Erna Blitzer Gorman - April 26, 1984
Hiding During Pogroms II
Do you remember, were these Ukrainians or Germans who were...
Well, I think the beginning maybe where they were still Ukrainians. Uh, after that... Then I think that um, um, it must... One time I remember hearing, hearing the Germans because yo... they, you know, the way they were very command type of voice, and... And, you know, and, and the third time or fourth time uh, I, you could, you could even hear um, they were knocking on the floor, just... You know, they, they knew that people were doing that. And um, and it seems to, it seems that I remember, I have that feeling that it, it was hollow when he... But he didn't give it away. And I call this my first miracle.
When the German heard but didn't, didn't reveal you.
Whether it was a German or somebody else, I'm not sure. But I call this my first miracle. Um...
Do you remember your feelings about being... It must have been dark, must have been...
Well, I uh, I, well, I have um, a very bad experience about it, matter of fact, because my mother used to take a pillow with her and um, put it on my back. And um, I'm crying all over. I have no control over these. Um, she, she I suppose maybe people were uh, frightened that I would yell or cry. But um, she, she would put my face into her lap and put that pillow on my head and I really had a tremendous fear of that pillow, so. It really wasn't my favorite pillow, I'm sure of it. And um, so yeah, and then a couple, a couple times uh, when we went out there were people outside laying dead. Um, but you know, the, the mood then was--I'm almost duplicating my tape--the mood then was that it was um, people didn't cry or didn't scream or didn't say anything, it just, they just, you just, you were quiet. You were so... Nobody... All your... People were just looking at each other. Nobody was saying or, they were, I don't know who these people were outside were dead. Maybe everybody knew each other I'm sure. But um, I don't see any cry... I just see a stillness.
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