Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

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Magda Beer - July 5, 1983

Mm-hm, were they deporting any--were the--the Germans were there 'til January, did they take other people out at that time? Did they stop taking people to Auschwitz and to other concentration camps?

Wait a minute, they take the concentration camp people, it was in '44, they didn't take nobody in '45, nobody, just in '44. October they come and they take the people and whoever can go to the ghetto you know can stay in the ghetto, can stay.

So once you were there you didn't worry about being taken out?

No, no. They came searching for young people, but this time you know we know what to do. Once I was in the bed, it was a long bed, and everybody sitting, and I was in, I was in the back, you know, because they take all the young, the young people.

And this brick factory that was like uh, from there that's where they took people out?

They, they took the young people there--Jewish people, everybody, okay? And uh, in the morning we were ??? and in the morning it was a group the, the Switz...Switzerland letters, the Pope letters, the Spanish letters, you know, everybody had something in, in...

Woman: Some documents. A:...their hand you know and I remember the Switzerland don't worth a penny, the Pope don't worth a penny and the Spanish, they took away about ten people. The Spanish consulate was there. And then I ask--I went--I said, "If you don't let me go I don't know what I will do." And they take us in a very, very high ??? I don't know, near the Danube and I, I escaped from there.

Were the guards Hungarian?

The guards was Hungarian ??? how you call?

Woman: It's an SS too.

Yeah.

Mm-hm. But they were like Hungarian?

Yeah but not so bad you know, yeah that's right.

Woman: ???

Yeah, that's right.

So, you--someone just let you--they looked the other way?

Woman: ??? conscious people, conscientious people, you know?

I told him, "I must go home. I must to see my son and my mother. If not, then, I will jump."

So, then...

He said okay.

So you got back?

Yeah, I went back in my mother's house.

Did you have to worry about getting stopped on the street?

No, I didn't uh, I didn't scare--I just ran. I take off my star. I was walking home.

Mm-hm.

I, I didn't scare. I just, you know, I was going around what happening, I must to go, I must to go, you know.

Mm-hm, and then when you found your mother--shoot, were there--I keep getting this mixed up, I'm sorry.

Just ask me, maybe I mixed up.