country. We did our best to help the cause, fighting the fires spreading throughout the city. Although we still did not know what the next day might bring, we were happy just to know that our enemy was no longer roaming the streets of Warsaw.

One day, David was stopped on the street by a Pole who said he knew David was Jewish, and demanded proof. Other people in the group joined in this ultimatum to my shocked brother. Having no choice, David lowered his pants and exposed his penis. The anti-Semites then began a debate about what to do with the Jew they had caught.

Obviously enjoying their sick power game over such a defenseless person, they ordered David to run away. To make sure they would never run into him again, they threatened him with their guns, saying they would kill him as a member of the race Hitler had tried so justifiably to eradicate from the planet. I am using more “refined” words now to describe this terrible incident, since I do not wish to repeat the despicable language these hoodlums used.
After that experience, we felt forced to stay close to home once again, and we tried to avoid any further contact with the so-called Polish defenders. By now, the city began to run out of basic food products, and the streets were mostly impassable, blocked by collapsing buildings. After sixty-three days of resistance against daily bombardment and widespread hunger, the Polish leaders decided to surrender Warsaw, with its partly or completely destroyed buildings, to the Nazis.

The exodus of the Poles began on October 2, 1944, and lasted a number of days. Now that we had reached the day of reckoning, what were we to do? In order to leave the city, one had to pass a gate guarded by Polish and German police, a Gestapo unit, and civilian informers. The chances for a Jew to pass through successfully were almost nil.

We knew time was of the essence. We had to decide immediately on our next move. It seemed to us that we had only two choices: to try to pass through the gate out of the city with the others, or to hide again in the city indefinitely, this time in an underground bunker. Our chance for survival without detection in either situation was very slim, but finally, we decided to stay behind. We dug on the bunker at night and, as people were being evacuated from their homes by the Nazis, we “liberated” the food, water, blankets, and pillows being left behind in the empty apartments. We also took warm clothing, flashlights, candles, first aid supplies and matches. Our bunker’s ceiling was very low, and we knew that we would have to spend our time in a sitting or prone position.

October 9, 1944, the deadline, arrived, and we had everything assembled, including a pair of handguns purchased from the departing Polish fighters. They were only too happy to get rid of the incriminating evidence, and to receive some cash in return.

It was snowing on the day we entered the bunker, and we knew that by morning our hiding place would be completely covered. We knew we would not be able to see daylight again for an unforeseeable time. Our group included three women and four men: our sister-in-law Frania, her mother, her sister Andzia with her husband Andrzej, Rubin, David and me.

In a different part of the city, in a bunker similar to ours, Frania’s sister-in-law, a cousin, and a couple of their close friends, were also getting ready to close the top cover, to hope, and to wait for a miracle from God.
That was our final decision. We would not know if it was the right one until we came out alive. We had to stay silent, listening carefully to the slightest noise around the bunker. One loud word, sneeze, or cough could signal our location to our enemies. We had to sit or lie down until the day was over and the Poles and their German masters had gone from the section. At night we could talk quietly, put on a candle for a short while, or even make noises, which at other times would be out of the question.

During the daytime we could see a few rays of light coming in through the tiny openings in the cover as well melting snow. Right now no one would notice the cover under the snow. But what would happen when winter was over and snow melted?

According to our calculations we were just approaching the end of October 1944, and we were already beginning to experience food shortages. Frania’s mother was not well and needed special soft products. The real problem arrived when the water became stale and we could not drink it anymore. Even worse, despite chemical spraying and covering it with sand inside a hole at the end of the bunker, the accumulated human waste began to smell badly.

Rubin decided to take a chance and venture out at night in pursuit of food and water. He had not gone to all the trouble to save a dozen people from the Radom ghetto and find safe hiding places for them, he said, just to watch them die from starvation or thirst. One night, Rubin and Andrzej opened up the cover, “Don’t worry about us,” they said, as they climbed out of the bunker, and covered the entrance again. Time seemed to stand still while we waited for them to return. Finally, they came back loaded with fresh water and other life essentials. Our relief was indescribable. We kissed and hugged them as well each other, and our self-esteem got a tremendous lift. After that first successful try, we ventured out more often during the long winter nights. We used a broom covered with a soft piece of cloth to erase our footsteps, and the steady falling snow did an even better job.

At night, we listened to the sounds of artillery firing, an indication that the Russians were closing in. It was the sweetest, softest sounding music to our ears, a crying out to God for punishment and death to the Nazis. Christmas was nearing, and we could hear people standing near our bunker cover, discussing their plans for the holiday celebration in Polish and German.

One evening we had a very close call. A German standing near the bunker stepped on the cover. He began yelling something to the others, but we couldn’t understand what he was saying. We drew our guns, ready to shoot it out with the Nazis and, hopefully, take a couple of them with us for the long final journey. Finally he stepped off the cover, cursing aloud. He slipped on the ice, and must have twisted his ankle, because he left right afterwards with no further incident.

Just around Christmas time, Frania’s mother became much sicker and died in her sleep. The area was quiet and deserted because of the holiday, so that night we ventured out. We dug her grave and bid our last goodbye to her before covering it, leaving a tiny marker to remember the spot. After the war, her body was exhumed and reburied at the Jewish cemetery in Warsaw. It was very sad to see the two sisters mourn their departed mother, but at least they were with her until the end, they knew her resting place, and she did not suffer a great deal.

This event triggered memories of our own wonderful mother, who sacrificed her own life to save me from the Nazis’ clutch. I thought of her in present sense, forcing myself into believing that no harm could have come to such a pious woman. God would not have let this happen, I reasoned, so we, her family, must continue to survive in order to rejoin her at the end of this senseless, cruel war.

New Year’s Day 1945 came and went, but our situation remained the same. Day after day, listening to the voices outside, we ourselves almost forgot how to talk. We kept our sad thoughts mostly to ourselves, knowing that talking about our sorrow would not help us ease our serious problems.
In the middle of January 1945, the Polish workers and their German guards stopped coming to the area above our bunker, and we did not know why.

On January 17 after a few soundless days and nights, we heard shouting in Polish. Not sure what was happening, we got our guns ready-and waited. We hoped our good luck would last, one more time. The noise became louder and finally we could hear someone cleaning the snow and ice off the cover of our hiding place in the ground.
What a wonderful surprise awaited us! Instead of the dreaded Nazis we were expecting, we were suddenly face-to-face with our relatives from the other bunker! Behind them we saw military men, their faces radiating the most beautiful smiles we had ever seen. They spoke in Russian, encouraging us to come up out of the bunker. We could understand most of what they said, because of the similarity between our languages.

Our reaction was impossible to describe. After existing underground for so many months, we were finally free, able to talk and cry aloud, and no longer having to hide our ethnic or religious status.
We scrambled out of the bunker as fast as possible. We had to close our eyes, blinded by the sunlight reflecting off the beautiful white snow, still drifting down from heaven.
Once we were able to face the strong daylight, the Russians showed us how to roll dark tobacco and a piece of newspaper into cigarettes. I will never forget my first long puff, and the black choking cloud of smoke that came out of my mouth! But on day like this, nothing could spoil our happiness and the delicious feeling of complete unrestricted freedom.

When the celebration came to an end, however, our nagging questions came back in full force:
Did any of our relatives survive? How soon would we be able to see them? Were they waiting for us in Lublin, and worrying about our safety as we did theirs? Would we be able to move back to our apartments, and would all the real estate confiscated by the Germans be returned to us, the rightful owners? Was our ex-host Wacek and his family safe and well? Would I be able to continue my college education?
Other questions of a more philosophical nature haunted us:

What would living in a country with so many bitter and tragic memories do to us? How would our ex-neighbors and friends react to our homecoming? And did they by now realize who had been their real enemy? Most importantly, would they have the decency and courage to admit the grave injustices that had been done to us by the majority of Poles?

We would have to deal with the long-term consequences of our ordeal: Would we, in good conscience, be able to forgive and forget all the atrocities committed by the inhumane Nazis and their faithful collaborators in most of the European countries? And finally, what kind of world political and economic system would emerge after such terrible destruction in most of Europe?

Our hope of a quick return to Lublin was rapidly extinguished. We would have to stay in Warsaw for some time, we were told. The problem was a shortage of transportation to the eastern part of Poland, compounded by numerous groups of Nazi soldiers roaming behind the advancing Russian lines. Because of these uncertainties, the routes leading to the East were declared “off-limits”, except for military personal.

Our priority, in spite of our disappointment, was finding a place to live. Not only were most of the buildings in very bad shape, but also a large number of Polish refugees returned to their apartments in Warsaw, creating a great shortage of dwelling places. We also learned that most of the Jews, like us, who had chosen to hide in the city after the surrender, had survived. The Jews who had confronted the Nazis at the gate perished in the death camps.

Living conditions were still very bad. Our group lived in one single room, sharing the kitchen and bathroom with several other people. We stood in long lines to receive a hot watery soup. We had to walk to an office in another part of the city to receive coupons good for bread, eggs, butter, and other items.
Winter was still in full force, and we dressed as warmly as we could to prevent illness, since the buildings were not heated because of the unavailability of coal.

After a couple of tough months, beautiful spring arrived, and the warmer weather put us in a better mood. The Allied forces were doing well on all the fronts, and the Russians were chasing the retreating Germans through all the occupied eastern countries right back to Germany.

We knew that the war couldn’t last much longer, but it was still too soon for us to claim a complete victory over the inhumane Nazis. Although part of Poland was already liberated, the retreating Germans were trying to delay the final outcome of the war by putting up a stiff resistance, despite their heavy losses.

Hitler ordered his generals to fight to the last man, and that’s exactly what they were doing, sending young, inexperienced teenagers to the front. The Japanese were also fighting a fierce losing battle, inflicting heavy losses on both sides. The end of this foolish war was so near, but still so far, for the civilian victims as well as for the fighting men. Each day meant thousands more died at each front. In May 1945, Hitler finally took the coward’s way out and committed suicide, and Germany surrendered unconditionally. In June we received permission to travel by train to Lublin. After almost six years of living subhuman lives we were at last free to do what we wanted.

The trains were jammed. As soon as we arrived in Lublin, we were directed to a Jewish office, which was registering survivors’ names, and reuniting families. At this point, we found only two people we knew before the war: Mr. Korn, my high school Hebrew teacher, and Mr. Fruchtman, the son of a local fruit store owner. Although several hundred Jews remained in the city, they were actually from villages and farms on its outskirts.

After arriving in Lublin, we went straight to our old apartment on Wyszynskiego No. 20. We knocked on the super’s door and when he opened it, he went white as a sheet of paper and crossed himself! He thought he was seeing ghosts, having assumed that the Nazis killed us long ago. Our old apartment was taken, so we took up residence in another property belonging to our parents, a tiny apartment located at No. 3 Dominikanska.

We had no money, and we had to decide quickly how to earn enough to buy food. David ran into a friend who had a wholesale business, and he offered us his merchandise (clothes imported from neighboring countries) on credit, which we could retail at the numerous open-air flea markets in the city. We found it difficult work, especially with the unfriendly Poles as our competitors.

We also went to visit our mother’s close Polish friend and neighbor, hoping to get back the clothes our mother left with her for safekeeping before our move to Majdanek Tatarski. She would not let us in, telling us that our mother picked up all our clothes earlier. When we questioned her, she threatened to call the police. Not trusting the Polish police, we left very quickly.

Next we visited the Kusmirski family, with whom we had stayed for nine months. They expressed great surprise at seeing us alive, and then began to make excuses for their obvious good fortune citing the father’s business “luck.” To us, however, it looked more like the good luck of finding David’s lost suit, loaded with Russian gold coins. We knew from past experience, however, that we could not succeed in obtaining justice from them, so we decided not to rock the boat.

Shortly after our return, we made application to reverse the confiscation of our parents’ properties, and were initially encouraged when the court lifted the Nazis’ law, declaring us the legal owners of the now-abandoned real estate. The property did not stay in our possession for long. The leaders of the Polish Communists declared all private properties confiscated by the state and under government control. At least this time properties belonging to Poles also came under the same ruling!

Finally we were allowed to move back to our old apartment, but now we had to pay rent just like everybody else. Time moved on, and none of our dear family members had yet returned. After a while, the Russians began allowing the return of Polish Jews who survived by escaping to Russia before the Germans occupied Poland.

These were mostly young people who had not trusted the Nazis. After the famous German-Russian “ friendship pact “ divided Poland into two parts, they moved out of the area with the retreating Russians.

In June 1941, when the Germans invaded Russia, the Russian government had deported all “ stateless “ (i.e., non-citizen ) residents, including Jews, to Siberia. They took this step claiming “security” reasons, saying they could not trust the loyalty of the war refugees. This seemingly heartless move actually saved a lot of Jewish lives, since they were placed beyond the reach of the Nazis.

In the late months of 1945, we were pleasantly surprised by a visit from Zygmunt and Guta Winder. Our mother and Zyg’s mother were sisters, she being the oldest of the siblings and my mother the youngest.
Rubin knew them because they were close in age, but David and I did not know them at all. In September 1939, just a short time before the Nazis occupied their hometown of Warsaw, the couple escaped to Russia.
In June 1941, the Nazis invaded Russia, and Zyg and Guta were deported to Siberia along with other war refugees. Siberia was frigid and had mountains of snow and ice. They were put to hard labor, cutting down trees in the forests. After both of them worked what seemed an endless time, Zyg was transferred to a bakery, and their situation improved. He worked in a warm place, and they had plenty of bread to eat, and even had some left over to exchange for other commodities. We were very happy to have them around, and personally I considered Zyg to be like another brother.

Meanwhile, the United States initiated the Marshall Plan to help rebuild Germany, and the Russians began shipping out everything they could to their own homeland, which had been devastated while they were fighting off the Nazi invaders.

Our own little family circle began to break up. Rubin and Frania married immediately after our liberation. Now she was pregnant, and they needed their own place to live. They decided to move back to the same apartment in Lodz where she lived with Leon before the war. The apartment, at No. 61 Legionow Street was in a building they had partly owned. Miraculously, everything was still there, just as they left it, including the furniture! Rubin hoped to get a job as a chemist in Lodz, which was much larger than Lublin and the country’s leading center of heavy industry. Frania’s sister and brother-in-law also decided to join them in the new adventure.

Zyg and Guta moved to Wroclaw, a German town before the war. Now the Russians gave it to Poland in exchange for the eastern part of the country, which was annexed by the Communists. Wroclaw had a large ethnic mix, which made it easier to escape the feeling of hatred experienced by Jews in the “pure Polish cities.”

It was the end of 1945. After six years of Nazi occupation, the country’s mail and travel systems were still in disarray, and some people were still finding family members long presumed dead. For us, however, it looked as though our good luck had finally come to an end. Our cousins invited us to leave with them, but David and I were not quite ready to give up hope. We still refused to admit our defeat aloud, praying for one last miracle.
At the same time, we concluded this was not, and could never be, our homeland as it was before the war. We worked very hard to eke out a meager living, while our ex-host Wacek was enjoying the good life with our money, often spending his leisure time in our apartment.

Meanwhile we were getting letters from our cousins, who now proposed the idea of leaving Poland for Germany, where American, British and Canadian organizations were helping refugees by registering homeless persons for emigration to their respective countries. We continued to ask ourselves the burning question: should we stay in the country where we were born, where we knew the language, where we had attended school, and where our family had owned property? Or should we seek better lives and fortune elsewhere?

In June 1946, something happened in the city of Kielce, located between Lublin and Radom, which made up our minds for us. There Jewish survivors of the concentration camps and their families requested that confiscated properties be returned to rightful owners from the Poles who had replaced them. When the Nazis’ victims received a negative response, they took their claims to court.

The Poles, fearing a legal defeat, attacked the Jewish families at night, killing all of them in cold blood. Forty-nine Jewish men, women, and children were murdered in that vicious attack. How ironic that these people escaped the Nazis only to die at the hands of their neighbors. The Polish Communist press blamed the killings on the underground partisans, who were against the government as well as the surviving Jewish Holocaust victims. After that brutal act of hatred, we had no more doubt what we should do next.

We knew from past experience not to discuss our plans with anyone else. We had to make our move just as soon as possible, without raising our neighbors’ suspicion.

It was a great temptation to talk about it to Wacek, and to a couple of other “friendly” souls, but the stakes were too high to risk making even a tiny mistake. Our lives seemed to have little or no value here. The Poles grew accustomed to seeing Jewish blood spilled on the pavements of their cities. Most were not ashamed to show their satisfaction and great hatred quite openly.

Jews had a presence in Poland for more than one thousand years. Now, they seemed to be saying, their country was finally Juden Rein (free of Jews). Hitler and his henchmen had done their job well. He would have been very proud, if he could see the Poles finish what the Germans had not be able to accomplish completely.

It was no wonder we were called “Wandering Jews.” That’s what we had become in 1939, when the war began, and now we really did not have a place to call our own. For thousands of years we were persecuted in every country. We were envied and vilified for having so many smart, outstanding people representing us in politics, education, science, business, etc. The jealousy and hatred we endured was strong and depressing.
Still I must make clear that some of the Poles were very honest and friendly. But they were a very tiny minority, and most of them were too afraid to speak out or stand up for what was right.

In Lublin I met a very nice young Jewish woman. We became very close, but I could not dream of getting involved with her seriously, while my future was still so bleak. I had no desire to raise a new generation of children in a place where Jews were hated so much, and where I was surrounded by many painful reminders of our gruesome past.

It was very hard for me to say goodbye to Lublin, where I spent so many wonderful years with my dear family. While staying in our old apartment, I could almost fool myself into visualizing each of them walking in the rooms. At night, while asleep, I could hear their sweet voices of assurance, saying, “Everything is going to be all right.”
There were so many questions I wanted to ask my father: Why had his prayers to the Almighty God not reached the high heavens? What happened to God’s promise to take care of his chosen people? Why did we have to pay such an extremely high price for being Jewish? Is it a crime to believe in one God? Or to be the descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob?

I saw old pious Jews being dragged to their death, reciting their final prayer of Sh’ma Israel (Listen Israel), and the anthem Ani Maamin (I Believe). Every person was affected differently by the Nazi atrocities. A lot of people became very religious, thanking God for letting them survive to tell the world what happened to the Jewish nation.

I could not and would not pray to a God who watched in silence the murder of millions of innocent Jews and Gentiles. For almost fifty years, my anger with God was so intense that I could not go inside a synagogue and offer a prayer. I tried to engage many learned Rabbis in a conversation on this subject, but to no avail. They kept silent or let me know that there was no answer to my question: Why did God not intervene on behalf of his faithful flock? During the last ten years I have mellowed and joined a conservative synagogue, but every time we say the prayer for the departed, the same question hangs on my lips again: Why?

Finally, in July 1946, David and I were ready for our trip to Wroclaw, Poland, hoping for the best. We tried to convince Rubin and Frania to come along, but they were not willing to expose Sylvia, their beautiful four-month-old baby girl, to a hard life of wandering, not knowing where the next night would be spent.
We left in the middle of the night while everyone was asleep. Since it was hot, we could not wear too much, and carried only the most useful personal affects. We proceeded with caution and haste to the train station.

After after a long train ride, we stood at the door of our cousins’ apartment in Wroclaw. They were happy to see us, and after a good night’s rest, they outlined their travel plans. We would try to cross the Polish-German border by train to West Germany. There we would try to get into a refugee camp where American, Canadian, and British authorities were registering people for emigration. Zyg and Guta were anxious to reunite with another cousin in New York.

After a few days of rest, and prompted by the hope of finally reaching a freedom loving country willing to accept us as even partners, we were ready to move on again. We heard so much about these faraway places before the war, but to us it had always seemed like an impossible dream. Many stories had been circulated about how easy it was to become rich and famous there. We packed our belongings carefully, hoping to be able to handle ourselves in any kind of situation.

I thought we were experienced enough to handle anything, but the very next incident proved me wrong. We purchased tickets for the trip, but the train had no passenger seats. To our horror, it resembled the freight cars used by the Nazis to transport their victims to the camps! The only difference was that these cars were wide open - and there were no armed soldiers accompanying us. As anxious as we were to leave Poland as soon as possible, we tried to make the best of it.

We settled on the floor, which was thinly covered with straw, and happily looked forward to getting far away from the reach of the hated Poles. When we reached the border, however, the Polish border police showed up and began to confiscate our luggage. When we tried to argue with them they told that they didn’t mind getting rid of us, but we would not be allowed to take anything out of their country. Their final words still ring in my ears:

“The Germans took your lives and your property,’’ one guard said. “We are happy to see you leaving, but your property belongs to our state,” one of them said as they began to confiscate our bags.

The confusion and the crying of women and children were chaotic and terrifying. It was difficult for us to believe that a whole year after the end of the war, the Jews were still the “scapegoats.” When and how would this come to an end? We wondered when we would be treated like human beings again. The Poles learned all the evil tricks from the Nazis, and they were using them against us.

We arrived at Stuttgart, Germany, with only whatever we had on our backs. It wasn’t much, given the warm summer weather, and the fact that most of our heavier clothing was confiscated by the masters of the “New Democratic Poland.”

We contacted the Jewish relief organization and discovered that the few streets set aside for Jews waiting to emigrate were already overcrowded. David and I were given a requisition slip for one room in a very old apartment occupied by an old German couple.

Their son, an SS man in one of the German death units, was killed on the Russian front. SS and Gestapo units had been in charge of Jewish “ affairs,” deciding the fate of Jews in all the occupied countries. During the war they supervised the ghettos, the labor camps and the death camps. Like all the other Germans, however, the old couple insisted that their son was a hero who had died defending his beloved German Third Reich and Hitler. By now we were used to such claims of German innocence.

I wanted to resume my college education, but financial problems came along, and once again we were forced to eke out a living. The “start-up “ was very difficult, but, later on, David became part owner of a leather business, and our financial conditions improved a lot.

Despite that, we could not wait for the moment of our complete redemption. After all, we were still in the company of the people who had killed our loved ones without mercy. We could not and should not stay one moment longer than necessary in a country that committed genocide against our people and claimed ignorance of the atrocities.

Nothing in the world could bring back our family, as well as the millions of other innocent Jewish victims.
Europe was and will always be, one huge unmarked cemetery, containing six million victims. Even to this day, I haven’t been able to make the trip back to my native land to claim our rightful properties. My brain tells me I should go, but my heart starts pounding, just thinking about all the horror I experienced in that old country of my birth.

One great day, we were delighted to learn we could finally leave Europe forever. I lived in Germany for three years. Finally, in late August 1949, I received the long-awaited permission to sail to the land of the free, the home of the brave - America. My cousins, my brother David and his wife, Giza, left a few months ahead of me. I boarded a military ship called “ The General Hanh” for my trip, and ten long days later I saw the famous “ Statue of Liberty “ with her arms stretched out, ready to give me that motherly hug I had missed so badly since the Nazis had taken away my own beloved mother. I will never forget that moment as long as I live.

I spent a few days in New York, and then boarded a train to Providence, R.I., where my brother David and his wife were living since their arrival in the United States. They were expecting their first child and I could see the excitement in their eyes while waiting for this new generation to be born. On November 21, 1949, Giza gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. She was given the name Eleanor, in memory of Giza’s mother who died in a German concentration camp. The baby was a delight to look at, good and sweet like her mother.

I got a job in an electrical shop the day after my arrival, and tried to lead a normal life. I was not earning much, but at least I was finally free. As time progressed, I began making some nice friends in the area.
Then I had a frightening experience – another close call. A good friend and I drove every day after work to swim in the ocean near Providence. One day, while alone in deep waters, I felt a cramp in my leg and started to go down. After the second wave, I yelled for help. A woman tried to assist me, but I was too strong for her. Finally, a couple of men in a passing boat were able to pull me aboard after rendering me unconscious with a blow to my face. I wound up in the hospital for one night while the doctor pumped seawater from my stomach. I also made the local newspapers, with a picture of my heroic rescuers and me.

That was another sign from heaven that I made the right decision to emigrate to this wonderful country. I couldn’t dream of such friendly life saving deed in Poland or Germany. So here was another close call! But still it was not my time. Once more strangers saved me. At that time I came to the conclusion that, for some strange reason, God wanted me to hang on for a while longer. Now that I am much older and a tiny bit wiser, I understand that He is keeping me alive so I can bear witness to all the atrocities that have befallen the Jewish people.
I also think that God wanted to prove how it is easy for Him to perform miracles. I hope and pray to be able to finish my task before the final call arrives. I strive to report the positive as well the negative facts concerning our relations with the non-Jewish population while the whole world was at it lowest point.

In 1950, our brother Rubin, his wife Frania, and their daughter Sylvia emigrated from Poland to Israel. Shortly after their arrival, Frania gave birth to a second daughter, whom they named Mary. Israel was a young nation, just a couple years old and engaged in constant struggle to defend itself from the hateful and powerful neighbors. Israel was not able to supply to all the incoming refugees from around the world even the basic necessities. After several years of living in a tent with his wife and two daughters, often unemployed and relying on food packages from us, they moved to Canada, where Rubin obtained a decent job in Montreal. After six years they finally joined us in New York. Rubin found work and all of them led happy lives. The two daughters, Sylvia and Mary, attended fine schools, graduated from college with honors, worked, married fine young men and after awhile each of them were blessed with two beautiful children.

Meanwhile, David and I had been working for others for two years. We decided to take a chance and go out on our own. We had to work hard in New York, but it was a good feeling, knowing we were achieving a better standard of living for ourselves.

In July 1953, David and Giza had another baby girl, just as delightful as the first one. They named her Rachel, in honor of our sister Henia, who also perished with most of our family at the Majdanek concentration camp at the age of nineteen.

Finally, in August 1959, Rubin and his family arrived in New York and later became American citizens. Our cousins also lived nearby, so we saw them quite often as well. What a relief and a joy it was, to have the remnants of our family reunited in the same city once more! Now I had two brothers and their families here. But I was still single.
In April 1963, I decided to take a month off and visit Europe and Israel. It was a beautiful month to travel and I enjoyed good weather everywhere I went.

While in Israel I met Esther, a young Jewish lady from Melbourne, Australia, who was living with relatives and working in the Holy Land. We took a liking to each other, and decided to continue our friendship by mail. We missed each other so much that, when I returned home, I asked her to come to New York.
In late July 1963, she arrived in New York and after a short courtship, we married with a crowd of relatives and good friends in attendance.

On March 3, 1966, we were blessed with a beautiful baby boy, whom we named Philip Isaac, in honor of our two deceased fathers.

I will never forget the moment, right after the delivery, when the doctor brought the baby out for me to see. Our son gave us great pleasure and pride, and he was admired and spoiled very much by all our relatives.
His mother loved him very dearly, and did the best she could to express her feelings toward her only child. I worked long hours during the week, but the weekends and holidays were usually spent trying to keep the family together.

Unfortunately, after a few years when Philip was five years old, my wife and I agreed to a divorce. At age 15, Philip decided to stay with me, while his mother went back to Australia to take care of her elderly and ailing mother. Philip and his mother have always stayed in contact with each other, however, and continue to have a very close relationship. Philip visits Melbourne as often as he can and considers Australia a second home. He even has dual citizenship!

After graduating from a private high school in Queens, N.Y., Philip enrolled in New York University to pursue his favorite subject, journalism, even though he knew journalism can be a very demanding career. After four years at NYU, he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in journalism and politics. He also earned several honors for his outstanding achievements. Years later he would become an adjunct professor of journalism at his alma mater, in addition to his full-time job as a TV news producer.

In the meantime, our family was getting smaller. In November 1978, Rubin’s wife, Frania, died of lung cancer, after a long and painful period of suffering. Rubin was her exclusive caregiver during her sickness, and I never heard him complain about his hardship. Until her last breath, Rubin continued to hope and pray for a cure for his wife and life partner. After her death he went into a deep depression for quite a while. A few years later, Rubin met and married Ida, a very nice lady. They seemed very well suited for each other, and very much in love. Unfortunately, their relationship did not last long enough.

June 20, 1982, on Father’s Day, Rubin suffered a massive heart attack and died instantly while he was riding a bicycle and enjoying the little leisure time he ever had. Many years have passed, but my dear brother Rubin, my hero, is always on my mind and deep in my heart. Hopefully, he finally was able to rest in peace, after such turbulent and heroic life. My cousin Zyg passed away shortly after a severe heart attack, at the age of sixty-six.

They all died before their time, leaving a great void. I will never forget them, and they will be with me until my dying days. They suffered so much and, at the end, were not given enough time to enjoy their families. After working very hard for many years, David and Giza decided to move to Florida to retire to a warm climate. A short time later, I also purchased a condominium in Florida, to taste the sweet feeling of taking it easy and doing all the things I could not afford to do until now.

In 1987, I was fortunate enough to meet a young French-Canadian lady, who was sitting poolside during a visit to her sister. Although it was difficult for Christiane to leave her family behind in Canada, we were married in Florida after a three-year courtship. She really did adjust to her life here very smoothly in a short period of time.

In 1988, my son Philip graduated from college. He joined the Associated Press as a journalist, and enjoyed working there for six years. After receiving a good offer from CNN he became a business news producer and writer. He remains at CNN as a producer on the Nancy Grace show, which covers crime and legal issues. On this show Philip has realized his dream to be on TV, as well as working behind the scenes. He visits us in Florida several times a year and we also travel to New York quite often. Though as I reach my 85th year now it becomes harder to travel, especially with the intensity of the crowds and security lines at airports in the wake of the tragic events of September 11, 2001.

I have had a very difficult life. I suffered great human losses during the war, as well after, and now my biggest desire is to see my thoughts in print. All the Nazi atrocities have to be reported again and again, so that, hopefully, nothing like this will ever happen again. Americans knew very little about these events, for a long time. But that all changed, starting in the 1970s. The horrible truth is finally being told and taught in schools, churches, synagogues, movies, newspapers, and books.

The facts are now being spoken about aloud, instead of in a whisper, in order to honor our holy victims. I have been interviewed for the Holocaust Museum in Miami, and my story is now recorded on tape, so future generations can listen to a survivor’s story. I also participated in the testimony of Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation, founded and chaired by filmmaker Steven Spielberg. His foundation and his film Schindler’s List have done much to acquaint the general public with the facts, so that future generations will never forget what so few lived to tell.

I know nothing can heal our wounds, and I continue to be upset by the way the search for the murderers was conducted, with very few apprehended and convicted. Time is running short, the victims as well the brutal culprits are all old and dying. Soon it will have to be left to God to punish the guilty beasts.

My story bears witness to the atrocities that took place during the war. I also speak with pride of the many heroic Jewish underground fighters who stood up against the oppressors, despite the terrible odds. If the local populations had made some kind of attempt to help their Jewish neighbors, a lot of lives might have been saved. Most did not help, however, and a great many innocent civilians paid with their lives.
The Talmud, which is the fundamental code of the Jewish Civil Law, says:
“He who saves one life, saves the world.”

My brother Rubin saved more than a dozen people, including me!

Before I end my story, I would like to give credit to another person who is very dear to me. In 1948, my brother David began to date Giza, and that was when I met her. After their beautiful wedding, Giza became more than just a sister-in-law to me, serving in part to replace the void left after the loss of my two sisters in the Holocaust. When I arrived in the United States, I stayed with David and Giza until I could find a place of my own. During that time she treated me like her own brother.

After they moved to Florida, Giza continued to be very active, belonging to many social organizations, and arranging lunches and meetings in her home. Then tragedy struck once more.
Giza became a different person, forgetful, easily agitated, and acting strangely. After consultation with her doctor, David was told that she is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, and the lives of that wonderful couple were changed forever.

David became his wife’s caregiver, sacrificing his time and energy to her exclusive care. Giza, a woman once so fully independent, was completely disabled. It was heartbreaking to watch her try to talk and do things for herself and mostly failing. I hope that we will be able to find some medical help and save victims of this terrible disease that robs the person of his or her mind and dignity. In September 2007 on the second day of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, Giza passed away, after fighting her illness for nearly a quarter century. She was a brave soul and I know God is now looking after her and the rest of my dear family.

For many years I could not attend religious services, reasoning that this time God did not listen to our prayers and pleas for help. When I got older my lovely wife Christiane finally talked me into joining the shul and to pray to God for the well being of my family, small in numbers, but very much beloved by me. I still believe in peoples’ humanity and hope and pray that something like this should never happen again any place in the world, and all nations should live in peace and prosperity.

This, my life story, is dedicated to my dear departed family, so brutally murdered by the Nazis, as well as to those who remain, my dear wife, Christiane, my son, Philip, my brother, David, my nieces and nephews, who were all so instrumental in completing this memoir. My great love and eternal devotion goes out to all of them.