947: The End Of The Gallery Munich, prewar: Tom Heinemann's family, international art dealers, run Galerie Heinemann: Tom Heinemann Read Full Text Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Home All Memories About Menu Close ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Edited from Tom Heinemann's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, October 2023 • Learn More → Tom Heinemann Business Seized Dismissed From Job Encounter With Nazi Officials Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Germany See Locations Full Text Munich, prewar: Tom Heinemann's family, international art dealers, run Galerie Heinemann: My grandmother ran the business until 1938. Franziska Heinemann, known as Mimi. She ran the gallery very successfully. Then she got arrested on some trumped up currency charges and put into prison. They broke into her flat, stole all the paintings. She paid, somebody told me, a million marks ransom in return for an exit visa. But was told she's got to sell the gallery, it had to be Aryanised. The man who bought it was actually a member of staff. A Mr Zinckgraf, who had been with them for 40 years. The German authorities were very suspicious but eventually passed it. Now, Zinckgraf didn't have the money. But he had a backer, a director of the Reichsbank, who had the money. He gave him the money to buy the gallery for flumpence, ha’penny, in return for profit sharing. The gallery was then changed to Galerie Lenbachplatz, because it couldn't be called Galerie Heinemann anymore. Zinckgraf carried on from 1938 until he died in 1954. When my father returned to Germany he did a deal with him. But he let him carry on. Mr Zinckgraf was a decent man. When he died, everything was auctioned off & that was the end of everything. In 1938 Tom & his parents escaped to Switzerland, where they had a gallery in Lucerne. I was just told I was going to fly to Zurich. So exciting. On the flight, since I was the only child there, the pilot asked me to come to the front & I sat on the co-pilot seat. This was a Hungarian airline. Jews weren't allowed to fly on what was Lufthansa in those days. Tom has many memories of the Galerie Heinemann in Munich before it was seized: In 1902 they had a big house built in Lenbachplatz. The gallery was on the ground floor & mezzanine. Above that my grandparents lived. We lived on the top floor. My grandmother was a chainsmoker. She smoked over 100 cigarettes a day. I can remember this thick smoke in her office, everything stinking of cigarettes. She always had a big dog. I used to run up & down the gallery as a child. I used to enjoy that. There was a courtyard at the back, & a goods lift there. That went down into the basement. There was a carpenter shop there. They had a full-time cabinet maker, who made picture frames & packing cases for sending them all over the place. I loved to go down there as a child & mess about. He tried to teach me some woodwork. There was a big balcony the width of the building. I would run up & down on the tricycle there. I could look down on the Lenbachplatz. I loved doing that, watching the world go by. I remember the big Nazi parades with music. Of course I thought it was very exciting. All these bands in brown & black with flags. Hitler was very often in Munich. They pulled down the synagogue well before Kristallnacht. It was said, because Hitler, when he came to the Braune Haus, from the station he had to drive past the synagogue. And he hated it so much that he told them, ‘Pull that bloody thing down.’ My grandparents were founder members. I’ve still got their receipt with the number of the Betstuhl [seat in the synagogue], as they call it. Eventually, the gallery building was pulled down. The facade is still there, because there was Denkmalschutz [protection order]. But behind, there’s an office block now, there's nothing there anymore now of the old gallery. 947: The End Of The Gallery Tom Heinemann Edited from Tom Heinemann's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, October 2023 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts

969: No One In My Situation Lia Lesser came to Britain from Prague on a Kindertransport in 1939: Lia Lesser Read Full Text Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Home All Memories About Menu Close ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Edited from Lia Lesser's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, April 2023 • Learn More → Lia Lesser Auschwitz Close Family Murdered Finding Out Helped By Non-Jews Hiding Valuables Kindertransport Nicholas Winton Kindertransport Not Remembering Recovery Red Cross Letters Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Czechoslovakia See Locations Full Text Lia Lesser came to Britain from Prague on a Kindertransport in 1939: In 1939, my father married again in Prague. His wife was called Ola & she was a seamstress. When she came out of Auschwitz after the war she got in touch with me. I didn't remember her at all. I found it so strange because I just didn't know her. I block some things out. But I wasn't going to argue. She came out of Auschwitz on a stretcher. She was very poorly when she first came out. When she was better she got in touch. Evidently a soothsayer in the camp told her: ‘You'll be all right after the war because you'll be able to go & see Lia.’ That's what she told me. So I only know what she told me. But I don't remember her. She remembered me. She was a very nice lady, very accomplished. I've got all sorts of lace, things she crocheted. When I travelled to Britain I had two big suitcases & a label around my neck & I had a little pillow, a little blue pillow, just a tiny one, to put your head on. That's all I had. The suitcases contained just clothes. I wasn't a very dolly person, so I didn't have any dolls. I brought my schoolbooks & school report, & a little pendant of Moses giving the Law on Mount Sinai & a photograph of each of my parents but I didn't yet have the other photographs & the jewellery I got when I stayed in Prague with my stepmother Ola many years later. We spent 14 days going round offices & banks in Prague. You couldn't get your things back & you had to give money. It was a dishonest society. Then Ola said ‘Look, she's going back to England tomorrow. Please can we have her things?’ So eventually I, in a Prague bank, I got what belonged to my family, so I've got them to this day. But it was proper jewellery. People don't wear proper jewellery now. I found out what happened to my parents soon after the war. By letter. I presume they must have been gassed but nobody’s actually told me. Before I used to correspond with them. I've got some of the letters. Then we got letters through the Red Cross. They stopped in 1942. My guardian, Mouse, was very good. She always said ‘I’m not going to steal your mother’s affection. That is your mother’s.’ A very kindly lady. She didn't think that she’d keep me forever. She hoped she wouldn't have to keep me forever. She used to say, ‘If your parents are alive...’ I was staying with her elder sister, Glad, in Banstead, Surrey. And I opened- I think it was called the Picture Post magazine. The pictures in that were, [sighs] death camps, all the pictures. And, oh, [sighs] I couldn't eat certain things after that. I don't think that it really hit home exactly how dreadful things were. It’s hard, hard to think that nothing’s been learnt from the Holocaust, nothing. Well, it’s something you just [sighs] had to accept. You felt helpless to do anything about it. You just– I've always wanted to help people, whatever their circumstances, it doesn't matter what race or colour or anything else. And my guardian, she had seven sisters & a brother. I was always treated as one of the nieces & we're in touch still, & the next generations. But it was very difficult because I couldn't really talk to anybody. There wasn't anybody else in the same situation as me. But everybody was extremely kind. I made lifelong friends. You just have to do the best you can. I remembered my parents from their photographs but apart from that you could only imagine. It’s hard for a child to think that you haven't – I believe my father gave his last bit of bread for a cigarette. That's what Ola said. 969: No One In My Situation Lia Lesser Edited from Lia Lesser's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, April 2023 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts

980: Getting Streetwise Margot Harris came to Britain from Kassel with her family in 1939 after her father's imprisonment in Buchenwald: Margot Harris Read Full Text Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Home All Memories About Menu Close ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Adapted from Margot Harris's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, July 2024 • Learn More → Margot Harris Encounter With Nazi Officials Finding Out Hiding Valuables Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Germany See Locations Full Text Margot Harris came to Britain from Kassel with her family in 1939 after her father's imprisonment in Buchenwald: When we were packing for England, the Gestapo came & went through all the cutlery drawers & took the silver cutlery & this & that. My parents had expected this. So, in Germany, on the kitchen wall you had a salt cellar, oval enamel in white & blue. There was salt in it & my father put my mother’s jewellery into the salt cellar. He told us—they always told us what was going on—so we wouldn't look there. They came in with the big hats, turned everything over, the sofas, & they didn't find it. So when we went across the border from Germany into Holland, again the Gestapo came in & they went through all—people were taken off because they didn't have papers but we had our papers. My mother & father [laughs] had put the jewellery into little cigarette cases. In those days little girls wore bodices. We were told to put one case in each of our bodice & we went & looked outside & they turned the carriage upside down. We learnt to smuggle at an early age. So you get streetwise. I had a lovely little girl-friend, Rita. She lived around the corner, we used to go to each other’s houses all the time. We had a warning that we mustn’t talk to any strange men. So one day a man approached us: 'do you want some sweeties?' We ran off quickly because our mums had told us what to do or not to do. Little lessons you learnt. Rita was Jewish. On my return to Kassel they had listed all the people who had lived in Kassel & their fate, if they hadn’t been lucky enough to live—leave. I found Rita & her parents had died in the concentration camp. That was very sad. Another sad story: my father had a bookkeeper who had a Down’s syndrome daughter. He always brought her with when he came to do the books & I used to play with her. I saw in the book, in Kassel, that the three of them had died in a concentration camp. That was sad. It was very sad. 980: Getting Streetwise Margot Harris Adapted from Margot Harris's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, July 2024 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts

April 15, 1945, Bergen-Belsen concentration camp was liberated. Susan Pollack OBE was there, after incarceration in Auschwitz and Guben: We were not human beings anymore. We were reduced to being animals - maybe more. That’s how it was. We were just – no feelings. No awareness of me. We didn’t exist anymore. When you’re under such inner fear, even the fear goes somehow. When hope disappears, you don’t ask God, because where is God? And just, it was the end of life, the end of life that you can’t – there is no way out. In Auschwitz there were two or three levels in the barracks. We looked in disbelief & we looked at it in a totally ignorant – you know, when you have no – your mind doesn’t produce any – the mind also needs to be fed. Well, we weren’t. So, the mind needs some comprehension, some questions. No, no, no, it was just vacant, vacant, vacancy. I was in a world which somehow doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t correspond to anything I knew. I wasn’t a person anymore. I wasn’t a human being. I see myself as just a shadow, reduced. There was an occasion, I think it was in – it was some – where could it have been? I looked up at the sky & saw the sun. Somehow, did I interpreted it as God is looking down? But I don’t know whether that is something I recognise now, or did I think of it that way in those times? I don’t know. In Auschwitz Susan was selected for slave labour in Guben. One would think you'd realise: oh, I’m being selected, there’s hope. No, I was a robot. I was a complete robot, with no sentiments, with no feelings, with no hopes. Just a robot and life didn’t mean anything. Guben was something to do with armaments, small pieces to sort out. They showed it to me, nobody beat me up. I just always nodded in agreement. I don’t think anybody was supervising me. When I was told to do something, I did it if I could. I was willing, of course, because really, I wouldn’t object to anything. No, no. When the Allies advanced, Susan was sent on a death march to Bergen-Belsen. We got into Bergen-Belsen, place of death, diseases. In the barrack where I was put, there were all rotted bodies. I crawled out—I wasn’t able to walk anymore—I crawled out to the next barrack. Who do I see? My former neighbour, a Jewish woman from Felsőgöd. She recognised me. ‘Are we going to survive?’ she said. I said ‘Yes, just hold on a bit longer. Things will work out.’ The following day, I could see the lice all over her forehead when I crawled back to see her. She died. Lice would carry the diseases: typhus, tetanus—all the diseases I could think of we were infected with—most of us died. I heard shouting when finally the liberation came. But it didn’t mean anything to me anymore. It didn’t mean anything. Those who were strong, perhaps they could reasonably perhaps work it out. Ah, we’re free. I crawled out, I crawled out. On the green, in the field I wanted to die there. I feel a pair of hands gently picking me up, placing me in a warm place. A miracle. A British soldier. I got on my feet. I said, ‘What put that goodness into your heart that you could actually…? You made yourself vulnerable for us.’ They set up in a small building, it wasn’t even a building, just a small couple of rooms, they had beds. I remember fainting couple of times. But I was given food. This woman tried to explain where I might be able to get help. I just nodded. She said ‘Sweden.’ I didn’t even know that Sweden existed. So not long after I was moved. The Swedish sent the boat. You couldn’t walk, you had to be carried. Sweden offered me & others a place of rescue. 949: Liberation of Bergen-Belsen Susan Pollack OBE Credits & tags Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Previous Memory Next Memory ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → Previous Memory Next Memory 949: Liberation of Bergen-Belsen ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → Susan Pollack OBE Read Full Text Previous Memory Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Next Memory ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Edited from Susan Pollack OBE's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, October 2023 • Learn More → Susan Pollack OBE Auschwitz Bergen-Belsen British Army Concentration Camp Guben Liberation Slave Labourer Swedish Recuperation Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Germany See Locations Full Text April 15, 1945, Bergen-Belsen concentration camp was liberated. Susan Pollack OBE was there, after incarceration in Auschwitz and Guben: We were not human beings anymore. We were reduced to being animals - maybe more. That’s how it was. We were just – no feelings. No awareness of me. We didn’t exist anymore. When you’re under such inner fear, even the fear goes somehow. When hope disappears, you don’t ask God, because where is God? And just, it was the end of life, the end of life that you can’t – there is no way out. In Auschwitz there were two or three levels in the barracks. We looked in disbelief & we looked at it in a totally ignorant – you know, when you have no – your mind doesn’t produce any – the mind also needs to be fed. Well, we weren’t. So, the mind needs some comprehension, some questions. No, no, no, it was just vacant, vacant, vacancy. I was in a world which somehow doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t correspond to anything I knew. I wasn’t a person anymore. I wasn’t a human being. I see myself as just a shadow, reduced. There was an occasion, I think it was in – it was some – where could it have been? I looked up at the sky & saw the sun. Somehow, did I interpreted it as God is looking down? But I don’t know whether that is something I recognise now, or did I think of it that way in those times? I don’t know. In Auschwitz Susan was selected for slave labour in Guben. One would think you'd realise: oh, I’m being selected, there’s hope. No, I was a robot. I was a complete robot, with no sentiments, with no feelings, with no hopes. Just a robot and life didn’t mean anything. Guben was something to do with armaments, small pieces to sort out. They showed it to me, nobody beat me up. I just always nodded in agreement. I don’t think anybody was supervising me. When I was told to do something, I did it if I could. I was willing, of course, because really, I wouldn’t object to anything. No, no. When the Allies advanced, Susan was sent on a death march to Bergen-Belsen. We got into Bergen-Belsen, place of death, diseases. In the barrack where I was put, there were all rotted bodies. I crawled out—I wasn’t able to walk anymore—I crawled out to the next barrack. Who do I see? My former neighbour, a Jewish woman from Felsőgöd. She recognised me. ‘Are we going to survive?’ she said. I said ‘Yes, just hold on a bit longer. Things will work out.’ The following day, I could see the lice all over her forehead when I crawled back to see her. She died. Lice would carry the diseases: typhus, tetanus—all the diseases I could think of we were infected with—most of us died. I heard shouting when finally the liberation came. But it didn’t mean anything to me anymore. It didn’t mean anything. Those who were strong, perhaps they could reasonably perhaps work it out. Ah, we’re free. I crawled out, I crawled out. On the green, in the field I wanted to die there. I feel a pair of hands gently picking me up, placing me in a warm place. A miracle. A British soldier. I got on my feet. I said, ‘What put that goodness into your heart that you could actually…? You made yourself vulnerable for us.’ They set up in a small building, it wasn’t even a building, just a small couple of rooms, they had beds. I remember fainting couple of times. But I was given food. This woman tried to explain where I might be able to get help. I just nodded. She said ‘Sweden.’ I didn’t even know that Sweden existed. So not long after I was moved. The Swedish sent the boat. You couldn’t walk, you had to be carried. Sweden offered me & others a place of rescue. 949: Liberation of Bergen-Belsen Susan Pollack OBE Edited from Susan Pollack OBE's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, October 2023 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts

989: Buying Sauerkraut & Soap Eva Mendelsson, Offenburg, November 9, 1938: Eva Mendelsson Read Full Text Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Home All Memories About Menu Close ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Adapted from Eva Mendelsson's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, May 2016 • Learn More → Eva Mendelsson Attempted Humiliation Dachau Encounter With Nazi Officials Food Kitchener Camp November Pogrom / Kristallnacht Pre-war Camp Reunited Song Torah Destroyed Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Germany See Locations Full Text Eva Mendelsson, Offenburg, November 9, 1938: When you're a child, when nasty things happen, you remember. It makes a tremendous impression, even if you don’t quite understand. Kristallnacht. They came at 7am. They yanked my father out in his nightie. Two of those… I don’t know whether they were SA or SS. They took him away. Then my mother rang round & said, “What’s happened?” “What? Did it happen to you?” “They’ve taken Ed away.” They found out that everybody else was in the same boat. All the men had been collected. They did not desecrate the synagogue then, because it was attached to another building. But they took the Torah, threw it out of the window. They didn’t even know how to draw a Hakenkreuz. They didn’t make a good job of it. To desecrate the portion - it’s just horrific, yes? My father then disappeared then for six weeks. They took him to prison. They made them sing sing: 'Muss i denn, muss i denn zum Städele hinaus und du mein Schatz bleibst hier...' [I have to leave the town, I have to leave the town, but you, my darling, you stay here] 'Wenn i komm, wenn i komm, wenn i NIE wieder komm' [The original song lyrics are: 'when I come back', but she sings “'when I NEVER come back']. The 10-minute journey to the station took them an hour. People were looking at them. They made them wear a top hat so that they could make fun of them. You know, not very- not very nice. The journey to Dachau: I can’t tell you. They were kept at night in a prison. A fortnight later, my mother got a postcard. 'Es geht mir gut. Bitte beobachtet die Beschreibung.' In other words: 25 words we’re allowed to write. On the 20th of December, there was a ring on the bell. I went down, & I saw my father. I was afraid of him. I shouted, 'Mutti, Mutti, ich glaub’, es ist Vater!' [Mum, mum, I think, it is Dad!] His head was shaven. He had lost so much weight. I was a bit frightened of him, somehow, this bald head. It was just, you know, I was 7. My mother she came of course, & they had this reunion. Apparently that’s the only time that she’d seen my father cry. Then she went out & she did some shopping. Sauerkraut & Würstchen. That was rather funny, that that made an impression, you know? During the lunch he explained he had to leave within six months or else they would harm the whole family. Six months later, my father went on a certificate to England, on transit to Palestine. The idea was to bring the whole family over, afterwards. But bear in mind, that was in June ’39. And war broke out September 3. You had July, August, so you barely had eight weeks. In those 8 weeks he could not get us out. So, my father went to England. He landed up in the Kitchener camp in Deal. They had correspondence, but once the war broke out, you can’t write anymore. Everything stopped. Now my mother was left with 3 children. 3 children. I don’t know what she lived on. I have no idea... Can’t tell you. My mother’s first reaction or declaration was, she went to the pharmacy to buy soap. I thought that was very odd. Soap is important? War? You know, that was the connection. Maybe in the First World War there was a shortage. I can’t tell you. Then she was frightened for us. We were so near the French border. She decided she would like to go inland more, because we were so close. 28km from Strasbourg. So she was afraid of the French bombing. So, we went to Munich. A rented room with a Jewish family. From house to flat, from flat to one room. 989: Buying Sauerkraut & Soap Eva Mendelsson Adapted from Eva Mendelsson's interview with Dr Bea Lewkowicz for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, May 2016 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts

978: Hitler On The Loudspeakers Simon Jochnowitz, born in Fulda, Germany, to Polish parents, came to Manchester with his family in 1939: Simon Jochnowitz Read Full Text Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Home All Memories About Menu Close ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Edited from Simon Jochnowitz's interview with Kristin Baumgartner for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, June 2024 • Learn More → Simon Jochnowitz Deported Polenaktion Saved By Rabbi Schonfeld Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Germany See Locations Full Text Simon Jochnowitz, born in Fulda, Germany, to Polish parents, came to Manchester with his family in 1939: I remember Hitler on all the loudspeakers everywhere. You couldn’t escape it. I remember being in bed & saying “Oh I can’t sleep, I can’t sleep”. My mother said, “there’s nothing I can do about it." I remember them [Nazis] going through the high street. I used to go like that with that my hand [Nazi salute] until my sister said, “Don’t do that.” I wanted to be like everybody else [laughs]. In late October 1938, Simon & his family were sent to the Polish border as part of the Polenaktion. They wanted to get rid of all the Polish Jews. They came on Friday afternoon. I remember my sisters packing suitcases. Half were full of books. You don’t think straight. They put us in a van & took us to Kassel. It was the meeting point for all Jews who lived around that area. My father was able to make Kiddush: he had two loaves of bread. It was the first time I saw non-religious Jews. They were very different. Then we went on a train. They locked us in the train. Crazy. Why they locked us in lord knows, because we weren’t going to escape [laughs]. We got to the border to Poland, & a civilian policeperson came on & he said, "no". Because Poles had closed the borders, they wouldn’t let us in, fortunately. Then he said, "you can go wherever you want now." My father just couldn’t take it in, he was so wound up, he just couldn’t take it in. Then we were sent back to Fulda. Of course with efficiency they sealed our apartments, so we couldn’t get into our apartment anymore [laughs]. Simon & his family came to Manchester with help from Rabbi Schonfeld. We took the train to Frankfurt & then onto Belgium. My mother wanted to get off & see her brother in Antwerp. But my father said, “You’re not getting off until we get to England.” So she didn’t see him. He didn’t survive. My cousin his daughter had two children from her first marriage. And those poor children, I think they went to a cinema in Brussels, & they were all ordered out of the cinema & shot on the spot. So, you know, they didn’t survive. My parents found it a bit difficult in Manchester at first. People would ask stupid questions like “Did you have running water in Germany?” At the beginning my parents would say, “It was better in Germany,” you know, everything was better in Germany, but that didn’t last long. We still drank coffee instead of tea, so we were able to exchange some of our coal for coffee [laughs]. I was eight years old when I came, so my German is very rudimentary now. I didn’t identify with anything, so, you know, I basically became a little English boy. 978: Hitler On The Loudspeakers Simon Jochnowitz Edited from Simon Jochnowitz's interview with Kristin Baumgartner for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, June 2024 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts

England Manchester Memories 978: Hitler On The Loudspeakers Simon Jochnowitz I remember Hitler on all the loudspeakers everywhere. You couldn’t escape it. I remember being in bed & saying “Oh I can’t sleep, I can't sleep... Previous Location Next Location

See Locations Hungary Memories 929: Fending For Myself Aged 9 Stephen Nagy I contracted scarlet fever. You had to go to an isolation hospital for six weeks. The fascist Hungarians took over. So, I was stuck in hospital... Read Full Memory 942: Father's New Woman John Hajdu MBE In each flat it was about 20 of us squeezed in. The area was guarded by the Arrow Cross Party: fascist & brutal. Hardly any food... Read Full Memory 943: The Legless Side Of The Bed Laszlo Roman I was always told I mustn’t pee by the side of the road because someone might see that I am circumcised... Read Full Memory 954: Arriving In Auschwitz Judith Steinberg We were put in a big school hall, we were all sitting on the floor with a rucksack. They said we are going to go to work... Read Full Memory 955: 28 People Hiding In The Loft Rivka Reich We thought going to Auschwitz would be just hard labour. But my father was different. He thought we must escape... Read Full Memory 958: Discovering I Was Jewish John Dobai My parents thought that by changing their religion, it might produce some sort of saving, at least for me. But they were wrong... Read Full Memory 959: The Invasion Of Hungary George Donath It 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... Read Full Memory 988: Getting Up From The Dust Ivor Perl BEM I was only 12 when I was taken to Auschwitz. I feel very, very hurt that I haven’t got many memories of my family... Read Full Memory Budakalász Budapest Makó Oradea Paks Rákospalota Szeged Ujpest Locations Previous Country Next Country

Harry Bibring, Vienna, 1938: It was perfectly OK to try & obtain Jewish property by purchasing it at a peppercorn price. There was actually an official place in Vienna called the Vermögensverkehrsstelle where a Nazi could go & say, “I’d like to buy a tailor’s shop”, or,“I’d like to buy a flat”, or whatever. I picked up some documents in the '70s in the Austrian State Archives: a man wished to buy my father’s shop for 5,000 Reichsmark, about £200. It was argued that my father’s shop was in debt. That wasn’t surprising, because he hasn’t any customers since the Anschluss. If it had happened, my whole life would have been different. Because my father would have lost his shop to these people. I don’t know why it didn’t go through. If it had gone through, the shop would have survived the war. I would have come back after the war, got my father’s shop back, possibly lived in Vienna. Follow in his footsteps. That’s a possibility. But because that didn’t happen, on Kristallnacht it was destroyed. What happened was this: on November 10 my father disappeared. The last employee that my father still had working for him, a non-Jewish man, a family friend, he phoned up & said my father hadn’t arrived at the shop. We found out afterwards that my father was arrested, together with other men from our block, from surrounding blocks. They were transported by a van to a jail, & locked up for 10 days. 12 to a cell. Fed on bread & water under the cell flap. No exercise whatsoever, except to bring them out for the wardens to amuse themselves & abuse them in various ways. We didn’t know any of that. Later that same day, Nazis came to our flat. And took my mother, [sister] Gerti & me, initially to the headquarters of the local Nazi Party. There were eventually about 30 women & children in this room. We were then marched through the streets for about an hour, flanked front, back & sideways with guards. And brought to a flat way out from where we lived. Some woman’s flat, a Jewish woman, living alone, in a large flat. She wasn’t told we were coming. We were told we had to stay there until further notice. We were actually relieved. I think all of us expected, although none of us said it, that we were being marched to a train station to go to a concentration camp. This was happening all over the city, though we didn’t know at that time. We stayed there for some time & had to find a way of getting food. Eventually Gerti was sent out to buy food. She was told where the local shops were. She took all the money that the old woman had in the flat & that other people had in their purses. She came back with a load of root vegetables, which was clever because they aren't perishable. Every root vegetable that you could think of. So we were all stuck there. After about ten days, somebody came & told us to go home. And when we were going home, we met my father coming from this prison—which we didn’t know he was in—from the opposite direction. We were reunited outside the front door. The scene is indescribable: a happy & sad scene. My father told us what happened to him, & we told him what had happened to us. It was then that he cleaned himself up & went to the shop & found it was totally destroyed. Not a pair of trousers left from his shop. Everything that was breakable was broken. It was also the point when my father told us that he was thinking of emigrating. Because now he can’t earn any money. There’s not much in the bank anymore. So talk started about emigrating. 995: Father's Shop Harry Bibring BEM Credits & tags Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Previous Memory Next Memory ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → Previous Memory Next Memory 995: Father's Shop ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → Harry Bibring BEM Read Full Text Previous Memory Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Next Memory ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Adapted from Harry Bibring's interview with Dr Jana Buresova for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, February 2018 • Learn More → Harry Bibring BEM Arrested Destruction Of Property Encounter With Nazi Officials Hitler Youth November Pogrom / Kristallnacht Reunited Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Austria See Locations Full Text Harry Bibring, Vienna, 1938: It was perfectly OK to try & obtain Jewish property by purchasing it at a peppercorn price. There was actually an official place in Vienna called the Vermögensverkehrsstelle where a Nazi could go & say, “I’d like to buy a tailor’s shop”, or,“I’d like to buy a flat”, or whatever. I picked up some documents in the '70s in the Austrian State Archives: a man wished to buy my father’s shop for 5,000 Reichsmark, about £200. It was argued that my father’s shop was in debt. That wasn’t surprising, because he hasn’t any customers since the Anschluss. If it had happened, my whole life would have been different. Because my father would have lost his shop to these people. I don’t know why it didn’t go through. If it had gone through, the shop would have survived the war. I would have come back after the war, got my father’s shop back, possibly lived in Vienna. Follow in his footsteps. That’s a possibility. But because that didn’t happen, on Kristallnacht it was destroyed. What happened was this: on November 10 my father disappeared. The last employee that my father still had working for him, a non-Jewish man, a family friend, he phoned up & said my father hadn’t arrived at the shop. We found out afterwards that my father was arrested, together with other men from our block, from surrounding blocks. They were transported by a van to a jail, & locked up for 10 days. 12 to a cell. Fed on bread & water under the cell flap. No exercise whatsoever, except to bring them out for the wardens to amuse themselves & abuse them in various ways. We didn’t know any of that. Later that same day, Nazis came to our flat. And took my mother, [sister] Gerti & me, initially to the headquarters of the local Nazi Party. There were eventually about 30 women & children in this room. We were then marched through the streets for about an hour, flanked front, back & sideways with guards. And brought to a flat way out from where we lived. Some woman’s flat, a Jewish woman, living alone, in a large flat. She wasn’t told we were coming. We were told we had to stay there until further notice. We were actually relieved. I think all of us expected, although none of us said it, that we were being marched to a train station to go to a concentration camp. This was happening all over the city, though we didn’t know at that time. We stayed there for some time & had to find a way of getting food. Eventually Gerti was sent out to buy food. She was told where the local shops were. She took all the money that the old woman had in the flat & that other people had in their purses. She came back with a load of root vegetables, which was clever because they aren't perishable. Every root vegetable that you could think of. So we were all stuck there. After about ten days, somebody came & told us to go home. And when we were going home, we met my father coming from this prison—which we didn’t know he was in—from the opposite direction. We were reunited outside the front door. The scene is indescribable: a happy & sad scene. My father told us what happened to him, & we told him what had happened to us. It was then that he cleaned himself up & went to the shop & found it was totally destroyed. Not a pair of trousers left from his shop. Everything that was breakable was broken. It was also the point when my father told us that he was thinking of emigrating. Because now he can’t earn any money. There’s not much in the bank anymore. So talk started about emigrating. 995: Father's Shop Harry Bibring BEM Adapted from Harry Bibring's interview with Dr Jana Buresova for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, February 2018 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts

Hungary Szeged Memories 988: Getting Up From The Dust Ivor Perl BEM I was only 12 when I was taken to Auschwitz. I feel very, very hurt that I haven’t got many memories of my family... Previous Location Next Location

See Locations Lithuania Memories 930: Reunion After 22 Years In Siberia Dorothy Bohm My sister was one when I left. 22 years later I saw her again. We had no language in common. No memories in common, no childhood. Nothing... Read Full Memory Memel Locations Previous Country Next Country

John Goldsmith came to Britain in 1937 after the murder of his stepfather & went to The Leys School in Cambridge: I'd been there 3 years, when in 1940, on my 16th birthday, I was writing an English essay & looking through the window & I saw a policeman walking on the grass which we weren’t allowed to do, towards the Head Master’s house. I knew what was happening, because another German refugee, he had his birthday a short time before me, & he'd been rushed away on his 16th birthday so I knew that it meant internment. The policeman came back with the Head Master who was very nice. He said, “I am sorry you have to go away for a few days.” The police were nice, I didn’t finish my essay. They said, “Just collect a few things to last you a few days.” My mother packed a bag for me & we went by car to Bury St Edmunds, to what must have been an army camp. After a few days we were taken by train to Liverpool. From Lime Street we had to walk, carrying our luggage to a huge TA hall, which no longer exists, & on the way there there were cat calls, “bloody, bloody, bloody Germans” etc. Not anti-Jewish but anti-German. They had no idea who we were, that we were refugees, which brings me round to another point which is that the internment policy in WW2 was just as stupid as in WW1. They hadn’t learned any lessons. It was in response to the gutter press. We had an Italian in our camp who had been in the country for 25 years & never taken out naturalisation papers & his son was serving in the British army. Things like that. Anyway, from that TA camp we were taken to a place called Huyton, on the outskirts of Liverpool. The younger ones were put in tents in the gardens. I was hungry. There wasn’t enough food. From Huyton we were taken to the Isle of Man. From there we were taken by train one day in July 1940, no warning of course, to Greenock, near Glasgow, onto a ship called Sobieski. From there we were taken across the Atlantic up the Saint Lawrence River to Montreal. On the ship there was a man I'd known in Cambridge, a patient of my mother’s, a very intelligent chap, a political refugee from Germany, not Jewish. He'd served on the left wing side in the Spanish Civil War & been interned in France & then come to England. Now he was interned again. He was very knowledgeable chap. Also a very much do-it-yourself chap. He found a piece of sailcloth & made me a pair of shorts on the ship which I treasured for many years. They were a bit stiff, rather like denim. But very useful during my internment in the summer. On the ship there were also German prisoners of war. We were separated thank God. From Montreal we were taken to a place by train to a place called Trois-Rivières, three rivers. We were accommodated in a football stadium for a day or two, & we went again by train to a huge camp which was being built amongst pine woods & birch woods of Canada, quite near the American border I believe. The camp it wasn’t quite ready yet. There was one water tap for about 600 people. If you wanted a wash you had to start queuing up at about 2 in the morning but that was soon remedied. They didn’t have the roofs on either, but it was summer & that didn’t matter. I quite enjoyed the camp. We were sent out in groups to cut down trees for firewood. The huts, later in the winter, were heated by wood burning stoves & ultimately there wasn’t enough food there. We did have the Kaiser’s grandson who was a student at Oxford, he was one of the internees. I nearly chopped my leg off once. Then a commissioner called Hamilton was sent by the Home Office, who'd realised it had been really rather stupid in interning all these refugees, some of whom had actually been in a German concentration camp. He interviewed us all individually & offered some of us release. So in mid January 1941 we were taken again by ship to Liverpool. I ended up at the Adelphi to make a phone call to my mother to say I was back. My voice had broken in Canada, I had no money, so I had to ask if my mother would accept a reverse charge call from Liverpool. My mother thought it was probably some poor refugee who hadn’t got any money. Of course she was quite right, but she wouldn’t believe at first it was me because my voice had broken. I told her that the next day I would be arriving in Cambridge & she did something which for her was quite unusual, she cancelled a patient so she could meet me at the station. Only one patient mind you! She met me at the station & we were both delighted. 952: Interned On My 16th Birthday John Goldsmith Credits & tags Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Previous Memory Next Memory ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → Previous Memory Next Memory 952: Interned On My 16th Birthday ← Previous Memory All Memories Next Memory → John Goldsmith Read Full Text Previous Memory Home Memories People Places Experiences About Contact Menu Close Next Memory ← Previous Memory Credits & tags Edited from John Goldsmith's interview with Dr Rosalyn Livshin for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, June 2003 • Learn More → John Goldsmith British Internment Canadian Internment Isle Of Man Internment Reunited Read AJR biography Next Memory → See Instagram & Facebook posts Canada See Locations Full Text John Goldsmith came to Britain in 1937 after the murder of his stepfather & went to The Leys School in Cambridge: I'd been there 3 years, when in 1940, on my 16th birthday, I was writing an English essay & looking through the window & I saw a policeman walking on the grass which we weren’t allowed to do, towards the Head Master’s house. I knew what was happening, because another German refugee, he had his birthday a short time before me, & he'd been rushed away on his 16th birthday so I knew that it meant internment. The policeman came back with the Head Master who was very nice. He said, “I am sorry you have to go away for a few days.” The police were nice, I didn’t finish my essay. They said, “Just collect a few things to last you a few days.” My mother packed a bag for me & we went by car to Bury St Edmunds, to what must have been an army camp. After a few days we were taken by train to Liverpool. From Lime Street we had to walk, carrying our luggage to a huge TA hall, which no longer exists, & on the way there there were cat calls, “bloody, bloody, bloody Germans” etc. Not anti-Jewish but anti-German. They had no idea who we were, that we were refugees, which brings me round to another point which is that the internment policy in WW2 was just as stupid as in WW1. They hadn’t learned any lessons. It was in response to the gutter press. We had an Italian in our camp who had been in the country for 25 years & never taken out naturalisation papers & his son was serving in the British army. Things like that. Anyway, from that TA camp we were taken to a place called Huyton, on the outskirts of Liverpool. The younger ones were put in tents in the gardens. I was hungry. There wasn’t enough food. From Huyton we were taken to the Isle of Man. From there we were taken by train one day in July 1940, no warning of course, to Greenock, near Glasgow, onto a ship called Sobieski. From there we were taken across the Atlantic up the Saint Lawrence River to Montreal. On the ship there was a man I'd known in Cambridge, a patient of my mother’s, a very intelligent chap, a political refugee from Germany, not Jewish. He'd served on the left wing side in the Spanish Civil War & been interned in France & then come to England. Now he was interned again. He was very knowledgeable chap. Also a very much do-it-yourself chap. He found a piece of sailcloth & made me a pair of shorts on the ship which I treasured for many years. They were a bit stiff, rather like denim. But very useful during my internment in the summer. On the ship there were also German prisoners of war. We were separated thank God. From Montreal we were taken to a place by train to a place called Trois-Rivières, three rivers. We were accommodated in a football stadium for a day or two, & we went again by train to a huge camp which was being built amongst pine woods & birch woods of Canada, quite near the American border I believe. The camp it wasn’t quite ready yet. There was one water tap for about 600 people. If you wanted a wash you had to start queuing up at about 2 in the morning but that was soon remedied. They didn’t have the roofs on either, but it was summer & that didn’t matter. I quite enjoyed the camp. We were sent out in groups to cut down trees for firewood. The huts, later in the winter, were heated by wood burning stoves & ultimately there wasn’t enough food there. We did have the Kaiser’s grandson who was a student at Oxford, he was one of the internees. I nearly chopped my leg off once. Then a commissioner called Hamilton was sent by the Home Office, who'd realised it had been really rather stupid in interning all these refugees, some of whom had actually been in a German concentration camp. He interviewed us all individually & offered some of us release. So in mid January 1941 we were taken again by ship to Liverpool. I ended up at the Adelphi to make a phone call to my mother to say I was back. My voice had broken in Canada, I had no money, so I had to ask if my mother would accept a reverse charge call from Liverpool. My mother thought it was probably some poor refugee who hadn’t got any money. Of course she was quite right, but she wouldn’t believe at first it was me because my voice had broken. I told her that the next day I would be arriving in Cambridge & she did something which for her was quite unusual, she cancelled a patient so she could meet me at the station. Only one patient mind you! She met me at the station & we were both delighted. 952: Interned On My 16th Birthday John Goldsmith Edited from John Goldsmith's interview with Dr Rosalyn Livshin for AJR Refugee Voices Testimony Archive, June 2003 • Learn More → Text adapted and edited by Susanna Kleeman Facebook & Instagram Posts