Joseph Gringlas - January 14 & 22, March 18, 1993
Conditions on Train
Do you remember what it was like inside the train? Was it dark, was, was it smelly?
I, I can't imagine so many people all together--you couldn't--it was terrible.
Any food, water?
There was no food.
And obviously no toilet facilities.
Not at all.
So what happened in there?
You know I was just thinking today what happened, I just, I can't remember what happened we need to go, urinate or going to bath....I don't know what happened, I can't remember. Maybe we didn't need, we didn't, we didn't need to.
Did people die in the train?
From, from Blizyn to Birkenau?
Yeah.
Our group, I remember on the train, no, I don't think, nobody died.
Was it silence Were people...
Beg your pardon?
...were people yelling, talking?
Yeah, talking, we knew we're going to Auschwitz. We knew--we had...
You knew.
We knew we were going to Auschwitz, yeah.
And what had you heard about Auschwitz up to now? Did you know where it was, what it was?
Eh, we didn't know actually, we didn't know where Auschwitz was, no. In Blizyn when I was in, in Konzentrationslager I didn't know. I, we heard that the Auschwitz, something came, there's a, I guess gas chambers. And the, the gassing in, in, in, you know. When we went and we going there we know that, that's, that's the end of us.
And the...the...they were all men? You were all men?
Yeah, women in Blizyn but only mostly men.
So you, you arrived at.
There were women too in Blizyn, you know, but I--they were working with women's things, clothing and that,
But not in the trains. but not, in the train I remember being in the group with men.
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