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you have Kaluszyn, you have Wegrow, you have S , you have more to the Russian side, to the east. And so it was a difference, a different city, a different setup between the Christian population and the Jewish population. We didn't have this kind of --like it was in some other places. But naturally, the German influence, the propaganda after passed away. You know what I mean, the anti-Semitism propaganda began to influence, you know, the Polish people. It's a fact when the Germans comed in, in 1939, like I told you in the fall, the war didn't last too long. It last maybe eight, ten days. The Poles didn't want to fight. The Germans, what I know about it, the Jewish people, the Jewish boys what they was in the Polish army, they would do the fighting. Because we expected from the propaganda, when the Germans will come in, what is going to be. It's a fact that the Germans already took Poland, it was divided Poland by the book, between Russia and Germany. The Germans comed in, the Germans took away the quarters of our house, from our house. A big officer happened to take up from our house, half a house. When he comed in, he was like a hyena, like an animal. But you know, a Jewish woman, a Sabbath, she cooked fish and meat and mached a yulk an aroma.

The German officer was over there and you know, little by little he became domesticated. My mother used to bring him something to eat. After several weeks, four weeks, or six weeks, he used to come in, he used to say Frau Fishman, v didn't you go to Russia? Because Hitler what he said, he's going to do it, he'Il kill everybody. He stood in the light and he said, I'm sorry, such a nice people, they should be wasted. But in the meantime, you know what I mean, he realized, he said something what he shouldn't say it. So he said, please don't repeat what I said because he looks like he was afraid for himself, you know. Anyway, you know, after several months, you know what I mean, the Germans begin to tighten up the city like they used to take --. The first thing they took away everything what the Jews have. The radios, if you have a motorcycle, or you have something, they took it away. You couldn't have nothing, they cut it off everything. We had a housemaid. The housemaid, her name was Marta. She happened to marry a guy by the name, Bernard from Zh___._He was a very educated guy. He was a director of a Swedish factory what makes matches. You know, strikels are matches.

When the Germans comed in, he put it down a big eichenkrist a red belt with a black eichenkrist and he became a big man in the German thing. Over there, we have the German neighbors, Volkdeutschen. Volkdeutschen, a lot enlisted themselves to the Germans. The Germans naturally give the order they shall take the Jews for work. Naturally, they took me too. I knew them and they knew me. Lazora's son, they has son from the west. You know, a young man like me, I know the guy what they grabbed me for work. I used to say then, Poland was a Poland and you didn't act this way. He said to me, keep shout and kicked me in my behind, otherwise, you" ll get shot. I realized that this is the truth. I have to do what I have to do.

When I'll come to talk about this Bernard --. You know, he happened to marry the Marta, he didn't hurt nobody. He didn't hurt nobody. Is a fact, every time when I -- when they pushed us out from the city --when it come the time when every Jew have to get out from B > go into the Warsaw ghetto, he was the guy when he used to drive through with a truck, he used to drop me off azach. You know, it was a big -- with bread. He used to go through the ghetto.

Opened up the door, he used to say, stay in this corner and Ill throw you out a sack of bread for my family. While when we was in B , he had a bag radio. We used to hear the BBC from the underground. Between me and you I think he was working for some government. Not for the Germans, it is the truth. Otherwise, we used to close the door and we used to sit and hear from BBC received from England. Why did he have the honor to have the thing? His brother was a captain in a U-boat. But he was speaking a perfect French, a perfect English, a perfect German, a perfect Russian. Till today, I have only a suspicion that he was working for a foreign government, I don't know. Or for England, or for America. He did good. He saved maybe three times from my death. Oh, yes. Because when you're young. We had the kids.

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Contact reference@ushmm.org for further information about this collection Not far from B was a factory from sugar. We need sugar. I took the bicycle, it was not too much, a few kilometers, I run down and get sugar over there. Took off the armband and went down over there. In the meantime, it was, what do you call this, a roundup. Why was the roundup? The Poles killed a couple Germans and they took the helmets, excuse me, they shit in the helmets. They put it in their chests, the helmets. You know what I mean? While they was there, they making a roundup, I was over there too, in the middle. In the meantime, they grabbed me and I was laying on the ground. I'll never forget a German come through. He had three squares on his shoulder. I was laying on the ground and a German was staying with a gun over me. He said to me, he said to the guy, the kerl is a strong kerl, why you keeping him like this? He asked me what are you doing here? I said Bernard sent me to get some sugar. Who's Bernard? I said he has this number, here is his card. He said to me , get lost. Believe me, on the bicycle I was flying. I was not pedaling, I was flying. I come back to him and he said to me, why you didn't tell me. In other words, you know, check us. Why you didn't tell me you're going over there. You're doing things, one of these days, I'm not going to be able to help you. It was several times what he saved me. That's the reason I can say about him. That is the chapter. All right so we was in Warsaw now.

Q: Can I stop you for a second? The Warsaw ghetto wasn't, didn't --.

A: 1940.

Q: Yeah. So between "3 - --?

A: Was still an open ghetto.

Q: Right. Between "39 and "40 then, what happened, how was, what were things like for you and your family?

A: Well, what it was, it was still --. The ghetto was still open. In 1940, the ghetto was still open.

So you could trade with the Poles. If you have something to give them, they will sell you bread or they" ll sell you potatoes or something. You know, it was still --. But they were typing down.

When they shift us in -- when they had a law, all the suburbans have to go into the Warsaw ghetto. You see, all around Warsaw, all the suburban little cities, had to go in one place, in the ghetto.

Q: You went with your whole family?

A: Yeah, still the whole family, yeah. In 1940, I got married in the ghetto. I was the oldest son and I knew my wife already for a couple years. My father said he wants to bring the first child to the hippa, you know to the altar. When I got married, it's a tradition. When I got married, he said to me, my son now you have to think about how you're going to survive. So after the wedding, naturally I begin to -- I'm the oldest son -- my father was that time maybe, maybe 42 years old. The Germans already begin to put out laws, a law they needed young people to work. Everything was covered, how to say, they didn't know what they needed people. If they give the order in Warsaw, they need 500 people for work, the Jewish gemeinde, they had to give them 500 people, a thousand people. You know how many people they want, there to bring it. I was the oldest, I begin to smuggle in some food for the family. You know, don't forget there was still six people, father and mother, everybody we had some things what we were able to cash in, trade whatever you had. People begin to do business in the ghetto. I'll never forget

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Contact reference@ushmm.org for further information about this collection there was a Jewish man by the name Rubinstein. He used to stay in the corner and used to make vixin. You know what vixin is -- jokes. He used to say schmaltz. That means fats will be cheap. People would ask him why. . That mean the rich people melting out, they don't have no more money. Everybody's going to be poor, you know. In the morning, in the ghetto, life in the ghetto. People used to be laying in the streets, in the sidewalk. Used to go around a horse and wagon and picking them up. It was not even enough what to bury them.

They used to wrap them up in gasha you know in papers. Wrap them up and bury them. I was going around, it was already so bad, --.

Q: After how long, just a few months?

A: Oh, no. It was already more than six months, eight months. You know when the -- they already made, how to say, when you going in, you had to open up a piece of wood like in the military to open up, to go in. I used to smuggle in sometime with horse and wagon, you know, some bread, potatoes. He used to bribe the guard. The guard used to ask me what you have there. I used to leave the horse and wagon over there in the corner and approach the gate. It was soldiers, my lieber, my lovely men, would you please let me in. My father sick, my mother sick, the kids are sick, I have some bread, I have some potatoes. You never said how many you have because if he" ll step on the wheel and look it in, you have more -- I used to say a bisel, a little, never say how much. Because he could say why did you like to me? Always a little. It was going on for weeks. You know I used to bring it in -- one time it was a rainy night. I approached the gate to drive in and I give them a golden watch to drive in with my loot, what I had. They stepped on the wheel, they looked in. He says to me, why did you lie to me? I say, my lovely sir, I never lied to you. I told you a little of this, a little of this, a little of this. He turned around his butt from the gun. He smacked me over the head, opened up my neck. The blood was running, but you couldn't run away. Then you give him a leverage to shoot you.

You had to be near him till he gets sick and tired from hitting you, then he said, get lost. I turned around the horse and wagon, bloodied like a slaughtered animal. I went to another gate, I went over, I give them my briefcase. He looked at me, I'm so bloodied, he opened up the gate, I give him the briefcase. You drove in, you unloaded what you had in the horse and wagon. Then you was asking yourself, why didn't you go right away to this gate? It's a question, how do you know which is good and which is no good? You taking your chances. In 1942, I went out from the ghetto. It was already so bad. Old people were laying in the streets, you know, dying. Climbing their hands and knees and begging a bissel water, a drop of water.

Nobody could help them, nobody could help each other. Or you die or if you can, survive.

Q: What was happening to your family at this time? Were they --?

A: At that time, they were still alive.

Q: Were they all together, in one place?

A: Yeah, they were living in one place. In the sixth floor, in Warsaw. You know, in Street. You know by mine father's brother. They had a big -- they were moved in over there to them. They were living over there. Is a fact for a couple of months after this, when I went out from Warsaw, you know, I went to where she was born, . Polaski. I went over there. The first thing what I did with her, I dressed her like a shiksa, you know like a Christian, like a peasant. She went out and she boarded a bus. You know what a bus is, what they travel in. A regular bus and one schoolmate recognized her. You couldn't get out from the

ghetto. But he didn't say anything. He just went over, he just said to her Lonia. You know they were talking and she come to the city where they had a factory, a cotton factory. You know they had over there in Wegrow. In a few days later, I had to leave. You know I had to follow her because my father ---.

Q: How did you get out?

A: Okay, the way I got out. When you're going out from Warsaw, you have to go through Praga, that's two cities connected. You have to go through the Vistula, that's a river. When I went out, the Polish youngsters used to say, , a Jew runs away from the ghetto. What I had, I had 50 zloty, what is 50 zloty, you couldn't buy even a cigarette. It was not money. But I was walking. You know the streets was already bricked up with bricks, with glass on the top. I saw like a dog, we had to duck under, under the bridge in the street, and climb through and you walk. You know, you walk, so we come to the bridge and they recognize me as a Jew. You know, I told them. I offered them the 50 zloty what I had. But they said, no they want gold.

They thought every Jew had gold and diamonds. To tell the truth, I don't know if I should say in the desk, I always carry around a knife, a big knife in my boot. I had to -- and in the bridge over there between Praga, one soldier with a machine gun was going one way and the other was going the other way. I went over to the German and I said, burglars, you know, thieves running after me. So they took up the machine gun, they put it out a series of bullets. There in the other side, they grabbed a tramway, a streetcar, an electric streetcar, and they met me on the other side. I already went through the bridge. They said to me in Polish, give me the 50 zloty. I pulled out my knife, I said come on, take it. It took me a night and a day walking. I come to Wegrow. Wegrow was an open ghetto. Now begins the real thing. Wegrow was an open ghetto.

It was a city, a Jewish city where they used to over there. You know what it is, they used to write the Torah.

Q: Ascribe, lots of scribes --?

A" They used to make Torahs over there, writing special. They used to make telizen. You know what telizen is?

Q: Prolacteries, yes.

A: You know it. It was a city. They had a small industry over there.

Q: Made Jewish items?

A: Yeah, that's right. There used to be a city like this. The farmers there, they had a woolen factory what the farmers used to cut off the wool, bring it to their factory. The factory, the machine used to go and make big rolls from the other side. You put in this way and comes out this way. They used to trade, they used to bring potatoes, they used to bring cabbage, anything you know to -- it was an open ghetto, just to live. At that time not thinking about money, thinking about how to survive. It was people, it was a city where they used to make pelts, fur coats, from ---. Naturally they used to bribe the German commandant. It was already the war with Russians. The Germans attacked the Russians and they needed the pelts. They used to give to the Germans, the pelts, the ghetto should be open. Meantime, they begin to order the Jewish people should go to the camp. Now it begins we have to go to the camp. I'm a tailor.

When I went out from the ghetto, you know what I mean, what I need to take. I take a couple

coupons (?) to make a suit, you know that's three yards, another three yards. I have it over there. When I was in the Wegrow I found myself a tailor machine. I was assigned to another house with another couple to live over there. The gemeinde, you know the Jewish hierarchy, I was a biesnick. I used to come over there, how to say a biesnick, running away from the other countries.

Q: An illegal alien?

A: That's right. I was over there. In a way, I was how to say, with me they wanted to plug every hole.. It was Jewish police, it was the question, whom shall they send away in a camp? His brother, his sister? I was how to say, a newcomer to the city. In every place where it was a hole, they wanted to plug up with me. I was not an easy catch. I tell you truth, was not an easy catch with me. When I run through the street to get cigarettes, and the Jewish gemeinde saw me, they run after me because they had to fulfill the contingent what the Germans wanted for labor. All right, I was fighting them as much as I could. You know it was by the name, ; hierarchy, you know, what they wanted for the Jewish gemeinde, they had to -- listen they want to save their family. I was a stranger so they send me away in a camp. Star . They were making over there an airfield for the Germans from the woods.. They should taken off to attack the Russian front. Over there, the labor was very hard. They used to put up the railings.

People used to carry sections of railings, connect them and put it on a little --, like from the coal mines, little wagons. We used to push the stone or gravel, you know what I mean, to make.

Every day they used to come there, engineer or the hierarchy from the people. It was an organization Tod. It was over there.

Q: You were involved in working for this --?

A: Yeah, for them, for organization Tod. They used to come therein _._ They used to line up.

They used to count up and he looked at you. If you don't like it, they took you aside. Another one aside, five, six people aside, they took out the muzzle, the gun, bingo, bingo, bingo. Then he went to have his breakfast. In every package of cigarettes, they had stamps v__ in every front. This was the propaganda. And if the front was no good, he took out the Jews, bingo, bingo. When the airplanes, when the airfie4ld was already done, comed already the -- you have to fill the airplanes with gas. He picked out the biggest men, six-footers. I was a little guy. I give you a sample. When we were carrying the rails, a six-footer was in the front, a six-footer was in the back. So the six-footer was too heavy to carry, so he was bending down with the shoulder. The smaller guy like me, I had to lift up my shoulder to hold it down. They were going with clubs, banging over the knees, he shall go straight or the other, how to say, why you're doing this way. Anyway, every day was several deaths. For fun, they used to take out a strong guy, the same hose where they used to put in the gasoline, they used to put it in the hose.

They used to say to the guy, let down the pants, put it in the hose and let go the gasoline. The guy used to lift up, used to light a match and throw him. He used to burn like a, like a -- you take and sometimes you see in the jungle there, with a stick, you know what they burn in a fire.

Q: Oh yeah, a torch, yeah.

A: Atorch. This way they killed him. Listen, it was no way to survive. Over there I saw today's he, next day's the other. My line is going to be sooner or later.

Q: How long were you there?

A: I was over there for a couple of weeks. I run away. I run away. Hey, it was over ---. I wanted to be shot because when they're shooting you, it's over. But this way, you keep[ always sweating, always sweating from frightening. Might as well --. Anyway when I come back to the ghetto, I didn't went into the ghetto. I sended in a guy to tell to my wife, I'm over here.

She already knew. You know why, because when she come to the gemeinde, to the hierach from the Jews where they're giving out a loaf of bread, they told them the Warsaw bird already run away. After this, they send me away to M , another camp. It was a small camp, just how to say to take it out the youth. That the city shall be less Jews. Treblinka was not ready yet, not ready, how to say, to__, to destroy the people. It was still building the crematoriums.

They keep over there, it was over there a couple hundred Jewish people, women, men. Then when they liquidated, they come back to the city. When I come back, I was always frightened from the police. I was sitting, I give you a sample in the house and I was doing some tailoring because the farmers, when I fixed them a pair of pants or I made them something, they used to bring me a loaf of bread, a bag of potatoes, a chicken. Because I didn't need no money. The only thing what I need is just to survive. When the police saw me, I'm sitting in the window, they used to run. In Europe, a cellar is not like in America. In Europe a cellar is just like in the kitchen. A hole and its big boards. It was a deck, like a door. For the winter used to store potatoes or something. What I did, in the bedroom, I used to rip it up a couple of bolts and make over there another hole, lift it up, it was not a mattress like a shan __, lifted up this and let myself in. When they come in the house, they said, I just saw him in the window, where is he?

Where did they look, I disappeared. So they were looking there and went away. I had a couple hours work to do. In the meantime, when the farmer come, he brought me the -- several potatoes or anything, I had something to eat. When it was very bad, I had to hide somewhere in an attic. My wife used to -- she had an aunt over there, Mimi Lia, she used to cook up something and bring me up the attic because they were looking to send away people and I was hiding out. It was so bad, it was already m__ Yom Kippur, the end of Yom Kippur. Already they was taking people, sixty year old, was not youth, in Wegrow.

Q: Was this deg43?

A: Yeah, deg43, it was already so bad. It was already -- they didn't have already whom to take it. I was still there because I was fighting everybody. I was fighting the commandant, I was fighting ___, because I proved them at one time, I ambushed them. You know what an ambush is?

You know in Europe, it was a door when you closing the door with a big title, this is an iron bar.

I took the iron bar and I grabbed the commandant. I say, if you don't lay off, you see one bing, your brains is going to be in the wall. Because I didn't have nothing to lose. I was already dead one way or the other. Finally they said to me, Washua, _- , we'll do our job to you.

They" ll do it to you. When it was already bad, m__ Yom Kippur, they surrounded around the city of Wegrow. Looks to me like Treblinks was ready, seven kilometers from Treblinka. I have a, what you call this, I was sick. You got sick, too, what is it. Typhus, typhus. She got sick, the family, the family was still alive over there in Wegrow, they took her home. I was over there in the room where they give me to live there with another family. Naturally when you have typhus, you know the heat, the fever is very, very . It was over there a girl and the boyfriend used to sit attending his girlfriend, he attended me. Her boyfriend was not sick. He used to put her down cold water on the head, he put cold water on mine head. I always told him, Schema, when I survive, I'll never forget you. When I got better, I remember, we -- they were living near the shield. It's down the hill. You know when I went down to see how she's doing, the wind was carrying me. Well, she got better and naturally we went to the shul. The http://collections.ushmm.org

Contact reference@ushmm.org for further information about this collection shul was already destroyed. The less Jews were gathering in a barn. They're crying and begging to God, they're praying. If such a thing exists, the skies would split from the tears. We come back, in the night. The Germans went around, you know what ludens are, shadows. With the bietnam, in the shadows, Juden roust, Juden roust, you know what I mean. In the morning, they had to market all the Jews what was survived already. Old people, I was between the youngest because they couldn't do nothing with me. They loaded them in horse and wagon and they shipped -- they drove them up to Treblinka. I was still there. Me and my wife, we was hiding in this hole what I had beside the cellar under the bed. What I did, I opened up the door from the cellar and show to him, who will come in, the door was open, how it was already clean, no Juden. Because that time already. The Jews knew they made double walls, they climbed in, in the chimneys to hide; they hide in the attics. It was outside the toilets. A lot let themselves in the shit up to the chest, just to breathe, just to breathe. Over there in a small city, they had cows, they had chicken. The cows were without food, without a thing, were making moo, you know. When I, in the morning had got gray, I looked through the window. I saw a cat passing by. I said look, how lucky, they're not going to shoot the cat but if I stick out my neck and somebody saw it, bingo, I get a bullet in my neck. But it got a little lighter, I went down back to the hole. The Germans come in, in the house. I heard them. They were shooting in the walls because a lot of Jews had double walls, they were hiding in the walls. But a lot of Jews made mistakes, they took it in the walls, a clock. When you come in, in the house you can hear aclock. They looking for the banger from the clock. A lot of Jews they found between the double walls. They took them out and they took them to the cemetery. They had to dig their own graves, they shot them. I come to this, I'll tell you how I know how they did it. After sitting in this hole, for ten days without food, without water, I'Il never forget, the walls in the grave were so shiny from my sweating, from frighten, it was like a mirror. Finally it come on me such a -- I got so scared -- I said to my wife, let's get out from here. Let's go in the back.

There is over there a single house, painters were living over there. Let's go up in the attic over there. You know what she told me. My heart tells me I'm going to stay here. You want to go, you go yourself. I grabbed her by the collar. I said look, when I say go, you go. Is a fact she wanted to go out from the ghetto, from V. but the ghetto was already surrounded around by the Polish police, the fire department, gendarmerie, the Ukrainian, the Litvakian, all around. She wanted to get out, she couldn't get out, she had to come back in the same hole what I was there. She couldn't get out. Otherwise, she tried to get out as a Christian girl. She had to come back.

Q: I need to flip this over now, it's running out.

AS: | Okay, let's ---.

Q: Here we go, okay.

A: All right. So when everything -- she got so scared and I got scared, we went up in the attic over there where the painters were living. The first thing when I come up in the attic, I opened up at __ alittle door. You know what I mean, from the old side was in the pitch from the roof is a little door. I say to take away the suspicion open up. If it's closed, they" ll put it up a ladder, they want to see if somebody's there. I count up over there, it was the family from the painters.

So what I did the first thing, I put them under the eave and took all the rest and covered them.

My wife the same thing, I covered them. I opened up the piece of rope from the desk, opened up. I, myself, took a piece of iron. When they'll put up a ladder and they want to see who it is, hey, you smack them over the head, you'll kill them, you get up and they"!I kill me. That is --

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Contact reference@ushmm.org for further information about this collection mine thing is over. Lucky enough, they didn't come up to this attic but they went in another house where the door was closed and they took down a whole family. They were manufacturing leather, leather. They took down the whole family over there to the cemetery to be slaughtered. How I know what they did. One girl come back from the cemetery. She come back to this -- upstairs where we were over there. She told us what was going on in the cemetery. The Germans let her go, she was so beautiful, she was really beautiful. He looked at her, maybe he had a daughter her age and he said to her , get lost. Oust but get lost.

She come to us. She told us what was going on over there in the cemetery when they brought the people. They had to dig their grave, a trench. They undressed them and they shot them with a machine gun. They fall down and the Poles were staying over there and taking off the rest what is over there -- for sample, the stockings or the underwear. They robbed them. That she told me what was over there. Otherwise I wouldn't know what they doing over there.

Okay, now it will come when they took me the last days, when they took me up to i When they took already the remnants, what is left over, you know when the fire department and the other, this was the last when they put us in a gathering place, like a jail. Anything what they could, they shipped us off. My wife brought me two loaves of bread, you know with a piece of rope. You know, this was the last. They shipped us off. My plan was when thy put us up in trucks -- they put it up, the Germans with machine guns. My plan was when they" Il take a curve, the truck has to slow down, I'll jump. I couldn't jump because if I would jump, he was on the truck, I would get a machine gun. My plan was if I'll come down to the camp, I'll bury myself under the truck. When the truck will go out, P'll drop myself. It didn't work either.

When they took us out from the truck, we went inside, the truck went away. Now comes preparation when we comed in. The first thing, you know what a baya is?

Q: A barrier?

A: Abaya. This is a wooden belt all around, going to be maybe about six foot in diameter. About 15 inches high. You had to sit on the edge. They come with a machine, cutting off your hair and the hair fall down to the baya. I tell you true, I was already sick and tired from running.

This was already my last trip. I said look, all right, what is going to be, P'll be here. I already give it up. I couldn't take it no more. When did I decide to run. When they cut me off the hair.

I had a head of hair and I looked myself in a can. You know, the Germans when they had the rations, is the tin cans, you could see yourself. You know, like a mirror. I saw myself, I didn't recognize myself. I say no, I rather be killed, I'll run. In the meantime, in the morning, I had to stay in the line to get food. What was the food in the morning? The wheat, you know what the --half a skin, they call this kryen. They take it off the skin and the rest is flour. You know what you're able to bake. They mixed it up with water. In it was stinking, it was soil. The people was already over there for months before I come. They had diarrhea, the shoes were ripped, they didn't have no shoes, they took off bark from the trees with a piece of wire, if not a piece of -- thing put it in the food. They managed to still work, they had diarrhea, they were working and shitting, working and shitting. When they gave me the food, it was stinking, so I give it away. You had to take a can from the conserves, from the army what they all was over there, the barracks. They said to me, Washula, you going to be one ___ youre going to lick it out with your tongue every drop. I was thinking to myself, you're going to be King Solomon if I'll be here. Because to me my life already, I sacrificed. I don't want to live. What was the work?

greenazia. You know what greenazia is? It's aswamp. You making a big gutter, how the water shall run into this gutter. The people, the elflinger where they working had to rip it out the roots because it was swamp. It was big piles of the roots to dry in the swamps. You had to go in, it was already ice, thin ice but they were staying with the bullwhips. If you don't go in, they will

bullwhip you. You had to go in, in the swamp six footers, lower, lower, lower till the end.. Me, a greenhorn. I comed over there, it was cold. It was already thin ice like the glass. I try to hide but the police was staying, I had to go in. One happened to be a Jewish policeman, happened to be too. _, a Jewish boy, a schoolmate of hers. He said to me Washula, you go in. I couldn't go in, it was already ice. I tried to hide under the roots. So he pulled the whip. I grabbed the whip on the other side. I pull it. Why I pull it, it was running with my neck, I open him up his face, he was bleeding. I said look I'm going away from here, the Ukrainian will come, they" ll shoot you. This was the night when I decided, I will run. I come back to the barracks. He was sleeping. I was sleeping in the first and another Wegrowak, Ulek was sleeping in the other. In the night, we had the toilets, we had outside. Outside the barracks. It was a, I don't know what you call this, like this here. It was like this. In here was a stick, you had to climb up and shit into the hole. To the rest, it was not, how you say enclosed. It was everything open.

Ulek says to me, give me *s scarf. You know what it is, shake my hand, you're not going to leave me. I said fine, we're leaving tonight. They give us our coats, our ripped coats.

The pillow was stuffed with grass and we decided tonight, we'll leave the camp. It was wired, barbed wire, but the wire was maybe about 12, 15 inches apart. You know it was reflectors all around, in the woods. So I the night, I went over to the wires, you know, had reflector, goes around. Meantime when the reflector goes one side and this side is dark, before the reflector come to you, you laying in the ground. When it gets dark, you go up again and you come to the wires. You taking the jacket and you throw over the barbed wire, barbed wire points. He grabs it and you pull him down, you knocking out the lights. When you're knocking out the lights, the machine guns begin to fly. You can feel every bullets what goes by your head. You know what I mean, cuts the air, you know every bullets what goes by near you. You dropping to the ground and you begin to climb. It took me several days. I didn't went into the ghetto. I sended in a Polish guy what I used to do tailoring for and tell him, I'm back. See, she was still over there in the ghetto. So after a day, we escaped. We escaped from there and we went out in a colony. In a colony, I come over there to a guy by the name, what was his name, Munich. I was working for him over there. When I went out from the ghetto, I had to have a piece of bread or something, I used to go out from the ghetto, it was open ghetto, I used to go in the village walking over there in the colony. When I was working over there for a couple weeks, I made with him friendship. When there was already no Jews, little Jews what they're going around looking, who was still hiding, I went out over there and I took the girl what I told you come back from the cemetery in a crossroads. She went one way. I went to this guy Munich.

Why she went over there, her father like I told you, he had leather. She knew a Polish guy what he had the leather and she went to this guy over there. But a couple of weeks later, I found it out that she got shot by the Felt gendarmerie. It used to be Felt, used to drive around in the fields looking for Jews and she got shot over there. I was over there with the guy Munich. One night he called me in, he said to me I'm such a good friend of yours. He used to deliver to the Germans somagun. He used to make vodka for the Germans. He used to make to deliver to the Germans, vodka. He used to deliver from the Polish farmers, grain. It was a noma how much every farmer has to give to the Germans for the army. He says to me I'm such a good friend of you. If you would see what they're doing to the Jewish people when they capture them, they putting on ropes. They're putting on ropes, one leg are up and the other leg in the cars going apart. They're ripping them apart. He says look, you're such a good friend, I couldn't be able to live with myself if I would see what they're going to do to you. I'll go into the city if you want, Ill bring you poison. This is going to be the end. He already had -- mine what I had.

Naturally when I come to him, what I had I give him away. I said, look, if I'm going to leave you, why don't you give me at least a piece of material. When I'll go to a farmer, at least he" ll give me a loaf of bread for it. You know what I mean? He says you're not going to need

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Contact reference@ushmm.org for further information about this collection nothing. You'll go out from here. It was a group of Poles used to go around and killing the Jews because the Germans give them a reward for each Jew, give them a kilo of sugar. This is two and a half pounds of sugar __if you bring them alive or dead. So he told me I don't need anything. But luckily I survived. I went -- I told him where will I go? I took my wife under the arm. It was already late fall, very late fall. I'll never forget, it was already the sugar beets was already the last what you have to take it off. The leaves used to flop in my boots back and forth. I was going with my wife; everybody's already killed. Her parents was already taken to the cemetery to be shot. The brother was shot, the mother had to take him out. I found it out later, the mother was taking him by the legs, the father by the arms because the brother was shot in the house and bringing him to the cemetery. They got shot over there. Her mother and father. With the and with the younger daughter, with the younger sister here. I come over there to another guy, Genchel, another guy. It was already -- I went through -- I was working through the whole winter between the farmers. Over there is a style under marriage.

One farmer's daughter married to the son, the son is married to the other, are chained, a whole village is under related. What it was, I was working for the farmers, for the winter, making clothes. You see, my father was smart. I was making clothes, making pants, jackets, heavy coats, you know what I mean. I give you sample, of I had a job what took me a week, I used to make it three weeks. I was interested in time. While I was there, I was safe. Because if they would find me over there, they would shoot the farmer with the family and then they would shoot us. I saw when I was over there I was safe. Nothing do to me. I was going from one to the other till the winter was over. If the Jews what they was over there in the colony, they used to come in, I used to talk in the farmer to give them a loaf of bread to give them a pail of water, I saw when they'll stay away from here. The Germans should not find out that the Jews are running this colony. Finally, a whole winter, it went through. We survived the winter. The end of April, ---.

Q: Forty- three? deg44?

A: Yeah, for the winter, 44. End of the winter. The first day of May had to be the end of April is the first day May. Before in April, the Germans out it out big signs, everybody who's alive, who's in the woods, who's in the fields shall come back to the city -- no more killing. A lot of people went. What they did, they broke all the houses and they left one house. All the Jews that come back. It's a fact, my wife said to me, let's go back to the city, I want to see who survived. It's a fact, you know what I mean, a lot of Jews what they were in the woods and the fields, went back. What they were doing there --they were breaking up the Jewish houses while they were still alive. In the night, they all comed in one house. I said to my wife, you said I have to go right now. I say I don't go right now. I say, you know me, if I go to the city, I'm dressed like a farmer. You know why, I gived away my good boots, I gived away my good pants. I give away everything, I put it down to everything ripped. I stepped in cow manure. I stink like a farmer. I took a whip and I pretended to be a farmer. If 1 want to see what is going on in the ghetto, I went in like a Polish farmer. I was an outsider, nobody knew me. I come from Warsaw. Nobody knew me and I could see what was going on and come back. I _ said to my wife, you want me to go in the night over there and see? I say, in the day, Pll go. You know the way I go. The same night, they dynamited the house and they killed all the Jews. The neighbor, the next neighbor, Genchel comes over to Yanek to this, oh what I have the picture and he knocked on the door. He said, Yanek, did you hear what's happened last night? They leveled off all the Jews, no more Jews in Wegrow. They all blowed them up. Okay. Now begins me. Everybody in the colony knew I'm still there. Another guy by the name Kaluski; he had a daughter in another village, N . Over there was another wife with a husband, a

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Contact reference@ushmm.org for further information about this collection tailor .The Germans killed him over there. He comed back and he said he saw with his own eyes that they killed the Warsaw tailor. Me and my wife, they killed us. I said to my wife, now the book is closed. Officially, we dead. Nobody's going to look for us. Because the guy, the Munich what he wrote from us, he wants us to poison, he was still working for the Germans.

He was going around in every farmer, asking do you know where the tailors are, where they are, if they're still alive. When it was a rumor that the tailors were killed and Kaluski was a witness.

He saw with his own eyes, I said to my wife, we already dead. I was with this Yanek, this is what I have the picture. I digged a grave, I'll never forget when we digged a grave over there from his cellar. He had a boy what was eight years old, Henek. We was ripping the ground with the hands and the blood was running. You know from the finger. We made ourselves a grave over there. We was over there for eighteen months till the war ended.

Q: In the cellar?

A: In the grave.

Q: In the grave?

A: Ina grave! You know, we couldn't dig too deep because the water would come in. We put it in straw in the dust, the walls we put it down straw. We digged it in a corner in the house. I had a knife. Like I told you, I had a knife. I cut it around the stone. Because the house was staying in four big stones. In case it is a fire, I'll be able to pull it in the stone, in the grave and I'll be able to climb out. I took a knife and cut it away in the boards that the light shall shine in, in the hole. When I was sleeping, she had to be up. When I was up, she was sleeping. When we had a cough, we had to cough, we took a piece of --a de , aheavy piece of cloth, wrapped it around the head and coughed in that nobody should listen. Because you never know when a neighbor will come in.

Q: This is all day and all night?

A: All day and all night, twenty four- hours. We couldn't stand up because the grave wasn't so deep like this table. You had to only lay or sit. Once a week, she, Maria took out my wife and gived her a sponge bath in a baya, in a little barrel. The men were staying outside and watching a neighbor shall not run in. When he was washing me, she was staying outside, a neighbor shall not running in. Now you wonder why I'm sending them money. They deserved. They earned everything what I do. We didn't sign a contract. We just shake hands. Until the day he died, I had him here in this country for six months with me. Oh yes, I had his son's wife here for six months. Every month goes a check to this people. Thank God, I can afford it. Oh yes. You read in the papers.

Q: They brought you everything ---?

A: The first thing before they give me the food, you know what I mean? They had to empty out the steple, a pot what we're human being, we have to go in the toilet. She had to bring it in, outside. When we did get out, the soil you couldn't have a sign that it's fresh soil. After they put it in over there and the cow was staying and covered with manure. We was over there for 18 months laying. When I was liberated from the Russians, we couldn't walk. We had to begin to learn how to walk. When the Russians already, when we climbed out from the hole, it was Jewish soldiers and they find out that we're Jews. They took us in a field hospital. They were

at that time transporting the wounded in a horse and wagon. I was holding down on one side, she was holding down on the other side from the wagon. The horse was carrying the wounded.

We exercised to come over there. The first time in my life I saw already was in spring

Q: In deg45?

A: That's right, you know what I mean. The Russians were staying a whole winter, but in Warsaw, you know when they blow it up Warsaw, you what I mean, preparing for the last attack to go to Berlin. You know, I was already liberated. The Russians, the Jews told me we never know, we're liable to go back. You never know what a front is. Liable to go back. While when they brought through the front and they being to go through the other side Warsaw and they begin to go, the commandant from the village, Ruchna was already, how to say, a Jew and the Christian begin to ask me, how did you, where did you survive? I said, I survived in the partisans with the Russian army. You know, you had to cover the slot where -- how did you survive? I was afraid to say Yanek, I was over there because they'll come and they"! kill him. Because over there they didn't want it to -- not one Jew shall be alive. The commandant begin to ask me, do you know which Polak was killing Jews? I say, look I have one guy want to kill me and my wife. They made a celebration of liberation from this part with the territory. They made a Sunday, a platform, they took me and they said bring me this Munich. You know, to be represented, he was killing the Jews. This was a very bad task for me. Of course I knew that the war is near over and if you kill somebody, not you, even this, a lot of Jews what will survive, they" ll pay for it. So they saddled me up a horse. I had to go and bring this guy Munich. I went down in the morning; I knocked on his window. When his wife saw to me, she says, tailor how did you survive? I say never mind how I survive. You give me Munich. If he's not going to go with me, I said, the commandant want him. If you do not go with me, I have order to burn you down. Already the house is with straw, the roof is with straw. I had a peteshta, a Russian machine gun. He had to go with me. He killed several Jews. Now with this court over there, they made the burgomaster from the desk. They said to me that I should be the judge.

Q: Oh, God.

A: Wait a minute. It was good. I didn't know why I got the mind. I looked at him. I recognize the clothes what he was wearing and I knew what he did. He killed his schoolmate David Bass, a Jewish boy and he pulled out the boots from him. When I looked at him, I said to Munich, take off the boots. They don't belong to you. They belong to David Bass what you killed him.

I stripped him naked and I told him go home. Everybody was clapping. I knew, you know, a shame. Sometimes it's worse than that. I know. You know, I was plenty shamed because I was a Jew.

Q: Absolutely.

A: He had to move out from the village. Go in taken territory where the Poland took up a piece of land from the Germans. Until today, twelve years later, I took my kids. Me, my son, my daughter, my son-in-law, I showed them Auschwitz. I showed them Treblinka. I show them where I was working. I show it in the grave where I was buried what I have here in the movies.

I made a video from it. I took 10,000 feet of film. Everything is alive and , they'll be able to see. Here today, when I come back to the village, I was loved by everybody. I didn't took nobody, I didn't hurt nobody. I prevented that nobody should be hurt. I have the proof in

here. In here you can see all the papers. I did everything for this couple what they give us life.

He was rewarded from the State of Massachusetts. He was rewarded from the American counsel in Warsaw. Every month, he gets a check till the lift. He was with me, for six months here living. He comes here. If I come show you the movies.

Q: Oh, yeah?

A: Oh, sure I have it. I have it on video now. The way he count and the way he laughed. He count like a farmer, he laughed like a lord. That's right, with a golden cross, with a ring on his finger.

He'll come back You know, I loaded him up. I'm a tailor. I have plenty things what is left over from people. They don't want to take it off. He had several pounds of luggage. What I brought him down to New York with the ship, it was absolutely --. Listen, I owe it to him. I owe my life to him. It is a shame, is it's not too many people what they were helped and they forget about it.

Q: Now that's true. Although I think the people who did -- who were hidden and things like that, a lot of them ---.

A: I don't forget bad things and I don't forget good things. Let my son or my kids tell me when I come back, I went back, they opened up the doors. Everything, tailor what you want is yours. I got stuck over there in the mud with my car. You know when I went over there for two weeks, I got stuck. They come with horses and they pull me out in the mud. Tailor, what you want, you want sweet cream, you want butter. I say, look darling what we've thrown away in America, it is the truth. I didn't tell them no lie. What we've thrown out in garbage you people don't have it for the holidays.

Q: That's true.

A: Thank God I'm alive. I can tell this story. I have something to prove with you. I made ten- foot, I made a video. They still live in the same thing, they were living a hundred years ago.

Still horse and wagon. They still not have the machinery to cut. Some day if you come back, I'll put you up the video and you'll be able to see the way the city looks now. It's over there, still the pump where they used to bring some people to the cemetery to be killed. The German ordered the woman to take off the shoes because another woman run after the woman and say, give me the shoes. She refused to give him the shoes. She said, you'll take the shoes when they kill me. The German ordered her, give her the shoes. She slapped the German in his face and he shot her near the pump. She says now you can have the shoes.

Q: Do you remember --? Can I change the subject to before?

A: Sure, oh, yeah.

Q: I told you I want to ask you more about your Kaluszyn?

A: Yeah, about Kaluszyn.

Q: That you could describe a little bit what it looks like?

A: Kaluszyn was a city the same thing like Wegrow. They were over there, factories were making

leather, making pelts, shoemakers, small industry. Shawls for praying. There were small carvers what they carve them from wood, making brushes. The education, it was a small garden . People left at the meal. You know, they used to have -- I don't know if you know what

is achulen, you know. After Saturday, you know me, you come back from shul. You have your meal, you take your wife, you get your kids, you go for a walk. It was a real,, like in Israel now.

A real Jewish life.

Q; Like a small town, a Jewish small town?

A: That's right-- a Jewish life , a decent life. You couldn't see chicanery or crookedness. I wish before I die that America shall have at least 20% a life the way it was over there. I'll never see it again. I'll never see it again. But I tell you I can be proud of my family, the way I brought them up. I have three kids here. They married, two daughters, they're married to doctors. My son is a doctor himself. He is a vice-president in the Deacon's Hospital. I, myself, don't have a big education. I'm just a plain tailor and I'm proud of it. I have to thank.

Q: Absolutely, I wanted to ask you -- I forgot!

A: Take your time.

Q: Oh, it was more about the town. Were there Zionist activities or things like that?

A: Yes, yes. I belonged in the Shomrah "

Q: Oh, you did?

A: Yes, that's right. Listen the Jewish people was always -- the Jewish people was a very small minority. We had communists, we had socialists, we have L , we have R , we have Shomah . We used to make jokes of each other. We have five Jews, with ten organizations. We used to have fun about this. But when it come to something, we always were united, we all Jews.

Q: So even though you belong, for example, to , you observe Shabbos?

A: Listen, you couldn't bring a shame to your family. When I went outside -- outside I was a human being like everybody. But when I went from the house, I took my hat and I left it near the door. Outside, I didn't wear no hat but when I come in the house, my father had to say, I wear mine hat. This was tradition. You don't go against tradition. You know. That's what is in shame, shame is worse than death. That's right. If mine kids, if I could take you down and see the way mine kids living, anybody would be proud. They giving away more charity what I make a week. Thank God, they can afford it. If I can tell you when I come here to this country, I had bleeding ulcers and I was dead. I was already between the death, pulled it out in a cool room. But when I was begin to think, in order then when my son was born. I begin to think, I had no , you know what is, I had no cemetery, a place where to bury me. That's right. I say my kid will grow up, he's not going to remember he had a father. They were healing me in ulcers and what I had, a ruptured appendix. There, it's a miracle I survived. The doctors themselves were surprised I survived. When I was laying there already in the cold house and I begin to think my life the way I survived. They ask me whom shall I call because it was already the last hours, to call my wife, I said no. I don't want her to see the way I die. Then I

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Contact reference@ushmm.org for further information about this collection said I want to go to the bath, the nurse told me that it's already the orders from the doctor, I cannot go no place. I said, look, my mind is still working. If you don't let me go down to the bath, I'm not going to make him better, I'1l go down by myself. So she give me a bedpan.

When I moved my bowels, they saw this is a broken appendix, they brought me back in between the sick, they piped me up like a plumber. Two pipes in my nose, pipes in my arm.

What you call this, intravenous. From the other side, the blood. They put me down under a big lamp and they brought me up the next day in the morning. They told me to count to ten and I went out, I didn't know. When they brought me up the next day and I looked through my hand, I could see the bones, I was yellow. A few days later, they used on me the first invented aureomycin. When they made a show for the new students the way I survived, every doctor go by me, shake my hands and they said, you survived from Hitler, now you survived again. I'm here to tell the story.

Q: Well, ""m very glad that you are. I want to thank you. Is there anything else you'd like to add about your story or we could talk to your wife. Perhaps you can add more about your family members if you want?

A: Listen, my family members, | tell the truth. It's not too many people what they come, compete.

I don't know how to express myself. I don't know to say -- because it was Jewishness or they were human. They understood people need to be helped. They didn't stopped for anything, they shall not help. It is the truth and I learned it. I saw it in my house. In my wife's house, was the same way. People -- you know what a balbatash place is, that's what it was. I could be proud of it. I couldn't be --. My kids, I have three children, they learn from the house. If I could take you down to one of my kids, or to all of them, you would go out and they could take example the way Jewish people live.

Q: That's great, glad to hear that.

A: It is true, it is true .Listen, it's not about bragging. I'm telling the way it is. Mine son-in-law, he brought up the kids and they getting a dollar, twenty-five cents goes away for charity.

Q: Very nice.

A: That's the way it is, He was brought up this way. He comes from a very wealthy family in Massachusetts. They're well known. The Dewey Storm family, the first ship, they give away to Israel as a gift. The Boston University has built a whole wing from his money. Very big charitable people. They . They built their money, thank God, they had enough money to give away. But I have to tell you a story. Me as a newcomer. You know, you go into the synagogue in this city of Malden, you have -- how to explain -- myself, the high aristocracy.

You know a Jewish wife's doctor's or something. They were sitting in shul and talking between themselves. They used to talk themselves, do you know the greenhorn's daughter whom she got married to? It come to me she got married to Dewey Storm's family. It didn't -- like we were born in a stone, it didn't come to us. Let me tell you something. I'm very proud of it. I don't have to be ashamed even of myself.

Q: Certainly not. Did you want to say something?

A: [Female voice: "I have nothing to say. He said everything.""] That's right. I already said for her too. See I can say the way they killed her father, the way they killed her mother. The way they

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Contact reference@ushmm.org for further information about this collection killed her family. The Germans comed in and they were hiding in the house near the factory.

They first killed the brother. The mother had to take the son by the legs, the father had to take the other half of the brother and to take him over there to the cemetery. Then they killed the family over there the rest, in the cemetery. Now I went to look for the cemetery in Wegrow.

It's no cemetery, it was plowed through, no cemetery. From the , the tombstones, they made sidewalks. Over there is no more Jewish cemetery, it's too bad.

Q: It's terrible.

A: They tried to kill mine -- they founded out after a while -- because I send them money. They used to wait for the postman. They come the postman with the Jewish money from America. I had to send. I had to write away some letters to the priest. I had to write away letters that he shall have a speech to the congregation in the city. That this Polish guy, washes off the dirt and the blood from the Polish people what it's still dripping from their fingers, what the ground is still wet from the Jewish blood. How he is washing off the sins from the Polish people over there. If I went to Senator Kennedy and I told him the story, he told me if you want, I'll bring him over in 48 hours if they're not going to stop bothering him. He sent a telegram to the American consulate. The American consulate sent it over a guy to the city over there from the city of Wegrow and he talked to the clergy. If something happened to this man, you people will be responsible. They stopped bothering him. It is the truth.

Q: I'm going to turn this off now.