Lights were coming on all over both camps. Up ahead a hand waved through the fence. “Hans, Hans, here!” A voice hoarsely whispered, trying to be quiet.
I ran and stopped by this disembodied hand. It pulled me down to the ground.
“Hans, crawl under here.” Herschel had a long pole, which he was using to pry the wire up from the ground. I squirmed under, and he helped me to my feet.
We watched the action across the road. The fence line was well lit by spotlights and running soldiers who held hand lanterns. I saw some soldiers wrapping two limp bodies beside one jeep.
“Come,” Herschel said, pulling on my blouse.
I became Herschel’s brother Hans that night.
Chapter 18 - Herschel’s Story
I grabbed Hans under his arm and helped him to his feet. In the dim moonlight we embraced.
“Thank you, Herschel,” he said simply.
We stepped back into the shadows and watched what was happening across the street. A jeep carrying a single wounded man sped back toward the road, turned left and sped toward the medical clinic I had been released from a short time ago. A medic bent over the rear where a stretcher was secured. We couldn’t make out the wounded figure or his attire.
“Was that someone you knew, Hans?”
He shrugged, “I do not know. I hope not. I mean, I hope my friends were not the two bodies they are loading now.” A 4x4 truck had come out and slowly made its way to where the bodies lay. We saw several soldiers climb out of the truck and begin to hoist them inside in their blankets.
I pulled on Hans’ arm. “Come, we need to lose you in the camp.”
Silently we slipped from shadow to shadow. Near the front of the camp, a crowd had gathered trying to see what was happening in the prison camp across the road. We skirted the rear of the crowd and found my tent. Inside, Reb Horowitz and Mendel were reading a book they’d borrowed from the small library the Red Cross people had started. The Reb had reverted to his role of teacher, as both Mendel and I were eager to continue our schooling.
I entered the tent, tugging Hans in behind me. Mendel looked up, and then struggled to his feet, or rather, his foot. The artificial leg was propped against his bunk. Reb Horowitz cocked an eyebrow; his spectacles perched on the end of his nose.
“My friends, this is my brother, Hans.” I shoved him before me and into the light of the kerosene lantern.
Reb Horowitz turned it brighter and squinted, looking up. “I know you,” he said.
“Yes, sir, you do.” Hans sat heavily on the edge of my bunk and leaned forward toward the old man. “I am Hans Rothberg. I was a guard at your camp. I am sorry, sir, for everything I did there.”
I interrupted them. “Reb, Mendel, Hans saved my life. Now I have to save his. I need your help. We both do.”
The Reb studied him, and then said slowly, “You arrived only a few months before the Americans came. The gassings were over by then, were they not?”
“Yes, sir. I had no part in that, nor would I have.”
“Do you remember when Sergeant Granski shot the three cooks in the kitchen?” I asked.
The Reb nodded.
“I was there. Granski was just about to shoot me when Hans here stepped between us. I am alive because of a camp guard.” I took a deep breath. “He is now my brother. I ask you both to accept him.”
The Reb looked at each of us, at Hans the longest. “How old are you, young man?”
“I am seventeen years, sir. Why?”
“I want to insure that you have a long life, my son.” He held out his hand, and they shook. Now he looked at Mendel and nodded.
Mendel held out a hand, though with some reluctance, “If Rabbi Horowitz and Herschel say you are a good man, then I also welcome you.” He grinned. “I am Mendel.”
He gestured at the tent. “Such as it is, this is our home. Tomorrow we will get you some new clothes and papers. Then? We shall see what the future will bring.” Mendel brightened. “Perhaps you will come to Palestine with us?”
“First you will have to make me a Jew, Mendel!”
I laughed. “That is a job for the Rabbi here. He is trying to make good Jews of all of us.”
The Rabbi shrugged. “It is my job.” He waved a hand, peering at us with mock severity. “Sometimes a curse.”
Mendel and I grinned. We’d not been the best of students.
Hans said, “I have just escaped from the camp across the road with two friends, and several other men. Two were killed and one was wounded. I hope that my friends are all right. Do you hate us?”
The Rabbi carefully replied, “It is for God to decide if you are a hateful boy. We can only forgive. Are you worth forgiving?”
Hans frowned, “I never killed or hurt anyone, sir. What the Reich did was wrong, and I will try to make up for that.”
I indicated Mendel, “And you, Mendel?”
“I do not know enough about what went on in your life, Hans. Right now I will have to trust Herschel’s word. Over the next weeks, we will talk, and then I can make up my mind. Until then, your secret is safe with me.” He held out a hand, and they shook.
The next day, I walked down to the main tent with Hans. The American woman I had met before, Maria, was at the desk. I stuck a big smile on my face and took Hans by the arm. “Excuse me, Miss Maria? Do you remember me? Herschel?”
She frowned, studying me, then Hans, “Of course, I do. Herschel, uh, Herschel…”
“Rothberg, Miss Maria. I have found my brother, Hans. He has been here in the camp for more than a week.”
Her frown deepened, “I don’t remember you coming in, Herr Rothberg. Do you have your papers?” She held out a hand.
Herschel and I had rehearsed this before we came. “I am sorry, but my coat with the papers inside was stolen yesterday.” He hung his head, “I am sorry, Miss Maria. I would have come sooner, but when Herschel and I discovered each other, we just spent the night discussing the past few years.”
You could see her soften, the frown fading. She scribbled some notes on her large pad and filled out some cards for her file before making out a green card with Hans’ name and description. It would allow him to come and go in our camp, eat in the mess tent and get some clean clothes from the supply office.
We thanked her warmly and turned to leave. Just as we got to the doorway, she called, “Rothberg brothers.”
We turned apprehensively. We had almost made it. Had we been caught? Would Hans now be sent back across the street? I said, “Yes, Miss Maria?”
“Will Hans be staying in your tent with you?”
I just nodded.
“Then I suggest you get another cot from supply for him.” She smiled and cocked an eyebrow. “So I’ll know where to find you. If I need you, of course.”
“Of course. Thank you, Miss Maria.” I said.
“And, Herschel, have you found your other brother yet?”
I gloomily shook my head, “Not yet, Miss Maria.” And we left.
Standing outside the tent, I whispered to Hans, “I think she knows something is not right. We must be careful.” He nodded.
We stopped at the supply tent and were issued a folding cot, bedding, a metal cup and clothing the Amis had confiscated from local civilians. Hans received a very nice pair of dress trousers, a pale yellow shirt and a waistcoat. Next we found him some shoes, brown brogans. We thanked the gaunt woman standing behind the counter. I glanced down. She had a tattoo on the inside of her lower arm. An Auschwitz survivor.
I helped Hans carry everything back to our tent. Mendel and Reb Horowitz had made room for him next to my cot. Between us was a small table and another lamp. These were new and I was amazed what Mendel was able to acquire in the camp.
I complained to him, “What, Mendel? No books?”
He grinned and swept my blanket back. Two books lay under it.
I hugged him warmly. “Thank you, King Mendel. You will be Palestine’s first Prime Minister, at the very least!”
&nb
sp; Hans smiled and gripped his shoulder. “Thank you, my friend.”
“All right, gentlemen, please finish what you are doing so class can begin.” Rabbi Horowitz was in full teacher mode.
After setting up the cot and arranging the bedding and clothing, we sat attentively awaiting the Rabbi’s instructions. “Young men, as long as you are in this tent, we will be having instruction for at least one hour a day in various subjects. Since I am no secular teacher and am not very good in mathematics, we will discuss history,” he ticked these off on thin, crooked fingers, “the Talmud, morality, ethics and almost anything else we feel is necessary.” He looked at each of us and we nodded in turn.
The Rabbi cleared his throat and leaned forward. “For today, I would like to discuss this unfortunate war. We’ll call today’s class, the “Morality of War”. Or maybe I should call it the “Immorality of War”?”
For the next hour, the discussion went back and forth between the Rabbi and each of us, voicing our opinions and observations on this and past wars.
Reb Horowitz concentrated on the Nazis’ dehumanizing the Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, Communists, labor leaders and others to the point where good men, and here he indicated Hans, could commit unspeakable acts. “If they had asked their soldiers to deal out horrible deaths to their friends and neighbors, there would have been a revolt, a mutiny. However, it was because the government of the Reich conducted a systematic campaign to declassify these groups as less than equal humans, as subhuman, that the atrocities were able to occur. Without that campaign, the Nazis would never have been able to commit the acts they did.” The Rabbi raised a finger for emphasis.
Hans nodded, “I know what you mean, sir. In the Hitler Youth, every day the instructors would tell us how the Jews were taking over our banks and how the Jews were killing German babies in their rituals.” He shook his curly head, “I knew Jews. I had gone to school with some Jewish boys my own age and never saw anything wrong or different with them. But I knew it must be true, or our leaders wouldn’t have said these things.” Here, Hans, my brother, stopped and covered his eyes. He was crying now, the sobs racking his slim frame.
The Rabbi laid a firm hand on his head and muttered a prayer of forgiveness.
I looked at Mendel. He also had tears in his eyes.
“I am so sorry, my friends, so sorry. Even my father told me these terrible things.” He looked up in anguish, “How could they all be so wrong? How could they do those terrible things? No, how could we have done these things?” Hans sniffed a couple of more times and wiped his wet face on his sleeve.
“Reb Horowitz, Mendel? How could we all have done the things we did or let them happen?” I was as bewildered as Hans.
Reb Horowitz had a much broader range of experience than any of us and told us his story. “I was born in Russia before the turn of the century in a town called Smetyko. My father was a butcher and bred mules while my mother raised three sons. When I was only thirteen years old, some Cossacks came into town drunk and killed several men who dared to oppose their pillaging. One was my father, and suddenly my brothers and I were now the town butchers. My oldest brother, Feivel, became the mule breeder. My next brother, Leib, and I operated the shop. We were fast learners and our modest prosperity allowed me to continue with my rabbinical studies. After all, to become a rabbi is what all good Jewish boys strive for. Despite continued pogroms,” he continued, “ the shop flourished. Feivel also began selling mules to the Russian Army. Ironic, no?”
The Rabbi went on, “Leib married, and then Feivel. Soon the house grew too small for the boys, their wives, my mother and me. I was now twenty and with a heavy heart, I packed a bag and boarded a train for Poland. In my pocket I had the name of a distant cousin in a town near Lubin. A cousin of my mother.
The local rabbi, an elderly man, helped me complete my training and in only two years I became the town’s rabbi when he died. The congregation grew, and in due course, the Yenta found me a bride. Her name was Rayna, and she was short, chubby, blonde and bubbly. I loved her so much,” he sighed, then chuckled. “I was tall, skinny, bearded and serious. We were quite the odd couple. Did I tell you that we were the pride of the small Jewish community in a corner of Lubin, Poland? Well, we were for many years.”
The Rabbi was openly weeping now. After a few moments, he sighed, wiped his eyes, scratched his beard and continued, “Rayna died in childbirth along with the baby, a boy, our first after trying for a long time. I just fell apart. I packed a bag and began wandering, wandering, wandering.” He snorted, “It is good that Jews, no matter how poor, are always willing to take a rabbi in, feed him, and then, of course, send him on his way. You know the Yiddish word for what I was?” He looked from one to the other of us, eyebrows raised. “No? A shnorer. Means a freeloader. I walked through Poland, western Russia and into Germany, until I was picked up by a squad of brown shirts near Munich, and taken to a work camp. After a while, I was sent to Dachau, then Kefferstadt where I met you boys.” He smacked his hands down on his thighs and said, “That is my story. Now, could I have done anything to change the course of the war?”
We all shook our heads no. No one could have stopped the Nazi juggernaut.
Chapter 19 - Hans’ Story
The Rabbi, Mendel, and most of all, my dear friend and brother Herschel, endeavored to make me a Jew in as quick a time as they could. We studied for an hour in the mornings and two or three hours each evening. I learned all about traditional holidays like Passover, when the Jews left Egypt. They taught me about Hanukkah, when the temple in Jerusalem was destroyed and only enough oil was left to keep the eternal lamp burning for one day, yet miraculously it lasted for eight days. There were so many rituals and ceremonies to learn and remember.
I especially liked the Yiddish language. Many of the words were similar to German, so I found it easy. Words like bupkis (nothing) and chutzpah (nerve), ferklempt (choked up) and klutz (clumsy) were all similar to my native German. These words, which derived from Hebrew and High German, with some French and Italian thrown in for good measure, we started using on a daily basis. Yiddish is sometimes referred to as a polyglot language.
We talked of the history of the Jews, the wanderings over the centuries. I heard of Masada, where the Jews fought against the Roman troops and, rather than surrender, chose to commit suicide. The Rabbi knew the tales of the early Hebrews, the Assyrians, the Egyptians, the Persians and all the other people who influenced Jewish culture.
Whenever Hans, Mendel and I ate in the mess tent, we talked of the day’s lessons and the Rabbi. Other boys from the camps, survivors, orphans, fellows like us, gathered around Herschel and especially Mendel. We told them of our lessons and soon the Rabbi had a full tent. Each day one or two more fellows came to hear his animated dissertations. I think he liked the attention. The first half hour or more were the Rabbi’s lectures. Often the lectures were based on the previous day’s questions and discussions. Soon we had to move our meetings to the mess tent to accommodate all who wished to attend.
One day we might discuss our past, another our existence in the camps. Then the Rabbi began steering the lectures toward morality and ethics. He had a difficult time convincing some not to go down the same road as their former captors. Their overwhelming desire was to hang every camp guard, every SS man and especially every Gestapo agent.
“Doesn’t that make you as bad as they are?” asked Rabbi Horowitz one day, arms outspread, a puzzled look on his face.
“No!” shouted several angry young men, survivors from the death camps. One fellow stood shaking his fist. He was small and thin, a redheaded boy from Dachau. “Do you know what they did to us? Do you know how evil those men are?” He was shaking, and his face was crimson, “If I had a gun, I would kill every one of them!” Several cheered his words.
“What is your name, son?” asked the Rabbi gently, sitting in his folding chair. He stroked his growing beard absently, crossing his legs.
“Tevi, sir.”
; “Well, young Tevi, it is my job, my calling, to dissuade you from this feeling.”
Tevi was dumbfounded. His mouth moved, but no sound came out. Finally he was able to say, “You want us to forgive them, to forget?”
Rabbi Horowitz shook his head, “No, son, never forget. Tell your children and their children but don’t let it ruin the rest of your life. Live your life to honor those who have passed away. Live an honorable and giving life, just the opposite of the Nazis.” He was in full lecture mode now. “Let the Americans and British and Russians take care of the Nazis. They will be treated as war criminals. But we, we must survive and go on. We must not ever let the rest of the world forget. We,” and here he was on his feet, glaring at us, “are what is left of the world’s Jewry.”
“Rabbi, we have suffered so much. Will it ever end? How much suffering must we endure?” Asked Tevi, anguished.
Reb Horowitz laughed a harsh laugh, “My young friend, you have not suffered. You have experienced pain, much pain, but pain is inevitable. However, suffering is a choice! Do you choose to suffer? Or do you move on?”
Tevi was perplexed, “Choice? You think we had a choice? The Nazis gave us no choice.”
The Reb shook his head, “No, you do not understand. You have to choose whether you will suffer or not. Oh, yes, the Nazis inflicted pain, but it is up to you how you use that pain. You can give in and make yourself weak or choose not to suffer, to be strong, if only inside.”
Now he continued, “We must travel to all nations of the world, settle down and show people that we are just like them. We love and laugh and work and raise families just like they do. Where you go is your choice.”
Mendel struggled to stand, leaning on his crutch. “I am going to Palestine where we will establish the state of Israel,” he shouted, face wreathed in a huge grin. “There will be Jewish policemen, shop owners, street sweepers, carpenters and cooks.” Hoping to lighten the tense mood, he laughed and said, “There will even be Jewish thieves, burglars and bankers.” He made it sound like a golden land of all Jews.
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