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It was then that the deportations and liquidation of the Izbica ghetto took place [4th November, 1942]. Everyone ran for their lives. There was a grove in the middle of a clearing, and we ran there, Grandma Blima, Father's mother, was with us but she was an elderly woman - she simply couldn't run anymore. It was a meadow where cattle used to graze. There was a cabin of sorts, a shelter for the herdsmen, the size of a privy. And Father put his mother in there. He still didn't believe it was the liquidation of the ghetto, he thought we'll take her with us on our way back. Father went one way, and Mother, Grandma Rajzla, and I went the other.
At night we heard a train arriving at the station to take the people to Belzec; it turned out the transport headed to Sobibor [35], not Belzec. All the Jews from Zamosc had been killed in Belzec, and the last transport went to Sobibor. And so we went back to Izbica the following morning, still not knowing if it was a liquidation. We saw a couple of Jewish policemen hanging around, some other people, not a German in sight. We got in the building we lived in and saw Father in tears, because he went to take Grandma back and saw somebody had shot her.
At night we heard a train arriving at the station to take the people to Belzec; it turned out the transport headed to Sobibor [35], not Belzec. All the Jews from Zamosc had been killed in Belzec, and the last transport went to Sobibor. And so we went back to Izbica the following morning, still not knowing if it was a liquidation. We saw a couple of Jewish policemen hanging around, some other people, not a German in sight. We got in the building we lived in and saw Father in tears, because he went to take Grandma back and saw somebody had shot her.
Period
Location
Sobibor
Poland
Interview
henryk lewandowski
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