Zofia Szostak - 1985
Germans
You know, now when I think about this now, I think this could have been very, very dangerous, you know, but uh, at that time, it, it looked just like, okay, this was the thing to do; why not? They will not come, you know, at least, I didn't think that they would come to us because they knew where they were living, so they would go and, and take them wherever they supposed to go, and, and never ask uh, you know, who, who else is over there? So Eva stayed for a few days, but parents, uh, you know uh, Mrs. Brown and Dr. ??? and his mother were not pick up. And the one day when she went to sleep over there, you know uh, 'cause they maybe, "Oh, this is just a talk, maybe nothing will happen," you know. And she slept and, and the Germans came, and they took them. And they were even laughing and joking, you know, with the little Eva, she was like, oh, maybe four and a half, five years old, you know...
The Germans were laughing and joking?
Yes, joking with her, you know and uh, and uh, I, I clearly remember 'cause, you know, at, at first we didn't know what, what this...they came to our section of our house anyways, you know? At that time we all woke up, you know, and uh, I noticed he was, he was playing with her, he even gave her a candy, you know, saying, "Oh, don't worry, you going, you going for a nice trip with your mother." And things like this, so they, they were really, I, I, I don't know, just, just dreadful people. And this was the last I saw of Dr. ??? and his mother, and they all went. They all went. Then few... maybe two, three months later, one day we sitting at the table and eating our dinner, somebody's knocking and I'm opening the door, and Mrs. Brown is coming with Eva. So they were sitting at Montelupich, you know, this prison in Kraków, at Montelupich Prison, and this was quite a, quite a large group of them, of Jewish people from Bochnia, you know, with Jew are supposed to be different citizens, and well, so they, they finished them off, all of them, you know. The men were separated from, from women, and if they saw each other, was only when they were assigned some kind of a duty, and women go, were going one way, and the men was going, then maybe passing each other in the corridor or something. And she told me that uh, Dr. ??? was...when he saw her, he, he made...he gave her some sign that there is no hope, that this is the end for them. So we don't know really how they died, probably they...they did not even bother to take them to uh, to concentration camp, only maybe they shoot them over there some place, in some kind of a, a execution, 'cause they were doing this too. But for some reason, they, they let her and some, some of the men, they were allowed to go, you know, and...after maybe few, few weeks or something, they were arrested again, you know. Now this time she knew that this, this is not--now they did not put them in a ghetto. They were still staying where they stayed, and one day they came, they took her, and this was the last time I saw her, but she survived. Uh, her mother uh, was hiding under a different name uh, Mrs. ???, and she was supposed to be a French, French teacher. I used to go sometimes to her, you know, and tell her about what Mrs. Brown was doing, you know, and, and got some, some messages from, from her. She, she used to live in, in a little different uh, different section of the town, and as a cover-up, she was supposed to give me French, French lessons or something...I didn't have much, you know. But...you know, so, she did not survive, because I found out, I was in England at that time, and got a letter after maybe two, three years uh, uh, when we stayed over there, I got a letter from one of my, my girlfriends, and she told me that Mrs. ??? died and who finished her, you know, were uh, Bezpieka you know, this, uh, political police in Poland? Do you know?
Hm.
Those, those bad, bad people, you know.
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