David Burdowski - May 13, 1982
Fate of Family
When you went off to the labor camp.
Yeah, when I went, went off to camp. And my other two brothers were taken in later uh, just a few days later. And then I don't know exactly when my sister was taken away. And then uh, then they took--in 1942 that's my--we know because I got a postcard from my older sister that she's been taken in--the whole family was taken in to, to the synagogue and I got a postcard from her saying that uh, were--they must have known already what was happening and uh, that they're in the synagogue and they--and God only knows what's going to happen to them. And then a few days later we found out in the camp already that uh, what happened to them; that they were taken into Chelmno and they were gassed and, and killed and, and buried in a mass, mass uh, grave in Chelmno.
Was this a few days after you got the card?
Yeah. This was uh, in 19...of uh, in January of 1942.
And after that you never heard from any of your family again?
After that, no. I thought maybe my brother would uh, uh, be alive from Russia. But I also had a postcard from him just before the, the Russians started uh, uh, I mean, before Germany started going into Russia and saying that he is a Russian citi...they, they made him a Russian citizen and he would uh, possibly go into the Russian army and that's probably what happened. He probably went into the Russian army and got killed in, in the Russian army and I never, never heard from him again.
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