The Boy Who Drew Auschwitz
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There were four options open to us Jewish youngsters: nursing at the hospital, cooking in the soup kitchens, sorting files in the community’s offices or gardening at the cemetery. I decided to devote a year to the upkeep of Jewish graves at Weissensee cemetery. There was no pay, just the privilege of holding a special travel permit and breathing in fresh air. The vast, walled city of the dead with its marbled mausoleums and crumbling tombstones was peaceful. Only the soothing noise of rustling trees interrupted what we considered to be our haven.
We were organised into working gangs. In spring and summer, we cleaned the weed-ridden footpaths, planted ivy and looked after the flowers. Come autumn, we swept the leaves. And in winter we would remove the snow. The cemetery was the ideal place for playing ‘hide and seek’ and ‘cops and robbers’. Wolfgang* and Werner* were fellow diggers. The riotous moments of chasing each other over the vast expanses of the graveyard were among my happiest days.
Besides the gardening, that year I was also initiated into the various pleasures of driving a tractor, playing cards and teasing girls. I smoked my first cigarette, and for the first time, a girl, Eva-Ruth,* fell in love with me.
Mother had taken a course as a seamstress, and found a job mending army uniforms. On occasion, letters would be found sewn into the linings of blood-stained Wehrmacht-issued trousers.2 Their messages, the unheeded warnings of Germany’s sons, told of desperate conditions on the Eastern Front. They would say that Leningrad and Moscow were out of reach and only death awaited them in the unforgiving snow-covered Russian fields.
I moved out of my grandparents’ apartment, and Mother and I went to Speyerer Strasse near Bayrischer Platz, a once-prominent Jewish quarter. It was a fashionable district, and the rent for one and a half rooms was so high that making ends meet was difficult. Our neighbours, fellow Jews, often invited me to see their valuable stamp collections and paintings – sometimes even for tea. None of them, however, showed an understanding of or cared about our financial troubles.
Around this time, the last letter we ever received from Father arrived from England via the Red Cross. He urged us to be brave. We really had to be.
Hitler’s cruel laws penetrated everywhere, having only one aim: victory. Confiscation orders were extended to warm clothes, radio sets and pets of non-Aryans. Our aquarium and parakeets had already been abandoned, so Hitler’s attention now turned to Grandfather’s cherished crystal set.
Grandpa Julius had been blinded while serving as an officer in the Kaiser’s army in the First World War. When in a jovial mood he would sing to me a sentimental song called ‘Ich hatt’einen Kameraden’ (‘I once had a comrade’) about fallen comrades. I had once read him the newspapers, but now his only pleasure was listening through earphones to the 15-year-old cat whisker radio set.
We sent a letter to the War Veterans Federation begging their intervention to let Grandpa keep it. The reply was sympathetic but to no avail. Jews were not allowed to have a radio. There could be no appeals against the orders of the new Reich.
Grandpa died on 19 March 1942, at the age of 71, unable to understand the new ways of his fatherland.
Real anti-Semites avoided all contact with Jews. Although they caused us much suffering, they personally remained unknown to us. However, it was the many helpful, courageous Germans that impressed me. Their sympathy for us did not come from any admiration for our Jewishness, but from adherence to a system of ideals and values that was now being ruthlessly outlawed.
Mother and I, unable to buy any influence, contacted everyone we knew who might be able to help us, but Nazi authorities would come down hard on anyone harbouring Jews. Any helper would be taking a potential risk not only to themselves but also to their own families.
Once, when hiding from yet another wave of arrests, we visited the home of a protestant clergyman from West Berlin’s Apostel-Paulus-Kirche on Akazien Strasse. But we had overlooked the fact that his new son-in-law was a devout Nazi. The cleric’s help dwindled to no more than keeping our plea for help a secret.
Desperate, we were finally given refuge by a widowed seamstress Clara Bernhard, a workmate of Mother’s. Clara put us up on a field-bed in the narrow kitchen of her apartment on Belziger Strasse. Many years before, when Fate had taken her Jewish husband, she had no inkling that someday she would have to reaffirm her loyalty.
Left-wing friends from Auntie Ruth’s student days – who had their own reasons to fear arrest – could be counted upon for radio evenings, and I, too, was sometimes taken along to learn of a world I had never seen.
These sessions were a special treat, for we were not allowed radios. To begin with, Radio London would talk of Allied actions and successful air raids. Then came the secret rite our left-wing friends had practised for nearly a decade: the crowding of ears to catch the muffled transmission, ‘Hier spricht Moskau’ (‘Moscow speaking’). With exhilaration written all over their faces, they listened to the long lists of recaptured Russian positions. Their radiant hope was contagious.
Another act of defiance came through the traditional Red Wedding district in north Berlin chalking its bombed-out buildings with anti-Nazi slogans. Much of the lettering had been done by disillusioned Hitler youths who saw no other way of expressing their grudges. Friends of mine from north Berlin had already contacted some of this new brand of rebel. Their slogans seemed universally appropriate: ‘Down with the teachers – they teach ruin.’
Among the highlights of defiance was a bomb planted at a much-heralded anti-Soviet exhibition. Arrests following this incident were so widespread, however, that rumours suggested it was an inside job, like the 1933 Reichstag fire, which the Nazis used to justify their harsh crackdowns.
By the end of 1942, the deportation of Berlin’s Jews was escalating on an intensified scale. The rumours at the time said it was mostly to Lublin in Poland. Friends and neighbours became fewer and fewer, with Mother and I in constant fear of the dreaded knock on the door.
Occasionally, I helped out at the bakery on Grenadier Strasse. So, every time it received instructions to provide loaves of bread in large quantities, we were alerted to the fact that another deportation was about to happen.
While working at the bakery I got to know the slums of Alexanderplatz. Gypsy and Jewish tenants seemed to live together in harmony, despite the drunken brawls that typified the district. They lived in abject poverty and overcrowding, but nevertheless the grown-up sons of the Gypsies were conscripted to the Wehrmacht to defend the fatherland.
We were now living alone in the Speyerer Strasse flat. The other tenants’ rooms had been sealed up by the Gestapo. All of the valuable paintings and stamp collections that belonged to our neighbours had fallen into Nazi hands. An elderly couple from another floor tried to negotiate their overseas properties for an exemption to be deported. They failed.
Instructions were given to empty the apartments of food before they were sealed off. On one of the backyard staircases a huge chunk of black-market cheese had been abandoned. Its owner had clung to all that was his to the very last.
Mother had been drafted into a factory that assembled miniature coils for speedometers. Only night shifts were available, so I had to get used to spending the evenings alone in an empty flat. Heavy and almost daily air raids exacerbated the situation even further. But I had nowhere else to go. Jews were no longer allowed into bomb shelters. Even when an incendiary bomb whizzed down and smashed onto our backyard, I stayed where I was, trembling and terrified.
There were many less eventful moments, however, that characterised my confinement. Reading, preparing my frugal supper and cleaning up. Often, I toyed with the idea of breaking into the now-deserted neighbours’ flats. A sale of a picture or a rug from a sealed-off apartment could have eased our financial problems considerably. It would have meant less overtime for Mother, a square meal and, perhaps, some kind of entertainment.
CHAPTER 4 LIQUIDATION 1943
The last dawn in February 1943 saw the beginning of the total liquidation of Berlin’s remaining Jewish communities. As all the other urban and rural districts had already been concentrated in the capital or deported, this represented the end of German Jewry.
Every other Jew was already listed officially as having changed his or her place of residence to Lublin, Riga or Theresienstadt.
Now the final mop-up operation meant cordoning off the streets. Special SS reinforcements and lorries converged on Berlin for the final big round-up. Overseeing the planning and supervision were the infamous Austrian SS Command, whose officers had already rehearsed a similar action on Vienna’s Jews.
We were ordered to stay in our apartments, while soldiers went door to door to tick off the last names written on the Gestapo lists. Only a skeleton staff was left for the Jewish hospital, the provisions centre and the cemetery in order to wind up all operations.
A sudden loud knock jerked us to attention. There was no doubting its ominous intentions. We waited for the knocking to stop, silently pleading that it would. But it went on and was now accompanied by nasty abuse. An escape by the back stairs would have been futile. While I noisily clanged the dustbin lids in order to lend support to our charade of having been down to empty the rubbish, Mother finally opened the door.
A man’s fists came flying through the door and punched my jaw. The following minutes were agony. I could not see his face, but I could hear him grunting and snarling as he laid into me. For not obeying the order to close all the windows, I was beaten repeatedly by the SS officer. This was my first close encounter with the SS and I emerged with my ears and face boxed more thoroughly than I had ever experienced before.
With our keys handed over and the rooms sealed, Mother and I stumbled towards the waiting lorry, each of us carrying a single cumbersome suitcase.
‘Heraus, schnell, schnell!’ (‘Out, quickly, quickly!’) echoed fiercely behind us.
A long, stressful and tiring tour, in quest of new victims, awaited us. Elderly people hardly able to carry themselves, let alone their suitcases, were dragged along the pavement and pushed roughly into the truck. Children in the streets spat at them. Other spectators, silenced by a mixture of surprise, shame and malice, just stared at us.
Through a slit in the truck’s tarpaulin, I peeped at our passing surroundings. There were reminders from the air raid the night before, with roadblocks isolating the destroyed Prager Platz. Demolished quarters were still smouldering. The bombing had finally reached a stage where it had to be taken seriously. Despite this, there were no delays in our arrests. The Fascist Beast was still strong and intact. Only its eastern fangs were bleeding.
Towards dusk, our lorry joined the others queuing up in front of an improvised detention camp.
Ours was one of six on Grosse Hamburger Strasse.1 Ironically, I was being taken back to the site of my former school, which, together with a home for the elderly and the ancient cemetery, had been demolished to make way for our arrival. Once inside, we were now caged prisoners. We were processed according to numerous lists that we knew nothing about. All of us were being prepared for final transports to the East. There were perhaps five hundred to a thousand people in the camp, the last remnants of Berlin’s Jewish community.
The guards were impervious Berlin policemen. There was nothing for us to do but spend the time wandering around the cemetery grounds racking our brains for ways of an escape. Climbing the wall seemed possible to me, but not for Mother. I could not imagine leaving her. And anyway, the repercussions for her, let alone for me if I were caught, would have been unthinkably severe. Plus, as a declared ‘enemy of the state’ and the ‘worst kind of being’, a Jew, how would I have made it on the outside?
One remaining tomb in the cemetery, imprisoned by a little wire-cage of its own, attracted many a contemplating glance. It was the resting place of Moses Mendelssohn, the famous Jewish philosopher. Many drew inspiration from this reminder of past glory; perhaps the great man’s teachings would prevail?
A committee within the camp had been set up to hear the pleas of family members trying to reunite with each other. Few reports ever went through to the commanding police officer, and of these most were rejected, but the imprisoned were aware that this was their last hope.
Half-Jews and nationals from neutral countries had the best chance of getting released. Any other attempt to cheat the sadistic talents of the police and Gestapo was pointless and dangerous. A crowded cellar prison provided the necessary intimidation.
Trying to fake evidence bore harsh punishments. I looked at my cards: I had no ‘Aryan’ blood in the family, no chance of a foreign government intervention and no money for bribes. I clutched desperately at one last trump card. I could bury the dead. First, I had to convince Mother. She agreed with me, so I approached the only Jew left on the Appeals Committee, Rabbi Martin Riesenburger, who had occasionally officiated at burials.
‘Yes,’ he exclaimed tiredly, ‘I have seen your face before. You are one of those flower boys. Don’t kid yourself that you are essential; you can’t even dig a pit.’
Mustering all of my determination and courage, I promised to do whatever I would be called upon to do. I never knew what made him change his mind. Perhaps it was my healthy and tanned appearance – I was not like the Jewish boys immersed in books that the rabbi used to see on his daily trips to the synagogue. But the rabbi changed his tone.
‘I’ll check up on the number of cemetery workers still left. There may be a need for replacements. What about your family?’
‘Only Mother,’ I replied.
His searching glance fixed itself on me. His stare met my stare. They were long seconds. ‘All right, if it’s only two of you I’ll try.’
The hours that followed were mental torture. Imagination’s hopeful light struggled with the more obvious darkness of our common fate.
Despair was winning over hope. Finally, the commandant granted me a hearing.
I clicked my heels, trying to replicate the German military salute, and stood upright to suggest that I was older than my age. An adjutant recited my usefulness to the Third Reich, which was then vouched for by the pudgy, bespectacled rabbi.
‘Cemetery worker essential for the upkeep of burials.’
‘Yes, yes,’ grinned one of the German officers present. ‘This brat will have plenty of work.’
A casual motion of the commandant’s hand was my sign to do a neat about-turn and march hurriedly away.
Mother and I seized our suitcases, grabbed the release papers and quickly made for the front gates before the Gestapo changed their minds. Before we could leave the camp, the police guard compared our faces to the photos on our identity cards. He remarked apologetically, ‘Some slip; we didn’t realise you were brother and sister.’
The grey street was tantalisingly close, freedom beckoned. We dared not delay. ‘Never mind,’ I replied, ‘we’ll manage without corrections.’
The steel gates swung open and we quickened our steps towards the next street corner. We had escaped certain deportation, so to be free again was an incredible feeling. However, it did not mean that we were safe, far from it. We had a form stating that we had been released, but this by itself did not protect us from being rearrested. My job was to seek real exemption papers.
Calling at the only remaining office for the Jewish community on Oranienburger Strasse, I pleaded for my rights. Initially, they would not certify my credentials as being an essential worker, as I was not on their list. After heated discussions with the staff, they finally agreed to register me as a common labourer employed at the Weissensee cemetery.
With this status came all the privileges originally intended for the informers who helped the Gestapo to make arrests. In return for a solemn promise to attend work regularly regardless of air raids or any private problems, I was handed a special badge together with numerous stamped and signed certificates. Alongside the yellow Star of David on my breast, I now donned a red armband lettered with Ordner (steward) and a number. All I cared about, however, was that I had outwitted the Gestapo.
Weissensee cemetery.
Ignoring all the rules, we plodded through a blacked-out Berlin to our distant home back on Speyerer Strasse. We arrived in the early morning and woke the porter. His face was a picture of surprise and disappointment, having been certain of seeing the last of any Jews.
‘What? You – free? And at this hour? Are they all coming back?’
After carefully checking our paperwork, he grudgingly handed back our keys. It was clear that he would have preferred rich, tip-giving Jews, and not destitute ones like Mother and me.
Tearing off the Gestapo seals from our door, we could finally lie down for a deeply deserved and peaceful sleep. Our new adage was to be totally inconspicuous.
Next morning, awakened by the five o’clock ring of the alarm clock, I discarded all my badges then boarded the tram to the far-off cemetery. When I first worked at the Weissensee cemetery there were 400 teenagers. Now, there were only six workers who had been spared deportation. My duty was to give all of my strength to the job.
Later, some half-Jews2 joined us; among them a few other youngsters. Though by no means the smallest, I remained the youngest. The work was hard, but we could not let the others down by being absent.
Digging graves 6 feet deep became our daily routine, normally up to three a day. Occasionally, the steep piles of earth would collapse, half burying one of us. We would then extract the victim, completely covered in grimy black soil. It was the fun part of our day.
I had big wooden clogs, a pick and shovel, a fixed minimum output and a weekly pay packet. And more often than not, there was overtime for this kind of job.
Suicides came in at a rate of up to 10 bodies a day. We had to be thankful for the law that forbade people under the age of 21 to attend to the dead. This limited our sporadic help to hearse pushing and taking the place of the mourners. Almost all of the bereaved were now absent and had more than likely followed the path of their recently buried loved ones.
When time allowed, we helped bury the scrolls of the Torah as required by religious law. These scrolls were sent to the Weissensee cemetery by synagogues from all over Germany. No one was left to care for these richly ornamented scrolls, however sacred they may have been. Hundreds of them were carried to a mass grave to be given a suitably appropriate burial. It marked the end of an epoch.
Other unpleasant visitors to the cemetery came in the form of bombs dropped by night-time raiders, who had missed nearby Weissensee industrial targets, onto what seemed to us the most pointless target possible – the city of the dead.
A few girls, mostly half-Jews, returned to revive the cemetery’s gardens and flowers. This, in turn, supplied the market for those who could afford the luxury of flowers and helped ease the financial burden on the cemetery’s management. Working with them was a Polish prisoner-of-war who quickly became our friend. We taught him German and fed him with whatever little we could muster between us. He was a simple but sincere soul and returned our favours with daring accounts about his native land.
Away from the daily grind of cemetery work, keeping occupied during the evening hours while alone was quite a task. I might have been a child, but I knew how desperate our situation was. We had no idea of the whereabouts of relatives and friends. We feared the worst. I could not travel to see friends as they lived too far away and it was not safe to visit. Meanwhile, Mother was busy peddling our last linens for much-needed margarine.
My loneliness was partially offset by a self-assembled wireless set. Working without electricity, its parts – headphones, crystal, condenser and coils – had been acquired stealthily, bit by bit. A wire that I had stretched across the room acted as an aerial. I was so proud when I first heard the crackling noise of words coming through.
Lying in bed with earphones on, scanning the airwaves on my new wireless set, became my favourite pastime. One evening I was startled to hear an English-speaking station, but though I mustered my best school English, I soon felt disappointed, for it was only Nazi phrases that I could make out. It must have been Berlin.
Slowly I came to realise that Nazism was not just a German monopoly, as I had been led to believe, but an exportable ideal that had gathered pace. To my shock, I found out that the Nazis had many sympathisers in the very countries they were waging war with.
Just living on a daily basis became increasingly difficult. Our special ration cards needed renewing, a procedure most Jews avoided as it meant reminding the authorities of their presence.
Unable to exist on black-market food alone, we made the dreaded journey to the food office on Wartburg Platz. The Nazis were efficient, and every rubber-stamped swastika meant the law. Therefore, we had to take along an ample selection of documents for close analysis.
‘We thought that there were no more Jews in the district and accordingly no cards were taken out for them,’ squeaked the unfriendly voice of a minor female official.
However, after much begging, the management finally relented and telephoned the central head office to ask whether non-Aryans whose presence seemed to have the approval of the Third Reich should be issued new ration cards.
More calls followed to check the accuracy of our claim. It was early in the morning, with Nazi bureaucracy still yawning away yesterday’s monotony. Not wanting to obstruct official orders, they handed over the precious booklets of coloured ration cards. It meant a few more months of vital supplies such as bread, flour, potatoes, jam, sugar and margarine.
We learned later that, soon after our departure, instructions came through to completely stop the issuing of Jewish ration cards and to arrest their applicants. Fate was shining down on us. Now Mother and I had valuable supplies and it bought us time.
Despite this reprieve, trouble was never far away from us. This time it was about our one and a half rooms in the apartment.
‘Why,’ said the landlord, ‘I am not to blame for the Gestapo deporting all the other residents and sealing the doors. It’s you two who live here now, so you have to pay the rent for the whole five-room flat.’
We could barely afford the rent anyway, so we had no choice but to move out. Eva-Ruth, a fellow workmate, and her mother, Lotte,* offered Mother and me a room at their home on Konstanzer Strasse. We took along two suitcases each and moved in.
The new district, near the fashionable Kurfürstendamm, was full of well-nourished, elegant snobs. It was the rendezvous of well-to-do Germans and foreign fascists. Polished luxury cars shuttled in between ice-cream parlours, exclusive restaurants, connoisseurs’ tobacconists, beauty salons and vendors of rare flowers. Berlin’s West End, early on in the summer of 1943, nearly made one forget that there was a war on.
One day at the cemetery, something moved from deep within a rubbish heap. It seemed to be bigger than a dog. The girls from the cemetery’s flower shop begged us to investigate further.