Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Nathan Nothman - November 30, 1982

Fate of Mother and Sister

And when were you separated from them?

In 1944, in May, in Kraków-Płaszów concentration camp. They ??? They were separated, I never saw them. Then I found out after the war that my sister hid in Sweden. Got out by the border from Sweden--took my sister to Sweden. My mother is in Sweden. They were lucky. And we went to Bergen-Belsen all the way on the other side to English territory--English uh, occ...occupation on the German. Then we find out Bergen-Belsen that my sister and my mother is in Sweden.

How did they wind up in Sweden? How did they get there?

I mean, Count Bernadotte. Count Bernadotte was Sweden. He was a, a--not a prince, uh...

Count?

...uh, King Gustav...

Mm-hm.

...brother-in-law, something like that, he was killed in Israel you know, in 1948. So he, he save a lot of Jews, a lot of Jews, a lot of Jews.

In Kraków-Płaszów, did you ever hear of a uh, the Emalia Factory run by a man named Schindler?

Emala, this is, uh...

Emalia.

...this is the paint factory. Emalia paint factory.

Mm-hm.

I heard about it, but I was not there.

Okay.

Never worked there. Emalia factory, yes, I know that. I heard of this.

What about uh, the uniform factory? There was a uniform factory run by Titsch and...

Yes, my mother worked there.

Okay.

They--my mother worked there--sewed the uniform for the German in ghetto. And then they took outside the ghetto. So they uh, so they sew the uniform for the Na...for the Wehrmacht or the SS, I can't remember, but they worked for the German uh, government. And they didn't pay nothing, nothing. Just for nothing--completely free. They give you a piece of bread, you can, you can build a, a a, building with that bread. It's a, it's a clay. And they give you completely nothing. You couldn't survived. You couldn't...


© Board of Regents University of Michigan-Dearborn