Oral History Interview with Hasia Aufschauer

Anatole Gorko was born in Lodz, Poland on June 28, 1907 of well-to-do Zionists. He worked in his father’s spinning factory until 1939, when Germany invaded Poland. He fought in the Polish Army for three weeks. After being in the Reserves, he was taken to a prisoner of war camp for a few weeks. He found himself with his family in the center of the Lodz Ghetto in January 1940 and describes the life there. He worked as head cashier for the ghetto stores until August 1944.

He and his family including his wife and child were finally deported to Auschwitz, in cattle cars, where, in the presence of Mengele, only he and his brother-in-law were selected for work and the rest of the family perished. He describes the train ride, arrival, selection, and shaving. He remained there for one month, then pretended to be a mechanic and was selected for a camp in Sudeten where after two weeks of training he worked on V2 rockets. Here he managed to sabotage, and persuade other workers, including German mechanics, to sabotage the work. He worked there from September 1944 until May 1945 when the Russians liberated the area. He made his way back to Lodz where he remarried, became head of the textile production for Communist Poland, but decided to leave. He smuggled himself and his wife to Munich, and waited from 1946 to 1948 to obtain necessary papers to resettle in the United States. He describes in some detail his adjustment to the United States.

Gabriela Truly, née Braun, was born January 7, 1916 in Levoča, Czechoslovakia, where her family had lived since the first half of the 18th century. She and her five siblings were active in Zionist groups. In 1939, as Slovak nationalists allied with the Axis, restrictions were placed on Jews. Her father’s tinsmithing shop was taken over by the State in 1940. In 1942, Mrs. Truly was rounded up with 1000 single girls aged 14-40, from surrounding areas and sent in the first transport to Auschwitz. She describes the dehumanizing intake process and the difficult life in the camps. Later, when mothers were brought with small children to a separate block, her sister and her 4 ½ year old son were among the first to be gassed in Auschwitz. Mrs. Truly describes the drive of self-preservation, of caring only for yourself, although she narrates many incidents in which she aided others and others aided her. Later in 1942, she was moved to Birkenau, and became very ill with typhus, diarrhea and a badly infected foot. In February 1943 she was hospitalized back in Auschwitz. Mrs. Truly categorizes which jobs were easier to survive and which more difficult. Again, aided by a hairdresser named Monsi, she gets a job first knitting for commandant Hoess, then filing in the personnel building. She was told permits to go to Israel had mysteriously come to Auschwitz, but nothing happened. On January 18, 1944, she was taken on a three day death march, and then near Ravensbrück, where she saw her mother for the last time. Next, they were taken to Malchow where she later met up with the younger sister of her sister-in-law. Eventually, she came to Crivitz and witnessed rape by Russian soldiers. Three brothers and one sister with two children had also survived. At last she went to Prague, where in 1948 she left for New York to live with a brother. She married an American-born Jew and remained in New York.

Malvina Lebovic, née Kleinberger, was born in 1920 in Kalnik (Kal'nyk), near Munkacs, Czechoslovakia. She was the oldest of nine children. Her father was a butcher, the family was very poor and life was difficult. Her father organized a school for Jewish children because of antisemitism in school. In 1934 the family moved to Karlovy (Karlsbad) hoping for a better life. In 1938, after the Anschluss of Austria they moved back to Kalnik but shortly thereafter the area was occupied by Hungary. Mrs. Lebovic describes that Jews started to be persecuted, her father and brother were taken to labor camps, Jews were frequently beaten and food was scarce.

When Germany occupied Hungary, all the Jews were deported to Auschwitz in cattle cars. Mrs. Lebovic describes conditions during the journey and arrival at Auschwitz. Her mother and younger brother were immediately taken to the gas chambers, she and two sisters to barracks. Later, in a group of 2,000, they were transferred first to Stutthof and then to Baumgart for hard labor. They lived in tents and slept on straw. Only 200 of the 2,000 survived.

All three sisters contracted typhus shortly before liberation by the Russians in March 1945. They returned to Kalnik, married and eventually made their way to Israel. After her daughter contracted polio they came to the United States for medical treatment and remained there.

See also testimony of her husband, David Lebovic.

Jack Arnel (previously YashaAronovitz) was born on May 23, 1929 in Vilna, Poland (now Vilna, Lithuania) to a well-to-do Jewish family. His father owned a furrier factory and his mother was a custom tailor. He shares his childhood memories of his war-time experiences. He describes their pre-war life, having a maid, and a governess and spending summers in the country. Jack was a member of Betar. Jack briefly describes how their lives changed under the Soviet Occupation in 1939.

Jack describes that in 1941, when the Germans occupied the area,his family was moved into the Vilna Ghetto and from there to a sub-camp for furriers (who were privileged prisoners called Keilis). There they made fur vests for German soldiers. Jack describes the family’s deportation in 1944 and the fear that they were being sent to their death since they were headed toward Ponary2, but eventually passed it. The women were forced off the trains in Stutthof and the men were sent to LagerKreisLandsberg, a sub-camp of Dachau. Jack was forced to work building underground facilities to manufacture weaponry for the German armies and describes Dachau in detail: beatings, starvation, killings and brutal labor. Later he and his father fled from a transport during an American air-raid and found an advancing American Army unit. They were cared for at St. Ottilien Hospital, an American camp set up in a church in Germany. His mother and sister, Sonia, survived as well and were liberated by the Russians. Jack describes how they were all reunited in Munich. They remained in a Displaced Persons Camp for four years and arrived in the United States in July 1949.

Willie Nowak was born August 1, 1908 in Berlin, to a family of libera1 Austrian Jews. His father owned a tobacco factory in Berlin. After attending a Realgymnasium in Berlin, Willie sold pharmaceuticals in Brunn, Czechoslovakia, 1935-37. On his return to Berlin, he found he had lost his German citizenship. During Kristallnacht in 1938, he witnessed the burning of the Fasanenstrasse Synagogue where he had celebrated his bar mitzvah. He emigrated to Shanghai in 1938 with his fiancée and the two children of his first marriage. He describes in detail the refugee camp in the Japanese district, the support from the Joint Distribution Committee and the Russian Jewish community for a hospital, kosher soup kitchen and the services of a rabbi. Willie worked as a musician in bars and night clubs and was also in charge of Jewish guards in the refugee camp. He describes interactions between Chinese and Japanese individuals and himself. His wife, Elsa, worked in an underwear factory owned by Austrian Jews who sold to Japanese buyers. The Nowak family emigrated to the United States in January 1948 on a collective affidavit for Shanghai refugees.

Rosa Zygmund Burk,nee Tennenbaum was born on April 20, 1927 in Szydlowiec, Poland, a town of about (90%) 7,200 Jews. She was the daughter of David and Ethel Tennenbaum. Her father was a shoe factory worker and a member of the Bund. Rosa describes their life before the German invasion, her schooling and the Jewish community life. At school they spoke Polish, studied Jewish subjects separately, and at home they spoke Yiddish. She had a large extended family of which only she and two cousins survived.

Rosa describes the Germaninvasion in September1939: raiding Jewish homes, cutting offmen’s beards, the beatings and murders. She explains that the Germans and the Polish police completely burned down the towns’ synagogues. She discusses theJudenratand how they supplied money and riches to the Germans in hopes of saving the people. She details the creation of the Slovia Ghetto and explains how Jews from Krakow and Warsaw flocked to this ghetto because it was an open ghetto and how the crowded conditions created disease.

Rosa was deported on foot at the end of 1942 to the labor camp, Skarzyskoand worked in the HASAGammunition plant. She goes into great detail about the cruelty of the Germans and the work and living conditions. She also mentions some kindnesses from a Jewish Kapo. In 1944, Rosa was transferred by truck to another ammunition work camp, Czestochowa, where there were constant “selections.” Rosa describes in detail the hardships of working in these factories and how she escaped the death march to Buchenwald by hiding in a latrine. On January 16, 1945 she and five other girls walked out of camp and into the town of Czestochowaand were liberated by the Soviets a few days later when they converted the house they were living in to a hospital. They worked as nurses for the Russian wounded.

Rosa did not return to her home town because of antisemitism. She fled to the American zone in Erfurt, Germany and then to Frankfurt am Main. She was in the ZeilsheimDisplaced Persons camp run by the Joint Distribution Committee, and there she met her husband (who had been liberated from Buchenwald). After the war they moved to Frankfurt and then to the U. S. on February 2, 1950 with the support of the Joint Distribution Committee.