Oral History Interview with Harry Zaslow

Nathan Form, born in Kroscienko, Poland February 28, 1922, was educated in Polish and Hebrew schools. Warned by a Polish policeman, his family fled from the Germans but failed September, 1939. He describes surviving during the German occupation, operating a clandestine leather factory, and barely escaping execution by the GESTAPO. He worked as a slave laborer locally, then in a GESTAPO camp near Rabka, Kraków. He describes facilities for German SS and Stormtroopers, and atrocities committed by Ukrainian soldiers.

He describes the killing of a Jewish family by the SS at the Rabka camp in 1942, the bravery of a Jewish girl, and how his testimony in a German court helped convict SS Sturmführer Wilhelm Rosenbaum, after the war. He witnessed mass killings of Jews by German soldiers in Plaszow, after the liquidation of the Kraków Ghetto. He was a prisoner in Gross-Rosen concentration camp in May or June 1943, then in a labor camp in Wüstegiersdorf, Germany, guarded by the Wehrmacht, where he dug bunkers. The camp was closed January 1945. After a forced Death march the prisoners were taken to Camp Ebensee, via Mauthausen, to dig tunnels. Only 150 of the original 3,500 survived. He details brutal conditions, savage beatings, Appells and how he managed to survive while his friend perished. He describes how Germans used various means, including trickery and extermination barracks, just before liberation to kill as many prisoners as possible.

He talks about conditions in the camp pre and post liberation on May 6, 1945 by Eisenhower’s 8th Army. He relates how he got treatment for a friend of his, in a German hospital, helped by a Jewish officer who threatened the German staff. The Red Cross cared for survivors and the Jewish Brigade smuggled Nathan and others to Italy. He was in Santo Deszeria, Italy from 1945 to 1947. He describes his life in both Paris and the United States after his arrival October 29, 1951.

Nathan explains how the Holocaust affected him, why he was reluctant to talk about his suffering even to his children, why he is now willing to do so, and expresses his thanks to the American government.

Interviewee: FORM, Nathan Date: April 22, 1985

Fred Hammel was born on Friday, May 13, 1921 in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. His father was a successful leather goods manufacturer in Offenback. Fred had a very comfortable childhood living in a villa with maids in Sachsenhausen, southern Frankfurt am Main. He attended public school and though the family was a non- observant Jewish one, they belonged to a synagogue.

After 1929 and later in 1932 his situation changed drastically. The depression hit and Nazi storm troopers wearing brown coats arrived. Fred described the mass unemployment, and how the rise of the Nazi party and Nazi youth infiltrated German society. He described the growing isolation of the Jews, and the 1933 boycott of Jewish stores as Nazification grew. He also claimed that Henry Ford financed many of Hitler’s early programs. By 1935 Jews started to leave Germany and Fred was apprenticed to a tanner.

Fred lived through Kristallnacht and provided vivid details. His father was incarcerated by the local police and many of his relatives who were sent to Buchenwald suffered a great deal before being released. By 1938 his mother decided to get him out of Germany to the relatives in the United States via England. Fred was almost 18, the cutoff age. But just in time, his mother arranged for him to join the Kindertransport to England on April 19, 1939. He gives details about the Kindertransport journey. He traveled by train to Zevenaar and Cologne in Germany and to Hoek van in Holland, and by boat to Harwich, England and then by train to Victoria station in London.

Fred worked one year in a tannery in Northampton, England, and then in May 1940 he received his visa to the United States. He met the woman who would become his wife in Massachusetts shortly afterwards. In 1943 Fred was drafted; he served in the US army in the Pacific in Okinawa. After the war Fred and his wife were able to start a family; they have two children and currently three grandchildren.

Milton Harrison was a 19 year old First Sergeant in the Medical Detachment of the Ninth Armored Infantry Battalion of the Sixth Armored Division. In 1945 he heard about German atrocities from home but not in the army. On April 11, 1945 on the way from Mühhausen towards the Saale River, his unit encountered Russian Prisoners of War who had escaped from Buchenwald. From them they learned about this camp and that most of the SS had already left. A tank under the command of Captain Kiefer, with a total of four Americans was dispatched to investigate. Shortly thereafter, a small group of 28 men, including Mr. Harrison, followed. On the way they stumbled on the now unguarded "Little Buchenwald," a camp for mostly Jewish children between 10 and 14 years old who had worked at hard labor.

They were the first American soldiers to enter Buchenwald, and Captain Kiefer and First Sergeant Harrison reported the situation at Buchenwald to their superior officers that evening. When his group reached the main camp, the ovens were still hot. He inspected the camp, was shown a lampshade made from human skin and rows of bottles containing human parts which were part of Ilse Koch's collection. He describes the survivors’ physical condition and their reaction to the liberators.

On April 12, the Waffen SS attacked Buchenwald with small arms and mortar. Two American captains and Rabbi Herschel Schacter were in the camp at this time, and called for assistance. With help from the 44th Infantry Battalions, the SS was overwhelmed on April 14th, and Buchenwald was declared a "non-combat zone" on that day and medical assistance began arriving. Generals Groh and Patton toured the camp and were horrified. Inhabitants of Weimar were ordered to bury the dead.

Mr. Harrison, who is one of the historical officers of the Buchenwald Information Committee of the Sixth Armored Division Association, stresses that only soldiers of Command A of the 6th Armored Division can be called liberators of Buchenwald. He cites several references to verify this claim. He describes the lasting effect seeing Buchenwald had and still has on these soldiers.

Alan Spiegel was born August 11, 1903 in Orahovicza, Yugoslavia into a wealthy Zionist family. He details his family history in Hungary including his grandfather being a Second Adjutant during the Hungarian Revolution. Mr. Spiegel studied medicine at Budapest University. He discusses the difficulty for Jewish students to be admitted due tonumerus clausus policy and that he was dismissed in 1920, three months before graduation by a prejudiced faculty. An ardent Zionist, he then worked for the Jewish National Fund while employed in a family business.

In 1932, he married Elizabeth Boschan, in Cluj, Romania, where they lived until 1939. In Budapest, he had to serve as a slave laborer under the Hungarians. Mr. Spiegel gives testimony about working with Rezsö Kastner and Joel Brand to exchangethe release of over 1,000 Jews to Switzerland for money in 1944 and how he found out from one of the more humane German officers that their transport was destined for Auschwitz even though they paid. He details how he arranged to bribe other SS to have the transport sent to Bergen-Belsen instead. Two months later, a smaller group of 350 was sent to Switzerland of which he and his family were a part. He discusses how Kastner was condemned in Palestine for his actions. Mr. Spiegel also shares a vignette about how he secured the release of hundreds of Jewish boys and how small meaningful occurrences helped him have the strength to continue his work. He also relates memories about theVizhnitzerRebbe.

In 1947, Spiegel emigrated from Switzerland to the United States with his wife and daughter.

Daniel Goldsmith was born in Antwerp, Belgium on December 11, 1931 to Polish parents. His family was orthodox and he was educated at a Yeshiva. They lived in Antwerp under German occupation and suffered under the ever-increasing anti-Jewish measures. His father was transported to a labor camp in France, August 1942 and never heard from again.

His mother, Ruchel Goldschmidt – who was in contact with the Belgian underground – managed to get some money, safeguard their possessions, and find a hiding place just before and while the Germans raided their neighborhood and ransacked Jewish-owned houses, helped by Belgians who pointed out Jewish residents. Daniel cites several instances when Belgians cooperated with the Germans. He also gives many examples of aid by non-Jewish Belgians, especially Father André (who was recognized as a “Righteous Gentile”) and other Catholic clergy and nuns. He also mentions his mother’s work with the underground.

Daniel and his sister were placed in a convent in December 1942, then with Christian families after their mother found out the Germans were going to enter the convent to look for Jewish children. He was in a succession of orphanages in Weelde and Mechelen, run by Father Cornelissen, from 1943 to 1944, while his sister lived with another Christian family. Daniel got false baptismal papers, changed his name, lived as a Catholic, but refused to convert.

In May 1944 the Germans imprisoned all circumcised boys in the orphanage, then transported them on cattle cars with other Jewish children. Daniel and several other boys escaped from the moving train and managed to contact a priest who placed each of them with a different Christian family who hid them. Monsieur and Madame Botier, hid Daniel, were kind to him, and worked to reunite him with his mother after liberation in September 1944.

Daniel describes various placements post liberation, especially in AischeEnRefail; mentions a French committee that collected hidden Jewish children, and Aliyah Bet. His mother was injured during an air raid and could not take care of her children at that time. He relates how difficult and painful it was for all parties, especially his sister, when his mother wanted to reclaim her daughter from the Christian family that sheltered her for three years.

In April 1948, Daniel, his mother and his sister went to the United States from Belgium, sponsored by his father’s family. He talks about his family’s life shortly after they arrived, and his own life from that time to the present.

Rabbi Helmut Frank, born April 15, 1912 in Wiesbaden,Germany, talks about his early interest in Judaism, details pre-war Jewish life including religious education, relations with Gentiles and sporadic antisemitism. He describes education at the Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums in Berlin from 1931 to 1937. He also studied at Berlin University and received his Ph.D. from the University of Bonn in 1935. He gives his impression of Leo Baeck and his role in the Reichsvertretung. He explains why many Jews still felt they could survive in Germany.

He was ordained in 1937 and was appointed as a Rabbi in Worms. He provides a history of the synagogue. His vivid, detailed eye-witness account of Kristallnacht, November 9, 1938 includes several vignettes, the burning of his synagogue, damage to his apartment, and lack of reaction by the fire department. He was arrested, along with other Jews. They were compelled to clean the debris in the streets, then transported to Buchenwald. He describes brutality, organization of camp life, lack of medical treatment, effect of incarceration on prisoners’ physical and mental health and religious observance. He mentions Aktion Jews and Jehova’s Witnesses and that Nazis warned released prisoners never to talk about Buchenwald. He worked in a labor squad but was released after his parents got him a visa for China.

Rabbi Frank returned to Worms where he opened a House of Prayer and a school with permission from the German authorities. He describes the extent of the damage in Worms and the continued persecution of the Jewish community. He left for the United States in August, 1939. He discusses the immigration process, postwar conditions in Worms, and restoration of the Worms synagogue in 1961.