Tag #120798 - Interview #100343 (Meer Kuyavskis)

In early August 1944 we were put in the carriages and taken to the west. We did not know exactly where we were heading. The only thing we knew that ghetto was evacuated to work in Germany. Germans assured us that we were going to work in Germany and our plants and factories would be evacuated along with us. It was really warm and stuffy in the cars. There was no water, we had to relieve ourselves straight in the corner of the cars. The Germans who were escorting us gave bread to those who was hungry. We took the bread but could not eat it in such a heat. We could not wait to see the end of this trip. Mother had been constantly praying, asking God for us. In several days the car stopped, the door opened and they ousted us from the car. There were policemen in two lines outside. All of them were armed with clubs. They had us walk towards the columns of the policemen beating us black and blue. Some people fell failing to reach the columns of the policemen. In couple of minutes we had such an ardent pain, that we stopped thinking of our future. I supposed we even were not looking like human beings. Those who passed through the column of policemen were lined up in two columns- men and women separately and started sorting. Young and relatively healthy people were put in one column and elderly, sick and ‘unwanted’ people were lined up in another column. The only thing mother managed to cry out was: «Children, stay together. I am so lean!» My poor mother got right away that they were to face death. Those were the last words of my mother. Only 300 people (including me and my brother) out of 5 thousand of those who arrived in Auschwitz, were taken to the camp. We saw mother and other people getting on special trucks. They were burnt in crematorium the same day.