The Brothers of Auschwitz

Chapter 8

Dov: Remember Mermelstein? Tall, with a beard,

recruited by the Czechs in 1939? He was a

gunner, rode a horse, six horses pulled a cannon.

Yitzhak: One of the boys from that family was with you.

Dov: Yes, but we lost each other along the way.

Yitzhak: We lost ourselves along the way,

Dov, look what happened to us. We lost everything.

Dov

I went by truck from Auschwitz to Camp Jaworzno.

It was the middle of summer. Hot. We traveled standing up. Crowded and stinking. I was finished. Two adults fell on me simultaneously. One died close to my eye, one on my shoulder. I carried them both until Jaworzno. The old pain in my groin came back. The place that would swell up and turn blue when I dragged heavy logs to the train track in the village. At night, I’d drag them with father and my brothers.

We got down from the train. Even hotter. Saw rows and rows of brown wooden barracks with thick, white smoke above them, like sand. SSman, two meters tall with a cap and a loudspeaker in his hand yelled, strip, you’re going to shower. I didn’t believe him. I was certain they were taking us to the gas. In my pocket I had a piece of bread. I hid it in my shoe. I thought, if I get out of the shower alive, a piece of bread will be waiting for me. Naked and thin we went into the shower. Tall men, short men. All ugly, disgusting, just like the goys always said about us. Everyone had white skin, sores and a smell. They’d press on their skin and there’d be a hole in the flesh, as if their skin was old. Their bald heads were brown like mud. A thin layer of bristles. Their nails were bitten to the quick. I thought, maybe it’s easier to kill people who look like this. I was sure I looked like that, too, maybe I was also disgusting, ugh, stinking. I started looking for a mirror, didn’t find one. I smelled my skin, it smelled like spoiled cheese.

We stood stinking and crowded under the taps and I didn’t know if they’d give us water and then gas, maybe gas and water together, maybe they didn’t have enough water in that camp and we’d have to wait like we did in the train car, and maybe we’d just stand there until we died.

The air became smellier. Someone near me pooped standing up. Two others in front of me did the same. Maybe out of fear. Silently I asked myself, if they’d put naked Christians in here instead of Jews, no, no, if they’d put naked Germans in here, say, the tall, blond men I saw in the newspaper, the ones who always looked as if they’d just had a good shave. Would they also be as ugly as us after two months in Auschwitz? I had an answer. Yes. It would be easy to kill them, because of the sores and the smell.

Some of them began to call Shema Israel, Shema Israel and to weep. The weeping spread like fire in cotton wool. I also wept. We all wept to someone about someone. They began to move back and forth, as if they had a beard and were in a synagogue, moving in shoes and coat and hat. And suddenly water.

A flow of boiling water hit us on the head. Water without a smell. We couldn’t escape the burning. Nonetheless we screamed water, water, and in a flash, the tap was turned off. We were saved. The men’s weeping turned to roars of laughter. The tears remained. For the first time since leaving home I saw Jewish men laughing. I knew a piece of bread was waiting for me in my shoe. I started to hug someone next to me. We wept together. In the meantime they opened the door. At once we shut up so the Germans wouldn’t change their minds. They gave us clean clothes that didn’t smell. The black stripes looked darker. They put us in a dark bloc with three-tiered bunks. I couldn’t see any windows. The walls were brown. The light bulbs were faint. I managed to get a place farthest away from the floor. I ate my bread lying down; I was happy that day in Camp Jaworzno, higher up than Auschwitz.

The next day we returned to the morning and evening parades. We stood for hours on our feet, sometimes just because of a mistake in the numbers. Those who fell on parade, fell and that was that. Didn’t get up. A disgusting smell grew in the camp that increasingly consumed our minds and clogged up our asses.

At Jaworzno I worked in construction. Dangerous work. Because I was small. We helped build a factory for supplying electricity. The professionals were Germans.

We worked in excavation and construction. I was lowered in a basket into a six-meter-deep pit. I descended slowly into the darkness. I dug with a spade at the bottom of the pit. I sent the sand up in the basket. It was dark in there, suffocating. The earth was cold and my body full of water. I dug for about six hours straight. After a food break, another six hours, down in the pit. The Germans didn’t reinforce the sides of the pit. Grains fell into my eyes all the time. I put my fingers in my eyes, it didn’t help. I tried to wipe them with the striped pajamas, that was worse. I remembered that someone had died from an eye infection, but not only from that, he had other diseases. I tortured myself with thoughts of the coming collapse. I knew there was a big chance of a collapse. I knew that only the depth of the pits interested the Germans, I didn’t count. I knew I could be replaced by a whole transport. It was clear that I could be buried alive in a heap and that the sand would cover me and get into my ears, nose and mouth, and that I’d have to breathe sand in through my nose until death. I dug as slowly as I could. For months. Other small prisoners like me were digging in the pits next to me. Many died in the sand that fell on them. Don’t know how I stayed alive.

And then came winter.

All we had was the same striped on the clothing. No coat. No socks, vest or underwear. The frost was terrible. I couldn’t feel my palms. The same for the soles of my feet, and it was only a matter of time before my fingers fell off. I was certain that tomorrow, the next week, following month, I’d find three fingers on each hand, or three toes on a foot, or I’d come out of the pit in the basket without a thumb. I dreamed of fire. One day, on the lunch-break, I found a few planks. In my pocket I had paper and matches. I went behind a wall, and I lit a fire.

The work manager came up to me.

The work manager was a young Pole of twenty-five. He had huge hands. He had a neck as thick as a bull. He stood the prisoners in a line, dragged me in front of them and ordered: Bend down. I bent down. Waited for a bullet in the head. The work manager took a large plank in both hands and struck me with the plank in the middle of my backside. Thwack. I felt I was falling to pieces. Thwack. Jew lights a little fire, warms his hands and the Pole, damn him, crushes. Yes. Thwack. I counted five blows. There was no flesh on me. I was skin and bone. I felt as if even my bones couldn’t hold up under the skin. They were like nuts knocking about inside a towel. Thwack thwack thwack thwack thwack. I didn’t open my mouth so my bones wouldn’t spill out.

For a month I couldn’t sit down. During breaks I stayed on my feet. Leaning first on my right leg and then on my left. At night I couldn’t sleep. I lay on my belly and didn’t know if my ass was open or leaking. I felt a tingling in my backside and was sure worms had got into the wound and were now eating me alive. Every few minutes I carefully felt the place around the wound. It was wet there. Then it was wet and smelled. Then it began to get hard there with a scab. Finally it was dry but really hurt. It hurt for two months.

The bombing of Jaworzno by the Russians almost killed us all. Noon. It was a food break. I was waiting in line for a bowl of hot soup.

I knew I had no chance of getting anything from the bottom of the pot because I was small. Every time I’d stay away from tall prisoners who approached me, an elbow ready. I already knew those elbows. They were like a snake. Thwack. And quiet. The guards saw nothing.

Suddenly a rising-falling siren. Bombs fell close to us. The distance of my house from the road. I ran zigzag to the bunker. A concrete structure dug deep underground. At the opening to the bunker were sacks of sand. Prisoners were stepping on one another because of the narrow opening. I fell on the prisoner in front of me. We both fell on the floor. His pants were wet. I managed to get by him and crawl into the bunker. Frightening darkness. I advanced along the ditch with small steps. Prisoners’ shouts in the distance behind me grew fainter. And the whining of airplanes. A few minutes went by, and then a short siren. I knew, they were calling us to come out.

I wanted to get out quickly.

I couldn’t see anything. I felt the walls and they were rough and cold. I dragged my feet, I felt as if I were walking through mud. I turned left, I passed another wall, a strange silence, I didn’t understand where all the prisoners were, where they’d gone. My heart began to beat frantically, I went back, pressing my hands on the concrete wall and changed direction again. I walked on, straight I think, and couldn’t find the way out. After a few steps I stood still. The same. Darkness, silent as a graveyard. I realized I was stuck alone in that shitty bunker. A hot needle pricked my ribs, entered the heart, dropped to the belly, settling in my backside. I felt my backside getting warm, swelling. My legs began to tremble. I grabbed the walls, shouting help, help me get out, I can’t get out on my own, where are you, help.

I began to run through the ditches like a blind man with an open ass.

I held fast to my ass so my wound wouldn’t open up anymore. I ran from side to side, to no avail. I hit walls, got a blow to the head, got up, continued running. My clothes were wet with sweat. My mind screamed, you’re lost, lost, this will be your grave. You will crumble in the darkness, and no one will know. I stopped. My breaths sounded like a running herd, lost. I closed my mouth, pressed my nose. Stretched my neck. I heard the sound of sirens. Without people. I didn’t understand what had changed. Had the bombs maybe killed the prisoners and guards and I was the only one left? No. I stuck to the wall. Slid down until I was sitting. My forehead was burning. I covered my face with the palms of my hands and waited to die.

I felt a tickling warmth in my fingers.

I opened my fingers a crack. A large blotch of light hit my brain. Right in front of me stood my mother. She had on a scarf and a dress with an apron. Mother smiled at me as if from out of a picture. I wept, Mama, Mama, I’m going to die. The weeping increased, I called louder, Mama, help me to get out, Mama. Mother smiled and then German voices disturbed us. Irritated voices that weren’t far away from me.

The light disappeared. I jumped to my feet. I heard Germans running, shouting. And then I saw light. The way out was right in front of me. I hid my face under my arm and left the bunker. Prisoners were standing in two rows opposite the opening to the bunker. My place in the row was empty. I approached them with bent knees.

A Kapo thug fell on me.

A large, fat Kapo hit me in the face with his fists, kicked my leaking ass. I fell. I ate earth mixed with blood. The Kapo didn’t stop. He kicked me in the belly, ribs, head and back. I lay there without moving. I stopped breathing. The Kapo stopped. Kicked me again in the pelvis, turned and walked off. The Kapo’s kicks paralyzed the right side of my body. I got up slowly, couldn’t straighten up. I saw through a mist of blood. I ran crookedly to my place in the line. Don’t know how I survived. I was young, I was strong. Stronger than Hitler.

Chapter 9

Yitzhak

The transition from Camp Buchenwald to Camp Zeiss was difficult.

Winter. Rain. Lightning. Storms. When I was in Buchenwald in Bloc 8, I ate well. I slept in a bed with sheets, I showered, there was light at the window.

At Zeiss I lived the life of a rat. There was darkness and damp. I wrapped pipes with steel wire for twelve hour shifts, at least three or four meters deep. Every day. I had no gloves. My hands were full of cracks. Every crack broad as a ditch. After a few weeks my skin was as hard as the sole of a shoe.

For the first few weeks I ran the distance from the camp to the factory. I still had strength in my body from Bloc 8. Then I stopped running. Barely managed to walk. Hard work didn’t scare me, it was the hunger that was scary. In the morning they gave us hot water that tasted like coffee. At noon soup with bits in it I didn’t know, but I still ate it. In the evening a piece of bread with cheese or margarine. That’s it. I was sixteen and I could easily have finished off a calf for lunch, but I finished off a little water with a few tough bits from the top. I felt the hunger was devouring me from inside. My hunger was full of eyes like the angel of death. Sometimes when my body ached I could see it in the darkness of the factory.

At Zeiss there were aerial bombings, mainly when they were handing out water with tough bits.

We just got out of the earth and the planes came, boom. Boom. Boom-boom. They made a terrible noise. The poured down on us everything they carried in the belly and disappeared. The Germans made us go into a huge, open pit. In this way we lost even the little water with the few bits and ran to a pit full of pipes and steel. The guards entered after us. The bombs hit six-inch pipes. Pieces of steel flew up, circled above our heads and boom landed on the ground. Like an enormous cannon shooting spears. Steel pieces split open a prisoner’s head next to me. He fell without a sound. Jets of blood mixed with mud and soot sprayed us black. The SSmen also got sprayed. I saw SSman collapse with a huge hole in his belly. There was nowhere to run. I contracted my body to the size of a pin and lowered my head as much as I could. I heard the terrible weeping of wounded prisoners. There was no one to save them. The planes threw more and more bombs at us. I saw my end coming. I refused to die with a piece of steel in my head. Beside me was a young prisoner, maybe twenty years old. His ears stuck out and there was a bulge in the middle of his nose. I shouted into his ear, I’m getting out of here, want to come.

We ran into the open field. The field was colored white. My face burned from the cold and the wind. My nose dripped and dripped. I stuck a striped sleeve to my nose so it wouldn’t fall. I beat on my legs. The earth was as hard as asphalt and I couldn’t hear a sound, just waves coming and going in my ears. I was hungry. I got on my knees and scraped at a layer of ice. I prayed, maybe something was growing there, maybe. I dug with my hand. I found cabbage roots deep in the earth. The boy who came with me also got down on his knees. We began to dig like madmen. We found more roots. We collected a large pile. They were frozen. I began to shout, you want to kill us with hunger, but we will live, we will live. I wiped my face. We found a tin. The boy had matches in his pocket. We looked at each other and together pulled down our trousers. Peed into the tin. We put the roots inside and warmed them with matches from below. We ate roots in hot urine. We ate the entire pile. It tasted as good as mother’s food. I felt full and whispered thank you to the sky. It was black, evil. The planes disappeared. My eyelids were heavy. I wanted to sleep standing up. As if I was resting in my village after a meal. As if I was fixing something in the yard and in a minute I’d be going inside. I see my family. Father Israel would talk about the market, about a rather good deal. Mother would ask, did you bring my buttons? And she’d take a heavy pot from the fire. Avrum would want to know a little more about the business. Sarah would be writing in her book. Dov would help mother with the dishes, and I? I don’t remember anything about me. As if there were no war in the world and no trains to the crematorium, as if the world were alive without Hitler.

After a while we went back to wrapping pipes in the ground.

The next morning began with bad signs. A prisoner two bunks from me ran to the fence and tzzzzt, finished.

Burned in a second. Looked like a striped shirt that fell off the washing line, it all happened even before we stood in line, even before the dawn. I took a good look at the dead man and then two prisoners next to me left us and ran to the same place. Together, the two of them, like a couple, one tall, one with a bent back, they both ran fast and tzzzzt tzzzzt. As if they’d fallen off the washing line. I couldn’t separate myself from the little heap of the dead. I’d also had enough, but then the scream of the SSman reached my ears, stand in a row, quickly, forward march. We filed off. Men as thin and dirty as stained paper. Paper connected to shoes dragging along the asphalt.

I was almost last and didn’t move on the asphalt. SSman gave me a blow on my back with the butt of a rifle. Thwack. I shut my mouth and he screamed into my ear, forward, in line, dirty Jew.

Walk, quickly. Quickly, thwack. Another one, on the pelvis. I paid no attention, let him hit me, kill me, didn’t matter. I already knew that soon they’d take all of us to die in the crematorium. We all knew the method at Zeiss. The method: No food, no water, no place to breathe, no shower, no coat, no medication, just work, work fast, until death comes. It takes about three months to come. In the meantime they bring a fresh, healthy consignment and the old-timers get on a train to the nearest available crematorium. Yes. Three months was enough for the Germans to turn healthy young men into a pile of disgusting rags. Rags should be burned, I thought.

Tomorrow I’m on the fence. Yes, tomorrow. Another moonless night, enough. Was there a moon?

The thought of the fence gave me some strength. Maybe the three gave me the strength to think about the fence. I strode forward and made up the space in the file. And, oops, I unintentionally stepped on the shoe of the prisoner in front of me. He made a cheeping sound and fell. SSman approached us. I grabbed the prisoner’s shirt and pulled him up. He pushed with his hands and rose. I saw he was missing a finger and a half on his right hand. He rocked, rocked, stood. I passed him and began to walk with great strides, like the beginning, when I had the strength of Bloc 8. I passed at least eight prisoners and got back in line.

The first morning light began to cover the fields. We approached a German village. Regular houses with chimneys. A low fence and a yard. A few trees, more flowers, and thin ice on the water, but mainly cold that could bury you standing up. Heavy clouds stood on the roofs of distant houses. Mingled with normal smoke, white smoke, a little gray. I knew German farmers were warm in their houses with their stove and chimney, and their woolen socks.

I jeered at them because of the fence I was planning on, tzzzzt. And that was that. Silver drops spread over the grass at the side of the road. A rotting bird lay with its feet in the air. Tomorrow I’ll be dead. Yes, tomorrow.

Two figures stood by the side of the road just as the morning sun pushed a cloud. One was tall. The other shorter. I remember women’s scarves. The tall one wore a dress. The little one wore trousers. As we approached I saw a woman and a girl looking at us. Holding hands. What do the two of them want, what. Want a show, about wretched people, people who weep without tears, well, here we are. Until that morning I’d barely seen any people, I barely remembered there were any in the world. I knew they were hiding in their houses, I knew. I sensed their glances from behind a curtain, behind a sheet on the line. The children were as far away as possible, maybe they hid them under a bed, so their sweet children would sleep well at night. If I had a mirror to see myself, I knew I’d scream with shock. I didn’t need a mirror, I looked at other prisoners. I understood the village people. By chance the road near the village led to Zeiss. Twice a day a huge file of wretched, stinking, disintegrating people passed by.

The two women at the side of the road looked only at me.

They looked like mother and daughter. The little girl wanted to stick her head in my face. She pointed at me. Whispered in her mother’s ear. The mother nodded, yes, yes. The mother turned to a tall, particularly good-looking SSman. The SSman signaled, halt! We halted. Everyone’s heads were looking down. The mother spoke in SSman’s ear. She whispered in German and pointed at me. The SSman agreed and she gave him a package.

The SSman approached me.

The SSman gave me a package. Ordered: Open it. The whole line was on top of me. My whole body shivered, my hands trembled, I didn’t understand what they all wanted from me, why especially me. I wanted one of the adults to tell me what I should do now and if it was all right to open the package. The adults were breathing heavily with faces like a predatory animal about to jump. Slowly I opened the paper. There was a cooked potato inside. Hot. SSman signaled to me: Eat. I swallowed the potato in a flash. The mother and daughter went towards the village.

The SSman called, march. March.

I strode, fell. Got up. From excitement. My legs tripped over each other. In my head there was a flood. What was this, what.

The prisoners almost killed me with their eyes, and he? He said eat, and didn’t move away from me. I felt I was going mad, that’s it. I was pulling off the stripes on the pajamas, the tracks of the trains and life. In the meantime I scraped my nail against my tongue and found a few crumbs. My belly started making strange sounds, I didn’t know what to do with myself, and why are they confusing me with good deeds.