Oral History Interview with Henry Altschuler

Moshe Moskowitz was born in 1922 in Lespitz-Baya, Romania to a merchant family that was traditional but not deeply religious. He studied in a Jewish school, then in a vocational school. He planned to go to Palestine, joined a Zionist youth group and worked in an agricultural community. After the German occupation, Jews were transferred from the villages to the large cities, and many were sent to forced labor camps. His Zionist youth group became active in the resistance. Moshe took on Aryan identity, as did others who had contact with Zionist emissaries in Constantinople and Switzerland. Emissaries from England and the U.S. often attended the resistance meetings. The diplomatic courier who carried letters from the resistance betrayed them, and those who were arrested were sent to camps in Transnistria.

Moshe and his group smuggled children out of camps, gave them false identities, and set up cultural activities until they could be processed to go to Palestine on illegal immigration on ships. In 1944, British-trained parachutists from Palestine landed in Romania and Moshe’s Zionist group was among those who gave them identity papers, living quarters and maps to help them reach Bucharest. They also helped German, American and English prisoners-of- war in Brasov with money, clothing and medicine. After liberation, they rushed to the American and British zones to take Jewish prisoners out of the range of German bombings. Moshe was in charge of the funds through the Landsmanshuteyfor such operations. Groups who were involved in saving children maintained connections in Israel. Moshe emigrated to Israel post-war.

Mina Lustiger, nee Bochner, was born July 30, 1929 in Bielitz, Poland. Her father was in the scrap metal business. She shares childhood memories including frightening antisemitic attacks. She describes the commotion and uncertainty after the German invasion, first sent with her siblings to her grandfather in Kęty, to avoid the Germans but then having to return home. After finally reunited with her parents in Bielsko she witnessed Jews being harassed and her family experienced the plunder of their silver by Germans. The whole family then fled toKęty because it was a smaller citywhere they hoped to avoid harassment. When her mother was jailed in Kęty for trying to send a package of food and her father was sent to a labor camp, the four girls were left alone. Mina describes the Kęty Ghetto and her subsequent deportation to the Neudorf Ghetto in 1941.They were warned1 not to be in the area during a selection and fled, posing as Aryans, to their uncle in Chrzanów. She describes the harrowing journey, travelling alone as a 12 year old, and then being joined by her sisters. Subsequently, they found out that some of the family had survived the selection and were then in Wadowice and the sisters again made a dangerous journey to join family. Mina describes the gated Wadowice Ghetto and how they had to sneak in with a labor brigade. Soon after, she and her sisters were deported to Sucha labor camp where they did hard labor regulating water near railways. She describes being sent to a distribution center at Sosnowiec and again being deported with her sisters to forced labor, this time in a spinning factory in Freiberg, Germany in 1943. She speaks about slightly better treatment there, but still long working hours and the scarcity of food. They were deported to Röhrsdorflabor camp and describes harsh working conditions, with little food and much suffering from disease. She mentions fasting on Yom Kippur.

In 1945, as Russian forces approached, they were sent on a death march to the Sudeten in Czechoslovakia, walking for several days, without food and sleeping in the snow. At Kratzau concentration camp, they joined inmates from many other countries. They finally were incarcerated at Gross Rosen, where she experienced the most brutal conditions. She describes beatings, many deaths from typhus and exhausting work in freezing weather.

On May 8, 1945, she was liberated by the Russian Army and then re-united with her family in Bielitz. In 1946, she went to England with a group of 100 other children and attended an ORT school. In 1951, she married Samuel Lustiger and they emigrated to the United States in 1952. They have a family of three children.

Mina does not indicate whether these were Jews or Gentiles who warned them.

Rachel Hochhauser, née Swerdlin, was born July 2, 1928 in Krzywice, Poland. She was the only child of a religious family. Her grandfather was Rabbi and Shochet of the shtetl. Her grandmother and parents operated a general store. She describes religious education and a comfortable life, pre WWII, and friendly relations with Polish and Russian neighbors until September 3, 1939. She details restrictive occupations under Russians and subsequent persecution by Germans and local collaborators in summer of 1941. When her father was killed she went into hiding with her mother and other relatives after warnings from non-Jews, including the police Kommandant for whom she worked.

The family hid on several farms from April, 1942 until 1944. They were protected for 20 months by a Catholic farmer’s wife, Anna Kobinska, with whom Rachel continued to correspond after the war. When forced to move for the final time, they went into a partisan-occupied area. She describes the privations of living in a swamp during the winter of 1943-44. A log bunker built for them in the woods in exchange for 20 rubles of gold sheltered ten people until spring, 1944. The Russian Blitzkrieg and deserting Germans drove the group to return to their homes in Krzywice, where her family was welcomed home by neighbors. They adopted an orphan girl found in their house and moved westward to the DP camp at Foehrenwald. Rachel describes her education there in an ORT school. She immigrated to the United States in April, 1951.

Recorded at the 1985 American Gathering of Holocaust Survivors in Philadelphia, PA.

Lillian Wishnefsky, née Kupferberg, was born in Sosnowiec, Poland in December 1929. Her father was a merchant and her mother a professional pianist. Her family observed the Jewish holidays. She attended public school until fourth grade when Germany invaded Poland in September 1939. She describes the formation of the Sosnowiec Ghetto in 1941, the confiscation of her father’s factory, her clandestine education, life in the ghetto, her family’s move to the Srodula Ghetto; her mother obtained false papers and was hidden by Christians. She describes the Nazis taking her father in the middle of the night, murdering her grandparents and deporting her to a camp and later Auschwitz.

Even though she was only 12 ½ years old, she was not sent to the children’s camp in Auschwitz but was instead assigned to forced labor. Her barracks were across the street from the gas chambers. One and a half years later she was sent on the death march to Ravensbrück. She was part of a prisoner exchange arranged by President Roosevelt and traveled to Sweden via Denmark. She describes her experience on a Swedish farm and her move to Stockholm which was precipitated by a Swedish publishing company’s interest in her diary. She moved to the United States in November 1545.

Ervin Belik, formerly Bleiweiss, was born in Mistek, Czechoslovakia, June 13 1918, the youngest son in a large family. He was educated in both Jewish and Czech schools. After the German occupation March 1939, he was warned that the S.S. was waiting to arrest him and fled to Poland in May 1939.

He joined the Czech army in Krakow and changed his name to Belik. His unit landed with the Russian forces in Poland and was sent to Ukraine. He served as a member of the Czech Army unit under Russian command in Poland and Russia; under British command in Palestine and other countries in the Middle East, and took part in an attack on three French Army units suspected of being Nazi collaborators. He later served with an Australian Army unit in Tobruk. His unit returned to Palestine where he participated in the defense of Haifa and in the rollback of German and Italian forces from El Alamein to Tripoli. Mr. Belik arrived in England in June 1943 on the troopship Mauretania. He met and married his wife, a German Jewish refugee, in England. He participated in the invasion of France and arrived in Pilsen, Czechoslovakia with Patton's Third Army in 1945.

Mr. Belik was discharged in January 1946 and returned to Mistek where he met his brother Ernst. is entire family except for his brother, and aHHis HHis eniree HH

Hkmkjkjkjkjljklkjl His entire family except for his brother, and a sister who lives in Haifa, was murdered. Ervin, his wife and two children lived in Mistek until they emigrated to Israel on July 7, 1949. He describes their new life in Israel.

This interview took place in KiryatMotzkin, Israel.

Eva Cutler, née Frederich, was born in 1925 in Budapest, Hungary, the second child of a cultured, Jewishly emancipated family. She describes her family’s change from being unaware of existing Hungarian antisemitism and of Nazi persecutions of Jews elsewhere, to growing dread under government imposed restrictions, almost secret attempts to emigrate, along with continuing disbelief. She tells of varied attitudes of Hungarians under German occupation and help given by some non-Jews, even a German administrator. Her brother was inducted into a work brigade and later her father was taken away.

In the fall of 1944, Eva—along with many other young Jewish women—was herded out of Budapest. She details horrendous conditions and brutality during the death march to Bergen-Belsen. She witnessed a mass execution of men. A German army officer helped her walk so she could keep going. Some townspeople offered food to the marchers, others abused them. She mentions a brief encounter with Wallenberg at the Austrian border, where he saved those who had Swiss or Swedish protective passes or said they had. Eva arrived at Bergen-Belsen in January 1945 after enduring a prolonged cattle car ride. She describes how survivors suffered from continued deprivation and illness there and also had to cope with hostility from Polish and Czech Jews already there. After liberation in April, she learns that her parents survived in Budapest and her brother is presumed dead. Eva was sent to Sweden for recovery and rehabilitation by the Red Cross. She praises the excellent medical care and kindness she experienced there. She came to the United States in 1946. Her parents came to the United States via Canada, after Eva attained U.S. citizenship. She closes with an account of her return to Hungary after 37 years and stresses the brotherhood of man.