Oral History Interview with Lily Maor
Title
Date
Contributor
Summary
Lily Maor, née Krausz, was born into a middle class, not very religious family in Gyoer-Raab, Hungary, a town located close to the main road between Vienna and Budapest. Lily shares details about pre-war life and that the Jews were fully integrated into the community. She describes German troops entering in March of 1944 ostensibly to help Hungary. She describes the changes under German Occupation, being forced to wear a yellow star, limitations to her father’s business and being forced to the Sighet Ghetto in June 1944, a poor town which already had overcrowded living conditions. They were allowed to take only what they could carry and she describes leaving many things behind. Lily also describes the sense of confusion that the Germans created before they deported the Jews to Auschwitz, making them move from one part of the ghetto to another, humiliating body searches, being told that they were going to a work camp, the rabbis suffering shaving and humiliation because they called a prayer service. Lily mentions the kindness of one gendarme who helped her evade a body search and also mentions that the local Priest offered some girls to come work on his farm to avoid deportation. They declined because they wanted to stay with their families.
Lily describes being loaded into cattle cars on June 11, which took them to Auschwitz. Lily gives detailed description of the arrival, selection, starvation and depravation at the camp. Her mother and nine year old brother perished there. Lily vividly recalls the cruelty of Kapos and guards, and of Dr. Mengele, who came every few days to observe the selections. She also describes that they were under Hungarian supervision until the border and they were let off the train to use the facilities and were warned by some children to run away.
In Auschwitz, Lily quickly realized that to survive she had to be able to work. She was among 500 Hungarian women chosen to go to Bremen to remove medical, dental and other equipment from the ruins. They were moved to Oberheide, where Lily worked in the cement factory. As the Allies came closer, they were moved to Delmhorst, 20 kilometers from Bremen. From there the women were taken in open trains or were made to walk to Bergen-Belsen.
Lily was liberated on April 15, 1945 by British troops and recalls that on the day of liberation people died because they did not know how to eat the food that had been given to them. She remained in Bergen-Belsen for a short time. When she learned that no one in her immediate family had survived, she moved to Israel. She lived there for a number of years, then emigrated to the United States.
Lily adds comments on Dr. Kastner and his involvement in efforts to rescue the Jews of Hungary. Nora Levin then briefly explains details of the negotiations.
See also her 1988 interview with Sylvia Brockmon.1
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of
Charlotte Bing
Charlotte Bing was born in 1918 in Bielsko (Bielitz), Poland, a textile town near the German border. Charlotte describes her town and explains that most of the 8,000 Jews were financially well off. She details her schooling at a Jewish school for four years and then at a German high school. She discusses pre-war antisemitism and also the good relations between the rabbi and the Catholic priest, but that the priest would not step in to say anything about his parishioners hurting Jews unless the rabbi requested it of him.
Charlotte recounts that in 1938 Polish Jews living in Germany—who were deported back to Poland—were helped by the Jews of Bielsko. She vividly recalls the blatant antisemitism exhibited by Polish citizens when Germans took over the city and the anti-Jewish measures that began. The SS rounded up all of the Jewish men. Jews were ordered to give up their money and gold. Jewish children could not go to school and Jewish stores were not permitted to operate. Her family fled to Wadowice thinking that the Germans would not come further into Poland, but were again forced to flee after six weeks. Charlotte describes the escape of her family and her fiancée to Krakow. After a year in Krakow, the entire Jewish community was deported to the Plaszow Ghetto. Charlotte describes in detail the creation of the ghetto, conditions, forced labor, scarcity of food, and the clandestine education of children. She describes how work at menial jobs was organized by Germans, assisted by selected members of the Jewish community.
At the end of 1942 Charlotte and her husband were transferred to the Majdanek concentration camp Charlotte describes their arrival (in sealed cars, no food/water, toilet). She witnessed atrocities (including the killing of a baby) upon their arrival. She details her work as translator and laying rail lines and an injury that never healed, as well as conditions in the camp. She also details frequent visits by Adolph Eichmann.
The Soviet army liberated the camp in July – August 1944 and the first Jewish community in Europe was formed nearby. Food and clothing came from the Russians and from Jews living in Palestine. Charlotte describes the immense difficulty faced by people who came to reclaim children taken in by Polish families and children searching for their parents. She details post-war threats by Poles (liberated Polish political prisoners known as ACOFTA), who targeted her husband. She describes their flight through Krakow and Czechoslovakia to Germany and recounts their very difficult time getting visas to emigrate to the United States. In October of 1945 they secured menial work on a U.S. Military transport plane as a means of coming to the United States, where they joined family in New York.
of
Raoul Harmelin
Raoul Harmelin, the only son of a doctor, born September 11, 1924 in Boryslaw, Poland, received both a secular and a Jewish education. He talks about pre-war life in Boryslaw-- whose main industry was oil refineries-- and life under German and Russian occupations. Raoul describes life under the Germans after June, 1941, including pogroms, anti-Jewish measures, attitude of the local population, and formation of forced labor battallions organized by the Judenrat. He describes a series of Aktions (roundups and mass murders of Jews) from November 1941 to 1943, and the murder of 600 Jews in Doly in great detail. Some were conducted by a German VernichtungKommando under General Katzman. Polish and Ukrainian locals, Austrians in the Schutz Polizei and Reiterzugpolizei, the Polish Kriminalpolizei , and Jews in the Ordnungsdienst all helped to round up Jews. Jews were sent to a camp at Ulica Janowska in Lwow or to forced labor in local industry, most were transported to and murdered in Belzec. Raoul escaped from a roundup where he witnessed the murder of an infant and a young girl.
His father continued to work because Jewish doctors were needed to treat the citizens of Boryslaw. One of his patients hid Raoul and his mother. A ghetto was established but was liquidated after a forced labor camp for Jews was opened in 1943. Jews who could not hide were eliminated or worked as slave laborers in the Zwangsarbeitslager in Boryslaw. Raoul and other Jews who worked in connection with the war effort had some degree of protection. He got news from London via radio and from an underground paper published by ArmiaKrajowa (Home Army). A Ukrainian acquaintance hid 13 Jews, including Raoul and his parents from March 13, 1944 to August 8, 1944, when the Russians came back.
He describes postwar life under Russian occupation, including two arrests and escape to Breslaw. He and his parents decided to leave Poland after a pogrom in Kielce. After a stay in Paris, aided by HIAS, they arrived in Sidney, Australia in November 1947. He was able to bring his new wife and her parents to Australia later. He talks about his life in and adjustment to Australia after a very difficult beginning. He closes by naming relatives on both sides of his family who were killed or survived, and reflects on the actions of non-Jews during the Holocaust. See also 2 interviews with his wife, Rita Harmelin.
Note: Collateral Material available through the Gratz College Tuttleman Library are photocopies of these German documents:
Certificate for Raoul
Harmelin
that he can walk in the street unaccompanied by an Aryan.
The same document for his father, Dr. Elkan
Harmelin
.
Work I.D. Card for Raoul
Harmelin
.
I.D. Card for Regina
Harmelin
, his mother.
Tags with letter "R" which indicated that Raoul
Harmelin
and his parents were assigned to a work detail.