Aaron Salzburg - July 24, 1984
Escape from Sandomierz
Was he a Jew?
Oh no. He was a, he was a Gestapo man. A very bad man. [pause] One night, I can recall it right now, we were, we were packed in that ghetto, about 7,000 people in a matter of a couple of weeks. They came from all over. Children without parents. It was a pity to see how these kids walked around, ran around. Cried, with no help. Invalids, sick people--just a madhouse. We were, we were assigned to two small rooms--very tiny rooms. We were priv...privileged to get two small rooms. Others couldn't have that either. There were ten people in these, these two rooms--eight boys, two young girls. One girl had a fiancé, and she had a girlfriend with her, which uh, these two girls shared one room, and us eight shared the other room. One evening uh, we heard after the ghetto, after, after the ghetto was, after the ghetto was fenced in, suddenly--at night fall came on--we heard a lot of shootings--fire was all over. That was the first fire uh, we experienced in this ghetto. First thing I did, I jumped the ghetto fence. I don't know what had happened or what, what that shooting was all about. As soon as I jumped the fence, I was in a different world. I walked down the slope and got into the first possible house which I could see and hide in a latrine. I must, must have been there for about three or four hours in that latrine. People used it and I could look out through the open holes--and I looked out and I seen an antenna on the roof. Oh that convinced me--and I was sure of that this house must have been occupied by some German. It was no place for me to be there. It has gotten late and my boots--the water start to come through my boots, and I didn't feel very comfortable there. I got out of that place and I start to walk. I didn't' know where to walk, but I did--walk through all the night. Finally I guess, I came to a secluded place where it looked to me like a shanty, it was something like a shanty. Luckily enough there was an opening on the roof there and I got in that little dormer up there. It was like a little attic and I laid down there and must have spent three, four hours there, too. And uh, before dawn I knew it--I can't stay too long there, I start to walk again. I got out of there, untils I got out, out of the city--far out of the city. In the morning I stopped at the farmer's house. Uh, the lady served me lunch uh, breakfast rather. I paid her. And uh, I tried to pick up a conversation with her. I asked her if she knows where some Jewish people are located here. I sure knew exact locations--all the locations where the Jewish people were, but just to pick up a conversation. I told her I came from Warsaw. Um, she was pretty pas...passive and uh, she gave me some directions where to go and um, I did--took her advice. There was a camp by the name of Kocina, yes? The name of the camp was Kocina, which was--which was created by the Jewish people. A lot of our own people from our city tried to develop that camp--it was a labor camp--with our money--tried to bribe the Germans.
[interruption in interview]
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