I don’t know what happened with our parents’ apartment. We were accommodated in a hotel for repatriates. Since my sister and I wanted to live alone, we were looking for an apartment. Nobody opened the door to us, though, and our feet started to hurt and were completely swollen from all that walking.
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Displaying 43651 - 43680 of 50826 results
Zuzana Wachtlova
On our way out, we used to see a board with the inscription ‘Trautenau 40 km,’ or in Czech: ‘Trutnov 40 km.’ We said to ourselves that if we survive, we would go home on foot. This wish actually came true. We were extremely lucky we didn’t have to take part in the death march [27]. Heavy battles near Vratislav lasted for a long time. We could hear the cannons.
During this service, we worked outside when bricks or coal arrived. The factory head assigned a job in the heating plant to me and one other young girl. This work was extremely hard; we had to rake over smoldering coal with iron bars. Once we had to chop the coal in freezing weather and transport it from the yard to the heating room. I dared to tell the ‘Leiter’ [German for ‘leader‘], that it was awfully hard work for women. He immediately asked for my number. I was terribly scared that he would send me to the concentration camp. I don’t know why but I stayed.
This way my sister and I ended up in a transport that went to Merzdorf. We had to hurry to the train station late at night and had to do everything ‘schnell, schnell’ [German for ‘quickly, quickly’].
In Auschwitz, all our clothes were taken away, we received some shabby togs and had to take a shower. We had absolutely no idea that gas chambers exist. The other people were also told that they were going to the shower and they actually ended up in the gas. We spent the nights in a thousand-block [a block in which 1000 prisoners were accommodated]. We stayed there for probably ten to twelve days but we gradually lost track of time. Metaphorically speaking, we held each other’s hands, my sister and I, so that nobody could separate us.
We arrived in Auschwitz on 8th October 1944. On the ramp, my sister and I were separated from my parents and that was the last time I saw them.
My sister’s husband was deported to Auschwitz in a transport before us, in October 1944, we never heard of him again.
In June or July 1942, the original inhabitants were forced to leave the town due to a rather high number of transports arriving in Terezin. Some time before World War II, I took a course on small babies care. Owing to this, I started working in a children’s house in the ghetto. Mothers relied on us and believed we would take good care of their babies and treat them properly. It was a rather sad job because children that were born at home and brought up in a family had great difficulties with getting used to the conditions in the ghetto. Children already born in the ghetto got accustomed to this way of life easier because they never knew anything better. Many children died.
Together with my parents, I was taken in the first transport to the ghetto in Terezin on 2nd December 1941.
The janitor hid my suitcase with bed sheets and she returned it to me after the war. All our furniture and Persian carpets that my father liked to buy remained in our apartment though. We didn’t want to endanger any people by storing our property in their places. They could have been persecuted for it, even pay the highest price for it. We could easily live without those Persian carpets but we wouldn’t be able to live with pangs of remorse.
We, youngsters, managed to put up with these regulations, we at least used to go swimming together until it was possible and we used to visit each other. The restrictions applied also to public transportation. We couldn’t sit in the trams, we had to stand on the front platform. Once I traveled like this and the guide told me to take a seat since there were places vacant. Since I had blue eyes and blond hair, I probably didn’t look Jewish at first sight. He couldn’t believe that both my parents were Jewish. I obviously explained this to the guide and remained standing for the rest of my trip. At the beginning of the 1940s, the Jews had to wear a yellow star [26] on a visible place. My parents received the fabric and sewed the stars themselves. None of us dared to object to the directive because we could have had great problems for it. Some Jews were taken to the concentration camps right away.
My parents counted on the necessity of emigrating and they therefore immediately applied for Panama visas that were obviously later annulled. My father attempted to get us abroad, he wrote letters and sent parcels to various people. Unfortunately, nothing helped and we all ended up in a transport.
Marta emigrated together with her husband and settled in Herzlia, a small town close to Tel Aviv. Ervin continued in his business with fountain pens and pencils. They had two children together – Hana and Gideon. My sister didn’t work; she took care of the children.
After passing the final exams, we got a tailor’s apprentice certificate. Afterwards, I spent a year as tailor’s apprentice in one department house that had a tailor’s workshop on the top floor. Its recent name is Petrof. After passing the qualification exams I became a professional tailor.
I started to attend a public school in Brno in 1926. All subjects were taught in German at this school. The school was located at the corner of the street where the conservatoire is today [Avenue of Captain Jaros]. I had several Jewish classmates. The Jewish children didn’t have to take part in the Catholic religion classes. Instead of that, we, the Jewish kids, had Jewish religion classes in the afternoon. After the public school, I continued my studies at the secondary grammar school. After four years, I successfully completed my studies and enrolled in Vesna, that is, a school where women’s occupations were taught.
Our parents would sometimes take us to the cinema and theater. From time to time, we went to a cafe where my parents met their acquaintances.
The fellowship also organized various lectures and cultural events. The members used to meet on a kind of regular basis, approximately every other Saturday or once a month. My parents would usually go there for about two-three hours in the evening. They also took part in balls and dance parties that were organized by the Jewish Women Association in Brno and other Jewish organizations.
Before World War II, my father voted for the Social Democratic Party. In those days people used to say that almost all Jews in Brno were social democrats.
He then handed over the money that he collected to the Brno Jewish Community. He himself didn’t serve in any position in the Jewish Community simply because he didn’t have any time for it due to his business trips.
Generally speaking, we considered ourselves Zionists [13]. A blue-and-white box bearing a map of Palestine and the inscription KKL [14] was hanging on the wall of our apartment. This inscription stood for a Jewish fund for purchase of land in Palestine. When my sister and I became members of the Jewish Youth Movement, we received a small portable moneybox made of paper. It had a slit on the top and a canvas hanging underneath. Everybody could make a donation for KKL into this box.
We also celebrated Sukkot but we never built a sukkah. I think it was built in the yard of the synagogue. My favorite holiday was Purim. When we were children, we used to prepare some performance.
When the Sudetenland was annexed to the Third Reich [9], my father thought the best thing to do was to sell the relatively large four-room apartment and move to a smaller one on Obilný trh [the Corn Market]. We lived here in two rooms, but it was rather sufficient for us.
Most of our neighbors were not Jewish. However, all of them knew we were Jewish simply because we didn’t try to conceal it. To tell the truth, we never experienced any conflicts or misunderstandings. As children, we used to play with other children from the neighborhood. Sometimes, we would go to the Brno Veterinary Station together to look at the animals.
We moved from Prazska Street to today’s Masaryk’s neighborhood when I was ten years old. We lived in a very nice four-room apartment in this suburb. We had a kitchen, dinning room, bedroom, a room for us children and a living room. The Masaryk’s neighborhood was quite far from the center of the town and it was always a long trip for me and my sister to get to the town and take English lessons, do some sports or go for a swim.
We spoke mainly German at home. My father went to German schools, that’s why his Czech wasn’t that good. My mother was proficient in both Czech and German.
My parents first met in the Brno Jewish Sports Club Maccabi [8] where they used to come and do sports. They got married on 11th February 1917 in the Great Synagogue in Brno and I believe it was Rabbi Levy who tied the wedlock. Unfortunately, I don’t know any details concerning my parents’ wedding.
My father was injured in World War I – a bullet wounded his calf and he therefore returned from the front already in 1917.
My dad attended schools in which German was spoken. At first, he went to elementary school in Sokolov, former Falkenov. After completing four grades, he spent four years in a textile school in Brno at the end of which he probably must have taken a school-leaving examination. My mom completed four grades at the elementary school in Brno. She was a very talented painter and singer.
My grandparents told me that in the past there used to be a ghetto next to the present-day Brno railway station. However, when I was a child the ghetto didn’t exist anymore and the majority of Jewish families lived at Vlhka Street. Several religious Jewish families also lived at Krenova Street [5]. Their synagogue was also on this street; the synagogue was very simple and sober, almost gaunt, because it had no ornaments whatsoever. A passer-by wouldn’t even recognize from the outside that it actually was a synagogue because the building looked like an average house. Maybe also owing to this the Germans didn’t destroy the synagogue during World War II.
The Kohnstein grandparents were not Orthodox. They didn’t keep a kosher household. However, they celebrated all Jewish holidays: Chanukah, Yom Kippur, New Year’s [Rosh Hashanah], Pesach etc. On Saturday and on holidays, Grandpa went to the synagogue or a prayer house. Most commonly, he used to visit the prayer house at Prague Street [3]. I still remember that my grandmother was fasting during Yom Kippur and I used to bring her juicy apples fragranced with cloves to the synagogue. When she smelled them, she forgot about hunger. I’m not sure if they kept the Sabbath. Yet, on Friday evening they lit the candles. I cannot recall everything that clearly anymore because I wasn’t interested in these things that much when I was a child, but I have seen candles in their house, that’s for sure.