It is incredible, but we didn't have any idea what it was! It wouldn't have occurred to anyone that there were gas chambers there, that people were being liquidated in gas chambers! That they were being shot, hanged, bludgeoned to death, yes, but gas chambers? We didn't believe it! It's a strange detail... you don't realize that what you've experienced, stays inside you. That you can't get rid of the experience. It's like when you have an unexploded bomb inside of you. Today, now I know it won't explode in me at my age, that's clear to me. Without knowing, you are inevitably marked by it.
- Tradíciók 11756
- Beszélt nyelv 3019
- Identitás 7808
- A település leírása 2440
- Oktatás, iskola 8506
- Gazdaság 8772
- Munka 11672
- Szerelem & romantika 4929
- Szabadidő/társadalmi élet 4159
- Antiszemitizmus 4822
-
Főbb események (politikai és történelmi)
4256
- örmény népirtás 2
- Doctor's Plot (1953) 178
- Soviet invasion of Poland 31
- Siege of Leningrad 86
- The Six Day War 4
- Yom Kippur War 2
- Atatürk halála 5
- Balkán háborúk (1912-1913) 35
- Első szovjet-finn háború 37
- Csehszlovákia megszállása 1938 83
- Franciaország lerohanása 9
- Molotov-Ribbentrop paktum 65
- Varlik Vergisi (vagyonadó) 36
- Első világháború (1914-1918) 216
- Spanyolnátha (1918-1920) 14
- Latvian War of Independence (1918-1920) 4
- Nagy gazdasági világválság (1929-1933) 20
- Hitler hatalmon (1933) 127
- 151 Kórház 1
- Thesszaloniki tűzvész (1917) 9
- Görög polgárháború (1946-49) 12
- Thesszaloniki Nemzetközi Vásár 5
- Bukovina Romániához csatolása (1918) 7
- Észak-Bukovina csatolása a Szovjetunióhoz (1940) 19
- Lengyelország német megszállása (1939) 94
- Kisinyevi pogrom (1903) 7
- Besszarábia romániai annexiója (1918) 25
- A magyar uralom visszatérése Erdélybe (1940-1944) 43
- Besszarábia szovjet megszállása (1940) 59
- Második bécsi diktátum 27
- Észt függetlenségi háború 3
- Varsói felkelés 2
- A balti államok szovjet megszállása (1940) 147
- Osztrák lovagi háború (1934) 9
- Anschluss (1938) 71
- A Habsburg birodalom összeomlása 3
- Dollfuß-rendszer 3
- Kivándorlás Bécsbe a második világháború előtt 36
- Kolkhoz 131
- KuK - Königlich und Kaiserlich 40
- Bányászjárás 1
- A háború utáni szövetséges megszállás 7
- Waldheim ügy 5
- Trianoni békeszerződés 12
- NEP 56
- Orosz forradalom 351
- Ukrán éhínség (Holodomor) 199
- A Nagy tisztogatás 283
- Peresztrojka 233
- 1941. június 22. 468
- Molotov rádióbeszéde 115
- Győzelem napja 147
- Sztálin halála 365
- Hruscsov beszéde a 20. kongresszuson 148
- KGB 62
- NKVD 153
- Magyarország német megszállása (1944. március 18-19.) 45
- Józef Pilsudski (1935-ig) 33
- 1956-os forradalom 84
- Prágai Tavasz (1968) 73
- 1989-es rendszerváltás 174
- Gomulka kampány (1968) 81
-
Holokauszt
9685
- Holokauszt (általánosságban) 2789
- Koncentrációs tábor / munkatábor 1235
- Tömeges lövöldözési műveletek 337
- Gettó 1183
- Halál / megsemmisítő tábor 647
- Deportálás 1063
- Kényszermunka 791
- Repülés 1410
- Rejtőzködés 594
- Ellenállás 121
- 1941-es evakuálások 866
- Novemberpogrom / Kristályéjszaka 34
- Eleutherias tér 10
- Kasztner csoport 1
- Jászvásári pogrom és a halálvonat 21
- Sammelwohnungen 9
- Strohmann rendszer 11
- Struma hajó 17
- Élet a megszállás alatt 803
- Csillagos ház 72
- Védett ház 15
- Nyilaskeresztesek ("nyilasok") 42
- Dunába lőtt zsidók 6
- Kindertranszport 26
- Schutzpass / hamis papírok 95
- Varsói gettófelkelés (1943) 24
- Varsói felkelés (1944) 23
- Segítők 521
- Igazságos nemzsidók 269
- Hazatérés 1090
- Holokauszt-kárpótlás 112
- Visszatérítés 109
- Vagyon (vagyonvesztés) 595
- Szerettek elvesztése 1724
- Trauma 1029
- Beszélgetés a történtekről 1807
- Felszabadulás 558
- Katonaság 3322
- Politika 2640
-
Kommunizmus
4468
- Élet a Szovjetunióban/kommunizmus alatt (általánosságban) 2592
- Antikommunista ellenállás általában 63
- Államosítás a kommunizmus alatt 221
- Illegális kommunista mozgalmak 98
- Szisztematikus rombolások a kommunizmus alatt 45
- Kommunista ünnepek 311
- A kommunista uralommal kapcsolatos érzések 930
- Kollektivizáció 94
- Az állami rendőrséggel kapcsolatos tapasztalatok 349
- Börtön/kényszermunka a kommunista/szocialista uralom alatt 449
- Az emberi és állampolgári jogok hiánya vagy megsértése 483
- Élet a rendszerváltás után (1989) 493
- Izrael / Palesztina 2190
- Cionizmus 847
- Zsidó szervezetek 1200
Displaying 3391 - 3420 of 50826 results
Jan Fischer
My brother Herbert disappeared in a similar way. He came to Terezin where he worked as a sewer cleaner, but he didn't stay there long. He left on a transport to the east, where he vanished without trace.
He waved his hand towards the gate and the little figure of my mom left through the open gate and got onto the freight train. That was the end. I broke down in tears. I wanted to go out of the barracks, but was stopped by the 'Ghettowache', the internal Jewish guard, and they shook me. I collapsed and started to cry hysterically and fell to the ground.
We suspected that we would be going to a worse rather than a better place, perhaps a labor camp. We didn't know anything about the reality of Auschwitz, so deportation was just an uncertain kind of threat. It was difficult for me. My conscience told me that I should go, but my mind told me that I would hardly be able to protect her. My sense of morality drove me to the transport. But I was in love, I had my civic duties in the library, and I adored the theater.
By the time my bad arm had got better, however, my plumbing days were over. I then was in charge of the youth library. I don't know where the books came from, though. They were available on loan only for people under 20. There was a hunger for education. In addition, we held lectures, which was an even more important activity. The Germans were given only the titles of individual lectures, so they didn't suspect that the lectures comprised entire series. These were intended as a substitute for school. We tried to give young people at least a basic education, as there was no school. The library was run by a council composed of people of various political persuasions, from Communists to Zionists.
I have already admitted to having had a love for the theater since childhood. In my room, on the opposite bunk to me, there was a great guy, Zdenek Jelinek [1919-1944, born in Prague, died in Auschwitz]. He was a poet and translator who also wrote his own stuff. He was a person full of humor and always in a good mood. I owe a lot of my knowledge, wisdom and observations to him. He lent me the book 'Lasky hra osudna' [Fateful Play of Love], which was written by the Capek brothers [see Capek, Josef and Capek, Karel] [12]. I was enthused, carried away, enamored. 'We have to play that!' More enthusiasts came forward, one person got hold of one thing, another came by something else, and one day we found we had a stage in the attic of an abandoned building. For lighting we had a powerful light bulb on wire. We didn't need a curtain; after all we were the avant-garde! I played the part of Scaramouche and my costume consisted of the bottom part of a gent's leotard. The costume was ready once Franta Zelenka, that wonderful person and great set designer, had painted colorful diamond shapes on my body. There are many things that I can't remember about this, but I will never forget the wonderful atmosphere. In that dark hole we suddenly had poetry; a world of fantasy filled us with joy. It was our world. The real world was an awful long way off. Someone had to keep guard at the entrance to see if the SS were about. At that time, you see, culture was still prohibited. Nothing was 'normal' - not us on the stage, nor those in the audience, not to mention the period. The theater was given a completely new dimension, one that surpassed all criteria.
Jirka and I were called on to finish off the water mains for the building. We worked from morning to night and two ovens were already working at full blast. Coffins weren't used, of course. The dead were carted in on rough boards with loose lids in three consecutive rows. The boxes were returned and only the lid was incinerated. Involuntarily, we became experts in cremating bodies. It is a terrible thing, but one can get used to anything, even dead bodies. The ones who didn't get used to it were our roommates in the barracks. They cursed us: 'You stink of dead bodies, you shits! Go and sleep somewhere else!' Yeah, we all stunk of dead bodies, but we couldn't smell it yet.
One day they lined us up in the yard. One of the SS commanders had a few words to say: 'We have found several letters that some of you put into mail boxes in the town, even though this is strictly prohibited. Those who committed this offence, take two steps forward.' They knew our names anyway. I was one of the sinners, as I had wanted to send a letter to my mom in Prague. I was about to step forward when the person standing next to me held me back. 'Don't be an idiot,' he said, 'if they know the names, let them call them out.' I thought he was right, so I didn't step out of the line. Nine lads stepped forward. 'Take them away!' Then they disappeared into the slammer. A few days later we were officially informed that those nine lads had been hanged for gross breach of orders. One of us had had to carry out the execution. It was an ambulance man from the pathology section who set about this terrible task. He thought he could get over it better, since he was used to death. He was evidently mistaken. I found him one day in a large empty room, sitting on a straw mattress, crying. It was a brutal psychological trick the Germans had played as a way of ensuring discipline. A lot of things were to happen later but this terrible execution was a singular case.
The strangest person there was Mr. M, who had been appointed by the religious community to keep order. Taking the Germans as his role model, he went around in riding breeches and jackboots, had a horsewhip, shouting and threatening. He was basically a lout and a stupid Jew. We went on normal passenger trains to Terezin, as people. Then everything got worse. We were crammed into some kind of large warehouse: mattresses on a concrete floor, tiny washbasins, dirt everywhere, and no detergents. People used whatever they had; those that had nothing had bad luck. This 'suffering' at the start of our anabasis was laughable in comparison with what was to come, but every beginning is difficult and it seemed cruel and inhuman to us. My dear cousin arranged for me to work as his assistant, and because a plumber is an exceptionally important person, we had certain advantages from the outset. It was great luck for me that I worked with him in Terezin. I had a good job where there was relative freedom.
I soon fell for his ideology. I longed to do something active. I hated fascists and Nazis from the bottom of my heart and Communists were their arch-enemies. One day I asked Mr. Weil if I could become a member of the Party. I wanted to fight.
I waited to see how people on the street would react, how they would behave when faced with this new fashion? Everyone pretended not to see you. I wasn't allowed to go in cafes, pubs, the cinema or the theater. On the tram I was only allowed to use the rear carriage, and I had to be home by nine in the evening, and so on, and so on. I moved with my mom to an even smaller apartment in Vrsovice [on the outskirts of Prague]. I slowly started to get the feeling that something had to happen soon. This was not life, it was something makeshift.
Our family's situation got increasingly worse, but I was 18, an age where there is a strong desire to live. Out of an understandable inferiority complex, I joined a boxing club. Apart from my sporty friends, I also mixed with a different sort of people with whom I frequented cafes, went on trips, went canoeing on the Vltava in summer, and so forth.
After graduating from school, I was faced with the problem of how to make a living. Before the war and during the German occupation I had done several menial jobs. I worked in a photography shop for a while, but it wasn't long before they fired me, because the boss was an ardent fascist. For a short while I sold theater programs in the Lucerna complex [famous theater and cinema complex in the centre of Prague], and then I got a job as a laborer in a workshop where they made glass frames. I worked there with my brother Herbert, who in the meantime had got married and moved into his own apartment.
However, a large proportion of the insurance company was in the hands of Germans, who took out their capital. It soon declared bankruptcy. They then took everything from us, confiscated the lot. We were stony-broke, my mom, brother and me, basically without any money at all.
In 1938 my dad's German agency was taken away from him. At the time he had debts, since German products were obviously not selling as well. As an honest businessman, he couldn't bear the fact that he had debts that he wasn't able to repay. So he committed suicide in 1938.
At the end of the 1930s Hitler took on more power and the atmosphere in Czechoslovakia was becoming tenser. Dad's business was getting worse and worse, as less people were now buying German goods. So we had to move again to a cheaper apartment, this time in Vinohrady [today a neighborhood close to the city center]. It was a small but comfortable one.
My father's German agency prospered nicely. Dad even bought a car - a Skoda [Czech brand]. It had extremely big head-lamps and looked very imposing. A chauffeur also came with the car. It was a company car and he used it during the week for his work, but on Sundays it came to Tynska Street. A chauffeur would open the doors and our family would set off on an excursion.
At one time, all documents had a religion column that had to be filled in. During the war [World War I] my parents got baptized and after I was born they had me baptized too, and that was on the 'Augsburg' denomination, which is some evangelical branch [Lutheran protestant branch].
Back to our family. We spoke German at home and Czech with the staff. I went to a German-language school, for instance. That was probably because my dad was the Czech representative of the German company, Zeiss and Zeiss Ikon Opticians.
My mother was a non-practicing Jew. Marrying a boy from a good family, my dad, released her from her misery and loneliness. I always knew that my dad married her as a poor orphan.
My dad sympathized with the social democrats. They were liberal, slightly left- leaning.
He was promoted to the rank of first lieutenant and, what's more, he became the regiment photographer. He took photos of the officers riding horses, infantrymen, of course, their wives and children, and of various celebrations.
In November 1989 I was sitting in the theater, involved in one of those ardent debates. There was speech-making, chanting, and thunderous applause. It was great. The vent had opened and clean, sharp air was starting to circulate in our country.
My children already knew what I was writing about, but not about everything, Auschwitz for example. I tended to hold that back from them. Actually, they knew everything in snippets, whereas the book describes things in detail. When you are sitting with someone and talking to them, you don't describe what a crematorium looks like. You can do that in literature. But even my book is written in quite an abridged way. I felt that if I were to elaborate any more, it would convey a completely different atmosphere from the one I wanted... I didn't want to write about what a poor wretch I am or so.
agnessa margolina
My grandmother, my father's sisters and their children and we got accommodation in the house of a local woman. She had an airbrick house [bricks made from cut straw mixed with clay and dried in the sun]. She gave us two small rooms: one for my stepmother, my grandmother, my brothers and me and another one for Sima and Beila and their children. The owner of the house gave us what she could. There was a clay floor in the house. She gave us woven rugs to put on the floor, bed sheets and some crockery. We got planks at the evacuation agency and made trestle beds, stools and a table. We didn't have any warm clothes with us. We were lucky that winters in Nukha were mild. We got jobs at the evacuation office. They asked me whether I could count. I thought they were asking about mathematics that we had studied at school and said that I could. I was sent to work at the accounting office of the local silk factory. Their employee - a man - received a call-up from a military registry office. He was allowed to train a replacement at work for two months before going to the front. I had to work and learn simultaneously. Of course, I made mistakes since I had never dealt with accounting before, but I grasped things quickly and two months later I became chief accountant.
We didn't observe any Jewish traditions in evacuation. We didn't celebrate any Jewish holidays and following the kashrut was out of the question considering the circumstances. We ate what we could get. We didn't celebrate Soviet holidays either.
In August 1944 we heard that Soviet troops had liberated Kiev. We decided to go home. We didn't have money to buy tickets. We traveled on the roof of a carriage. There were seven of us: my brothers and I and Beila with three children.
When we arrived Kiev we stayed at the railway station overnight. Our house was ruined. In the morning I told my brothers to go to medical school. They wanted to become doctors, but since they only had lower secondary education they couldn't enter Medical College. My brothers met with Ivan Pevtsov, the deputy director of the school. They were admitted without exams. They returned and told me to go see Pevtsov as well. He asked me what I could do. When he heard that I had worked as an accountant he offered me a job at his accounting office.
Israel finished the academy in February 1945. We got married a few days before he graduated. We just had a civil ceremony in a registry office. My husband got a job assignment as a military doctor in a division in Budapest. He left. I couldn't follow him since my brothers hadn't finished school and I didn't want to leave them. My older brother, Boris, was rather sickly after evacuation. I stayed with my brothers. My husband came to see me about twice a year. My brothers finished school in May 1946 and received their [mandatory] job assignments 23 in Uzhgorod, where they were to work as assistant doctors. My brothers left there. They got accommodation in a room in a hostel.
Uzhgorod is a very beautiful town: it's clean and nice. There are beautiful houses in town. People in Uzhgorod are nice and friendly. There was a Hungarian, Ukrainian, Czech and Jewish population in Uzhgorod. The Jewish population was numerous. People were tolerant and friendly. There was a synagogue and a Jewish school. Neither my brothers nor I were religious. It was the way we were raised, but I liked it when religious people could go to the synagogue freely and celebrate Jewish holidays openly without hiding like my father had to.