Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Anna Greenberger - August 24, 1982

Escaping from the Typhoid Hospital

And, and my mother was home already from the--they sent her already to Neustadt from uh, that where she was in the hospital. She didn't know that I am sick. And, no, in Hofgrup. And she was there, so. Uh, a day before, yeah, they came in and they checked me and they said--sometimes I was lucky, the nurse didn't look so I shaked the thermometer so the fever went down. But I couldn't do it all the time. And I said to the doctor that--to that lady doctor, if they don't let me out, I will run away. Uh, because everybody was going already. And they watched me the whole day Saturday and Sunday I shouldn't run out from the ho...uh, the hospital. And that Saturday night, that was a lady from Lithuania and she run out. She ranned out. And nobody paid any attention. She disappeared and that's it. So next day, I talked to my sister through the window. I didn't have clothes. Matter of fact, they even told me they will put me on a plane and they will uh, fly me to Prague and I should still stay in the hospital. And I didn't want to because uh, I didn't want to stay by myself and I wanted to be the family together. So I told my sister that if they have some clothes--some schmates--they should bring me and I will try to escape from the hospital. So it was Sunday and uh, a ma...the doctor came everyday and he told me I shouldn't give nobody nothing, water or nothing because they are very high fe...some were so high fe...with fever they didn't know what they are doing. They stripped completely. Some drank the water from uh, some English soldiers brought flowers in vases--they drank the water from the flowers. But they told me I shouldn't give nothing and I was afraid that they kill me at night, you know they, with the high fever and I was feeling better already. So Sunday my mother came under the window and she brought me some clothes and I went in the bathroom and two German--two Gentile Polish girls came with me to the bathroom. They watched--nobody should see--nurses or doctors. And I put the cover on me and I went in the toilet and I changed in clothes. And I took a babushka they shouldn't recognize me and a cover from the bed. And I went nicely to the door, I looked around, I threw the cover behind the door and I walked out.


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