Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Regina Cohen - April 18, 1982

Escaping Selection Again

Um, one other time I escaped uh, I knew I couldn't be sorted again. Because one time I was lucky, the second time might not be that lucky. Maybe somebody would recognize me. Maybe--who knows, but they would wonder, "How did she get left behind? We know we took this kind of stuff out a long time ago." In the barrack, before this I was in eight and number six and number four were like two barracks of supply rooms, like what they call Kanada II--blankets and pots. The, the pots that they would use like, instead of cups for, for our food were, there were extra supplies there. And those blankets were stacked almost, I'd say, about ten feet high. I'm looking at that. About a door high maybe, a little bit taller than that. And uh, then we knew, somehow or other, the, the, the barrack uh, uh, uh, the person in charge of the barracks knew when there'll be sort...sortations, when they'll come and sort us out again or whatever. Whether it was for work or whether it was for the gas chamber. Um, she let out a remark of uh, "It would be smart for some people to hide themselves." There was a lady with a thirteen-year-old daughter and myself and another girl from uh, Hungary somewhere. She was thirteen, but she was huge. She really looked like ei...she was very, very tall. Uh, this one had no shoes any more and, and very, very pathetic. You know, five three and a half now, I was fourteen then. Um, we got, snuck out of our barrack into that supply barrack and we were under those tons of blankets. Now the girl that let us in there, she says, "I didn't see anybody." And the gate sort of open very--we snuck in--we hid under. Uh, for some reason or other the Gestapo came in there and with their bayonets and their knife they were cutting through those blankets and one came down between a shoulder and I swore then if one cuts me, I'm not even going to cry. I'm not even going to let out--because we couldn't. Because if one of us cried, we'd give away the other one. I was lucky again.


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