He said that this would be the best place for him to hide. Sturza wasn't allowed to repair civilians' cars, only German army, police and Gestapo ones. He wasn't allowed to even change a light bulb in a civilian car; everything was designated for the army. So my brother got a pair of coveralls. Mr. Sturza claimed that my brother was his best apprentice, and that they didn't have to ask him to anything twice. When they'd bring in a car for repairs, the hood had to be opened and they'd lay a blanket under the car, because the mechanic worked underneath the car. It wasn't like today, with all those machines. And then, when it was fixed, he went with them for a test drive, they had to test it out. That's how he survived.
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Major events (political and historical)
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Holocaust
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Displaying 40501 - 40530 of 50826 results
Antonie Militka
In Prague the Red Cross caught us. They checked us thoroughly, as to whether we were healthy, whether we didn't have lice and scabies. They took everyone to the station at Masaryk [Train] Station. They didn't let anyone go, there was a whole army of them. It was something amazing, they were holding us out of fear that we were coming from the camp and were bringing epidemics and dirt with us. They held us for only a few hours. After the checkup we were allowed to get on the train again. The train traveled for a long, very long time.
When the Russians arrived in their tanks in the morning, they futilely called out to us. We were afraid to come out. Only when people we knew arrived, and said that they were Russians, did we come out. We knew that soldiers had arrived, cars and tanks, but we still didn't believe that the war was over, and that they were Russians.
At first I worked on the ramparts. It was soil that hadn't been tilled since the times of Maria Theresa. First we had to weed out deep grass roots, and carry the weeds down on stretchers. I think the ramparts were about one story high, with roads on them. Later the roads disappeared, because compost was carried up onto them, into which plants were planted. Almost everything went to Gestapo families, and some of it also went into the ghetto kitchens. You also knew how to steal something from there. It was dangerous, but of course we took something, and something was also issued to us. Mainly during harvest time, then we'd eat our fill. We'd carry it home, and for example exchange it with old people for bread, as that was in short supply. Every fourth day we got 1.5 kg of bread for two of us for four days. We drew lines on the bread. We had two small slices per day, morning and evening. Every second day was only soup, one day there was only coffee. One slice – that wasn't enough.
They notified him that he had to go into internment. They put him on a transport to the Postelberg labor camp, or Postoloprty in Czech. There he lost his legs. It was a labor camp for men that had Jewish wives. The camp was close to a German airport, where mostly prisoners worked. They worked two shifts. In March 1945, they were leaving after the night shift in the dark and in a blizzard, where you couldn't see a thing. The Allies were bombing airports, and the prisoners were repairing them. They worked through the day but also into the night, and would then go home. The roads weren't safe, because it was dark and you couldn't see. They walked close to some railroad tracks. Trains would pass by the airport, transporting everything that they needed. The prisoners were returning along the tracks, and a freight train was passing by, being pushed by a locomotive. There was a wagon in the front, and you couldn't hear or see the train. The prisoners were walking in single file along the tracks to the camp. One was calling to the next, look out, a train. My father was in front, they called to him: "Look out, a train!" My father heard something, and so jumped aside. But apparently he tripped, because among the large rails there were also small rails, for wagons for material. He tripped on these tracks, and then it hit him. His body fell alongside the tracks, and his legs stayed there. The train ran over both of them. This happened in March 1944.
They took Mother to Prague. She was jailed there for 6 months, guarded by the Gestapo. Then in February 1945 they transported the prisoners to Terezin, where I once again after a long time saw my mother. She worked in Terezin as well. We waited there for the end of the war.
They summoned me to the transport of 7th April 1944. People designated for the transport were gathering by the Veletrzni Palac [Trade Fair Palace]. From there people went to Terezin, or elsewhere.
When we left Maccabi, we had a house and garden. We had had to demolish the house and raze it during the war. In 1943 the Gestapo simply ordered us to raze our house within 14 days. My father called the neighbors to take it apart, some things also got buried. Unfortunately, he injured himself seriously during the demolition. He was on the roof, which he wanted to take apart. He was of course not an expert in this. Underneath the roof he also had taken something apart, so he flew through the roof and kitchen. On top of that, the cellar was open, and so he also fell down into the cellar, where he fell on his thigh. They had to operate on him.
Several times the Gestapo called my father in for interrogation. Luckily he always returned. It was a very dangerous time. The persecution was very hard, but even despite that we hoped that we'd see the end of the war, but it kept lasting and getting worse for us Jews.
Another thing happened to my brother and I when I was 12 and he was 8. Jews weren't allowed to go to parks and to walk in certain streets. Everything was forbidden for us. Even in the streetcar, we had to stand in a certain wagon. Life was so limited that all our parents would say was don't go anywhere, all you'll do is cause us trouble. They always watched over us. Despite the prohibitions, once on Sunday we went out for a bit. There was a movie for children being shown at the exhibition grounds. We didn't tell our parents where we were going. Each of us got 5 crowns in pocket money for when we went to see some other children. We went to the movie, I think they were showing Laurel and Hardy. We decided to go even despite the fact that there was: "No entry allowed to the cinema for Jews!" We bought tickets, they cost a crown, and sat down amongst the children and waited. The lights went out, and right then before the film began, one lady stood up and shouted: "Turn on the lights, there are Jewish children here!" They turned on the lights and asked her where they were. She pointed at us, and so they led us out of the theater. The usher didn't do anything, he just politely led us out and said: "Don't come here, so you don't have problems like today, and your parents too." So we learned a lesson. Some time later, someone told our mother about our adventure. She asked me why I hadn't told her about it. My answer was that I didn't want her to be upset.
There were mutual visits and relationships. Before the war I didn't feel any anti-Semitism, that wasn't until during the war. Back then, some sympathizers alas wanted to gain the favor of the Germans, which is why they behaved very unpleasantly toward us. On the other hand, there were also those that risked and helped Jews. They helped our family too.
I just never understood why they called Israel an aggressor, when it was the Arabs that attacked.
I've been in Israel countless many times. I liked everything, especially the people, their character.
I've been in Israel countless many times. I liked everything, especially the people, their character.
When the state of Israel was created, we were happy, that those people would finally have a home. When a person has a home, he becomes stronger. I always admired people that set out into the unknown. Even Karlicek, when he left, said that for him it would be enough to get something to eat and to have a place to sleep. I felt very proud at the time.
The worst thing about Communism was that people weren't free. Everyone was monitored. You couldn't travel freely. There was constant harassment by the authorities. Once, I traveled illegally to Israel without my passport – you see, you could persuade the customs people to not stamp your passport. The way we did it was that I went to Frankfurt to visit a girlfriend, and from there secretly to Israel. Upon my return, the StB [20] was waiting for me. Someone had seen me at the airport in Frankfurt. I told them, that's possible, my friend took me to see so many places, it seems to me that we'd passed a couple of airports. I don't know Frankfurt, how should I know that it's an airport? After a few hours of interrogation and intimidation, they finally released me, because they realized that they wouldn't get any further with me. It was quite unpleasant, because they kept using phrases like "we'll prove it", "we know everything about you." and so on.
Karlicek managed to get permission to come to our mother's funeral, but alas when it came to our father's, he wasn't successful. He wanted to arrange permission in Israel, but they [the Czech Communist government] wouldn't give it to him. He also tried it through the Swedish embassy, he even got to Vienna, but no further. He had to fly back to Sweden. Because of him, we postponed the funeral by ten days. Back then the times were such that they didn't allow siblings to see each other, for a son to come for his own father's funeral. They didn't respect people at all.
My son has a positive relationship with Judaism. When he was little, he used to go to the synagogue with me. We observed holidays, and didn't eat what was forbidden. For Passover we'd make food from matzot. Even to this day, I make stuffed fish, which I like very much, and bake barches, roast meat. Because my husband wasn't a Jew, I tried to prepare their holidays for him. We used to observe those too.
After the war, I at first helped my father run the newsstand. Later I worked at a machine works, where I stayed for 20 years. They put me into the computing center. We put together production reports for the finance department. We put together calculations for the accounting department for parts production, for which we issued salaries for workers and experts. I did that for 20 years. Technology advanced during that time. I liked this work, on the whole. After some time, I switched jobs and went to the computing center of a railway construction firm, where I was manager for four years. Sixteen girls worked there. We worked for all of Moravia. The head office was in Bratislava. From there I retired.
My husband worked in construction, and worked in various jobs. After he moved to our place in Brno after the wedding, also completed hotel school. He worked in a student cafeteria and in various recreational facilities. That was all fine. But a crisis took place in our lives. His social life took on an unfortunate direction. In his youth he did various sports, after the wedding he participated in sports only passively, and liked very much to attend games and various contests. Unfortunately, this hobby caused him to be more interested in it that than the everyday life of his family – his wife and son [Ladislav Militky, familiarly Ladicek – Editor's note]. So the spent less and less time with his family – later women that wanted him also came along. In the end we got divorced, because he literally abandoned his family.
We couldn't get our house back, as we'd lost it. We'd had to raze it. After the war, we returned to our pitiful apartment. My mother immediately began looking for someplace for us to move into. Someone told us that in the building just around the corner, on the ground floor, there was a vacant three-room apartment that had been abandoned by a family that had left for Germany. So we went to the National Committee, which of course immediately issued it to us. We were also given another option, but my father had that wheelchair, so we could only live on the ground floor. So we began living again, began working, and were happy.
Vera Erak
I finished the 6th grade of gymnasium. In September 1943, I joined the Partisans in the Second Southern Moravian Unit, which on February 4, 1944 became the famous 7th Serbian Fighting Brigade. (The Seventh Serbian Fighting Brigade was famous because its fighters participated in battles from Djerdap to Belgrade. The brigade was among the first to reach Belgrade and its fighters devotedly fought for liberation.) On the 15th of October, 1945, my brigade liberated Pozerevac. We remained there five days, then merged with the 23rd division and went to liberate Belgrade. After almost four years, on October 23 1945 at 5:00 PM I set foot in my liberated Zemun.
Every day my mother and I had to go to register at the Kulturbund. The Kulturbund was the German Cultural Federation and was backed by the SS. They were very strict. We had to go regardless of the weather conditions, and we waited if necessary through the hardest of rain storms so that we could sign in. I remember that Rudikka Teibl and Albrecht controlled us. Rudikka Teibl , whose father was the owner of a big hotel in Zemun, and Albrecht, whose father had a well-known furniture store, were members of the Kulturbund. They were both only about 20 years old, but they were famous for their brutality. They greatly mistreated the Jews of Zemun, who had to come to register at the Kulturbund everyday. Rudikka and Albrecht wore red suits and armbands with swastikas. We wore a yellow arm band with a star of David on our arm. We stayed in Zemun until August 1941, until the moment that we heard that the border with Croatia would be closed. We knew that they intended to collect all the Jews, and that is why we moved to Belgrade. In Belgrade we registered in the Commissariat for Refugees. To hide my mother’s Jewish name Edith, my father registered her under the name Zorka Erak. After two days we went by convoy to Pozarevac. The Commissariat for Refugees lodged in the Hotel Balkan, and then with Mrs. Agica Jankovic. We lived with Mrs. Jankovic free for some months and she treated us very correctly. She was not a Jew, but she treated us as if we were her family. Not wanting to be too much of a burden on her, we rented a small room.
Already in 1938, intolerance towards Serbs and Jews had begun in Croatia. On one occasion the windows on my father’s store were broken. My family was no longer able to survive in Dubrovnik and we accepted an invitation from my mother’s distant cousin Josef Kronstein who lived in Novi Sad and owned three movie theatres named “Apolo,” “Odeon,” and “Rojal.” We moved to Novi Sad in 1939 and my father accepted an offer to run the Rojal movie theater. I enrolled in the second grade of the gymnasium. I had a lot of Jewish friends. Lia Stark, Egon Stark, and Vera Schlosberger were my best friends. Vera Schlosberger survived the war and became a famous pianist in Yugoslavia. Egon Stark was president of the Jewish community of Novi Sad until not long ago. He held that position continuously for almost 10 years.
My parents regularly went to synagogue. We observed all the holidays. I remember that the Jewish community and the synagogue were well attended. The rabbi, who was also the ritual slaughterer, came from Trebinja. The president of the Jewish community was a prominent merchant called Tolentino (editor’s note: the last native Sephardi Jewish family in Dubrovnik, survived into the 1930s. Their house was actually attached to the synagogue, and they entered by a secret door. Their father was the city’s last rabbi, appointed in the early part of the century. His three children, one daughter and two sons, never married, and ran the synagogue service each Friday night and Saturday morning until they died).
My mother, Edith, was the third child, born in 1903. She went to a Jewish elementary school, and after that she attended a school for girls. She played handball. She went to a boarding school in Vienna in 1915, where she studied music and painting for a year. In Vienna she learned of the death of her father Markus, and she came back to Zemun in 1916. After the death of her mother, Minna, she went with her sister, Greta, to her uncle Weiss in Vrpolje. The two of them helped him in his law offices and his mill. She stayed in Vrpolje until 1925, when Ilija Erak came to her uncle’s to ask for her hand in marriage.
,
Before WW2
See text in interview
We did not keep kosher, but we celebrated all Jewish holidays. Mother regularly went to synagogue, and when I grew up a bit she regularly took me with her. My father, even though he was not a Jew, respected my mother’s desire to observe the Jewish regulations, and to raise me in that spirit.
Even though I was a single parent, with the help of my parents, I managed to educate the children. Branislav attended a two-year electrical college and Vesna a two-year medical college.
My father Ilija worked as the head of Izgradnja’s Warehouse, and in 1967 he died of a heart attack. My mother worked for a short time as a clerk and then dedicated herself to the home. She died in 1983.
After the war I helped to rebuild the Zemun Jewish community. Its first president was Albert Weiss. Working together, we gathered information concerning the Jews from Zemun who did not return from Jasenovac, and that list was given to the curator of Jasenovac. After that, Albert Weiss went to Nuremberg as the representative for Yugoslavia on the prosecuting committee.
Aleksandar Frank became president of the Jewish community, and he maintained this position for a long time. The Jewish community entirely revived itself and my children went with the other Jewish youth every summer to Hvar, Korcula, etc. In 1990 I organized the women’s section in the Jewish community, and I am still the president of that section. In 1995 I helped to establish the youth section.
Parallel to my work in the Jewish community of Zemun, I also work actively at the Red Cross. I am the recipient of many awards for my humanitarian work.
My father Ilija worked as the head of Izgradnja’s Warehouse, and in 1967 he died of a heart attack. My mother worked for a short time as a clerk and then dedicated herself to the home. She died in 1983.
After the war I helped to rebuild the Zemun Jewish community. Its first president was Albert Weiss. Working together, we gathered information concerning the Jews from Zemun who did not return from Jasenovac, and that list was given to the curator of Jasenovac. After that, Albert Weiss went to Nuremberg as the representative for Yugoslavia on the prosecuting committee.
Aleksandar Frank became president of the Jewish community, and he maintained this position for a long time. The Jewish community entirely revived itself and my children went with the other Jewish youth every summer to Hvar, Korcula, etc. In 1990 I organized the women’s section in the Jewish community, and I am still the president of that section. In 1995 I helped to establish the youth section.
Parallel to my work in the Jewish community of Zemun, I also work actively at the Red Cross. I am the recipient of many awards for my humanitarian work.
Serbia
After graduation in 1946, I became employed in the military firm Planum. There I met my future husband, Pavle Ruman, and we got married in August 1946. I enrolled in the journalism/diplomacy school. I kept my own last name so that I would not have to change all my documents from Erak to Ruman. At that time you could do this at the time of marriage. We lived in the house of my paternal uncle, Milorad Jovanovic’s, who moved to Novi Sad.
Our son Branislav was born in 1947. He used his father’s name, Ruman, until he became an adult, and afterwards to fulfill my father’s wish he took the last name Erak, because my father did not have a son to inherit his name. In 1951 we had a daughter, Vesna. We had a good marriage, which ended in the tragic death of my husband in March 1952. In the firm where he worked he was hit by a broken high voltage cable and was killed instantly.
After the firm Planum I began working at the Military Post 44/45 as a personal referent. I did not manage to finish the journalism/diplomacy school. I transferred to work in the municipal government of Zemun and in the meantime I had three heart attacks and four bypasses. I retired in 1981 with 39 full years of work experience. They also recognized my three years and nine months of fighting experience.
Our son Branislav was born in 1947. He used his father’s name, Ruman, until he became an adult, and afterwards to fulfill my father’s wish he took the last name Erak, because my father did not have a son to inherit his name. In 1951 we had a daughter, Vesna. We had a good marriage, which ended in the tragic death of my husband in March 1952. In the firm where he worked he was hit by a broken high voltage cable and was killed instantly.
After the firm Planum I began working at the Military Post 44/45 as a personal referent. I did not manage to finish the journalism/diplomacy school. I transferred to work in the municipal government of Zemun and in the meantime I had three heart attacks and four bypasses. I retired in 1981 with 39 full years of work experience. They also recognized my three years and nine months of fighting experience.
Serbia
I did not have any contact with my parents until the liberation of Pozarevac. All the war, my mother hid herself, almost never leaving the house. The neighboring villagers helped her and my father, sometime giving them a kilogram of flour or a little meat. After the liberation of Zemun, I rented a small truck and went to get my parents. We took the few things we had and moved to Zemun to the small apartment we were given. After demobilization I finished my schooling.
Serbia
Isak Avram Levi
I was the only Jew in Vratsa’s high school and I had many good friends among the Bulgarians. Yet, there were several anti-Semites, who had come from other towns and they assaulted me, beat me and bothered me. The whole town used to gather in the central square and those anti-Semites used to threaten me there also, yet my friends shielded me from both sides and even walked me home.
In Vratsa my father began to perform all rituals during the holidays. Actually, my father never cut his hair, never shaved and always had a little beard, just like his brothers as well as his friends. My father visited the synagogue so regularly that he also attended courses for slaughtering in order to be a shochet, too. In Vratsa my father was very good at his job. He made friends with all Christian priests, too.
My father used to check the knife’s sharpness by passing a nail over its edge, no roughness had to be felt. Usually the knife’s edge for birds was around a span long, while for bigger animals it was longer.
In Vratsa I used to help my father by preparing the stamp put on the animal in order to mark it as being kosher. I used to take a rubber and hollow a few millimeters out in it with a little knife, so that the three letters in Ivrit, which mean ‘kosher’ [kaf, shin and resh], would stay protruding. The letters had to be written backwards in order to be printed correctly. This rubber is dipped in an ink-soaked inkpad. When the Jews came to the slaughtering house, they wanted to see if the meat had such a stamp and only then they bought it.
In Vratsa my father began to perform all rituals during the holidays. Actually, my father never cut his hair, never shaved and always had a little beard, just like his brothers as well as his friends. My father visited the synagogue so regularly that he also attended courses for slaughtering in order to be a shochet, too. In Vratsa my father was very good at his job. He made friends with all Christian priests, too.
My father used to check the knife’s sharpness by passing a nail over its edge, no roughness had to be felt. Usually the knife’s edge for birds was around a span long, while for bigger animals it was longer.
In Vratsa I used to help my father by preparing the stamp put on the animal in order to mark it as being kosher. I used to take a rubber and hollow a few millimeters out in it with a little knife, so that the three letters in Ivrit, which mean ‘kosher’ [kaf, shin and resh], would stay protruding. The letters had to be written backwards in order to be printed correctly. This rubber is dipped in an ink-soaked inkpad. When the Jews came to the slaughtering house, they wanted to see if the meat had such a stamp and only then they bought it.
Bulgaria
I was born in 1914, and in 1915 the war started [cf. Bulgaria in World War I] [5], which lasted until 1918, and I remember that we lived on the ground floor of the house, while some officers used to live upstairs. We had a fountain inside the house linked to the town’s water-main.
For a certain period of time maids from the [neighboring] villages used to help my mother with the housework. They were treated in a very good manner. My father even used to help them a lot, especially with their weddings when they got married.
I used to study in Gorna Dzhumaya till the fourth grade, the first and second class at the Bulgarian junior high school, and then we moved to Vratsa.
In the 1920s my father’s business started declining because after 1918 the country’s territory was re-allotted. Bulgaria lost lots of territories, which were annexed to the territories of Yugoslavia and Greece. The clientele withdrew and my father decided to change his subsistence.
Therefore he decided that we move to Vratsa where he applied to become a rabbi. At that time my mother was pregnant with Yosif – that happened in September 1925. Local people there had to find a home for us. They found us lodging in a basement, and in this basement Yosif was born.
In a year we moved to some sheds where there used to be a church beforehand. And there we lived – all in all, we spent eight years in Vratsa. There I studied in the high school, like all my brothers did. Yosif studied only in the first grade.
Generally there weren’t any anti-Semitic movements at that time. Only two times synagogues were burned – in 1910 in Vratsa and in 1903 in Lom. It was done in most of the cases by strangers [people from other villages], who were later isolated by the local people and chased away in the end.
For a certain period of time maids from the [neighboring] villages used to help my mother with the housework. They were treated in a very good manner. My father even used to help them a lot, especially with their weddings when they got married.
I used to study in Gorna Dzhumaya till the fourth grade, the first and second class at the Bulgarian junior high school, and then we moved to Vratsa.
In the 1920s my father’s business started declining because after 1918 the country’s territory was re-allotted. Bulgaria lost lots of territories, which were annexed to the territories of Yugoslavia and Greece. The clientele withdrew and my father decided to change his subsistence.
Therefore he decided that we move to Vratsa where he applied to become a rabbi. At that time my mother was pregnant with Yosif – that happened in September 1925. Local people there had to find a home for us. They found us lodging in a basement, and in this basement Yosif was born.
In a year we moved to some sheds where there used to be a church beforehand. And there we lived – all in all, we spent eight years in Vratsa. There I studied in the high school, like all my brothers did. Yosif studied only in the first grade.
Generally there weren’t any anti-Semitic movements at that time. Only two times synagogues were burned – in 1910 in Vratsa and in 1903 in Lom. It was done in most of the cases by strangers [people from other villages], who were later isolated by the local people and chased away in the end.
Bulgaria