Diary of Bergen-Belsen by Hanna Levy-Hass

Author:Hanna Levy-Hass
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Haymarket Books
Published: 2010-12-14T16:00:00+00:00

3

B. B. | December 1944

I thought it was the end, that I wouldn’t have anything more to write down.… But there is no end. There isn’t one. The days follow one after the other—dark, terrible, terrifying days. We would like to see the end, whatever it may be.

Starvation is everywhere; each of us is nothing more than a shadow. The food we receive gets scarcer each day. For three days we haven’t seen a piece of bread. Some people have saved theirs and now they open up their miserable provisions and everything is moldy. Bread is gold. You can get anything with bread; you will risk everything for bread. And there are more and more thieves, especially at night. Someone suggested we take turns staying up and keeping watch so we could catch them. The hunt lasted two nights in the densest darkness. It was very dramatic, very noisy. No one slept and the results were nil.

Anyone who has a little bit of bread keeps it under his pillow or rather makes a pillow out of it. That way they feel more secure when they sleep. The mothers, especially, resort to this method to ensure a few mouthfuls for their children. As for the workers who are out working all day, they’re forced to lug their entire stock with them everywhere in their bag. And their entire stock means six days’ rations, at most, which is about half a loaf. The temptation is strong. Everyone ends up at some point eating the entire six days’ worth in one day.

Yesterday, on the way to work (in the women’s commando), we saw potatoes on the road; they had probably fallen from a truck or been thrown out by people from the last transport during a too long and painful march, when you prefer to run the risk of dying of hunger so as not to die of fatigue. We know all about this. And so, with our famished eyes, we caught sight of a few potatoes. One of us bent down to pick one up. But she had to drop it immediately, frightened by the savage screams of the soldier accompanying us who couldn’t tolerate so much gluttony.…

It’s been over a month and a half since the Germans eliminated all services within the camp. Everyone has to work outside the camp in the different commandos. They don’t spare anyone. Everyone outside—including the elderly and fourteen-year-old children—everyone is forced to labor. No one is in charge of keeping the blocks of the camps clean and in order. The Germans couldn’t care less about it. No schools, no cleaners. Everything has plunged into chaos, into a whirlwind of dirt and rot.

In order to mobilize the maximum number of internees possible for all kinds of work, the Germans have multiplied their terror tenfold. Each day, before dawn, at four o’clock in the morning, everyone must be up. We feel hunted. A feverish coming and going, marked by anguish and terror.… It’s the middle of winter; it’s bitterly cold.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.