Joseph Gringlas - January 14 & 22, March 18, 1993
Punished in Blizyn
Between his legs?
From the legs. I ran through it. And, and I was scared terrible because I know he's going--in the Appell they we...I had been, I was called. And that evening, every evening we had to go out in Blizyn, Appell he counted we are all there, if nobody escape. So I was, they would call me up, my, I had a number. At that time there was no uniform. There was by the number, I think 167, number white and number down by my knee. And they called, he knew it, my number and he asked the other boy was stay there, in the, when I run away from him. He, he asked him who, who I was and probably gave him the number too, why he was scared too, so at the Appell five o'clock in the evening when we stayed in Appell. My number was called and I knew, when, I knew anytime they called you out, anytime something happened, they called you out from the group there was a ??? surrounded by woods at Blizyn and the Ukrainian, two Ukrainians with the guns loaded and taken out in the woods to be killed. So I knew exactly, this is my end. But I don't know what happened. They told that and there was in the--I was hit, I wa...that, that, the head of the uh, Blizyn, the SS man told--he was telling what, to kill, to go in the, in the, in the woods to be killed and I was given twenty-five on my tush. He...
Twenty-five?
...he said it, at Appell.
With a wooden cane?
Yeah, with uh, with uh, you know that leather.
A leather strap.
Yeah. You know and I--they brought up two chairs in front, in front of Appell. Everybody saw it. And I was--had to let down my pants and there and there was two Jew...the Jewish policemen were doing it. The head of Jewish policeman of the group. One was hitting one side, twenty-five, that head of the SS man told to give me twenty-five. So he, that one was hitting one side and one the other side, the two Jewish policeman. And I, after twenty-five, gotten pun...lashes, I went in that barrack, barrack and laid down on, I couldn't on front--my stomach, cause I was bleeding like, like it's, it was like edges in my tush, there was bleed, bleed, blood coming out. And I was scream...I was crying terrible. This wa...I'll never forget that. [pause] And then I was all the time in Blizyn working, I mean.
Did you go to work after that?
I, I couldn't work, I couldn't--laid down a few hours, but...
You mean the next...
...yeah...
...day you were working, the next day?
...next day I had to go work otherwise, you couldn't stay in. If you stay in they're going to kill you. So I had to work. And.
© Board of Regents University of Michigan-Dearborn