Abraham Mondry - June 15, 22, 29 & July 13, 1992
Auschwitz--Health Problems
You were sure you weren't going to survive?
Hm?
You didn't think you would survive?
No. Nobody did, not only me. You see, uh, in 1945, first of the year, they started evacuating the camps, you know. So we had, we had to--every night, you hear planes going around. They used to put the rockets out. You know, they'd light the rockets around the camp and they shouldn't bomb the camp. But we know something's going on. I believe it was one soldier told him that the Russians are twenty miles from the camp. No, but I will tell you, this was like Christmastime. I got sick something. I had pains here and I don't know what it was. So, I took, I took uh, I had, I had some vodka bottles, vodka, you know, spirit, you know. Black market, we got them in some way. We got in and we hid it, you know, on, on, the roof, you know, let it down with a, with a rope. Nobody there to hold it. We want a bottle, we pull it down. I drink a whole, I mean a half-bottle, I drink to see if I was sick, the stomach or something here. It didn't let out though, so I tell my brother. Go and see Doctor Wohlman. Doctor Wohlman was our Jewish, Jewish doctor at camp. I know him. I work with him, you know. He was doctor in the war in Slovakia. He was Czech. He went to study there, you know.
I see.
He come, he come, he come in my block. He took a test and said, "You got appendix." You know, they operate me at twelve o'clock at night. Prison, prison doctors operating.
In the barracks?
Yeah, twelve o'clock at night.
In the barracks?
No, in the hospital.
In the hospital.
I was doing a Polish, a Polish surgeon named Dr. ???, an anti-Semite and well, an anti-Semite. And he claimed, he claim the, the alcohol opened my appendix, you know and burst it, you know. My appendix was bursted, really.
He operated on you? This anti-Semite. Saved your life?
Yeah and after this, but a week after they started, they put a transport out, you know. It was January, 1945.
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