Oral History Interview with Fred L. Hammel

Jack Zaifman was born in Radom, Poland on March 2, l925 into an Orthodox Jewish family. His father was a merchant. He attended public school and chederuntil age l4. He describes the savagery of the German bombing and invasion of Radom in September l939. Escaping from a round-up of Jews, he bicycled to Wolanow and lived for a year with a Jewish family until that small town was liquidated. He was taken for slave labor at a nearby camp manned by Gestapo, Ukrainian and Lithuanian guards. He worked as a tailor for the German Army, witnessed a massacre of 350 Jews and had to dig trenches to bury the dead. When he was ill with typhoid fever, a righteous German soldier took him to the Rodomer Ghetto hospital.

In autumn of 1941, Jack was sent to Blizyn labor camp, near the German border, where he was betrayed by a Jewish Kapo and severely beaten by guards when he tried to help another prisoner. Among the 3,000 survivors (out of l0,000) of Blizyn, he was shipped to Auschwitz where he sorted clothing of the dead. He describes the train ride, selections and his bunk make being selected for an experiment by Mengele. Jack describes walking over to another Kommando one day which was deported to Dachau where he endured brutal labor, carrying cement and laying pipes. During a death march from Dachau, April l945, he was liberated by Americans and taken to a hospital at Wolfratshausen, weighing 70 pounds. At the Feldafing DP camp he met and married his wife; they came to the United States in April l949. He began speaking in high schools and colleges about his experience in l977.

Dr. Paul G. Eglick served in the 508th Parachute Infantry of the 82nd Airborne, U.S. Third Army as a medical officer. Around May 7, 1945 he was ordered to go to Ludwiglust, Mecklenburg, Germany, not knowing he would enter the Wöbbelein concentration camp. He vividly describes piles of victims who had starved to death, the condition of survivors, and the attempt to save them. His unit took care to treat the starving survivors properly and evacuated them, helped by several other medical units. Dr. Eglick explains how deeply entering this camp affected him and the other American soldiers. Local Germans were ordered to bury the dead. He gives his opinion about United States policy concerning the extermination camps and why the United States could have done more to stop the killing. He tells about an encounter with a couple in a mixed marriage who survived in Berlin with the help of non-Jewish neighbors.

Dora Langsam was born in Brzeziny, Poland January 1, 1925. Her family kept kosher, her father, a business man, fought with Trumpeldor, her brother served in the Polish army.

She describes conditions for Jews after the German invasion in September 1939. One brother died trying to protect his father from the Germans, one sister with her newborn baby was taken during a selection. The rest of the family stayed in the Brzeziny Ghetto from 1940 to the spring of 1942 when the ghetto was closed and the Jewish population was transported to the Lodz Ghetto. Her mother was taken away in a selection immediately, a brother later. Dora and her father worked in a factory as slave laborers. She describes what she refers to as “hellish conditions” in the Lodz Ghetto.

In July or August 1944, the liquidation of the ghetto started. Dora, her father, and a sister were transported to Auschwitz. Her father was taken away as soon as he got off the train. Dora and her sister lived in barracks, supervised by a brutal Czech KAPO and endured daily Appells, selections, hunger and cold. Dora tried to rescue her sister during a selection and both were saved from certain death at the last second by an air raid. Both were transported to a labor camp in Neukölln to work in an ammunition factory owned by Krupp. In 1945, near the end of the war, they were transported to Ravensbrück where they received food packages from the American Red Cross. Dora and her sister did not get sick like most of the girls because they didn’t eat the non-kosher food.

On April 24, 1945 Dora and her sister went to Padborg, Denmark on a convoy organized by Folke Bernadotte, then on to Copenhagen and Malmö, Sweden. She describes how deeply being treated like human beings affected them and the quarantines in Lund then Visingsö. Dora worked in a sanatorium during the day and went to school at night, stayed in Sweden for eight years, married her husband, a survivor from Poland, and had a son and a daughter during that time. On July 6, 1953 they went to the United States, helped by HIAS, because her husband wanted to raise his children in a free country. Her sister still lives in Sweden with her husband, also a survivor.

Harry Bass was born on October 10, 1920 in Bialystok, Poland. He talks about his life, Jewish life in general, educational facilities for Jewish children in Bialystok, and his Zionist activities prior to 1939. He briefly mentions the arrival of Polish Jews who were expelled from Germany.

After the German invasion in 1939, his family hid for a while, then were forced into the Bialystok Ghetto along with the entire Jewish population of Bialystok, as well as Jews from surrounding villages and towns. He describes conditions in the ghetto, how he traded goods for food and activities of the Judenrat.

In December 1942, Harry, his three brothers, a sister and an uncle, were deported to Auschwitz in closed cattle cars. He could have escaped and explains why he chose not to.

In Birkenau, his two little brothers were sent to the crematoriums. Harry and his other siblings were taken to the slave labor camp. He describes the daily routine in the camps, living conditions, how prisoners were branded, and briefly mentions attempts at religious observance. Prisoners who tried to escape were killed. Harry worked in the kitchen, later in a Straf Kommando (punishment detail) where a German soldier saved his life.

To evacuate Auschwitz, prisoners were forced on a Death March to Gleiwitz in deep snow, then to Mauthausen on an open train on January 18, 1945. Thousands died and survivors were treated brutally. In April 1945, surviving prisoners were brought to Magdeburg and put on ships in the Elbe. Most ships were sunk by the Germans, Harry’s boat was torpedoed by the British but he managed to survive.

After liberation by the British, Harry recuperated in a hospital in Neustadt Holstein, searched for family members, and was reunited with some of them. He immigrated to the United States on March 29, 1949, where he became very involved in every aspect of the Jewish community.

The transcript includes historical endnotes by Dr. Michael Steinlauf as well as several vignettes about helping fellow prisoners, help from German soldiers and slave labor.

Interviewee: BASS, Harry Date: August 22, 1983

Emmi Loewenstern was born on February 19, 1925 in Emmerich, Germany. She briefly describes pre-war life: schooling and relations with non-Jewish Poles. The family was well known in the town. Emmi describes the change in attitude toward Jews after the Nazis came to power. She gives a detailed description of Kristallnacht, the damage done to their home by soldiers they knew, the imprisonment of her father.

In December 1941, Emmi and her family were deported to the Riga Ghetto in Latvia. She describes the journey and arrival in detail including hearing about the mass murder of the Latvian Jews by Jewish survivors still working in the ghetto. She details the lack of food, crowded conditions, forced labor, brutality and atrocities: people being taken out on work shifts and shot if they were caught stealing food. She discusses some holiday observances in the ghetto. She also describes an incident in October 1942 when some young Latvian Jews tried to bring ammunition into the ghetto, were caught and 39 were shot to death.

In November 1943 Emmi, her sister and her mother were sent to various places for forced labor: working for the German army at the Armeebiekleidungsamt [army quartermaster] sorting clothes of deceased German soldiers and in another (unnamed) camp. She describes how the young children were separated from their parents and never heard from again. In the fall of 1944, they were deported to Stutthof and then to Libau (Latvia) where they had to work at a shoe factory. She describes how they took the handkerchiefs off their heads during the trip to and from work so the townspeople would see how they were being treated. In February 1945, they were deported to Hamburg, Germany to Fuhlsbüttel (a subcamp of Neuengamme) where they had to label bags of spices. She describes the deplorable conditions of the deathmarch from Hamburg to Kiel where they had to sort bricks.

In 1945, they were taken to Malmö, Sweden via Denmark by the Red Cross due to the Bernadotte Agreement. Emmi contacted relatives in the United States and Sweden. Emmi emigrated with her mother and sister to the United States where Emmi married in 1947 and had two daughters.

Edith Millman, nee Greifinger, was born in 1924 in Bielsko (Bielitz), Poland. Father was an executive for Standard Oil Co. In 1937 the family moved to Warsaw. She was injured during the bombardment of the city in September 1939 when bombs hit the building in which they lived. She describes persecution of Jews which started immediately after the occupation and the horrendous conditions in the Warsaw Ghetto into which they were forced to move in November 1940. While there, she was able to study in small clandestine groups organized by teachers. She briefly discusses the Judenrat.

She worked at the Schultz factory until the end of 1942 when she escaped from the ghetto. With forged papers received from Gentiles, she passed as an Aryan and worked as a translator for the German railroad. She stole railroad identification cards, food stamps and coal with which she helped others. She describes fear of being discovered and close escapes. Speaking German and pretending to be an ethnic German helped her to throw off blackmailers. She lost many relatives, describes the deaths of several. After liberation by the Russians in August 1944 she studied medicine in Lublin, Poland, and after the war’s end in Marburg/Lahn, Germany, she came to the University of Kentucky in Lexington, KY in December 1947 on a B’nai B’rith Hillel scholarship. Her parents arrived in the USA in 1949.