Oral History Interview with Al Gross

Henry Altschuler was born March 28, 1923 in Jaroslaw, Poland. He was educated at both cheder and public school where he experienced some antisemitism. He talks about Jewish life in pre-war Poland and resistance to local pogroms. He describes his flight to Rovno in the Ukraine with his father because a policemen warned him to escape the invading Germans. After a brief return to Jaroslaw, he escaped to Chrobieszuw. He describes life in the Russian occupied zone and after the German invasion in June 1941.

He was in Jaktorów concentration camp from 1941 to 1942. His mother ransomed him helped by the Judenrat but he was caught and rearrested later. Together with his family he was moved into the Lubaczów Ghetto. His family perished but he escaped and went into hiding with a Polish family until he was caught and sent to a work camp in Lemberg. He escaped, was caught again and put into a death cell at Locki prison with two former “Kommando 1008” Jews where he witnessed many murders. About to be executed, he was reprieved and was transferred to the destroyed Lemberg labor camp where all incoming Jews were executed and he was almost beaten to death. He also was in Plaszow camp (near Krakow) for six months. He talks about all of these experiences in great detail with many vignettes.

He was liberated by Russians in 1945, returned to Lemberg and emigrated to the United States from Germany, in September, 1949.

He describes lasting emotional and physical effects of his experiences. Throughout the interview he cites many instances of brutality, of Polish and Ukrainian co-operation with the Germans, as well as several times when he was helped by non-Jews, and some attempts at resistance.

Gabriel Drimer was born May 2, 1922 in Dubova, Czechoslovakia. His family owned a bakery. He studied at the yeshiva in Bratislava and later apprenticed to learn tailoring and design. He belonged to B’nai Akiva, an Orthodox Zionist organization. He describes how anti-Jewish measures, confiscations, and deportations were instituted after the Hungarian army invaded in 1940 and relations between Jews and non-Jews changed. He relates an eyewitness account of mass murder of Jews, including his relatives, in Kamenets-Podolski in 1941. He stopped the deportation of his family due to good relations with the local police. Gabriel visited his family in the Taitch [phonetic] Ghetto in October 1943 while he was in a labor camp. His family was killed in Auschwitz except for a brother who died on the Russian front and a brother who died in the Resistance. The captain in charge of his labor camp saved all the prisoners until the Russians could liberate them.

Gabriel relates that a Ukrainian officer tried to kill Gabriel as a Jew, but a Russian officer intervened. Other Russian officers befriended the survivors. Gabriel worked with the Russian military secret police rounding up Nazis and describes their reactions. He returned to Bratislava and describes how he opened his old store, greatly expanded his business, fed survivors passing through, and met and married his wife.

In 1948, after two months of training he left for Israel with other Jews to join the Haganah. He served in the army, later was a sergeant in the police force, established a business and organized an association of 40 farms. He talks about his life and changing conditions in Israel. He emigrated to the United States in 1955 and went into business in New York.

Interviewee: DRIMER, Gabriel Date: April 21, 1985