Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

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Abraham Asner - October 10, 1982

By that time I was uh, liberated, me and my, and my older brother. My older brother was in another town in Li... in Lithuania and I was in that town, in Orany. And uh, one time they arrested some uh, where my brother was in that town, some uh, political prisoner, political uh, anti... what they worked for the Nazis. And anyway. And they was taken from that little town to a bigger town to, in Lithuania. Alytus, they call 'em Alytus. We used to call 'em Alyta. In Lithuanian it's Alytus. And they get ambushed and my brother get killed down there. Nineteen forty-five, March the fifth. And finally... That's uh, my last brother was, got killed. And uh, and they let me know to go to take him away and to bury him. By that time I was myself in danger to go, because no transportation, no nothing. It just was uh, wintertime, the early spring. And another fellow said to me--he's in uh, Israel now--I said, I'll go with you, doesn't matter what had happened. I'll go with you. We came down there and I saw my brother laying dead. And according, the way the whole story was, I talked to the driver and everything. They been surrounded by the Lithuanian, uh... Some, more over there used to work for the Nazis. But they used, they would need transport them, arrested to Alytus. They make an ambush to take away them. And then it looks like he don't have no choice, he shot himself. Because the way the bullet was, hit in the head. And the, the way his arm was stiff, the arm was close to the wound of the bullet and according to mine--and he was a brave man--he didn't want to be captured alive. Then I think it might have been he shot himself. Because according to the story from the driver, I talked to the driver. And according, the way, the position he was laying around, according mine experience, what I have uh, he shot himself. Then I was working farther. I couldn't take him away in another place. I buried him down there on a little hill actually. That's uh, the last one of my five brothers. Them where they get killed before I'll tell it later.