Nancy Fordonski - July 29, 1982
Dresden
But we can see that uh, we were fortunate and we were from the lucky one, because this was almost at the time when they were supposed to liquidate Stutthof, that concentration camp, so. And all the other people what were staying on in that camp what they were not taking out for any other uh, work--any other assignment. And when the war was approaching to an end, they called out all the people from the barracks and they gathered them all together. And Stutthof is a place where it's, it's close to Danzig--Gdansk. This is near the Baltic Sea. They gathered all the people there--that what we heard later when we were gone--and they got all the people around close to the Baltic Sea and they asked them jump in, in the sea because the Germans--the SS they didn't even care to waste any bullets on them because seldom--who from the people could swim? Even if they could years ago, they were exhausted, they were tired, they hungry, they were, they were uh, seventy, eighty pounds it was their weight. So they were just drowning, one by one. That's how it ended in that concentration camp, Stutthof. So somehow we were fortunate that we just got out on time and we went with that special group to Dresden. And there, when we got to that place--it was an ammunition factory. And we lived in that place. We didn't have to go in and out. There were rooms, large rooms that the women were together. We had already [pause] bunk beds and we could take a shower and there was already--we--they fed us. And in the morning, after we got up, the factory was on the same premises, premises. We were with SS and with the Sturmführers, with everybody. They watched us days and nights. But the women were women SS. In many cases we had uh, times that they were even worse on us you know, they were, they were tougher on us than even the men. And even in the night they were going through our rooms to see are we are all you know, on our bunks. That we don't go from place to place or whatever. It was just that we were in a factory. We didn't have to go in and out. And they fed us. But uh, we had no freedom. We were under look--watch uh, days and nights. And that Biebow, what I mentioned before. He was coming. He was there on and off, but he was in the Łódź ghetto one from, from the Gestapo people. And one day he came and he brought pots and pans and he said that this is from Łódź--from ghetto. That the ghetto is liquidated but there are some Jewish people they are left. They were hiding. And then after they cleaned up the ghetto, they came out and they were helping picking up and to do whatever they were asked by the SS. And then afterwards, they let them stay on. That news we got from that, from Biebow. So we were at least somehow relieved that we heard that some people you know, some Jewish people are still alive someplace because we didn't know what was going on in other camps or what was going on even much behind our backs. This gave us at least a lift that you know, there are still some people around.
Does a glass of milk remind you of anything?
[pause] That I didn't have any for years? If I see beets borscht I think more of blood. That whenever you said something or did something you got with a whip or you got with a piece of wood 'til the blood was gushing.
Does the name Farber remind you of anything? Farben? I.G. Farben? No? How about Krupp?
Yes. Wasn't this a factory in Germany?
Mm-hm.
Yeah?
Well, the factory you were at was ammunition.
It was ammunition factory, but uh, I don't know, I don't know under what name it was going.
Oh, okay. That's what I was looking for.
No.
Okay.
I really don't know.
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