Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

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Mala Weintraub Dorfman - September 15, 2005

Did anyone help you while you were in the camp?

Not, not in uh, Gorzyczki, not by Gorzyczki. In Skarzysko a German woman helped me. If not her, I probably couldn't be alive. My Kapo, she was a Kapo of our, we were working by, by the tables with the ammunition, checking it out if it's right or wrong and I spoke very well German at that time-now I don't speak it anymore-and uh, spoke to her. And I, I saw that she was kind of... She didn't, really didn't want to be a Nazi, but she had to be. I just felt it. And one day, I talked to her and I said to her, maybe you can bring me something, I have a wound and to clean it out and to cover it up. She said, yes. And that's how I got to talk to her and she brought it to me and I, at least I could clean it because it was pus coming out. And uh, she started bringing me food. And one day she took me to her house and let me bathe in her bathtub.

So, she lived in the town?

She lived in town, yeah, yeah. She lived in town, she didn't live with us in the, in uh, in the, in the camp. And she took me out, like with her passport and they didn't stop us. And then, she brought me... She wanted me to go away, to save me. I said, no I want to go back, I don't want to be a... I figured every Jew going to be dead anyway, so what am I going to do by myself? So, she brought me back to camp. And she helped me an awful lot.

Do you remember her name?

Yeah, Gertrude Hoffman. I'll never forget her.

Did you keep in touch with her?

After the war she came to Bauberg and she stayed with me. And, in fact, when they uh, there was a court for her and for the Lagerführer, I went to testify because they both were very good to us. They were Nazi because they had no choice, not by choice, she had to be.

Also Volksdeutsche.

Volksdeutsche.

Yeah.

No, I don't think she was a Volksdeutsche. No, no, no, she was from Kassel. No, she was not a Volksdeutsche.

So, she was sent to Skarzysko.

Sent, yeah sure she was sent there. No. But a wonderful person.

And how long did you stay in touch?

I stayed in touch with her maybe two years and then she went away and I never heard from her. She had a child with the Lagerführer. So, I have a picture with the child and everything, I have that picture with me. And uh, then she went also with us to Częstochowa. They sent her to Częstochowa too.

From Skarzysko.

From Skarzysko. And that's the same work we did in, in Częstochowa.