Sonia Nothman - January 4, 1983
Knowledge of Holocaust
Did people have any idea uh, of the death camps? Did they, did any rumors ever get back to your town of what was happening?
It was before they took us. A guy run away from a train. His brother lived by us in the same building. And he said that he saw--it--saw things, but nobody believed. And even my father, everybody said, "No God would not allow to happen this. No. Not to us." And then when we start hearing lots of things because they took from us people they look at my brother, they're sending to ??? to work. And then when he came he told, told us horrible stories. Yeah, but still nobody could believe it. Un-huh. I myself don't believe it. There were so many nice people from us, they took them right away. I remember there was a guy, they had uh, factories from, I don't know, lumberyards, different, very religious. And they took him, I remember I saw him. They were married already. And we were always singled out. And he came in, when I saw him, my gosh, I couldn't believe it. They didn't live long. They couldn't exist, couldn't exist. If I would be by myself, I wouldn't exist for two months. But I was with my sister and she's more energetic than, than me because I didn't care. I remember, I dreamed the first week, I just wanted to be with my parents. I don't--if they're dead, I want to be dead. You know, it's, they take you away from a home, you're raised and you love each other so much and...No, one person in there alone they couldn't survive, couldn't survive. Very hard.
© Board of Regents University of Michigan-Dearborn