Sonia Nothman - January 4, 1983
Death March II
They did guard you though, I mean, they...
Oh.
When you were marching they would not let you leave.
No, no, they guard. Of course they guard us. For a few, not one, a few. When we slept in the hole, I remember a ditch, a ditch. The water was already there and it was pouring and they were standing watching us. In the rain. Not a rain, it was... I thought when we will get up in the morning nobody will be alive because it's... And after this I remember so many people got sick, oh. And then we marched day--we marched at night. And at night you see so many people marching back and marching forward, and marching back and forth, so many thousands of people.
What was their purpose in marching you? Did you...
Who knows? To...How long can you march? How long can you march? My brother left Birkenau 1,500-1,600 people. There 140, 150 people came to ???. My brother was alive because it's something uh, it's like I said, a miracle. There was a guy on our--Pole and he came down he saw him, he did, they didn't have lavatories, so he went down so he got a guy, a German probably, this was in Germany. He got ten cigars, he gave it to my brother. Ten cigars. My brother--maybe he felt sorry for him because my brother had his hands with bandages, you know. So there still were people who had money and who have a bread or something, so. That was his ??? from his ten cigars, ten cigars that he had.
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