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When the Horthy Proclamation 11 came out, the Arrow Cross government takeover, then everybody got scared, and my mom said we couldn't stay there any longer. Then she thought of the old man, Tomasek, the miner, and she went over to Vertesszolos, and then came the family. He was the third person to hide us, but the first who didn't know we were Jews. It's possible he knew, but he took us in, anyway. We stayed there until December 13th. My father couldn't do much there either, but the two women, grandma and mother again, and I, just started knitting. We knitted socks, and warm gloves. And we lived from that. I remember, one December day, probably the 13th, there was a sudden deluge of Arrow Cross, saying they were looking for Sandor Acs who goes by the name of Ferenc Veres, and Mrs. Sandor Acs, who goes by Mrs. Ferenc Veres, and Mariann Acs, who goes by Ilonka Veres. From that we knew they had come out because someone had turned us in. Our suspicion is that that certain Mrs. Zoltan Kiss, who lived in the house, had a brother who was Arrow Cross. They found us from his report. The problem had been that Mrs. Kiss knew where we were. Sometime somebody, either Ilonka or Bela, had told her. One of them could have accidentally given themselves away, and that's how Mrs. Kiss's brother moved into our flat. He probably wanted to make off with the whole thing, so he reported us.
That's how the Arrow Cross took us away in December of 1944 from Vertesszolos, from the Tomasek family, poor people who suffered for it too, because they were beaten badly, his wife as well. They even took him to Komarom, to the Csillag Fort. We stayed a night there in Vertesszolos, then they turned us over to three Hungarian constables 12. The three constables took us from Vertesszolos to Tata- a 5 km trip - on foot. My mother tried to convince them to let us go. It was very near the end of the war. She would testify, if they get in trouble, that they had let us go, let us escape. But no, they took us to Tata. It was either a constabulary or a military center, I don't know exactly, and a short time later, to the Komarom Csillag Fort. We were there for about eight days. My mother had a map which marked where the front was, that's how they knew where the Russians were, and how the Americans were coming across Sicily. I remember the scene, there in the jail, a lot of women, we could already hear the cannons, from above, and we hoped we might just make it. But we didn't.
They put us in train cars in Komarom and took us to Ravensbruck. My father was taken by another train, we can only guess that he went straight to Dachau, but maybe from Dachau he ended up in Auschwitz. The two trains went parallel. After a long freight train ride, we arrived in the village of Furstenberg on December 24th, where there was a concentration camp, Ravensbruck. They took us in to the camp when we arrived, we had a night of freedom, we slept on the ground. The next morning they took away every last little trinket we had. After a cold shower, we had to remove all our clothes, we got a kind of rag in place of them, and they took us to Barrack 31. We were there for two months. Every day, there were constant appeals for mercy, it was very difficult to bear, it was very cold. It's close to the Baltic Sea. My mother got very sick, either with kidney stones or cancer. A prisoner doctor examined her, talked to her. My seventy-five-year- old grandmother was in better condition. They sometimes took me out of the camp to do all kinds of nasty work, sometimes they didn't. When I could, I tried to conserve energy so I'd stay strong, it was frightening.
That's how the Arrow Cross took us away in December of 1944 from Vertesszolos, from the Tomasek family, poor people who suffered for it too, because they were beaten badly, his wife as well. They even took him to Komarom, to the Csillag Fort. We stayed a night there in Vertesszolos, then they turned us over to three Hungarian constables 12. The three constables took us from Vertesszolos to Tata- a 5 km trip - on foot. My mother tried to convince them to let us go. It was very near the end of the war. She would testify, if they get in trouble, that they had let us go, let us escape. But no, they took us to Tata. It was either a constabulary or a military center, I don't know exactly, and a short time later, to the Komarom Csillag Fort. We were there for about eight days. My mother had a map which marked where the front was, that's how they knew where the Russians were, and how the Americans were coming across Sicily. I remember the scene, there in the jail, a lot of women, we could already hear the cannons, from above, and we hoped we might just make it. But we didn't.
They put us in train cars in Komarom and took us to Ravensbruck. My father was taken by another train, we can only guess that he went straight to Dachau, but maybe from Dachau he ended up in Auschwitz. The two trains went parallel. After a long freight train ride, we arrived in the village of Furstenberg on December 24th, where there was a concentration camp, Ravensbruck. They took us in to the camp when we arrived, we had a night of freedom, we slept on the ground. The next morning they took away every last little trinket we had. After a cold shower, we had to remove all our clothes, we got a kind of rag in place of them, and they took us to Barrack 31. We were there for two months. Every day, there were constant appeals for mercy, it was very difficult to bear, it was very cold. It's close to the Baltic Sea. My mother got very sick, either with kidney stones or cancer. A prisoner doctor examined her, talked to her. My seventy-five-year- old grandmother was in better condition. They sometimes took me out of the camp to do all kinds of nasty work, sometimes they didn't. When I could, I tried to conserve energy so I'd stay strong, it was frightening.
Period
Year
1944
Location
Hungary
Interview
mariann szamosi