The Tailors of Tomaszow: A Memoir of Polish Jews by Rena Margulies Chernoff & Allan Chernoff

Author:Rena Margulies Chernoff & Allan Chernoff [Chernoff, Rena Margulies & Chernoff, Allan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Biography & Autobiography, Personal Memoirs, History, Modern, 20th Century, Holocaust
ISBN: 9780896728769
Google: vMkkjOsIOVEC
Publisher: Texas Tech University Press
Published: 2014-09-15T20:52:05+00:00

4: Blizyn

The Gestapo packed us tightly into waiting train cars designed to transport animals—but now we were the cargo—about 120 people crammed together in each rail car. But because I was with my family it did not bother me. In all, they jammed 712 Tomaszowers onto the train.

It seemed as if we were en route for a long time. In fact, it was a journey of only fifty-seven miles to Blizyn, located in the Polish district of Radom.

Suddenly, the train stopped in the middle of a field. German and Ukrainian soldiers opened the doors and started yelling "RAUS! SCHNELL RAUS!" ("Out! Fast, out!"). While the soldiers yelled, they beat us with rifles and whips.

Since there were no steps we had to jump down from the high rail cars. As she landed Aunt Eva injured her knee and foot. Others also suffered injuries. Nevertheless, the soldiers forced us to run onto a meadow, and from there they led us to the camp gate where we lined up. The guards searched us, confiscating whatever few belongings we still had. Fishel Samelson, though, was able to get in with lots of clothing on his back.

"When we were brought in from Tomaszow to Blizyn, I must have had about a dozen shirts on me," said Fishel. "I had a jacket. I had an overcoat, I had scarves. Most of the people were frisked. I was able to get into Blizyn without anything taken away from me. In addition to that I don't know how much money I had sewn into my jacket. And I was able to go into the camp with all that. And little by little I used to sell that. I sell a shirt, I used to get two loaves of bread. An overcoat, I remember I had a brand new overcoat I had made in Tomaszow that I brought to Blizyn. God knows how many loaves of bread I got from a Polack at the wire, at the fence," said Fishel.

After the search the Nazis registered their prisoners, assigning us to barracks according to our work detail and separating men from women.

Until now we had lived as a family, Mama, Tatus, Romek, and I. But now Mama and I went to the women's barracks on one side of the camp, while Papa and Romek were ordered to the men's barracks on the other side.

Soon transports of Jews arrived from Piotrkow, Lublin, Radom, Bialystok, Kielce, and other towns and villages.

The camp's barracks contained three-tiered wooden planks that served as beds, seven prisoners to a slat, so that each person occupied only half a meter, as crammed as sardines in a tin.

Cousin Fryda was squeezed next to her sister in the bunk: "Every night as she lay beside me in our bunk, my little sister, Dorka, would sing herself to sleep. I loved hearing her, but sometimes I scolded her for not falling asleep sooner. I couldn't understand how she could be so happy and cheerful while so hungry, but what did

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