Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

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Emerich Grinbaum - October 3, 2000 & January 8, 2001

Well.

I know, I know. Uh, so uh, so we arrived to Dachau. Now, now the miracles started. Some positive miracles. You wouldn't believe. Uh, less than half arrived, I must say. And we arrived half dead. I remember sometime we couldn't walk. They took us to a shower, hot water. So everybody's drinking hot water. Whatever water comes, you know.

Nobody thought this might be gas. Did anybody think that?

We, we didn't care uh, didn't care. We didn't care. We just went in, we didn't care. But there was you know, nice shower. Refreshing. We had--we drank a lot of warm water, which is okay. Hot water. They gave us clean clothes. Doctor checked er, doctor or somebody, kind of a doctor, checked. And those who were in, in very bad condition they put in the hospital and they called them Revier. You heard this word I am sure. The German called Revier, that's the, the concentration camp hospitals. Can you imagine? They put in the Revier. And they treated them, whatever they could. So they put us in the barracks. They didn't give us too much food, but.

Who was in charge at this point? Who, who were the, who were the guards?

Not the...outside the SS, but inside the Kapos.

It was still the SS.

Always. That's Dachau! That was in Dachau.

But it wasn't Wehrmacht yet.

Uh, Wehrmacht was later in the other camp, I tell, tell you.

Okay.

Uh, some of the camps they were by Wehrmacht. In, in the Allach which we were later, there was mostly Wehrmacht. One of the camp, there were two camps. Um, and they, they treated us well. Didn't beat us there. We were laying, it was nice August. We were laying and recuperating. Didn't give us food much, a little bit. Water was enough. You can wash yourself. And every day--every two days we had to stay in a line. And those who they believe that ready to work, they took out and they sent to different other camps, not in--Dachau at that time was kind of a center, a concentration. They didn't have working place. O...only in the surrounding. Dachau had dozens of, of satellite uh, camps, ??? camps, different satellite camps. The second week I guess or the third week we were there, we recuperating, we were very weak. My father got, I told you, during the, during the march, her legs were swollen, this one. He got an infection, foot and leg and--so they took him into the Revier. And that's the end, you know. We're not going to see him. And, of course, next day or two days or five days later, they we took-- they took us--me and my brother, that was beginning of September, to, to a camp, which was close, ten, fifteen kilometers from Dachau. It's called Allach.