Lola Greenspan - April 25, 1983
Germans Begin Taking Family Members
This is in Będzin?
Yeah. Będzin, Będzin this was.
Were you there?
Yeah I went--this time I went, this time. And I went by my brother and my brother said, "We have to going someplace." And my sister-in-law she say, "No, we not going. We got a beautiful house." The houses make terrible, terrible the people. "I got a house, I got bed, I got this." And I said, "Luba, maybe we going ???" Said, "You have to go home to the mother," she said to me, "you been young." I say, "I not can going, we are going. Everything closed." And then and I went and stayed one week by brother and then when I'm stay by the brother is coming the police SS into the house. He looked--he tooked all this from the house and looked inside--he looked for ???, jewelry.
Mm-hm, mm-hm. Jewelry.
Yeah. He didn't find it. Just what she got, one watch and ???. And the boy he tooked the mother's dress and stands up and said, "Come on, come on, come on young boy, come on, come on." And he cry--start cry. Said, "Don't cry, you can cry later, you can cry later. You understand? You, you can..." And he cry, he holds the mother and his mother said, "Please, let's me, let's um, don't talk to my child like with this." "Schwein Jude ??? Schwein Jude ???" to my sister and law and she's afraid. And she got hits in, in the face. And then my brother--tooked my brother away and she were alone in the house, I went by myself alone in the house. Couple weeks later it went a big train and the sister-in-law she said, "Lola, you have to home back." And I'm going to the train and I'm going back to my house and my mother. And later she write--we don't got telephones in the houses--she write a couple words uh, card one day and she said--is writing to my mother, "Mama it's very terrible to be in the house. I been afraid. ??? is away. I got my baby. He talk--the police talk to my baby like this and this--Lola, she, she knows." And I talk to my mother and everybody start to cry. Said, "Mom, you see? You see going with the war and you saying it's nothing? Why you let us no going to Russia?" "No, nobody going to Russia," she said. And then a couple weeks later he tooked my, my baby--my sisters baby--??? I got the picture and sometime I'm looked at the picture I'm crying. He tooked the baby from my sister-in-law and she crying.
Mm-hm.
She, she said, "Don't worry, I put it in the camp with the kids--the childrens, with the childrens." Tooked off of the big--off the big train and just tooked the children away. And children she don't see the little boy. Later on, my sister-in-law were killed in Będzin, she killed in Będzin and that's all. I don't got my sister-in-law, my brother and my baby. The other one sister in Częstochowa she went '39, 1939 is came in the police SS. They tooked my--my brother in law sit in the ??? with the brother in law with the cousin--two mens, three mens and talking stupid something. Is coming three SS, "??? Stand up, stand up, everybody stand up. Heil Hitler, Heil Hitler." And my sister she stay, she's uh, she was so white and she so were afraid. And they said, "Come on, brothers. Come on, brothers. Come on." They said like this. And my brother said, "We don't have to going, I have to going to the work." He said, "Come on, come on, you going to work." He tooked my brother--the three mens, and tooked to Majdanek.
© Board of Regents University of Michigan-Dearborn