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Manya Auster Feldman - August 11, 1998

Where were you when—if you remember, when the, when theGermans. . .

I remember.

came?

I'll never forget it. It was a horrible time. Uh, it was um,it was on a Sunday. They came in with tanks and and uh and uh and uh and horsesand it was—we sat quiet. We didn't want to show any enthusiasm. But thegeneral population showed an awful lot of enthusiasm. They um, came towardsthem with flowers and uh and they were so elated. And they were yelling that—tothe Jews, "Now it's going to be your end." And um and the Germans riding—roadinto town. And we were sitting on the porch. And a terrible thing happened.Two guys that were doing business with my father came up to him and grabbedhim and said, "Come on." He said, "Where are you taking me? What's happening?"He says, "You dirty Jew, you close your mouth. You'll find out in a minute."My brother um, was—managed to run into the house and he went in the attic.And right away we had to go—we went into the house. We closed the shutters.And we didn't know what was going on. It was horrible, the unknown. So wes. . . stayed in the house for a couple of hours. And my mother and I decidedwe have to go and see what's happening.

They took your father.

They took, they took 200 Jews—males, middle-aged, not youngones. And they brought them into the center of the city. The, the cities hadalways um, a square where the marketplace was. They brought them and theysat on the ground and they had their machine guns pointed at them, ready toshoot.

This is the Germans.

The Germans. So uh, the women whose husbands were caught startedrunning and and to the, to the priest, to the, to the mayor of the city whowas appalled, the priest was—there was a uh, um, a Polish uh, um, priestand and the ministers of the, of the Ukraine uh, churches. And they startedbegging them, "Do something for us." So the Germans did it as a, as a matterof fact, as a preventive to show that they will not tolerate anything thatwill be done to a. . . against them. So they—first they, they grabbedthe Jews. And then they said that this happens to be a communistic town, theseare all communists and and they're going to get rid of them, of this group.So my, my mother and I and the women started running. And the priest and themayor came to the Germans and said, "Yes, there were communists, but theyall escaped into Russia, so these are all good Jews." So towards the evening,they released all of them 'cept they held twenty-two. They sort of pickedat random twenty-two people. And uh and the rest of them they sent home. Andthe twenty-two people they kept as hostages in case during the next few daysif something will happen to a German soldier, this is what they'll do, they'llkill them. And by the same token, they gave freedom to the gentile population.They announced it publicly, that they can go and loot and steal and grab totheir heart's desire of whatever they want from the Jewish homes. And theydid. They were looting. But, you know, a funny thing happened—a funnyum, they had a Befehl—a command. That's very important for the Germans,that they can have their freedom up to midnight and then they can't do itanymore. So they caught a gentile guy. He was—he was uh, robbing somebodyof sh. . . shoes, he was taking some shoes. They took him and they put himtogether with the twenty-two Jews. And after a day, they, they, they tookthem out into the marketplace and we heard that they are digging like a grave.So everybody was sure that this is what they are going to do, they are goingto kill the, the Jews and that's where they'll bury them. But a differentthing happened. They shot this uh, gentile fellow to show if they give a commandthey mean business. And they released the twenty-two uh, Jews.

Was your father with the hostages?

No, my father was not in the m. . . with the hostages.

Well, did he tell you anything about what happened or anything?

Well, he—we were there. We were there constantly.

You were. . .

We were there when they were sitting on the ground. They—therabbis were there. They—the Germans and the Ukrainians came up. And theywere just tearing their beards, tearing out their hair. It was a horriblesight. But they were elated, the gentile population. They were beaming withpride of what's happening.

They didn't worry that the Germans? They had, after all, invaded.. .

Pardon me?

They didn't worry about the Germans being the enemy and. ..

No, the Germans were their ally. They didn't consider the Germansuh, the, the, the enemy.

Because they were all anti-Soviet?

That's right. They, they, they were happy to get rid of the Soviets.