Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

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Abraham Holcman - September 14, 1983

How soon after you were, your neighborhood became the ghetto were you selected to be shipped out?

Uh, they were shipping out uh, select, selecting this way uh, we had to uh, we had to uh, put some blindfolds on the windows or covers, so no light will show through. See, a light and police came and uh, and you were on the list already to deportation next time. Stuff like that. Well, I got on the list for stealing a carrot.

Okay.

I, I stole a carrot going to work. I was working in the ghetto, going to work, I stole a carrot and I got uh, two weeks jail for it. And after there, I was on the list. The first, the third transport I was on the list to go. So I, I hid out a couple of times.

Where did you hide?

In the factory.

Did anybody know you were hiding there?

Yeah uh, my sister. My sis... my sister, she was uh, the uh, the watchman. When the people walked in and out, she checked 'em in and checked 'em out. So she saw, she had access to the factory, so I hid in the factory.

Was this a factory that she'd worked at or a factory that she was...

She worked. I didn't work there.

How did you get food and water?

In the best of times, there was no good and this was even worse. This is why I got in, in the jail in the first, in the first place. Uh, uh, I could hide out in the, I could have hide out in the ghetto without going in jail. But they take your uh, bread rations, so uh, you can't live two weeks without bread rations. So, I had to go out to the jail myself to uh, so I can get back my bread rations when I got out.

Okay, when you were in the factory uh, did somebody find out about it? The authorities?

In the factory?

Yeah.

No. Detectives didn't know uh, where I was, so. Or they didn't care. Maybe they knew but they didn't care.

So then, you...

In the factory all Jews.

Then you went back to your apartment after you...

Yeah, after the jail I went back to my apartment. After uh, after the selection uh, we stood there two nights, then we went back to our apartment.