George Donath, born in Ujpest, Hungary, was 13 on May 18, 1944 when Germany invaded Hungary:

The 19th of March was a Sunday. We went to my grandparents for lunch as usual. All of a sudden we see these black Mercedes drawing up in front. Black uniformed soldiers got out. I don’t think we realised they were Gestapo. They went into a couple of houses, dragged out three Jewish industrialists, left us alone.

Then Jewish legislation starts coming in. First thing is Yellow Stars. So we all put on the Yellow Star. More people have to go into forced labour, so my father under fifty, is called up & taken away. We have to move into a certain district & put a big Yellow Star on the entrance to the flat.

Then the deportations started. There were attempts made by the Germans to mislead us. We were taken to a place they called kenyérmesö [bread fields]. They organised masses of postcards, always the same text: “We are fine, send you our regards.” No postage stamp. It was childish but people believed it.

My father was in this camp. My mother heard it was us next. So she organised a country gentleman to pick us up during the night & take us into hiding in the countryside. This was the end of June. She gave this man a certain amount of money. We were waiting at the gate. We stood & stood, but he didn't come. He kept the money, nice.

The next morning the Hungarian gendarmes—it was the gendarmes who did the deportations. The SS were just not visible. The gendarmerie were the country police, dressed very distinctively: cock feathers in their cap, carrying guns and so on. They came for us. And marched us out.

The railway station was in a place called Rákospalota, a nice little walk of maybe 5km. We had this audience on either side, having a good time.

We get there & there are the wagons. We’ve got numbers, up to 80. My mother ends up, number 80, into the wagon. My sister & I, are out! Into the next wagon. So my mother, I don’t know how, got out. And screams that she’s not going to be separated from her children. And the gendarm rendör [patrolman] hits her with the back of the gun. And she says: 'You can beat me to death, you can shoot me,' nothing doing. She won. So all three of us got into the next wagon.

After a few hours, we ended up in a brick factory in Budakalász. There were 25,000 Jews there. A brick factory is an ideal place for this sort of thing, because whilst there is cover. it is also open. So they could supervise us. There was one single SS there. All the others were Hungarian gendarmes. At night, there were lights playing, not to let us sleep. To reduce resistance.

We were there for five nights, during the first bombing of Budapest. We loved seeing the bombs. The next morning the wagons were ready, & we’re going to be put into the wagons. But then six names circulated in the camp. Ours is one. So we reported. We spent a day in a central place surrounded by stones, watching people being loaded into wagons. There was another sight: a tanner called Lajos Kaufer. A big strong man but very short-sighted, almost blind. One of the gendarmes pushed him so he turned round. He was shot instantly. There & then. Probably the best thing that happened to him, but a dreadful sight. Anyway.

I was never actually frightened. My mother wasn’t frightened either. She had fear. I was very nervous apparently at one point but I had a strange faith – [with emotion] in my mother. That she will look after us. Which she did.

All of a sudden a lorry comes. We are told to get in with about sixty people. No gendarmes but an SS. We realise that we are going into town. Next thing we know we arrive at the Jewish Deaf and Dumb Institute. We go into the back entrance and there are hundreds of people there. We get off & they say: 'Congratulations you are here'. Through my mother's connections we were saved. To her dying day, my mother blamed herself for not taking another half-dozen children that were not hers. But who the hell thinks?

George Donath

Memories

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