Vera Schey - June 10, 1994
Living in Apartment
Eight floors up.
I did later too, I did it because of the Russians. Anyway uh, they came in about six, I think about six young men, fifteen, sixteen, seventeens, with bayonets sticking out, with the holsters, with the guns in their pocket. And they said, "We came to check everybody out and if there is one Jew in hiding or one deserter, all of you will be shot, including the family of the apartment." I don't think that night I'll ever forget. I mean, it was like... And I don't want to sound altruistic, but you didn't even think of yourself. You thought about this man who's hiding eight of us and what danger he is in. It was an unbelievable feeling. And uh, they checked the papers. Oh, I have to add that this man was hiding a--had a godson who was a German. He was from the maid they had for many years, his son. And this man, this cousin, put him through school and college. It was his godsend. And this kid was an Arrow Cross. He knew about us, but because of respect for his godfather he would be quiet. But he had a girlfriend who was a Romanian woman who was uh, bombed out, really bombed out from apartment and he brought her to stay with us too. So we were, I don't know, ten, twelve of us there.
Do you remember the man's name?
The one who...
The one whose apartment you were in?
Oh yeah.
What was his name?
Uh, Alexander Nicolich. And his wife, Borish, was a second cousin and Jewish.
Mm-hm.
Very, very good friend too besides it. They were wonderful people. I mean, he was wonderful. He committed suicide after the war. Because in his job--I don't remember the details. He was either fired or, or held responsible and he--for whatever happened there. And he was the most giving and the most caring and the most humanitarian person I have ever known in my life. And he uh, he couldn't take it, so. Anyway, they come in and they check all the papers. And you know, you die a little each time they go through each one of us. And uh, finally they leave and they walk out. And a sigh of relief that, you know, we were accepted as who we were and we were not found out. And two minutes later they knock on the door and they come back and they say, "One of these papers is false!" So all of us died. And he goes over to this Romanian girlfriend of, of this Nazi, of this Arrow...
Hm.
Party kid because that was written in Romanian and they had no idea. They thought it was a falsified something. First it was a real, the Rom...
Huh!
...she was really Gentile, she really had her papers. And she--"Come on out with us." And we all figured that she will say, are you crazy, not me but all the others. You know, this is outside the apartment in the hallway. And the kid, the boyfriend who, the Arrow Party guy goes over to them and says, shows him, shows them his papers and he says, "Are you crazy, this is my girlfriend. You don't think I would have a Jewish girlfriend, you are nuts?" And they left. I mean this, if I will be a hundred I will never forget that night. Ever.
So the two boys were still safe.
And the two boys at that point were sa...I mean, were saved. ??? They left the house and ???
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