Voices from the Holocaust

by Jon E. Lewis

  With Bajler in the cellar was fifty-five-year-old Gershon Praschker, who invited his fellow prisoners to say the prayer of confession before death.

  It was a very depressing sight. The sergeant-major knocked at the door, shouting ‘Quiet, you Jews, or I shoot!’ We continued the prayer softly with choking voices.

  At 7.30 in the evening they brought us a pot of thin kohlrabi soup. We couldn’t swallow anything for crying and pain. It was very cold and we had no covers at all. One of us exclaimed, ‘Who knows who among us will be missing tomorrow?’ We pressed close together and lapsed into exhausted fitful sleep haunted by terrible dreams. We slept for about four hours. Then we ran about the room, freezing cold and debating the fate that was in store for us.

  Thursday, 8 January 1942

  The day starts in more or less similar fashion to yesterday, although high-ranking SS men came to visit. Their identity is not mentioned, but they were driving in a limousine. The identity of one of the ‘eight’ who worked with the corpses is known: nineteen-year-old Mechel Wiltschinski from Izbica. Together with his fellows he was shot in the ditch at the end of the working day ... Two hours later the first lorry arrived full of gypsies. I state with 100 per cent certainty that the executions had taken place in the forest. In the normal course of events the gas vans used to stop about one hundred metres from the mass graves. In two instances the gas vans, which were filled with Jews, stopped twenty metres from the ditch. This happened once on this Thursday, the other time on Wednesday the 14th ... Our comrades from among the ‘eight’ told us there was an apparatus with buttons in the driver’s cab. From this apparatus two tubes led into the van. The driver (there were two execution gas vans, and two drivers – always the same) pressed a button and got out of the van. At the same moment frightful screaming, shouting and banging against the sides of the van could be heard. That lasted for about fifteen minutes. Then the driver re-boarded the van and shone an electric torch into the back to see if the people were already dead. Then he drove the van to a distance of five metres from the ditch.

  There were nine transports to be buried, of which seven were full of gypsies and two of Jews. Back in the cellar, the Jewish grave-diggers were ordered by the guards to sing.

  I began to sing ‘Hear, O Israel: the eternal one is our God, the eternal one is unique’. Those assembled repeated each verse in depressed tones. Then I continued: ‘Praised be His name and the splendour of His realm for ever and ever’, which the others repeated after me three times. The gendarme insisted that we go on. I said, ‘Friends and honourable people, we shall now sing the Hatikvah.’ And we sang the anthem with our heads covered. It sounded like a prayer. After this the gendarme left and bolted the door with three locks. Later that evening the prisoners had to sing again. They had to repeat: ‘We thank Adolf Hitler for everything’.

  By five in the morning everybody was awake because of the cold. We had a conversation. Getzel Chrzastowski, a member of the Bund, and Eisenstab, both from Klodawa (Einstab owned a furrier’s there), had lost their belief in God because He didn’t concern himself with injustice and suffering. In contrast others, myself included, remained firm in our belief and said, like Mosche Asch (a worthy man from Izbica), that the time of the Messiah was at hand.

  Friday, 9 January 1942

  The bottom of the ditch was about one and a half metres wide, the top five metres, and its depth was five metres. The mass graves extended a long way. If a tree stood in the way it was felled. Among the ‘eight’ today were Abraham Zalinski, thirty-two years old, Zalman Jakubowski, fifty-five and the earlier mentioned Gershon Praschker, all from Izbica. They were killed as usual. On arrival back at the courtyard of Schloss Kulmhof we were disagreeably surprised to see a new transport. They were probably a new batch of grave-diggers: sixteen men from Izbica and sixteen from Bugaj. Among those from Izbica were 1. Mosche Lesek, forty years old, 2. Avigdor Palanski, twenty years old, 3. Steier, thirty-five years old, 4. Knoll, forty-five years old, 5. Izchak Preiss, forty-five years old, 6. Jehuda Lutzinski, fifty-one years old, 7. Kalman Radzewski, thirty-two years old, 8. Menachem Archijowski, forty years old. Among those from Bugaj was my friend and comrade Haim Reuben Izbizki, thirty-five years old.

  Twenty of the old grave-diggers, together with five new ones, were driven into another room in the cellar. This room was somewhat smaller than the previous one. There we found bedding, underwear, trousers, suits, as well as foodstuffs (bread, dripping, and sugar). These items belonged to the new grave-diggers.

  We heard voices from the adjacent room. I banged at the wall and shouted at a spot where a missing brick let the air through. I asked if H. R. Izbizki was in the room. He came to the wall. I asked if at least his mother and sister had escaped. The guard interrupted our conversation.

  Afterwards the new arrivals gave us some political news. They said the Russians had already retaken Smolensk and Kiev, and were making their way towards us. We wished they would with God’s assistance come and destroy this terrible place.

  Seven to eight transports were buried this day, at first gypsies as yesterday but the last two containing Jewish victims.

  They were younger and older people with suitcases and rucksacks. On their clothes a Jewish star was affixed front and back. We assumed they were diseased camp inmates whom the Nazis wanted to get rid of in this manner. They were buried with their belongings. These events shook us to the core because up until then we had hoped that Jews in the camps would survive these terrible times.

  Saturday, 10 January 1942

  At about eleven o’clock the first van loaded with victims arrived. Jewish victims were treated in this way: the Jewish men, women and children were in their underwear. After they had been tossed out of the van, two Germans in plain clothes stepped up to them to make a thorough check if anything had been hidden. If they saw a necklace round a throat they tore it off. They wrenched rings from fingers, and pulled gold teeth out of mouths. They even examined anuses (and, in the case of women, genitals). The entire examination was done most brutally.

  Eisenstab told us he had no further reason for living since his wife and fifteen-year-old only daughter had just been buried. But his fellows restrained him from asking the Germans to shoot him. Today seven transports arrived.

  Sunday, 11 January 1942

  We were told we wouldn’t have to work because it was Sunday. After the morning prayer and the prayer for the dead we remained in our paradisiacal cellar. We didn’t recite the prayer of penitence. We again talked about ourselves, politics and God. Everybody wanted to hold out until liberation.

  Monday, 12 January 1942

  At 7 a.m. they brought us coffee and bread. Some of the men from Izbica (who had lately lived in Kutno) drank up all the coffee. The others got very annoyed and said we were already facing death and had to behave with dignity.

  At 8.30 we were already at work. At 9.30 the first gas van appeared. Among the ‘eight’ were Aharon Rosenthal, Schlomo Babiacki and Schmuel Bibedgal, all of them aged between fifty and sixty ... On this day we were absolutely slave-driven. They wouldn’t even wait till the gas smell had evaporated.

  Nine vans then arrived, each containing sixty Jews from Klodawa:

  My friend Getzel Chrzastowski screamed terribly for a moment when he recognized his fourteen-year-old-son, who had just been thrown into the ditch. We had to stop him, too, from begging the Germans to shoot him. We argued it was necessary to survive this suffering, so we might revenge ourselves later and pay the Germans back.

  After an escaped Jew warned others in the locality of their likely fate at Chelmno, those arriving in the transports were initially met with reassuring kindness:

  When they arrived at the Schloss they were at first treated most politely. An elderly German, around sixty, with a long pipe in his mouth, helped the mothers to lift the children from the lorry. He carried babies so that the mothers could alight more easily and helped dotards to reach the Schloss.

  The unfortunate ones were deeply
moved by his gentle and mild manner. They were led into a warm room which was heated by two stoves. The floor was covered with wooden gratings as in a bath house. The elderly German and the SS officer spoke to them in this room. They assured them they would be taken to the Łódź Ghetto. There they were expected to work and be productive. The women would look after the household, the children would go to school, and so on. In order to get there, however, they had to undergo delousing. For that purpose they needed to undress down to their underwear. Their clothes would be passed through hot steam. Valuables and documents should be tied up in a bundle, and handed over for safekeeping.

  Whoever had kept banknotes, or had sewn them into their clothes, should take them out without fail, otherwise they would get damaged in the steam oven. Moreover they would all have to take a bath. The elderly German politely requested those present to take a bath and opened a door from which 15–20 steps led down. It was terribly cold there. Asked about the cold, the German said gently they should walk a bit further: it would get warmer. They walked along a lengthy corridor to some steps leading to a ramp. The gas van had driven up to the ramp.

  The polite behaviour ended abruptly and they were all driven into the van with malicious screams. The Jews realized immediately they were facing death. They screamed, crying out the prayer ‘Hear, O Israel’.

  At the exit of the warm room was a small chamber in which Goldmann hid. After he had spent twenty-four hours there in the icy cold and was already quite stiff, he decided to look for his clothes and to save himself. He was caught and pushed in among the grave-diggers.

  The next morning Goldmann was ordered to lie in a ditch and was shot.

  Tuesday, 13 January 1942

  On this day the transports were brimful – roughly ninety corpses in each van. On this day the Jewish community at Bugemin was liquidated ... [and] ... we buried approximately 800 Jews from Bugaj. We buried nine transports; after work, five of the men who had unloaded the corpses were shot. When in our cellar, Michael Worbleznik burst into tears; he had lost his wife, two children and his parents ...

  Thursday, 15 January 1942

  On this occasion we rode in a bus. Monik Halter called across to me [that] the windows of the vehicle could be easily opened with a hook. The thought of escape had lodged in my brain all the time.

  At 8 a.m. we were already at the place of work. At ten o’clock the first victims arrived, again from Izbica. Till noon we dispatched four overloaded transports. One van waited in line after the next.

  At midday I received the sad news that my brother and parents had just been buried. I tried to get closer to the corpses to take a last look at my nearest and dearest. Once I had a clod of frozen earth tossed at me, thrown by the benign German with the pipe. The second time ‘Big Whip’ shot at me. I don’t know if the shot missed me deliberately, or by accident. One thing is certain: I remained alive. I suppressed my anguish and concentrated on working fast so as to forget my dreadful situation for five minutes.

  I remained lonely as a piece of stone. Out of my entire family, which comprised sixty people, I am the only one who survived. Towards evening, as we helped to cover the corpses, I put my shovel down.

  Michael Podklebnik followed my example and we said the prayer of the mourners together. Before leaving the ditch five of the ‘eight’ were shot. At seven in the evening we were taken back home. All those who hailed Izbica were in absolute despair. We had realized that we should never see our relatives again. I was quite beside myself and indifferent to everything.

  In the next room, we had learned, were eighteen grave-diggers from Łódź. We heard through the wall that Rumkowski (the elder of the Jewish there) had ordered the deportation of 750 families.

  Friday, 16 January 1942

  ... the victims came from Łódź. Some of them looked starved and showed signs of having been beaten and injured; one could gauge the degree of famine in Łódź. We felt great pity when we saw how they had hungered for a long time merely to perish in such a cruel manner. The corpses hardly weighed anything. Where previously three transports were put in layers one on top of the other, now there was room for four.

  In the afternoon ‘Big Whip’ again drank a bottle of schnapps; afterwards he began to deal murderous blows with his whip.

  On Friday they started to pour chloride on the graves because of the stench caused by the many corpses.

  On this day eight transports were buried; at the end of the day seven of the ‘eight’ were shot.

  Saturday, 17 January 1942

  We buried seven overloaded transports. We had finished the work at five o’clock when a car suddenly appeared with the order to shoot sixteen men. This was obviously punishment for the escape of Abraham Rois. (He had run away at ten o’clock on Friday night.) Sixteen men were selected. They had to lie down in groups of eight, face downwards, on top of the corpses, and were shot through the head with machine guns.

  Sunday, 18 January 1942

  We learned at breakfast that we would have to go to work. At eight o’clock we were already at the place of work. Twenty new pick-axes and shovels were taken down from the lorry. We now realized that ‘production’, far from coming to an end, was on the increase. Because it was Sunday not all the gendarmes were on duty. We consumed our lunch in the grave. They probably wanted to make sure that we didn’t attack any of them. We didn’t even attempt to hurl ourselves upon our executioners. The guns levelled at us filled us with too much fear.

  On this day no one was shot at the end of work.

  After the evening prayer we decided to run away, no matter what the cost. I asked Kalman Radzewski to give me a few marks because I didn’t have a single pfennig. He gave me fifty marks which he had sewn into his clothing. The escape of Rois was an example that had made a deep impression on me because he got out through a cellar window.

  Monday, 19 January 1942

  We again boarded the bus in the morning. I let all the others get on in front of me and was the last one aboard. The gendarme sat in front. On this day no SS men rode behind us. To my right was a window which could be opened easily. During the ride I opened the window. When the fresh cold air streamed in I caught fright and quickly shut the window again. My comrades, among them Monik Halter in particular, encouraged me, however. After I made a decision, I softly asked my comrades to stand up so the draught of cold air shouldn’t reach the gendarmes. I quickly pulled the window pane out of its frame, pushed my legs out and turned around. I held on to the door with my hands and pressed my feet against the hinges. I told my colleagues they should put the window pane back immediately after I had jumped. I then jumped at once.

  When I hit the ground I rolled for a bit and scraped the skin off my hands. The only thing that mattered to me was not to break a leg. I turned round to see if they had noticed anything on the bus but it continued its journey.

  I lost no time but ran as fast as I could across fields and woods. After an hour I stood before the farm of a Polish peasant. I went inside and greeted him in the Polish manner: ‘Blessed be Jesus Christ’.

  While I warmed myself I asked cautiously about the distance to Chelmno. It was only three kilometres. I also received a piece of bread which I put in my pocket. As I was about to go the peasant asked me if I was a Jew – which I absolutely denied. I asked him why he suspected me, and he told me they were gassing Jews and gypsies at Chelmno. I took my leave with the Polish greeting and went away.

  Life Inside the Warsaw Ghetto III, January 1942

  JEWISH SOCIETY FOR SOCIAL WELFARE (ZYDOWSKIE TOWARZYSTWO OPIEKI SPOLECZNEJ)

  The Zydowskie Towarzystwo Opieki Spolecznej was the Warsaw branch of the Zydowska Samopomoc Spoleczna, the largest of the Jewish communal self-help organizations in the Generalgouvernement, the area of Poland reserved for Jews.

  January 1942 was the hardest month for the refugees generally and especially for the residents of the locale at Dzika and Niska Streets. There is no misfortune and illness which they did not experience in the
time they have spent in Warsaw.

  Hunger, sickness, and want are their constant companions and death is the only visitor in their homes.

  In the last months of the past year the typhus epidemic raged there, not bypassing child or adult; hundreds of families were shattered – fathers and mothers passed away, children’s lives were cut down, and the last Mohicans among the aged are expiring most hideously. This January there were only isolated cases of typhus in the locales mentioned, yet the refugees fell like flies from cold and exhaustion; the mortality reached 539, or 18 per cent of their number.

  Now the newly organized body for refugee care is working in the locales, trying to alleviate the poverty and improve the sorrowful plight of the unfortunate refugees.

  The most serious affliction now in the locales is dysentery and its accompanying rash.

  The number of refugees declines from day to day. Now, as of the end of January, there are 2,977 refugees in the locales. The locales at Dzika 7, 9, and 11 have been liquidated. A large children’s residential centre is being organized at No. 9.

  If help for the refugee locale is not increased, if the sanitary-hygienic conditions are not improved, if the indifference on the part of the Warsaw Jewish community to the expiring refugees is not combated and the mortality is not halted, this locale, which is dubbed a ‘refugee town’, will become a ‘refugee village’.

  The situation at the end of the month is as follows:

  9 Stawkt Street

  The total number of refugees at the end of the month – 1,100; rooms – 170. The rooms are generally not heated. There is no heated room at all in the locale. No running water, and toilets are not working. Typhus – isolated cases. As of now, there are among the refugees 200 who are not exempt from the meal charges. The number of deaths in this locale was 280, the mortality here the highest: 25 per cent of all residents …