Oral History Interview with Jack Price

Jack (Isaak) Price was born in Warsaw, Poland, May 15, 1924. His family was in an import export business and he lived in a very Jewish neighborhood. In 1940 all schools for Jews were closed and the family was ordered into the Warsaw Ghetto with liquidations beginning July 22, 1942. Jack describes sneaking out of the ghetto to bring food in for his family and the bribery and corruption in the Jewish Council. He heard about the exterminations from escapees from Treblinka who reported to the leaders of the Jewish Fighting Organization and the Judenrat that the clothing of the dead was being shipped back to Germany. The escapees told of the gassing and warned Jews not to volunteer for “resettlement”. Many Jews could not believe these reports.Jack was able to join the Jewish underground because he did not look Jewish and was given Aryan papers by the Jewish underground.He went back and forth from the Aryan side and survivedby “dealing”; selling cigarettes, shining shoes and buying arms and uniforms from the regular German army(which was sympathetic to the Poles). His story istold inthe book, The Cigarette Sellers of Three Crosses Square by Yosef Zena, (Joseph Zieman).Mr Price was known as "Stasiek-from-Praga" in the book. Jack describes how his parents’ wish that “at least let there be a name left; fight for survival” was what kept his spirit alive throughout.

Jack details the existence of two Polish underground groups: the Polish Home Army in London(that was fascist and antisemitic) and the Polish Workers Party in Lublin (sympathetic to Jews); Jack fought with PWP. He continued to smuggle in pistols, dynamite and Molotov cocktail materials until 1943. He describes his fighting in the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto Uprising and his escape to the Aryan side. Jack escaped from a train on the way to Treblinka and was shot in the leg during the heavy fighting of the Polish uprising in 1944. He went from prison to prison as a Polish POW, was hidden by various sympathetic Poles and was liberated by the Russians on January 17, 1945. Jack details instances of antisemitism in Warsaw even after the war. He was sent to an international orphanage and later came to the United States in 1947.