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Moshe Maltz

On September 1, 1939 Hitler ימ”ש attacked Poland. The blitzkrieg against Poland by Germany had begun. The principal attack against the Polish Army lasted for three weeks, and in the middle of September 1939 all of Western Poland was occupied by Hitler's troops. The remnants of the Polish armed forces still put up resistance, in their attempts to keep the entire length of the front line along the rivers around Warsaw. But by September 17, 1939, the Polish government fled to Romania. Poland lay in ruins.

At the same time. A large part of the Soviet Army was mobilized and entered Poland, ostensibly to protect Soviet interests. In fact, following the Agreement in the Hitler–Stalin Pact, a new, fourth division of Poland took place. Half of the country of Poland fell to Hitler's Germany, and the other half to Soviet Russia.

Simultaneous with the carving up of Poland, the body of Polish Jewry was cut in half. Part of them fell under Hitler's rule and part under the rule of Stalin. The Bug River became the boundary of the sundered halves of the Polish country from the northeastern side. Our Sokal remained in Soviet hands.

In October 1939, on the Day of Yom Kippur, the first divisions of the Red Army appeared. Immediately after this, Jewish refugees appeared from the section occupied by the Germans, from the western Polish locations, especially from neighboring towns, such as Belz, Krisitanopol, Varenzh^[1] and the surrounding villages. The Rebbe of Belz arrived in Sokal, with the members of his family on Shemini Atzeret, on the last train that was still running from Belz. The balebatim of Sokal received the homeless refugees with a hearty desire and warm brotherly feelings and were immediately settled down in all the study houses, synagogues, and private homes. The problem of the refugees was not a light matter. Creating residences, sourcing food, and money for the most critical items demanded a broad and many-branched support and help action, a general community effort on the part of the Sokal Jews.

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A municipal Help-Committee was indeed immediately established, which immediately carried out fundraising, and from these gathered funds a public kitchen was established, where the refugees were given warm food to eat.

A much more strenuous burden stood before the Jewish Help-Committee when it was not only refugees who lost their homes that were streaming into Sokal but those not willing to live under Nazi rule. Now hordes of Jews, driven out of their homes, driven by the German murderers to the East to the new Soviet border, to the Bug River, on whose right side lay the city of Sokal.

On a rainy, cold November day in 1939 – we suddenly heard whimpering sounds in Sokal, which came to us from the border, from the train bridge over the Bug [River]. The Jews of Sokal immediately set themselves off in that direction, from which this wailing emanated. A frightening picture materialized before their eyes. The bridge was full of Jews being driven by members of the Gestapo in the direction of Sokal. At the end of the bridge, barely a few steps from the ground, which belonged to Sokal, the Russian border patrol pushed back the hapless Jews to the German hangmen. This frightening game went on for several hours with these starved Jews trembling from the cold. These were the remnants of the 1500 Jews, that the Germans had captured in Chelm and Hrubieszow and were driving them to the Soviet border. On foot, over stones and mud, without food or drink… this nightmarish journey had taken three days… woe unto the person who did not have the strength to continue further, and had stopped for a moment to catch his breath… a bullet from a revolver put an end to the life of such an exhausted Jew.

There were barely 300 left of the Jews driven from Chelm and Hrubieszow out of the 1500, who managed to reach the bridge over the Bug near Sokal. They were barely able to stand on their feet by exerting their last bit of their energy… on the other side of the bridge stood Soviet soldiers, who blocked their way and let no one in.

It was only at night, in the dark, a few Jews still felt they had the energy to spring from the bridge and by swimming, they were barely able to reach the other side of the river. They had hoped that in the hands of the Soviets, there would be an end to their misery… the local Polish thieves sensed an opportunity to rob… when these few exhausted Jews came out of the water on the Soviet side, they encountered a peasant robber band, who stole their clothing, and afterward threw them back into the depths of the Bug.

Only very few managed to be lucky enough to reach Sokal…in a frightful condition…sick…exhausted. The Jews of Sokal took them in like they were their brethren, saw to it that they had lodging, and created ways for them to support themselves during this very difficult time for all Jews in Sokal.

It proved difficult for the Sokal Jews to struggle for themselves under the Soviet régime. To begin with, all of the important administrative positions in the city were staffed with people from the underworld, who found various ways to take advantage of the otherwise peaceable balebatim. On top

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of this, Jewish businesses were nationalized and in the process, every commercial business, which was the principal source of the Jewish ways of making a living in the city, was cut off. The obvious forms of making a living were stopped. Jewish shops were closed and every other way of making a living was restricted.

When a few poor Jews took to selling merchandise, they were immediately arrested and put on trial. For selling a sack of flour or a strip of leather for a pair of shoes, you could be sentenced to 8 to 10 years of hard labor in faraway places in Soviet Russia. Among such “lawbreakers” the following Sokal Jews were sentenced: Reuben Zaks, Chaim'cheh Zilber, and Aharon Lipa the butcher's son. Not one of them returned from Russia.

On top of this came the issue of carrying the right passport. Every resident–beginning at age 14–had to take out a Russian passport. All those significant participants of nationalist undertakings, all the Zionist and Bundist activists received passports with a special paragraph – a warning, that the owner of such a passport belongs to the category of “undesirable elements” who were not permitted to live close to the border. Accordingly, these “politically incorrect elements” were compelled to leave Sokal and look for a place to live on a parcel of land that was approximately several hundred kilometers from the border city.

Also, the refugees from other cities, who had found refuge in Sokal, had to register for the military, where they had to declare whether they wish to remain in Soviet Russia, or they want to emigrate to America, to the Land of Israel – or if they wanted to, they would be returned to their previous residences now occupied by the Germans. Almost all of the refugees expressed the desire to emigrate and only a small percentage agreed to remain under Soviet rule.

The result of this registration was, that on a rather nice May night of a Friday before the Sabbath in the year 1940 – special divisions of the N. K. V. D. Troops fell upon the houses and drove out all those who had not taken out any passports, and taken to ready-prepared freight trucks. They were allowed to take along only the most necessary things…and do it fast… fast through the dark streets to the train station, where there were already placed freight cattle cars. Two, three days went by until about 40 wagons of this type were loaded with refugees… it was only then that the locomotive began to move from its spot… To where?… one knew that this direction led to Siberia, to the ‘white bears.’

Those refugees who had indicated that they wanted to live in Soviet Russia, got passports with an order to leave Sokal to a distance of several kilometers away from the city.

On the first day of Shavuot, the N. K. V. D. troops besieged the house of the Rebbe of Belz, to take him away. It was with the greatest of effort that the Jews worked with the forces of the government to delay this initiative for a few days. After Shavuot, the Rebbe of Belz left Sokal with his entire family.

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In the Nazi Gehenna

On June 22, 1941, the war between Germany and Russia broke out. The German troops crossed over the Bug and captured the city of Sokal. The first of the German troops stopped at the residence of Yeshaya the wagon driver, with the complaint that from there, they were being shot at. They immediately dragged 3 Jews out of that dwelling, put them up against the wall and shot them. Muni Polack, Zalman the wagon driver, and the son-in-law of Sholom Leibuniss – these were the first three innocent Jews who were martyred by German cruelty in Sokal.

The Ukrainian residents of the city received the Germans with flowers, and hung both German and Ukrainian flags from their windows. A silence reigned in the Jewish dwellings, saturated with fear and terror. Not a single Jew dared to show himself in the street.

The Ukrainian Czarnecki became the Burgomaster of the city, and he immediately organized a Ukrainian militia, which wrote itself in such a bloody manner into the history of Sokal Jewry.

In their wild hatred of Jews, the Ukrainians sensed the odor of blood and plunder. On June 30, 1941 the Ukrainian militia fell upon the Jewish houses, dragged whomever they found outside; old and young… everyone was driven to the Targowica…^[2] There, a selektion was carried out, during which approximately 400 Jews were selected, mostly from the city's Jewish intelligentsia, merchants, manual laborers, and plain ordinary young Jews deemed to be physically fit. The S. S. Murderers led all of them outside of the city, near the large brick factory…they were all shot there.

At the outset, in Sokal no one knew to what location these 400 Jews were taken… nobody could conceive that they met such a tragic end. Jews permitted themselves to be gulled and believed that these hapless brethren of theirs were led off to do work… This is the way the matter was discussed in the city. As a result, the parents of the seized young men, and the wives of the taken adult men carried out a collection of money among themselves and designated two women, who had the objective to find out the traces of these confiscated Jews. These two women immediately set out on the road. They looked in Ludomir, in Luck, and many other working places in Volhynia. You understand that they came back with nothing. Christians came to Sokal from a variety of places, Aperists,^[3] who said that they, as it were, actually saw the Sokal Jews being dragged out of town somewhere at a camp, in a completely thought out and created location… and they had managed to fool the money out of the confused womenfolk and clothing, that is to say, which had been prepared for their menfolk. This shameless deception went on for a longer time. The unfortunate widows sold off everything they had… because they still took solace and hoped that their men would, in the end, come back home… until they found out the truth, that the 400 Jews that were dragged away were executed by the murderous Germans.

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This is the way the German rule began in Sokal. The first martyrs were Jews. The Germans sicced the wild animals on the defenseless Jews. Ukrainian peasant bands who came from all of the surrounding villages robbed the Jewish businesses and became ready servants of the Nazi régime. Insults, abuse, and inciteful anti-Jewish agitation were a daily occurrence. The windows of the Jewish businesses that had been robbed were full of provocative material against Jews, with pictures of Hitler ימ”ש and criminal followers in this complicity. The present Ukrainian balebatim of the city now permitted themselves to be served by Jewish servants.

The Germans ordered that in Sokal, a Judenrat consisting of 7 Jews be created with a president [e.g. leader]…. they should have their own employees and a Jewish militia to support them. The objective of the Judenrat was to carry out exactly all the demands and decrees regarding the Jews, and especially the provision of Jewish laborers, to take away monies from the Jews for the German rulers… money under a variety of reasons, such as penalties, contributions, and just plain bribes. They also had to be concerned about fulfilling all the lusts of the German rulers immediately. They were especially interested in owning Jewish coats and other expensive things, which belonged to the Jewish populace.

The first of the decrees contained an order that every Jew aged 10 and over had to wear, on their right hand, a white armband with a blue Star of David on it. And afterward came other decrees: Jews were not allowed to wear any sort of beard, Jews were forbidden to wear hats, Jews were not to go on the sidewalks, – the Jews were not to distance themselves from the city more than half way…

Every day, the Judenrat had to provide every German, Ukrainian or Pole a set number of Jews to do labor, to the degree that each of them demanded. The Judenrat also had to provide 100 Jews each day to the municipal government for work… to clean the streets. These Jewish street-sweepers posed a frightening image… exhausted, beaten, elderly Jews, among them many orthodox people with their bards shorn off, municipal caps…with long brooms in their hands… they swept the streets… for hours sweeping the same streets… back and forth… the passing Christians used to laugh and make sport of them.

In November 1941the Germans opened a labor office in Sokal at the location of the new pharmacy, where Ukrainians were employed. All Jews from 14 to 60 years of age were compelled to register in this labor office, to receive identification cards with a photograph. With such an identification card, Jews were forced to present themselves every week in the labor office and they had to make themselves legitimate with a work card, [to prove] that one is employed in one form of work or another. Anyone who was unemployed was sent to a labor camp.

This decree elicited a frightful panic among the Sokal Jews. One tore one's self to get work at any price, one searched out Christians that they knew and begged for mercy to get some sort of work. Such Christian employers showed their ‘good hearts’ and employed these Jews as servants in their home-based workplaces…or in their businesses or factories. The Jews were considered to be very lucky

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if they got work in a German institution. Jews did the hardest labor… people stood for hours in the queue in front of the labor office. Hunger, frost, and cold did not frighten anyone away.

Very few of the children could barely carry the yoke of torture and suffering. In a matter of a few hours, the troubles and pain of this work aged these children by years… it was a fright, a true nightmare to gaze at these small creatures who, with stubborn patience and superhuman strength from who knows where – waited in the line … maybe they will be lucky enough and they will get work…

The Ukrainian bosses sat in the labor office, and with shameless pride made fun and laughed at these unfortunate Jews.

An important mission of the Judenrat was [also] to provide furniture for the ruling Germans, jewelry, and other valuable items. To meet this objective, the Judenrat levied a requirement on the better-off Jews to give up a variety of valuable items, which were then gathered together in a special storage location, in order, at every needed opportunity, to sate the appetites of the German murderers. The Jews lived with no alternative but to turn over everything they had to whatever was demanded of them. They lived in the illusion that anyone who strengthened the hand of the Judenrat, those would be the people to hold onto life.

The Judenrat also needed money…for contributions, for payoffs, for bribing the release of Jews from Ukrainian and German hands, for itself, for the Jewish militia, and a variety of low-life individuals… large and small, Jewish and non-Jewish. To serve this purpose, the Sokal Judenrat kept a permanent assessment committee, whose purpose was to tax all Sokal Jews according to their assets, if such a person [with assets] even still existed. Woe betides the Jew who did not want to, or could not pay, the requested sum of money, that the committee had decided upon. Jewish militants, in these cases, would show up at the home of such a Jew, uncover all the valuables, that were found on those premises, and they were confiscated and taken off to the storage facility of the Judenrat.

The writer of these lines on one occasion assisted the Sokal Judenrat with a collection of Jews; this was in front of the vice-president of the Judenrat and the chairman of the assessment committee who laid out a list of things, such as material (textiles), leather, fur coats, jewelry, furniture, and other things… other rare items, which the Judenrat was compelled to appeal for on behalf of the German hangmen. Wailing and crying did not help, even when one had given away one's last belongings. The storage facility of the Sokal Judenrat had to be always packed, full of good and valuable things, to sate the appetites of the German murderers. Members of the Gestapo did not have any great sympathy for the Judenrat and from time to time, they would break into their storage facility to familiarize themselves with the assets robbed from the Jews.

The overseer of the storage facility from the Judenrat, once gave the Gestapo handkerchiefs, that were not pleasing enough in the eyes of the German murderers. He was led away to the camp at Janowa, where he was tortured to death.

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But despite these harsh conditions, that the Sokal Jews had to struggle with to hold on for dear life, they continued to believe that by filling the appetites of the Germans, they would manage to hold on, despite the terror, the harassment, and the daily bloody martyrdoms, until the war would end.

It was first, on November 11, 1941, when the United States declared war against Hitler's Germany, was a sea change for the Jews of Sokal – as well as for all of Polish Jewry.

After the great speech, in which he promised the total annihilation of the Jewish people, the harassment of the Jewish population intensified in occupied Poland, and therefore with it, in Sokal.

On the Sabbath day of December 27, 1941 the Judenrat there received an order, that all Jews must take off their coats, fur hats, and gloves…it was a severe winter at that time, and the Jews needed to provide their warm clothing to the German soldiers, who were suffering from the cold on the Russian front… and to have an assurance that this coat-aktion would be carried out successfully, the Gestapo arrested several prominent Jews as hostages… the Jewish militia, on that Sabbath day, ran around from house to house and informed the Jewish residents of this latest decree, and to immediately shed their winter coats. The Sokal Jews understood what they were being threatened with, and carried their overcoats to the Judenrat with the greatest speed. A parallel list was prepared in the Judenrat. No Jew could avoid compliance with this decree. During these cold days, the Jews themselves had to make do with their summer clothing.

Spiritually broken, now the Jews of Sokal looked with fear to the future. The Germans intensified the efforts to also break the Jews physically. Until now, the Jews in Sokal received a daily ration of 35 deko^[4] of bread per person…forget about other foodstuffs, which were distributed in minuscule portions. The older Jews were literally dying from hunger and cold. The number of Jews, who were still able to earn something, grew smaller every day.

In such a hopeless situation when confusion and apathy reigned the Sokal Jews, a few were found, refined balebatim, who in this tragic situation began to organize help for their poor and hungry brethren… and there were many Jews hungry without a morsel of bread… these were the well-situated citizens of a prior day.

From meager payments, a fund was established from which a public kitchen was supported, which was opened in the house of Hersch Zaks and run by Engineer Schwartz and his wife, Zinger.

Merchants and well-to-do people of a former day, now stood in line by the public kitchen and waited for the small portion of soup…the frightening length of the hungry Sokal Jews line even moved the hearts of most Christians, among whom there could be found such people stealthily provided grain to the public kitchen.

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The cold, the hunger, and the constant bribing of the Gestapo hangmen by the Jewish militia and not infrequently by local Jewish informers, all have weakened the spiritual and physical resilience of the Jewish populace in Sokal. The feeling of insecurity and fear grew daily and signs began to appear that even more difficult times were coming. There was sporadic shooting and killing of innocent Jews, systematic repressions for the most insignificant, so-called infractions, these were harbingers of an intensified German régime policy towards the Jews… a beginning of the relocation-aktion, whose objective was to carry out a complete extermination of the Jewish populace in Sokal.

A fright and terror befell the Jewish population in Sokal, when the German murderers seized five Jews on February 24, 1942, and led them to the outskirts of the city and shot them there. These five martyrs were: Israel, the son of Yeke'leh the wagon driver, Dr. Knopf, Blind Yeke'leh, the butcher and his child daughter (he was seized as he was slaughtering a calf) – and Zal'keh Ring.

This miscarriage of justice further broke the spirits of the Sokal Jews, in particular, because at the same time, rumors circulated that all Jewish boys from the city had to be deported to camps in the vicinity of Zlotow, where the Germans had erected the most terrible death factories. It was generally known that strong and healthy people could not last there more than 10 weeks, and weaker people five at most.

Unfortunately, these were not just plain rumors. A fright and chaotic hastiness took hold of the Sokal Jews. on Friday evening, February 27, 1942, when they noted that at the women's gallery near the new pharmacy, there were military freight trucks manned by German and Ukrainian military troops. They immediately found out that the German hangmen had ordered the Judenrat to immediately, without delay, present them with 500 Jews.

With gifts, with the most expensive items, with fur and leather material, with gold and money – the Judenrat was able to work out with the Gestapo organization that they would be satisfied with 200 martyrs. The Judenrat had to turn over 200 hundred Jews to the German murderers to face a certain death… At night, the Judenrat sent out Jewish and Ukrainian militiamen to Tartakov, a neighboring location, from where they took 50 Jewish boys…after this, they fell upon the surrounding villages and dragged out the entire Jewish youth from there.

And when they returned to Sokal with this plunder and it appeared that they were still missing the contingent of 200 martyrs, the commander of the Judenrat ordered that the kidnapping of Jewish children should continue in Sokal itself. Following a list provided by the Judenrat, the Jewish-Ukrainian militiamen fell upon Jewish dwellings and dragged out innocent Jewish children, and led them to the Judenrat. And if by chance, someone on the list did not happen to be home, the militiamen took the father, the mother, or the sisters, as hostages…these people were first to be let go when their son or a brother appeared at the Judenrat.

The fathers of those boys seized in the surrounding villages came along, bringing packages with food for their children's journey.

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When all of the 200 boys were already to be found at the gathering place, they were loaded onto the freight trucks and went off in an unknown direction. Everyone knew that the children were being taken to a labor camp. Those Sokal Jews who happened to be on the street at the time saw the freight trucks passing by with the 200 boys, and they added that it was frightening to look at the sight, how the Ukrainian militiamen that went along with the transport, would murderously beat the innocent boys with the butts of their rifles… they were commanded to sing… under the hail of beatings the boys began to sing the Hatikvah with the melody from Lamentations…as if they felt that this was their final journey…

A feeling of insecurity now took hold of the exhausted ones among the Sokal Jews. Fear of the night…of being suddenly dragged out of bed gave them no rest.

In addition to the insecurity and fear, other frightening conditions descended, that the Jews of Sokal had to struggle with, in order to stay alive. The cold, the overcrowding, and the unheated dwellings… the lack of foodstuffs…not eating regularly… it was possible to get something warm twice a day… in the morning a bit of black coffee… at midday a watered-down soup with a small piece of black bread…

The Ukrainian militiamen drove the starved and exhausted Jews to the work of clearing the snow in the streets and in the process, beat them murderously…woe unto anyone who became sick and did not have the strength to go out to work! The fate of such a Jew was sealed… the Ukrainians shot him…and if there was an occasion where a Ukrainian wanted to learn how to shoot, he set up a Jew as a target, and then shot at him.

On March 10, 1942, the Germans prepared themselves once again to seize young Jewish boys in Sokal. The Judenrat used money and a variety of valuables to quell the appetite of the German bandits, which this time went away, not carrying out the decree against Jewish children. In this case, the Judenrat employed a great deal of energy using various methods and means, to help the Jewish children living there. A special aktion was organized to accomplish this task, in which almost all the Sokal Jews participated. A fund was created from monthly pay, that made it possible to provide the Jewish children in the camps with the most critical items. Every two weeks, a transport left Sokal with bread, sugar, and other foodstuffs, which Dr. Polack took with him, along with gifts for the German and Ukrainian masters that reigned in the camps. When Dr. Polack would return from such a trip, he always conveyed regards to the parents from their children. Under four eyes, the writer of these lines was told terrifying details of the Gehenna, in which the Sokal Jewish children exhausted themselves.

The constant fear that the fathers and mothers of Sokal endured about the fate of their children – is difficult to convey simply with words. Nobody believed that a time would come when these hapless Jewish children could be rescued. And yet, they seized on every spark of hope… they believed in every promise to rescue the children, they were prepared to give away everything they had to accomplish this purpose. They even underwent a tragic and gruesome separation-aktion. Dr. Falk

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encountered a person, that put forth a devilish transaction. For a large sum of money, this intermediary took responsibility to extract 40 Jewish Sokal children from the camp, under the condition that the Judenrat would present 40 other Jewish boys to go into the camp. The parents of the 40 boys, who exhausted themselves in the camp, did not sit around for a long time, and immediately collected the required money, and thereby, the Sokal Judenrat took on the objective to carry out the condition of providing 40 other boys.

In the middle of the night, Jewish and Ukrainian militiamen dragged out 40 Jewish boys from their homes, who, immediately the next day, were sent off to the labor camp, that had from previous times already contained Jewish boys from Sokal.

The terrifying transaction was consummated. On April 26, 1942, none of the freed Sokal boys returned. On the way, one boy died, a second returned who had gone insane. All were sick with advanced cases of tuberculosis, and starved.

The parents of the freshly taken and deported boys, upon seeing the frightful state of the boys that did return, fell upon the members of the Judenrat with complaints and curses, who didn't expect anything, and freshly and in secret did a deal with the second set of parents whose children were recently deported. A new ‘separation-aktion’ was negotiated. This time, as well, the parents sold off the last of their few things, to provide for the payoff money, to as fast as possible get their children out of that Gehenna…. and when they paid the Judenrat the agreed sum of money, the Judenrat again by night, sent the Jewish and Ukrainian militiamen with the objective of dragging out the required number of children from Jewish homes… Approximately 30 boys were driven out of their beds this time. The other day, the president of the Judenrat personally went on the road together with the seized children, with two Jewish militiamen and the collected money, to buy off the Germans.

This time the crazy transaction was not consummated… the Germans took the money and the transport of the boys…they held up the president of the Sokal Judenrat with his two militiamen. It was only a few weeks later, after the intervention of the Sokal Gestapo that the president of the Judenrat and the two militiamen were freed.

When they returned to Sokal, they described heart-rending scenes in the Judenrat. Jews were suspicious of the responsible Jewish members of the Judenrat, believing that they had appropriated the payoff money gathered for the Germans, for themselves.

The contact with the camps was cut off. The Jewish Sokal boys no longer returned.

At the end of March 1942, news came to Sokal that in Lemberg (Lvov) and Zolkiew the Germans seized Jews and led them out in an unknown direction. Letters came from Zolkiew Jews with questions, about whether anything is known of the fate of their brethren.

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The searches did not last long. The sorrowful news became immediately known… the Polish train employees revealed the secret, that the Germans had constructed a gas chamber in Belzec… and all the transports containing Jews were being sent to Belzec… that in these death chambers, Jews are asphyxiated and murdered. According to these witness reports it is possible that between 5 and 10 transports of Jews arrived daily at Belzec through Rawa-Ruska.

This news elicited an indescribable panic. The fear of being relocated to Belzec created a chaotic situation, that grew more intense with each passing day… and on top of this there was hunger…cold… crowding in residences…a nightmare… it was terrifying to live under such circumstances.

Days and nights went by like this. For the time being without larger murder aktions, without relocations. Here and there, a Jew was seized, or even more Jews were seized and sent to the labor camps or shot on the spot… these were daily occurrences, to which Jews became accustomed.

Heavy clouds appeared over the Sokal horizon. The Gestapo demanded a statistical accounting from the Judenrat, as to how many Jews, men, women, and children live in Sokal. This demand made a very threatening impression on the Jews of Sokal. The tragic transactions with the Jewish children were forgotten. The sorrowful news from other cities made a strong impression, news about “relocation-aktionen” in a whole row of ghettoes, the destruction of and the extermination of entire Jewish settlements. The news that an extermination-aktion against Jewish children had been going on in Lemberg for 14 days already cast terror over the city.

From day to day, life in Sokal became more and more difficult. An indescribable fear befell the Jews, when the Gestapo Commandant of Lemberg appeared in their city. Every time the Judenrat obtained some information that the executioner from Lemberg had to come into Sokal, they approached the Jews with a demand that they not show themselves in the streets during the presence of this German murderer. Decent ways of making a living in the city were cut off. This was part of the objective of the German rulers to break the Jews both spiritually and physically. To accomplish this, first of all, it is necessary to weaken the Jews, exhaust them, starve them… for this reason, all of the proper Jewish businesses in Sokal were closed down… the Germans and Ukrainians took over all of the Jewish businesses. In the meantime, the Jews survived on the pitiful remnants of what they had, which they had prepared after the last days before the outbreak of the war. The Sokal Jews sold off the last of what they had, to provide food for themselves…to pay the Judenrat the demanded payoffs for the various contributions, and to bribe the German murderers and their Ukrainian accomplices.

Together with the collective economic destruction of Sokal Jewry, the German murderers hacked apart valuable cultural and socio-community activity on the Jewish street. Synagogues were closed, as well as unions, and philanthropic institutions.

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It was to this end that the Germans imposed on the Jewish population in Sokal – as well as in all other cities in Poland – a Judenrat. It often had its own police and a special Jewish post, which was active in the location of the Judenrat.

A special plague and a means to torture and morally break the Jews, was forced labor. Every day, the Sokal Judenrat had to provide 150 Jewish girls to straighten the planting in the municipalities. Young, innocent Jewish girls with their thinned-out little fingers smoothed out every blade of grass. They would have to spend hours like this on their knees…not being permitted to straighten out their limbs… and all of this work was irrelevant and not needed… This work was used to inflict pain on Jewish children, and specifically to lower morale. How these neat Jewish daughters were shamed, when young Ukrainian gentile ladies, who used to come to Sokal from the surrounding villages, drove by and made sport and laughed at these girls.

Everything that belonged to Jews was treated as abandoned matter. Excepted were the contributions, payoffs, and ‘gifts,’ that the Judenrat would collect for the German murderers, as the latter, together with their Ukrainian partners sought opportunities to rob Jewish assets.

A Jewish informant told the Gestapo that the silverware of the Rebbe of Belz had been hidden somewhere in Sokal. The Gestapo people arrested the following Jews: R' Yaakov Yosheh the Shammes, R' Lejzor Melamed and little David, because they had to know where the Rebbe's silver was to be found. It did not help them to reveal this secret, and show the place in the synagogue where these silver items had been stored. The German murderers took away the silver and shot the three Jews.

Another example of German wickedness and cruelty involved the children of Risha, the lady Baker. She ran the only bakery in Sokal, a secret one, you understand, that was illegal. She bought off the Ukrainian police who knew of this with weekly payments. She also fell victim to being informed on. One morning, members of the Gestapo fell upon the bakery, took away the lady baker and her two daughters who worked there, and then closed and bricked up the entire house. Several days later, the news arrived that Risha the lady Baker with her two assistants were tortured in the Gestapo [prison].

A terrifying rampage was carried out by the German executioners in Sokal in June 1942. On the way from the Bug River, on the parcel of land that belonged to Hrubieszow, German Army formations arranged a sort of gathering place for cattle that were designated for slaughter, beside the train station. The Sokal Judenrat was ordered to send 30 Jews to this location every day, whose task was to pasture these cattle. For a month, 30 Jews would go out from Sokal every day, in the morning to perform this work. Every day these exhausted, beaten and bloodied Jews would return to Sokal. This work lasted for 30 days, until one nice clear day, the German military troops went to the edge of the Bug together with the cattle and the 30 Sokal Jews, who had gone out to work that morning…there was no sign of life on them…probably somewhere on the way, they were shot. Among these 30 martyrs was R' Sender, the son of the Shokhet of Dobrowow, a well-known scholar in Sokal.

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The Rebbe of Kristianopol lived in the house of the Rabbi of Sokal. Every Sabbath, Jews would come together to be with him for prayer. At this time, it was the sole remaining minyan in the city. On Saturday, August 15, 1942, in the morning, rumors suddenly spread that members of the Gestapo had appeared on the Synagogue Street. This became known with lightning speed even in the most remote corners of the city, and everyone ran to hide themselves in all kinds of hiding places.

The Sokal Jews laid for more than an hour in their hiding places. At that time, the members of the Gestapo rode up in a freight truck to the home of the Rabbi of Sokal, where they were praying. All thirty-one worshipers, wrapped in their prayer shawls, were driven out of the house and were taken by freight truck to the Gestapo. There, the 31 Jews were stripped down to their underwear and immediately led off to the Tartakov Road, where they were all shot. According to what was subsequently told by a Ukrainian militiaman, who was present at the terrifying bloody murder-aktion, among the 31 martyrs who so tragically surrendered their sacred souls at that time, was the youngest son of the Rabbi of Sokal. As related to us by the previously mentioned militiaman, he had the temerity to approach the German executioners with these words:' The entire German people will pay for our innocent blood… your end is near! As revenge, the German murderers chose not to shoot this dear, courageous Jew, but murdered him with an ordinary axe…

The next day, Sunday, a young Ukrainian lad brought several eyeglasses to Shmuel'tcheh the watchmaker for repair, which he found at that place where the terrifying execution of 31 martyrs from Sokal was carried out.

A significant amount of money was paid to be assigned to work…to any work… by Christian businesses, the post office by the train, by the Judenrat… People came in masses to the registration… and everyone saw salvation in each stamp on the work card. People simply believed that the stamp had magical power… it was especially so when the first ones receiving a stamp were the leader of the Judenrat, and his appointees, as did the Jews in the post office and the train station, those working at the mill and brick factory… and you understand that it also applied to the many who paid well for it.

There was a pressured common feeling that reigned in the Jewish homes of Sokal. Even the Christian neighbors could foresee the tragic end of Sokal Jewry. They knew from prior experience that such a stamp-aktion was a harbinger of a relocation… of a mass slaughter.

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Suddenly the Christians stopped buying domestic goods from the Jews. In the eyes of the Christian populace, the fate of the Jews was already sealed. They knew that after the relocation that very likely all of the assets of the Jews were going to fall into their hands. A Christian entered the store of the writer of these lines, and simply demanded that I should give him part of the furniture that he saw in my residence… because: ‘in any event you are not going to remain alive’… saying this to me with no shame at all.

Those who could not get a stamp, began to think about hiding places… in cellars… in attics… and also began to dig underground bunkers. Many Jews went over to Christians who knew them, to get past the critical time… The Christians were given the best and most expensive things from the house. The sense of insecurity and aggravation grew day by day. One waited in fear and trembling as to what the next day would bring.

Sadly, everything that was foreseen became a reality. The German murderers took to the Sokal Jews with their full anger unleashed. First, they murdered the Jews in the surrounding towns. From Poruck Jewish boys came running and told that German and Ukrainian militiamen dragged all the Jews out of their homes. Old and young, and drove them into the forest, where open pits stood ready. They were pitilessly shot by the German murderers and tossed into the mass grave that had been prepared. The same fate met the Jews of the villages that bordered on Poruck. Only a few young boys managed to flee and save themselves from this slaughter. They brought this news to Sokal about the relocation-aktion inn their shtetl.

A similar mass murder took place against the Jews of Volodymyr-Volynsky.

It was on December 16, 1942 that the German executioners turned to implement a mass murder of Jewish Sokal. There were wagons at the ready beside the train station that were specially outfitted to transport people to the gas chambers.

It is difficult to describe the pandemonium that broke out that evening when the news spread that the wagons had already arrived…the Jews of Sokal knew that the arrival of a larger number of wagons signified a preparation for a murder-aktion… to a relocation… to another relocation… this is the end–death…

Overly frightened…confused Jews ran all over the streets looking for places to hide. Jews who worked, and had stamped work cards felt themselves more secure. They took their families along to their workplaces… the members of the Judenrat, all employed in the Judenrat, as well as the Jewish militiamen, wrote in very large letters on the doors of their houses: ‘Here lives an employee of the Judenrat.’ These words were meant to protect the residents of the dwelling from death. At least they believed that.

The night of 16 to 17 December 1942 was a frightening nightmare for the Sokal Jews. The insecurity… the fear of the coming morning robbed everyone of their sleep.

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On Thursday 17 December, 1942 (9 Tevet 5703), at five o'clock in the morning, the murder-aktion began in our city. Uniformed Gestapo staff and wildly incited Ukrainian militiamen in their black uniforms, accompanied by Jewish militiamen – surrounded the city and ordered that no Jew should attempt to sneak out. Anyone who attempted to flee, and was captured, was shot on the spot.

In the city itself, the Gestapo staff with the help of the Ukrainians, dragged the Jews from their houses, and chased sick people, women, and children, all driven to the collection point at the marketplace, near the courthouse… there, everyone was compelled to kneel with a head bent low and wait for the dark, bitter end…

The German murderers did not even examine those who had working card identification…young and old… skilled and unskilled for work, were driven out of their homes. There were a few isolated Jews who previously received an assurance from a German robber for a great deal of money that during the aktion, they would not be taken… The Nazi murderers did not keep their word… it was in this fashion that the watchmaker, Ephraim Windler, fashioned a gold ring for the Gestapo overseer and he was the last one assured that during the relocation-aktion in Sokal, he and his family would not be taken. The watchmaker had trusted the German scum and now did not conceal himself. When the aktion started, the watchmaker and his family were among the first, who were seized and driven to the marketplace. There, Ephraim Wildner found his ‘protector’ and reminded him of his word and promise… instead of an answer the perverted German murderer took out his revolver and shot the poor watchmaker.

There were Jews who fell into the hands of the Gestapo even though [they were] hiding among Christians. There were those among the Christians who called the Gestapo on their own, and disclosed where the Jews were hiding.

2000 Jews–on that one day, the bloody Thursday of December 17, 1942, were driven together from all of Sokal. At about one o'clock in the afternoon, these seized Jews were driven to the train station. Starved, and exhausted…they went on their last journey through the emptied Sokal streets… whoever did not have the strength to go on and stopped along the way, was shot there. Among this driven horde, was a woman with a baby nursing at her breast. The German criminals shot this woman…the child was still alive and continued to suckle her breast…

Arriving at the train station, all the Jews were crammed in, 80 to a wagon… the windows and doors of these wagons were blocked off with barbed wire. It was strictly forbidden to provide the thirsty Jews in the wagons with even a drop of water.

On the dark horizon of that period in time, of cruelty and wickedness, the bright rays of light that showed humanity and a good heart were…very seldom seen… barely single rays of this kind… but signs nevertheless, that the roots of decent human behavior had not completely dried out.

Such an exception was the Austrian Oberleutnant Kroyfa the leader of a work camp for Jews near ‘Mosty' Wielki.’ who with danger to his life used every opportunity to rescue Jews.

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Always, when anywhere in the area of his camp there was a relocation-aktion with a selektion, at the critical moment, he would try his best to intervene with the Gestapo and extract a number of Jews to work in his camp.

Now, like an angel, he appeared in Sokal at the last moment, when the transport with the Jews to be relocated could already be found at the train station. He received permission from the Gestapo to remove 50 Jews from the transport, under his presentation that they were needed for him for work in his labor camp. This rare exceptional Austrian officer, left, taking 50 Jews not in the direction of his camp… he took them all to the Sokal Judenrat and ordered them to wait there until he sent for them. Among these 50 Jewish, a relative of this writer could be found, R' Itcheh Lawrence, who as a sign of thanks wanted to give the Austrian officer Kroyfa a gold watch with a gold chain. The gentle officer, however, did not take the gift. ‘Halte das für dich! Ich brauche das nicht!^[5]’– he answered and went away. He did not send anyone for the 50 Jews that he had led to the Judenrat… Regrettably, the Ukrainians told the Gestapo about his merciful act in setting the Jews aside. Kroyfa was immediately sent to the front.

That same Thursday in the evening, the train with the seized Sokal Jews began to move from the train station, on the rail tracks leading to Belzec, with the fainting and confused Jews.

In the [train] wagons, among the overly frightened and weakened group, a few young men were to be found, who knew that no miracles would occur to rescue them from certain death… and seeing that they had nothing to lose, they were ready to do anything… for this reason, only one thought enveloped them all… get off the train!… even if they were shot by a German bullet… it is still better than allowing themselves to be tortured… and at the time when the train was moving at full speed, they tore down the doors of the cars, and almost all those who felt that they had a little strength left, jumped off the cars…

It is so easy to say this… they jumped from the cars that were guarded by Germans, while the train was moving at full speed…many of these energetic young men were killed under the train wheels; even more fell from the bullets of the German soldiers who were guarding the train… only a few reached their homes, with broken bones, most crawling on all fours.

Immediately after this terrifying relocation-aktion, rumors began to spread that these German robbers were preparing to turn their city into a ghetto. Ghettoes already existed in many cities and they were occupied by Germans who partly came from Poland. The Jews in these ghettoes lived as if they were in prison, totally separated from the surrounding non-Jewish populace.

The German murderers brought to bear all the possible means to break the Jewish populace, whom they had fooled and swindled with the use of the Judenrat, with Jewish police, with their own post office, with implementing work cards, and on top of this, stamping these work cards which were ‘falsified’ cards that for a while gave the ‘privilege’ of working for the Germans.

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The truth was that these ghettoes were set up only to concentrate the entire Jewish populace into a cauldron, under lock and key, guarded by an array of Gestapo soldiers, and fenced in with barbed wire, if not with walls, from which all roads led to a death camp–to gas chambers.

Also, our Jewish living quarters were far from exceptional. The bad news immediately turned into reality. In the fall of 1942, it was already known, that the Judenrat was negotiating with the arms of the Gestapo in regards to the area and borders of the ghetto. In reality, these were not negotiations. The Judenrat was simply carrying out the demands of the Gestapo and saw to it that the Jews entered the ghetto as quickly as possible. By the orders from the Gestapo, the Jews first had to cordon off the entire length of the Schneider Gasse with barbed wire, and by doing so, this blocked off the access to the Bug. The old marketplace and the Synagogue street belonged inside the ghetto, as did the Konotoffer Gasse and the Schneider Gasse. This ghetto prison had three gateways: one was by the Konotoffer Gasse, near the house of Makarakhy the Baker: after that there was a gateway at the principal entry near Fishl Tzaler's house, and finally, a gate by Metzia Laymzieder with a block by the house of Hertz Constantine.

The Jews had until October 15, 1942, to move into this parcel. The Judenrat managed the allocation of living space in the ghetto. For each person, a two-quarter meter space was allocated. Jews began to seek favors and pay bribes to obtain better living quarters.

Yet another opportunity became available to the German murderers to deceive the Jews, who already harbored no illusions in connection with their tragic fate… however, despite this, a spark of hope still flickered in their hearts…to endure…to overcome the terrifying conditions… let it be in the ghetto… let there be overcrowding and filth… one must sustain oneself with all their might for that one befogged, and such an uncertain outcome to survive the war.

And so, the Jews hauled packages and sacks full of old stuffs and household items into the ghetto…They took along a little bit of wood and a few potatoes on small trays…

In the ghetto, [there was] an outcry, a shout, an argument on who should occupy which allocated space. The Jewish militiamen became strongly involved in this… they had the objective of assuring that there would be order in the ghetto. On October 15, 1942, the gates of the ghetto were closed. The doors of the prison were pushed together. The Judenrat traversed the distance from Hertz Constantine's house to the dwelling of Rishi the Baker. Approximately 4000 Jews were now pressed together in such a small ghetto-area.

For all the residents there were only four sources of water available. Starting as early as 4:00 a.m. people stood in a line, to draw a bit of water.

Need and poverty grew day by day. Hunger and disease became daily occurrences. To save oneself from starving to death, attempts were made by a variety of means to smuggle in food, which did not belong to the light things.

It was even worse with the sick. Nobody took care of them. They lay abandoned…people with typhus in one bed with other diseased people in another bed… nobody wanted to complain that they were sick… the German healing method was already well-known in the ghetto, every sick person was shot.

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People began to make preparations believing that the Germans were getting ready for a second murder-aktion. Already, just the rumor of a second aktion elicited a frightening pandemonium…to conceal one's self at any cost…to make use of anything as a hiding place…a tumult… running aimlessly around… people began to dig bunkers… practically an entire night was used, exhausting all energies, working to prepare hiding places deep in the ground.

The panic became more severe when about 1000 young boys and girls came to us from the Hrubieszow ghetto where such a bloody relocation-aktion had already been carried out, who along with other Hrubieszow Jews, had jumped from the overcrowded train cars, at the time that they rolled in the direction of Belzec and had the good luck not to be hit by the bullets from the Germans escorting the train. With considerable energy and exhaustion, they managed to reach the Sokal ghetto. They told gruesome details about the deportation-aktion in Hrubieszow.

Regrettably, these facts immediately became a reality. On October 28, 1942 (17^th Heshvan 5703), at 6 a.m., armed German S.S. soldiers and black-uniformed Ukrainian militiamen surrounded the entire Sokal ghetto. This was a sign that a new deportation-aktion was starting. A tumult arose in the ghetto…a trembling… Jews ran to hide in prepared hiding places, in the bunkers and the cellars.

The Germans and Ukrainians ran through the ghetto streets like wild dogs, with help from the

Jewish militiamen, they looked in every corner… from every hiding place they dragged out the terrified and unarmed Jews and drove them to a place near Konotoffer Gasse… and from there, to the train station.

In that one day, the German executioners drove approximately 2,000 Jews to the train station. Guarded train cars already stood there… and over 100 people were crammed into each wagon.

Dr. Joseph Maltz ע”ה was among these victims, the father of the writer of these lines…along with my little daughter Lifsheh'leh ע”ה, barely 14 months old.

In the morning, after this bloody murder-aktion, the Jews who remained alive after this gruesome slaughter left their caves and hideouts in trembling and anxiety… being very cautious and untrusting they came out of the attics and cellars, in which they were hiding…they were silent…personally not wanting to believe that they had remained alive… in a frightening silence they looked for their closest [relatives]… orphaned children ran all over the streets and cried in a heartrending fashion.

These confused Jews, who remained alive now ran to the Judenrat building. Maybe they would manage to obtain some information about the fate of their nearest…about fathers…mothers and children. One tells another of the miracles, thanks to which some managed to come out alive from yesterday's slaughter.

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The writer of these lines and his brother were among the first [to go] into the Judenrat. We asked what had happened to our father, a very sick man, whom the Gestapo staff had dragged out of bed, and literally threw onto a freight truck, in which there were already lying other victims pressed together, who were to be taken off to the train station. We were certain that our father ע”ה could not withstand the exigencies of that trip, and that he died shortly there, after being loaded onto the freight truck.

When, at the Judenrat, we learned that all of the dead had already been taken out to the cemetery, we immediately ran there. And among the dead, who had not yet been given a formal Jewish burial, we searched for our dear father ע”ה. Regrettably, we could not find him. Sima Schlager was laying there… next to her body with her head shot off stood her husband, R' Hersch, and wept bitterly.

We also encountered Fysheh Yuchts at the cemetery…he was busily engaged in giving his friend Gasthalter, Schitz's son-in-law, a proper Jewish burial.

The death train with its approximately 2000 Jews began to move out of the train station. This transport also contained the boys who had escaped from the slaughter at Hrubieszow and whom the Gestapo had seized in Sokal and were now being deported to Belzec. They had gotten out of the hands of the Angel of Death and had decided to tear themselves away [a second time] from the closed iron bars, from the intensely guarded freight trucks, in which people passed out from weakness, needing a drop of water…

Even before they were recaptured, they had already provisioned themselves with the tools needed to break open the train car doors. When the train was stationary in Kristianopol, to receive a fresh load of deported Jews, these energetic young people did not delay…with their tools, they hacked open the wagon doors, and those who only had the strength leaped off. The German train escorts watched. They immediately started to fire their machine guns. The murderous bullets reached these heroic youths… only a few managed to reach Sokal… a frightening place to be, with blood all over their bodies.

They said that the Jews in the wagons understood that this was their last trip and that they were riding to their death. The young men conveyed details about the terrifying life in the wagons… about R' Mend'leh Melamed and about other pious Jews who each possessed a bit of drink, and drinking a ‘L'Chaim,’ they manifested a fully high state of morale, strengthened by their knowledge and belief that soon their soul would be released because they were going to die in Sanctification of the Name.

The boys who were saved told of yet another holy man, R' David Sturm, who had a sum of money with him and divided it among the Jews who jumped from the wagons that had been hacked open.

In the ghetto, a silence reigned after the last slaughter… a sad one…frightening. Almost all of the ghetto Jews had been deported or executed.

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Immediately, the number of Jews began to increase, because other deportees came from the neighboring villages, such as Tartakov, Stoyanov, and Khodorow. There were Jews who returned and hid in the thick Wolhyn forests during the entire summer of 1942.

The German murderers deployed a variety of methods, to get the Jews to come out of their hiding places. For this purpose, they used false calming announcements and spread the word, that Sokal would become a ‘Juden-Stadt,’ where all the Jews would get work.

These pre-planned stories led to the fact that Jews who spent long months slogging about and living in the most execrable conditions in the bunkers, in the forests, in hiding places with Christians, allowed themselves to be deceived and came out of their hiding places.

In this manner, the number of Jews in the ghetto grew to approximately 5000 souls. Confusion and a sense of helplessness now reigned even stronger among the exhausted, because [from] the German orders of detention as dictated by the Gestapo offices it was now clear, that the Germans were getting ready for a new slaughter against the ghetto residents.

The German murderers began with a plunder-aktion. The Jews had to turn over everything that they had accumulated to the Gestapo.

The nights were gruesome, and all trembled before morning because everyone knew that relocation meant deportation, it meant slaughter… death. Because of this, anyone who still had the strength and means began to build bunkers and seek new hiding places…this time better fortified and secure.

An exceptional news item tore through the frightening silence of the ghetto on the morning of 22 November 1942. The news went from ear to ear, that the president of the Judenrat had vanished along with his entire family, leaving only his old mother in the ghetto. Now no one had any doubt left, that the end was coming near…that this time the German murderers would finalize their extermination-aktion.

The Gestapo still put up a front that nothing had happened. With false promises, it made efforts to lead the Jews astray. It ordered the election of a new president of the Judenrat. It was very hard to find a person willing to fill this position, who would simply be a yes-man for the Gestapo. Our important and refined Dr. David Kindler did not really want to take on the duties of Judenrat president. Engineer Schwartz also refused the position, but the Gestapo compelled him to fill it.

Also, the writer of these lines, who up to this time was still in hiding in the ghetto, was convinced that the disappearance of the president of the Judenrat was a sign that the remaining Jews who were still alive were standing before a frightening total slaughter. I therefore decided to break out of the ghetto and find another hiding place. To my good fortune, during the first German murder-aktion,

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I had made friends with a Christian, a rare, gentle Polish woman, Franciska Halamayova, who didn't live far from the ghetto. I discussed and established with her that when it got very hot in the Ghetto, she would hide me and my family in her house.

On the night of November 27, 1942, I and my family went out of the ghetto and set on the way to our Christian [friend]. Through barriers and abandoned buildings and shards from ruins, we reached the house of the lady Franciska. She immediately led us into a stable which stood at the side of the yard… there, in an attic house the lady Franciska Halamayova hid us.

Franciska Halamayova

It is only thanks to the news from my brother [that] I can convey details about the further fate of the Jews in the ghetto, about their further torture, and their extinction.

The news that I received from the ghetto was increasingly worse by the day. As my brother wrote me, not a day went by without executions, without shootings. The Gestapo man Riemann recognized Moshe Weber in the street, who was in the group of Jews that had been deported to Belzec. All the German did was ask him: ‘What are you doing here?’– and without waiting for the answer he pulled out his revolver and shot him on the spot.

Abusz Wetter's daughter fled from the slaughter with her children to the shtetl of Mosty and wanted to hide in the Sokal ghetto. The Germans seized her as she was smuggling herself in with her children, and shot them all.

Spotted typhus became a terrifying plague, that took on such dangerous forms, that more than 30 victims were dying daily.

The number of Jews left in the Hevra Kadisha became very small. They possessed a small wagon and a horse. On the small wagon, there was a sufficiently wide box, with room for five bodies. During the day, the horse dragged the small wagon containing the deceased to the cemetery. On the way back, this box was used to transport grain, which was purchased at an exorbitant price from the gentiles on the Svatislawer Gasse and smuggled into the ghetto. It was in this illegal manner that the Jews were able to provide themselves with food for a long time.

But now, even this method of procuring food was made more difficult and complicated, because – as my brother told me, the German

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executioners started to understand “how things work”, so told me my brother, and laid a barbed wire fence around the entire ghetto area. The restrictions have become more severe and crueler. It was enough to be accused of a minor sin to be shot without trial. Thus, for ex they arrested the wagon drivers and “squeezed” confessions out of them under murderous beatings, after which they were shot…

My brother told me about another frightening and bloody slaughter. Without any reason, the Germans seized 16 Jews in the ghetto and led them out to the cemetery, where they had to dig their own graves using only their hands, near which they were all made to stand. Their bodies fell into the open pit after they were shot by machine gun fire. Among these 16 victims, was the vice-president of the Judenrat, and even the Chief of the Jewish ghetto police was not overlooked and was killed in a cruel manner.

This uncivilized behavior by the Gestapo bandits did not come to an end. The Jews were considered totally worthless… their lives lay in the murderous hands of the German and Ukrainian executioners.

There also were in the ghetto Jews, in particular of the younger generation, who had heard about a resistance movement against the German authorities. They also found out that in the neighboring forests, there were surviving partisan groups, that were organizing the underground to fight the German murderers. But these Jews had their doubts, not knowing if in the surrounding forests there were Russian partisans, that take in Jewish fighters with open hands, or [whether this activity] was being carried out by [anti-Semitic] Ukrainian Bandera troops (named for their leader Bandera^[6]), who were just as hostile towards the Soviets, and also the Poles, and they especially hated Jews. For this reason, our youth decided to investigate the situation, and to accomplish this three youths were sent out of the ghetto into the forest to contact the partisans, who had to manage the intake of a group of Jews into their ranks.

The three emissaries returned from the forest with good news. The partisans were prepared to accept Jewish fighters. A raised combative spirit, full of hope, ready to sell their lives dearly– and so young Jews left the ghetto, who were eager to engage in battle against the cruel German enemy, to exact vengeance for the criminal deeds of the German executioners.

The disappointment was very frightening… how gruesome it was to discover that they had fallen into the hands of a contingent of Bandera troops, who deliberately fooled them… they fell as victims to the gruesome and bestial nature of Ukrainian pogromists. Only two Jews of that group were able to get away and return to the ghetto. According to their story, all their comrades were killed in the forest by terrifying means by the Ukrainian bandits.

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That is the way the attempt of the Jewish youth to break out of the ghetto, to take part in the heroic resistance movement, which was being conducted by partisans in the Wolhyn forests ended.

We remained in our attic residence with beating hearts, waiting for news from the ghetto. On Monday May 24, 1943 Mrs. Halamayova came up to us and told us that my brother Shmel'keh with is entire family, together with Dr. Kindler and his wife were coming to join us that evening, and they would hide out together in the attic space. We waited with great impatience for my brother and Dr. Kindler. Getting out of the ghetto was no easy matter. The ghetto was strongly guarded by the Ukrainian and German militias and by the barbed wire.

It was only first, late in the night, that steps were heard outside the stable. My brother and his entire family arrived, Dr. Kindler, his wife, and two sons. Mrs. Halamayova quickly led them to the stable, opened the door, and showed them where our attic residence was, and which [would] serve as their hiding place. With our help, they all came up, and our group got larger in that process.

It was quiet in the ghetto all of Wednesday. The relocation did not occur. The panic had been for naught… the fear had been for naught.

But to us, we thought of this as the silence before the storm. On Thursday, after the noon hour, it was already May 27, 1943 (22 Iyyar 5703), we heard an unusual sound coming from the street, the noise made by wagons. Through the cracks in the wooden wall, we saw whole columns of autos going by with German assault troops.

Barely two hours had gone by and we already heard heart-rending cries, wailing, that reached us, coming from the ghetto. We understood that the slaughter had begun.

A frightening silence reigned in our attic residence. A pain choked us… a pain… we did not shut an eye for the entire night, we stood in fear of the morning.

Very early in the morning, our Christian lady came up to us with some food. She confirmed that a deportation-aktion is being carried out in the ghetto.

We heard shooting going on all day…every shot pierced us in the heart. Frightening shouts were heard coming from the ghetto, mixed with the frightened wailing of tortured Jews…At the same time, the sound of music and singing reached us…These were the Ukrainians in Sokal celebrating their great achievement…the uprooting of the local Jewish populace. They demonstrated their glee with music and song in the streets because of the mass murder of the Jewish populace. We were told afterward by Jews who by some miracle remained alive after this deportation-aktion, there were also Jews in the ghetto during the Thursday slaughter, who bravely resisted the German murderers. All these heroic Jews were shot on the spot.

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According to the details that were relayed to us, the Thursday Action excelled in its frightening cruelty. The German executioners carried out one of the bloodiest of the mass-murder aktionen.

With help from the Ukrainian militiamen, the members of the Gestapo dragged Jews out of their dwellings and hiding places, and with freight trucks, took them to a place, three kilometers out of the city, where open pits were already dug. There, the hapless Jews had to take off all their clothing, being naked, and throw everything they had into a carton, which stood near the pits. Afterward, they were to stand themselves at the edge of the open graves. The bullets of the German machinegun fire ended the lives of the martyrs, which filled up the open mass grave.

To fill the pits containing the Jews who were shot, the German murderers brought in Christian residents from the neighboring village of Horbakov… they later told, that after they shoveled the earth back, they noted how the ground moved, probably from the convulsions of the Jews who were still struggling with the process of dying in these covered pits… The peasants had to shovel more earth onto the graves.

But this was not the end of the bloody slaughter. On the same day, Thursday, the Germans captured several hundred Jews and drove them to the cemetery… The Jews attempted to flee on the Swietozawski Road. They knew what awaited them… having nothing to lose, they attempted to save themselves in this manner… not one of these daring Jews remained alive… they were all shot.

The follow-on news from the ghetto was gruesome. After the bloody Thursday, no Jew was seen on the streets. Whoever was not shot was hiding in a variety of hiding places… in cellars, attics, in houses with camouflaged walls… in underground bunkers. The ghetto looked like it had died…nobody dared to show themselves in the street. In the course of several weeks, the Germans and the Ukrainians ran about in the ghetto streets and searched for bunkers and other hiding places… whoever fell into their murderous hands did not remain alive… all were shot on the spot.

When the ghetto was cleaned of the tortured and dead Jews, when the Gestapo-murderers had gathered together the robbed Jewish assets – an open notice appeared on the walls of the houses, indicating that Sokal was ‘Judenrein.’ Simultaneously, a warning was posted to the gentiles, that the hiding of a Jew would be punished by death. Along with this, it was stated that whoever would turn over a Jew to the Gestapo will receive a payment of 2000 zlotys and a liter of whiskey.

The entire area of the ghetto, all the houses and places were bought by the Gestapo and Ukrainians, who took the bricks and wood from the Jewish houses and sold them to the peasants of the neighboring villages.

Some Jews were still alive in several tightly packed hideouts among the peasants in the neighboring locations. They lived in fear…in terror – that the peasants not give in, and drive the Jews out of their hiding places.

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Those of us in the attic dwelling had the great good fortune that we had encountered such an extraordinary gentile, so rare to find among Christian women of that time, Mrs. Halamayova, who with her human behavior, strengthened our own condition, and held out the will to hold on, under these terrifying conditions, in which we lived.

The days stretched out in exhaustion and fear in that dark attic… every day felt as long as a year… the worms flooded us and inflicted their torture upon us.

Through a crack in the attic wall, our children looked at how Christian children were playing on green fields… how clear the sun shone outside… And [could smell] the scent of the blooming trees in the surrounding gardens…

And despite this mood, we had decided not to give ourselves up, not to fall into the hands of the German murderers while we were alive. In addition to bringing along a variety of medications, Dr. Kindler also brought along vials of strong poison.

In March 1944, we heard the thrum of airplane engines, which appeared above in the skies. From a distance, once again we heard the sounds of artillery warfare.

At the beginning of June 1944,, Mrs. Halamayova came upstairs to us and told us that the Germans had spoken of an increase in the number of German soldiers. It is easy enough to gauge our reaction… already on another morning, we had noted from afar German soldiers with tanks and mortars. Not far from our stall, they began to dig foxholes… other soldiers drew telephone wires across the roofs of nearby houses… now we can see our tragic end for ourselves…We were exhausted and suffered for so long to no end…Even Mrs. Halamayova, our protector, no longer brings food to us. It was only after the noon hour that she came entirely dissembled and was barely able to get the words out: ‘Pray to God, because we are now all lost.’

Later on, she threw a German military newspaper to us, in which we found a very important bit of news, that on June 6, 1944 a second front had been opened in France, which is what we had hoped for, being in the ghetto still, with all the Jews… finally awaiting…finally lived to see! But we could not be pleased with this news right now…

When the Christian lady brought up some food that night to us, we couldn't take it in our mouths… yet we knew, we felt that our days, and perhaps even just hours of our lives, are numbered.

For three days we lay in a condition of being beaten and apathetic resignation. Towards nightfall, Mrs. Halamayova came up to us with the news that the German soldiers were retreating from this location…a few days later we actually heard how the tank motors began to run. It was clear, that the German military divisions were preparing to leave the area.

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A glow of hope enveloped our hearts. We began to believe that we were destined to go on living… that we will emerge intact from this Gehenna.

But this good feeling did not last long. A few days had barely gone by and once again German soldiers arrived. As Mrs' Halamayova had informed us, the German military divisions had received instructions to evacuate the residents of Sokal and its vicinity, because a great battle was about to happen on the shores of the Bug.

This information confused us entirely. Where are we to go now? There was no point in thinking about staying with Mrs. Halamayova… indeed, she advised us that we should teach the children how to recite the Christian ‘Paczezh’ and they should flee… for our wives, she brought peasant clothing…

Suddenly – when we were thinking this way, and looking for a way out of our difficult condition, we heard the very strong noises of warplanes. Along with this, we heard the report of artillery fire in the area of the train station. These were Soviet Army divisions driving German troops before them… an intense battle broke out around our Sokal. On Sunday, July 16, 1944, in the morning, we already saw the German military pulling back at greater speed in the direction of the Zabuzhzhya bridge over the Bug.

On the next day, Monday, Mrs. Halamayova came upstairs to us with the news that the Ukrainians were fleeing the city. Wednesday – July 19, 1944 before dawn, the last of the German soldiers drew back, and burned the bridge on the Babiniec behind them… Sokal and the entire vicinity had been cleared of German soldiers.

Now, our Halamayova stood a ladder to the opening of our attic residence. One at a time, we climbed down from our hiding place.

We were free and our sufferings came to an end. We finally exited our hiding place, where we stayed for 21 months.

And our joy grew even greater, when we saw another three Jews, that our lady protector, the good-hearted Halamayova had hidden in her kitchen. These were: Yehoshua Krom with a wife and child (a grandson of Shmuel Tiszancis), and it was in this way that this gentle Christian woman saved 15 Jewish lives.

We now also found out that in a neighboring house, the former servant of Mrs. Linsker had hidden herself, with her two daughters.

Thanks to Mrs. Francizka Halamayova, one of those rare charitable [sic: righteous] people among the nations of the world, this handful of 15 Sokal Jews remained alive.

Now only one way remained for us… back to the ruins in our city, which was already ‘Judenrein’, because all of Sokal's Jewry had been tortured and executed.

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On the Ruins of Jewish Sokal

Freed miraculously, we impatiently counted the minutes when we were going to set out on the way home. In the meantime, the road was completely blocked, because German mortar fire was still falling on this parcel of land.

But our Dr. Kindler did not allow himself to be restrained, and with my brother Shmuel he went off toward the city. He was drawn to the hospital, where he had worked for so many years. He immediately wanted to know what happened to the few Jews that were hidden there during the time he was still working there.

It didn't take long before they both came back beaten and saddened and related details to us about the ruins in the ghetto. All that was left of the hospital building were bare walls… there was no trace of any human life.

Despite this sad news, we decided to return home. We really had no other choice. Exhausted, we got on the way to re-enter our home that had been destroyed. That gentle Christian woman, Mrs. Halamayova, escorted us part of the way. Through back roads we soon drew close to the gardens near the church on the Babiniec, and from there we were able to reach our house, which stood, near the post office, where the Germans had set up a technical mail division. We tore down all of the barbed wire installations and all other modifications relating to the post office. Once again, we were in our own home… it was hard to believe… everything comes forward as if in a dream.

On the second day, solitary Christians began to show themselves in the streets. Seeing us, they wondered, how is it that we remained alive. Now, we were greeted by the elderly Doctor Macienowicz and in a really hearty manner, he took pleasure with Dr. Kindler.

Our dwelling had been emptied of all household items. Together with my brother, we began to search among the ruins in the neighboring houses. Maybe we would find something useful for running a household.

Part of the building where the post office used to be was not wrecked. Nearby stood a cabinet in which a grenade had broken through part of a wall. We went in that direction. A frightful picture unfolded before our eyes… on a yard brick, there lay a Torah scroll… it was unwrapped and not clean… a little further there lay 17 additional Torah scrolls in a disgusting condition. We carried the Torah scrolls to our dwelling, and Dr. Kindler took one Torah scroll into his home, where we prayed every Sabbath.

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The house of our nearest neighbor, R' Shlomo Schuman ז”ל had remained intact. The entire house was now totally empty. A deathly silence now reigned in Shlomo Schuman's saloon… it was always lively and lusty there…Until late into the night, one would hear the noises emanating from the Jewish merchants and wagon drivers.

Now, only one person stood guard by the saloon-owner's house…the elderly Riczko, the drunkard, who, over many years, had served R' Shlomo Schuman… Now he sat in the empty saloon, he mourns his balebatim, and relates that in the fifth week after the last deportation-aktion, the son-in-law of R' Schuman, Muli Rosenblatt had hidden himself in the attic along with his grandson, Shabtai… Riczko brought them food… until someone informed on them to the Gestapo.

Weakened and exhausted Jews also returned from the forests. Now, we were a group of about 30 Jews that had emerged alive from the German Gehenna. This was now what made up the entire Jewish populace in Sokal.

We now felt a little more secure, and along with a few other Jews, I set out on the road to the area where the ghetto had stood. All around were ruins…bare walls… we are walking on sidewalks paved with the headstones from the [Jewish] cemetery… On the walls of the wrecked buildings, you could still read the anti-Semitic order: ‘Don't buy from Jews!’ We approached the gate to the ghetto… The barbed wire at the entrance had already been torn away. Only the booth that protected the Jewish militiamen stood intact.

We arrived at a frightening ruin on Synagogue Street. Once again, bare walls, and in every corner, tattered fragments of Jewish books were floating around. A yard brick remained from the house of the Rabbi… however, the building of the Bet-HaMedrash was intact. On the wall to the entrance, hung a board with German writing: ‘German Granary Storage.’ There was a frightening sight inside…it was completely empty… and an empty hall…no tables. No benches… the sztender [pedestal] from which prayers were led was gone…there was no Holy Ark… the only thing that remained were the built-in steps leading to the Holy Ark…the built-in foundation on which the table stood, remained. Four pillars remained… this is what was left of the Bet HaMedrash, where a large gathering of dear and decent Jews came to pray daily …where were my comrades and friends, with whom I would meet there? Who does not remember the earnest and elevated mood that once reigned in the Synagogue Street during the High Holy Days?

There was a brook that ran in front of the building of the Bet HaMedrash, where the Jewish children used to play. The brook was now dried out… the Jewish children exterminated.

We drew near to the Synagogue. The entry corridor was full of droppings used to fertilize the fields. In the middle stood a large weight… it was very difficult to open the door that led from the corridor into the body of the synagogue. Again, a frightening ruin… except for the Holy Ark there stood an emptied and orphaned house of worship.

We were soon at the Husiatyn Kloyz. The building had not been desecrated… but inside, another German grain storage facility…

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It was not possible to recognize the Konotopy place. There was no trace of the small wooden houses that stood there. The entire area was full of open pits… these were dug by Christians from Sokal and vicinity, looking for Jewish ‘treasures.’

From the entire Konotopy place with its surrounding streets, all that remained was an empty, pillaged area, full of ruins…there was a yard, brick and stones mixed, together with traces of broken furniture. Here and there, one could still see signs of bunkers, where Jews had for some time hidden themselves.

Finally, at the end, we went to the place where they had shot 400 Jews in the first days after the arrival of the Gestapo. The way took us through Tartakov Gasse. The street had been hacked up by grenade impact, and it was very difficult to move around. When we first came to the field behind the brick factory, we took note of small, scattered mounds of earth, where our dear Sokal martyrs, who had given up their lives in the Sanctification of the Name, lay.

A frightful shudder ran through our hearts… bitter weeping caused us all to break down… we were standing on the spot where our gentle Jewish folk were buried, [people] who lived and worked hard in our Sokal settlement, which had existed for hundreds of years, and were were erased, wiped out, by such terrifying means.

We took leave of our tortured fathers, mothers, brothers, and sisters, after reciting ‘El Moley Rachamim,’ and the Kaddish.

With bowed heads… with an ache in our hearts, we went back to the ruins in the city. In a sorrowful and oppressed state of mind, we again reached the streets of Sokal. We stepped again on the headstones that were used to flatten out the sidewalks of the street…the holy Jewish letters cried out to us… the names etched on these headstones… most of which bear dates going back for hundreds of years.

It was difficult to begin building a Jewish life anew on the ruins of our home, of the settlement, where not very long ago there pulsed a full and honest Yiddishkeit… on a rich Jewish level.

In November 1944, the new government of the Polish People's Republic, which was temporarily based in Lublin (Warsaw at that time was still under German occupation), decided with the Soviet régime via an agreement regarding the repatriation of all Polish citizens who lived in the areas under Soviet control. Because Sokal fell under Soviet-Ukrainian control, now all former Polish citizens, [who were] as good Polish citizens as they were good Jews, earned the right to relocate to Poland. Our small remnant of Sokal Jews who remained alive, registered for repatriation to Poland.

Before leaving Sokal, my mother ע”ה and I felt that we had a sacred duty to bury my sister Chaya Dvora ז”ל, in a formal Jewish manner; she had died on 26 Elul 5702 (9 September 1942) in the attic, at the time we were

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still in hiding with Mrs. Halamayova. At that time, we buried her in the yard under a tree. Now, after a two-day search, we found the location where she was buried. On March 25, 1945, we held the funeral. We went to the mass grave for the last time, where our beloved and dear ones lay, those who were torn away from us before their time. We went through the one-time Jewish streets that had been erased from the earth… there were still several wrecked and vacant houses standing there… a deathly silence reigned, when we stopped with the casket by the synagogue… where one of us eulogized my deceased sister, and recited the Kaddish. At the cemetery, we laid my deceased sister, my Chaya Dvora ז”ל to her eternal rest, and in my personal diary I wrote the following at the time:

‘On the 4^th of Nissan 5705 we brought our sister Chaya Dvorah ע”ה to be buried in a Jewish grave. Her grave is approximately five meters opposite the headstone from 12 Adar I 5695, beside Eliyahu Ze'ev ben Aharon Meir HaLevi, Eliyahu Wolf Strom.’

It was in this fashion, that we, the pitiful remnant of survivors from Sokal took leave of our cemetery, with the graves of the Sokal martyrs.

We were still in Sokal for Passover of 1945. With difficult effort and much exhaustion, we were fortunate to procure matzos. We bought the pure wheat and ground it by ourselves with a hand mill, whose stone came from a Jewish grave headstone.

After Passover we began our repatriation to Poland. Immediately after the holiday, the first group, consisting of several families, set out. The second group to leave, which contained, among others, Dr Kindler and his family members, and the family of the writer of these lines, left Sokal on May 9, 1945. We were the last Jews of the Sokal Jewish settlement, of which no trace was left.

1. Shown as Varyazh on modern maps. Return
2. A marketplace of sorts. Return
3. Indeterminate sect of Christians. Return
4. Obsolescent measure of weight, probably a small amount. Return
5. Keep this for yourself, I have no use for it. Return
6. Stepan Bandera (January 1, 1909 - October 15, 1959). A vicious anti-Semite with enemies on all sides of the war. In 1959, Bandera was assassinated by K.G.B. agents in Munich. Return

To sanctify the memory of Maria (Miriam),
Janina (Shlomit) and their mother
Anna (Chana) Gruber, murdered in June 1943
In the city of Sokal, in Eastern Galicia

The suffering of Jewish children during this last period of our history was difficult and gruesome; this is because, according to the Nazi program, in their ideology, the fate of children was decided beforehand: they were all sentenced to be killed, but the enemy manifested a special tendency to cruelty, especially towards the Jewish children, and from what we know to date, the Hitler executioners, including also their young, and even Hitler Youth ‘children’ (according to the elderly), showed a special talent for carrying out special forms of torture and acts of murder, first against domestic animals, and afterwards against Jewish children. This was meant to strengthen the Hitler Youth, that is, to make them heartless without a sense of being sensitive, and [to feel] unbeatable in battle against “the enemy”�!

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According

ly, we indeed found the rich repertoire of killing-methods, also those that were particularly or exclusively used against children, from their first day of birth or even after they were born (to shoot or slaughter them in their mother's innards to kill them); those who guarded the maternity wards of Hitlerism, those who first had to be born, [for them] it was nothing more than a sport activity).

Miriam and Shulamit

It is because of this, Hitler and his helpers – are to be reckoned as untermenschen [under-humans] with a high education!–finding dead children who had been torn apart in two: grabbling hold of a child by the feet and smashing the head against a wall, in the self-same polished and shining boots… and, in general, this was done in the presence of the father and mother and was overseen by a clutch of murder accomplices, who were eager, and acted with triumph at the chance of being able to kill a child with one blow!

We can read about this even in published books in the respectable literature that dedicate pages to the end of the war, and for us we also heard of the various legal actions against war criminals, of which only a small part were captured and tried in a court. Moreover, these gruesome acts became items of daily conversation among simple, average, innocent, naive people, and they became interesting items for…literary reading material, created for the average

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cultured citizen, young or not. How can this make an impression on them – these young readers, is a peripheral question that we must have an answer for. If life itself has placed us in front of this harsh scene, which is in general not easy to respond to, there is a problem: do we even try to have an answer this question?!

Understandably, pure, factual, objectively taken, the fate of a Jewish child was more than inhumanly frightening, and does it allow for itself in general to be expressed in words, grasped and articulated, something that people were engaged in!

For the present-day onlooker, these writings appear to be more suffocating, because here we are talking about children, who have to account for their souls only to God. They have not yet even tasted life! And they are already going to their death? – Sentenced by whom? By these satanic executioners!

What greets the eyes and is even more painful–even before it is examined with the senses–is the unending deep abyss, the fundamental basic difference between a murderer and a child. Here is a beast, who with his entire consciousness is bent on murder; his bloodthirsty body is seeking to inflict all manner of inhuman acts, he takes pleasure in it, he derives satisfaction from the other's suffering and death. He wishes to satisfy his lust with innovative, newly discovered methods, because he is refined, holds a degree, or he rather does it naturally, is specially chosen and becomes a master of it. The natural instinct is distorted by perverted ‘cultural objectives,’ of the twentieth century!

On the other side is a child… a Jewish child…

I believe that no child in the world is as naive as a Jewish child…

The facts of those times show us that–one can say what one wants about the grownup Jewish person–that he is already rooted, always working and worried; fate has led him to this state…but even among these grownups there are dreamers and seekers of The Divine; dreamy and fixated on the world-to-come or rather the world that is yet to be, they pass through the real world–I would say–with closed eyes! We have more dreamers and thinkers among us, the Jews, than any other nation…

And where does the Jewish child belong – I would say – they are all lost in dreams, thoughts, living in this world, in this life, together with the life of a world that does not exist, a reality that does not penetrate to them. Now, with time, in their mature years, under the hammer of daily life, the Jewish child starts to understand the real world, reality, and becomes a ‘practical’ person. And this is not always [like this] for all children!

The Jewish child–was and remains dreaming in his world. This was the constant and so it was in those years as well!

The murderer would approach the child with his murderous intent, with prepared instruments. One might think that the reek of his murders would carry for miles, even that the child should come to fear him.

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But somehow–the child goes to him as if he were a family member, asking the best of questions, and is ready to play with him…

And it goes so far, that during the Aktion, a grown child, in the last moments of everyone's death when the open pits are ready to swallow up those Jews who are shot and not shot, in a calm tone, the murderer is asked if it is necessary to take off the undershirt, or can it remain on him?!

Because the murderers – who killed Jews, so to say, for idealistic reasons, also looked after assuring that nothing of the Jewish belongings be lost, not even the personal clothing of the martyrs, and therefore demanded of them, before executing them, to undress, and gather the clothing together in one place. Tie shoes together in pairs, so that no searching will be required afterwards (economy!), and to assure they are not contaminated with the blood of killed Jews…

And the Jewish children performed this, without seeing anything bad in this, not missing anything–and nothing…

That is how far the naivete of the Jewish children extended.

It is these thoughts that come to mind when one reads the letters and cards that the two young girls Miriam (Maria, aged twelve) and Shlomit (Janina, aged ten), wrote from those places, and at that time, to their father (Medical Dr. Zigmund Gruber), who at this time was to be found in Rumania as a prisoner of war of the Polish army.

And it was typical of them [to do this], as was the case with Jewish children in general, especially at that time.

And, allow me to articulate a thought in connection with this:

In the years between the two world wars, Polish youth were–so to say–in a swing! Having almost achieved almost all rights of citizenship, they fought–and fought continuously–for a stable existence (the painful Jewish problem: making a living!). The Polish Jewry began to take an important place in all (and I stress this word) areas of human culture. Whether in Poland or outside of its borders, Polish Jews began to reach the first plateau more and more. They played – without paying attention to the various limitations on the part of the Polish régime–a rather significant role in the country itself, and in the Polish economy, culture, and even in the organization of the government. Also, in Jewish life in general, all over the world, the Polish Jews certainly began to push themselves continuously into the foreground. And this was just the beginning.

Being more talented, as the maturing generation began to manifest itself to be, this new generation, which was born and grew up under ‘normal’ circumstances, between the two world wars, and had more opportunities to learn and get educated that their parents or grandparents, wherever you went: to a ‘plain’ school, a gymnasium, or even a university, the Jewish youth took the first places. In competitions of the most prominent sort, Jewish children in general would take the first prize, in a variety of fields, and this, despite the fact that–as is known, there was no special affection for Jewish children, who felt that their time had come, and studied arduously and with greater commitment, in

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striving to achieve something in their lives. It was a rare period, when one saw such a mass move to culture and education, as we saw in Poland between the two world wars, and everything came to them in such a natural and simple way… With that kind of optimism and belief in the world and in their own strength…

This youth was talented enough to achieve much in their lifetime, truly much, and they were certain in their belief that they were ready to fly… But it was rare to find any of them – until the outbreak of the war – already having ‘achieved something,’ [because] they had first to get themselves ready…

What would have emerged from this youth had they been permitted to grow up?!

Then Hitler arrived, and everything came to an end.

What remained of all the struggle and education of our young generation?

From these two girls, nothing remained, except a few tens of items written in childish handwriting to their beloved father, from other children, even postcards did not remain!

And what could be expressed in such a postcard? Written in constant fear, and under the control of their own mother, Anna, who knew quite well that this card was going to pass through double censorship and every pejorative word will prevent the card from reaching its destination…

In the correspondence – written, as you understand, in Polish, in many cases in rhyme – what is expressed first and foremost is the great love to their father, their longing for him. They do not know, nor understand why he has been cut off from them? Indeed, why? They, with their childlike naive presentation – although both did not lack intelligence, having good sense and understanding, they knew more for their age than one might suppose, they cannot understand the untamed manner of the world! Who taught them this? Who made them comfortable with this?! Because what they were taught was only about what was beautiful and good, shielding the younger generation from anything bad and dangerous, ‘to be good and pious,’ this was the blessing for a little Jewish girl.

The events of the great war had not yet become known to them, and who is to tell if they did any sort of assessment about the Jewish fate in these world events, not even in the last months of their lives, which was so suddenly and heartlessly torn apart, in the moment when they were apprehended as [so-called] ‘illegal’ Jewish lawbreakers: first the mother, and afterwards the two little girls, whose only desire was to live, all this took place after the Murderer gave his death sentence: ‘Judenrein’!

And so, they were indeed shot and buried somewhere or another.

The mother was ‘revealed’ by a local lady Polish informer on the street, and was immediately turned over to the Gestapo (June 7, 1943). The two girls [were killed] a bit later (the 28^th of June).

One fate united them all: mother and child!

And how tragic: it took place at the moment that the father, who was in Rumania, made the greatest

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effort to extract his family from the Hitlerist Gehenna, The family knows about this and for this reason hoped and thought to themselves, that they were on the tip of being released.

Dr. Gruber used a variety of methods to attempt and rescue his family. Here, a medical train was traveling from Romania to Lvov to bring back wounded Romanians and he had the chance to make the acquaintance with the commandant of the train, a Romanian doctor, who promised to bring the family (as a Romanian woman who is a nurse) with this train to Romania. It travels and returns with nothing, because the Romanian doctor could not enter German-occupied territory, and he could not bring the train from Lvov to the nearby shtetl of Sokal, where the family had relocated itself from Lvov, to hide with the help of a committed Polish nurse.

And here, another possibility appears for smuggling people out of the Third Reich to captured Romania. A higher German officer, who worked in the Gestapo (!) involved himself with this matter, (you understand) for good money. The transaction was carried out, the German officer received the money by hand, rides off, and meanwhile, Dr. Gruber gets informed by a delayed message from the Polish nurse, Viera Novak, that the family no longer exists…

On the address of Mrs. Novak, for the whole time, there was correspondence that went on between the divided members of the family. The gentle Polish woman had the will, being one of the few Righteous Gentiles of the World in those places, to either hide the Jews, or her name should figure in the address of their correspondence.

In this manner the Jewish family was executed: this was the fashion that the lives of two promising young girls were torn apart, who in their lives had learned a lot, a very substantial lot – apart from what they learned in school – Hebrew, music, etc. – But who taught them to distinguish a ‘cultural’ murderer from a just plain wild animal?!

Who taught them to defend themselves from this sort of a modern murderer and had a normal and even a friendly smile for his victims?!

In pre-war times, and during the gruesome war, we held back from staining the pure children's souls with the sole understanding about falsity and theft, about murderous killing and acts of rape. And even in the worst and last minutes of life in the Nazi Gehenna mothers, Jewish mothers, trembled over the lives of their children, as they protected them, so they should not, God forbid, know of wickedness, that reigns over the world and of gruesome death that awaited them, these innocent children. They still did not want to disrupt the childish naive world, the world of righteousness and honesty.

And so the Jewish children fell, as pure and innocent souls, that were not darkened even with the simple thought about the terrifying fate that awaits them from the side of the Hitlerist murderer.

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