Diary of Bergen-Belsen

by Hanna Levy-Hass

  B. B. | November 18, 1944

  In spite of everything, my work with the children continues. The others—the “adults” and the “competent ones”—instead of helping me, do nothing but create obstacles for me. I cling desperately to every chance, however slight, to gather the children together to foster in them and in me even the slightest mental sharpness, as well as a basic feeling of human dignity.

  It was decided in the camp that Saturdays would be devoted to children’s entertainment, mostly of a religious nature. In our barracks, we are also taking advantage of Saturdays to provide the children with some amusement, but adapted mostly to the overall mentality of the people here: oral recitations, singing solo or in chorus, small theatrical productions. Given the total lack of books, I collect and write down the material for these performances based on the children’s memories and my own and more often than not, we must resort to improvising texts or poetic lines. A whole throng of known tunes have been recovered thanks to the tireless efforts and concentration of all my students—but the words escape us as if they had been sucked into a pit. So we begin to invent lines, to rhyme, to create texts that affect us deeply, to invoke our distant homeland, glorious and heroic.…

  I carry out this task spontaneously, even instinctively I would say, through an irresistible need in my soul—in the rare moments when I manage to awaken it—and by an irresistible need that I can clearly sense coming from the children’s souls. Because they take my lead, they get excited, they want to live, they want to rejoice, it’s stronger than them. What heartbreak!

  B. B. | November 20, 1944

  There is something strange and frightening about a human being’s ability to adapt to anything: to humiliation, to degrading hunger, to the lack of vital space, to fetid air, to infection, to washing oneself in a group.… This group washing exceeds everything a normal imagination could possibly conceive: we remain standing, all of us, undressed, in an area that has only gaping holes as windows and doors and that is hammered from all sides by gusts of wind.… We wash, we scrub ourselves with icy water … and we get used to it—just as we get used to the mounting terror, to the most cynical brutality, to the sirens and the threats, to the mass illnesses, to multifarious, collective, slow but certain death. Man gets used to it, he does. Pinned down, miserable, terrorized … he gets used to it! He sinks lower and lower. And if he doesn’t hang on, he dies. That ’s his only response. And the rest of us continue to drag on, and to sink also, continually lower and lower. What horror! This death without dying, this prolonged living death.…

  B. B. | November 22, 1944

  Ch. just died unexpectedly. He was a well-built, solid man. At the age of sixty-five, he had retained, even here in the camp, some remnants of his admirable freshness from the past. And then here he was, weighed down by unhappiness, stretched out on his bed for only three days until, with the help of exhaustion and hunger, he passed away.… In three days it was all over.

  Yesterday the Appell lasted all day and into the night, in the wind and rain. Five people were missing. This morning, they were “found.”

  For over a month all we’ve had to eat is one bowl of soup per day. Soup? In a manner of speaking. Rutabagas boiled in water. And such horrible water! But that’s it…rutabagas in water. On the ground, in front of and behind the barbed wire. Everywhere. Wherever you turn, wherever you look, there are rutabagas, endless rutabagas. Mountains of rutabagas. rutabagas, rutabagas, rutabagas—in the carts, in front of the doors, in front of the kitchens, in the underground depots—everywhere.

  This gray turnip that is normally used to feed animals—we are made to eat, we are made to want it by having been abandoned over and over to the claws of consuming hunger. Oh, such hunger! rutabagas, we’ll eat rutabagas all winter long. Unless we die first.… Germany, land of blessings, land of rutabagas, of ersatz, of concentration camps, of slavery and terror.

  Allied planes fly over us constantly. The air raid sirens never end. All of Germany is being bombed. The sirens sound two or three times each and every day. At night, darkness is the rule. No one ever lights the smallest candle, anywhere. The major part of our existence unfolds in total darkness. If someone ventures to light a fire, a tiny little fire, a deafening racket rises up, everyone protests and grumbles. Because everyone is jittery from fear of the Germans, who have become even more savage. They shoot at the sight of the slightest light. They’ve already killed a man and a woman in the Dutch barracks for this.

  Those who are “lucky” enough to work for the Germans outside the camp tell us heartening news: Germany is at an impasse, its population suffering from endless bombing and food shortages. To be sure, the end is near. But here, the German soldiers and officers haven’t changed—same arrogance, same brutality, same cruelty.

  We are told that the Balkans have been liberated. According to this same news, a federation of Balkan republics has been created, with Salonica as its capital. And we hear many more such fantastic things as well. Even if it’s not all true, on the whole, the basic state of things they describe is or will be true, that’s for certain.

  I’m trying to imagine the homeland liberated, with a perspective of boundless joy in a new society; it’s making me dizzy. Considering things from the perspective of the deplorable state we’ve been reduced to, I wonder if our nerves will stand up to so much happiness. Our emotions will erupt as though from the depths of a volcano; long stifled tears would begin to flow, flow.… This happiness would be too strong, too violent. It would cause too much suffering.

  But even so, we’ll be able to take it. And with time, everything will return to normal, will crystallize. The nightmare will have given way to clear, healthy sensations. Beauty will become natural. Oh, this will come about, without a doubt, it must come about—even if not for me personally. But it must come about, overall, no matter for whom … but it’s sure to come, that’s the important thing.

  3

  B. B. | December 1944

  I thought it was the end, that I wouldn’t have anything more to write down.… But there is no end. There isn’t one. The days follow one after the other—dark, terrible, terrifying days. We would like to see the end, whatever it may be.

  Starvation is everywhere; each of us is nothing more than a shadow. The food we receive gets scarcer each day. For three days we haven’t seen a piece of bread. Some people have saved theirs and now they open up their miserable provisions and everything is moldy. Bread is gold. You can get anything with bread; you will risk everything for bread. And there are more and more thieves, especially at night. Someone suggested we take turns staying up and keeping watch so we could catch them. The hunt lasted two nights in the densest darkness. It was very dramatic, very noisy. No one slept and the results were nil.

  Anyone who has a little bit of bread keeps it under his pillow or rather makes a pillow out of it. That way they feel more secure when they sleep. The mothers, especially, resort to this method to ensure a few mouthfuls for their children. As for the workers who are out working all day, they’re forced to lug their entire stock with them everywhere in their bag. And their entire stock means six days’ rations, at most, which is about half a loaf. The temptation is strong. Everyone ends up at some point eating the entire six days’ worth in one day.

  Yesterday, on the way to work (in the women’s commando), we saw potatoes on the road; they had probably fallen from a truck or been thrown out by people from the last transport during a too long and painful march, when you prefer to run the risk of dying of hunger so as not to die of fatigue. We know all about this. And so, with our famished eyes, we caught sight of a few potatoes. One of us bent down to pick one up. But she had to drop it immediately, frightened by the savage screams of the soldier accompanying us who couldn’t tolerate so much gluttony.…

  It’s been over a month and a half since the Germans eliminated all services within the camp. Everyone has to work outside the camp in the different commandos. They don’t spare anyone. Everyone outside—in
cluding the elderly and fourteen-year-old children—everyone is forced to labor. No one is in charge of keeping the blocks of the camps clean and in order. The Germans couldn’t care less about it. No schools, no cleaners. Everything has plunged into chaos, into a whirlwind of dirt and rot.

  In order to mobilize the maximum number of internees possible for all kinds of work, the Germans have multiplied their terror tenfold. Each day, before dawn, at four o’clock in the morning, everyone must be up. We feel hunted. A feverish coming and going, marked by anguish and terror.… It’s the middle of winter; it’s bitterly cold. At five o’clock, the human columns must already be in perfect order in the Appellplatz. This is the first Appell of the day (Arbeitsappell—roll call for work). It’s still completely dark out, we stand for at least two hours waiting for the officer in charge who has to count us and send us off to work. Frozen, extremely weakened, famished, we feel our strength abandon us. But no leaving the square, no moving, even.

  Due to the icy cold and starvation, many faint and collapse to the ground. Twice, I myself became violently dizzy and nearly succumbed. At such times, the ground has a magical appeal. Oh, how nice it would be to rest! But I managed to gather myself one more time. Falling ill here is not a good thing. No one and nothing in the world can help us. We die, and that’s it.

  The German officer finally deigns to count us at seven or seven thirty. He begins with a hearty volley of insults and cursing directed at everyone, he starts to let fly, kicking people for no reason, randomly. Afterwards, he chooses his victims, those who dare to explain why they can’t work. These are the ones he “sets right.” Systematically, he lunges at them, gives them a back-breaking beating, drags them on the ground, and tramples them—after which he forces them to stand up and take their place in the ranks.

  B. B. | December 1944

  The camp commander was just dismissed. Kramer was appointed in his place. Kramer, however, is the former commander of Auschwitz. Ominous reminder. All commentary is useless.… The camp regime gets more atrocious by the day. Beatings are commonplace; punishments that in the past were given to individuals and meant depriving one person of bread or of food are now collective measures meted out to the camp as a whole. What difference does it make if there are small children and sick people among us?…

  An atrocious fright has gripped all of our hearts. We feel that there will be no one to look after us anymore. We are completely at the mercy of the new commander, a villain and avowed anti-Semite. Absolute Master of the camp, he is subordinate to no one. No authority exists for us, except him. God Himself is powerless here.

  Kramer does what he likes. Endless transports keep pouring in. Processions of strange creatures move constantly between the blocks and the barbed wire. Pitiful, their terrifying appearance so unlike that of human beings. Ghosts. They look at us with fright and we look at them the same way. Without a doubt we make the same impression on them as they do on us. There isn’t enough room for all these people. We change places every day, each time more tightly squeezed together. Finally, they give the order that we are to sleep two to a bed, so the three-tiered bunks now contain six people. The space between the bunks is even narrower than before. This is how we emptied half of our barracks to make room for new arrivals.

  Mud, rain, and dampness have moved into the barracks with us; these barracks are very poorly constructed, shabby, fissured. But there’s nothing we can do about it, we have to stay here. We are submerged in an ocean of germs, lice, and fleas, of mold and stench. Literally piled one on top of the other, we form an ideal breeding ground for lice. There is no way to chase them away or eliminate them. The rock of Sisyphus. Moving around has become impossible. As for sitting or lying down to rest, it is out of the question. Hellish crowding … what torment! One look at Barracks 25, where the French women live with the Hungarians, etc. … pell-mell. … It’s enough to drive you mad. A veritable den of thieves, as the French say. Isn’t this the height of calamity that can befall us? Or can it get worse yet?

  B. B. | December 1944

  Kramer dismissed the Jewish camp commander. The Jews will no longer have a say in the blocks. All the administration members are disgraced. To be frank, they were all corrupt, insensitive to the group’s misery, completely indifferent and thoughtless. Their role was confined to robbing others cruelly, benefitting from their position for personal gain, currying the Germans’ favors by mistreating their brothers and forcing them to work for the Germans. Their behavior was scandalous in every way. But I’ve already spoken about them elsewhere. And besides, that’s a chapter in itself.

  What is important to us at the moment is Kramer and his band. He has imposed a new command on us, composed of Aryans, common criminals (the Häftlinge) of German, Polish, or French nationality. They are well-fed types, big and strong as bulls. They continually strut among us with clubs, beating whomever they wish. They wear convicts’ clothes, those striped pants and long shirts with large numbers marked on the back. But the most tragic thing is that by their very nature, they are criminals in the worst sense of the word. Their body and soul sold to the devil—to Kramer—they have nothing of humanity left in them. Cynical, cruel, sadistic. You should see the perverse joy they take in beating people. I’ve noticed it clearly. They are wild animals disguised as men. This is what the Germans have done, what they have reduced them to. And it seems that it is on us that they intend to take their revenge.

  These hardened criminals are our masters from this moment on, free to dispose of our lives, our souls, our children. We are enslaved under these vile serfs. What an infernal scheme! The Nazi brute is never short of ideas when it comes to finding a way to humiliate man better, to crush him better. The new command, these new Kapos attack the male internees especially. They persecute them mercilessly. There is a place called the Stuppenkommando. It’s the death commando. In the evening, after work, not one of the men who have worked there returns unscathed. There they are beaten to the point of being broken, bloody, and swollen. Yesterday, December 30, two men died under their bludgeons. The same day, two others were brought back to the camp on stretchers carried by their comrades. The “kapos” also strike the women or, worse yet, succeed in prostituting them.

  B. B. | January 1945

  The new regime weighs on us like a nightmare. The “kapos” are like warped, drunken, insane, bloodthirsty beasts. There is no news, nothing that can bring us back to life. A deadly silence. In this horrifying terror, all has become mute. We don’t see an end to it.

  B. B. | January 1945

  I succeeded in talking to some of the women from the transport that came from Auschwitz. Most of them are Jewish women from Poland, Greece, or Hungary. They tell us what they’ve experienced at Auschwitz. In 1943 and 1944 alone, during the time they were there, hundreds of thousands of people were exterminated. They are among the few hundred who miraculously managed to get out of there.

  “There are no words to describe what we went through,” they tell us. And they tell us of mass murders, by gas, of 99 percent of the detainees who were eliminated in this way, of their executioners’ depraved behavior. They tell us all this while scrutinizing us to see if we believe them; because, they say, they are beginning themselves to doubt the truth of what they say. They fear that no one will ever believe them, that their words will be taken as those of aberrant, demented people. Only a few hundred women remain alive out of all those who were deported to Auschwitz. The men and the children were immediately eliminated, as were the elderly and the weak. A Jewish woman from Greece tells me that out of seventy thousand Greek Jews interned at Auschwitz with her, only three hundred women are still alive. She herself saw her parents and her entire family disappear in smoke.

  It’s strange. These women who have escaped from hell and who worked in the kitchens, in the depots, in the orchestra, even, seem relatively healthy. They ’re all robust, well preserved. It ’s bizarre, when you compare them to our own bodies. They tell us: Back there, in Auschwitz, people got en
ough to eat. On top of that, the internees themselves had organized a sort of mutual assistance program and made arrangements to procure what they needed. In general, they didn’t suffer from hunger. On the other hand, the risk of death hovered over everyone, each person knew he was under constant threat of a sudden, irrevocable death, as each one imagined himself already consumed by the flames.…

  The death factory functioned at full capacity every day. Columns of men, of women, several hundreds and sometimes even one or two thousand per day, waited their turn at the entrance to the gas showers. The crematory smoked right before their eyes, and they just watched, knowing exactly what it meant. The smoke spoke to them of the fire where their loved ones had burned and where they themselves would soon end their existence. No, they weren’t hungry there, our companions from Auschwitz tell us, dismayed by our tales of the methodical hunger we are subjected to. All this just shows that the goal is the same, only the means vary. Back there, a brutal and cynical process, mass assassinations by gassing; here, a slow extermination, calculated in a cowardly way through hunger, violence, terror, consciously sustained epidemics.…