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Joseph Gringlas - January 14, 1993

Was it Hochofen?

Hochofen, yeah. And, and my brother and me worked at uh, thisHochofen. So, the way we-and when the Auflösen come and the liquidation ofthe Jewish people in my hometown. And at night before, when that happened,we had a feeling already they're surrounding, Ukrainian and Germans surroundingour town, because we hear, they systematically did from one town to the-anothertown and we knew it was getting close to our town. That was a Saturday night.And I, my, I went to go, I was going to a night shift in that metal factoryand my brother was in day shift. But, so I went the Saturday night, at nightwhen I went to, to work-to go to work to that metal factory. So I knew alreadyI'm not going to see my parents anymore, that was the last time. 'Cause Iknow about, cause I knew it, I'm going to exist for awhile because I'm working,they need me for their war, so they're going to let me live awhile. And soI, I had a terrible feeling I know that's, I'm going to see my family. Andthat same-next morning, it was Sunday morning that liquidation started. Andmy brother was on the list that he worked on that, in that, in that metalfactory. So at night after the whole day when was the Aus......the Aussiedlung,that liquidation of the Jewish people. So he came around, five, six o'clockthey took him down because he was on the list as working. So they picked himup from the, from the people and he and I saw him in the, in the evening inthe factory. So I was crying terrible, I knew that what happened that time.

You were fifteen.

I was about fifteen years old.

Do you know what happened to them?

Uh.

Aussiedlung. Resettlement, right?

If something happened after the, when I was, I was in that factory,they didn't let me, in the morning when there was the liquidation, they didn'tlet me get back home, they, at the time because they, they kept me there.Usually in the night cause I work, I was working, the morning I would go backto home. I would go there by guards, you know, they take, go there to getyou, it was a ghetto. But after that night with the liquidation, they didn'tlet me go back to home because that was it.

They kept you in factory?

Stayed, stayed in the factory all day long and when I saw mybrother coming in, in that day at six o'clock, he came down and they keptus in the factory for a few-for a week, because there's no place where togo. They kept-we, we were sleep, laying down on the ground there for a fewnights. Then after those were left from us, from the factory, working forthe Germans, they took us to give us a little, few blocks in my hometown.We should live there, live in that, those whatever place we stayed. 'Causeit was unbearable to stay laying on the ground in the, in the, in that factory.So we came-it was after a few days we came back, they give us uh, like a fewstreets. Those, the people what worked in the factory and, and I talked tothe people that were stay...there were some people there. I don't know theyworking, I don't know where, but they, from my hometown, they told me theysaw my father and mother and my sister. However before we came back to theghe...ghetto to stay there, they told they took them away. That means thatmy father and mother was hidden and sister at the time the liquidation. Butprob...a few days later they got out, took them out and they were sent toMajdanek.

Majdanek.

Yeah. So it was just about an hour before when I-they took usfrom the factory, to that little street to live. So that, that was the feelingthat uh, that they were sent to Majdanek.

Did you know what was going on at Majdanek?

No, I-I know yes, I don't know, I wen...I knew what was goingon at Majdanek because uh, we had an, we knew already that, going on thatthey, they send them to gas them at that time.

You knew about the gas chambers.

Yeah.

There were rumors?

That time was rumors that they're killing them and they-and thosepeople were taken to work they just keep them for awhile because how longcan you exist if you don't, if you're not getting food and you work hard labor,you don't gonna to exist too long.

When, when was this, do you remember?

1943, I think.

'43.

Yeah, I think so. End of '43 like.

Um.

Yom Kippur.

So it was in the fall.

Fall, yeah.