Martin Koby - April 20, 1999
Age at Liberation
How--now, how old were you when you were liberated?
Forty--fourteen years old--almost fourteen years old. And I've got a--you know, a little bit...
When you, when you walked--you went to--you were at a cemetery.
No. The street uh, down the street you know, was a cemetery.
Okay.
Right by the highway. So we were right--next house, next house over was--you know, they had a brick wall with iron works on it. The next, next to the cemetery was a house. That's where we just parked there, you know. You remember I told you I went with my--I went--I was volunteered to go dig the anti-tank ditches?
Yeah.
Well, this is what had happened that first day.
So the--these feelings that you had that...
I mean, this is another day.
...this is--you weren't, you weren't alone at that point?
I was standing there all alone, because my father and mother and Tante Chyka that went into town you know, you're a--if, if you come to Detroit and you end up, let's say, like in Royal Oak, there's a cemetery, right?
Uh-huh.
By 12 Mile Road. But there's nothing else around. I mean, there's just the beginning of the city you know, like a block into the city. You're in Royal Oak. And the center of the city is downtown. So you--how you get off and you say well, let's see, there's an empty house. I have did written down there. There's no, no windows and no doors in the house. You know, it was all taken out for fuel. You know, there were floor--people used to rip up floors. You know, I sometimes wonder in bombed cities what do people do? How did they eat? How do they cook, you know? Where do they get shelter, how do they stay warm? You're in an abandoned house, you go and rip the floors, you rip the doors, you get the windows.
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