Sala's Gift by Ann Kirschner

Author:Ann Kirschner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Free Press
Published: 2006-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

By the fall of 1942, as camps shut down and addresses changed, mail service to and from the Schmelt camps became more erratic. Sara Czarka was assigned to clean the Neusalz office one day and came across a stack of undelivered mail for Jews thrown carelessly under a clerk’s desk. She removed the letters surreptitiously, a few at a time, until she had delivered every one of the treasures to their intended recipients.

In the space of a few months, Sala had been taken from Geppersdorf to Gross Sarne and Laurahutte, then briefly back to Gross Sarne, before ending up in a camp at Brande. Her rapid movements increased the danger to the letters she had already received. Some of the transports were organized on a few minutes notice: a supervisor would enter the barracks and tell the prisoners to leave. But her luck held. At every camp, she found old friends among the prisoners, and she could pass her packet of letters to someone for temporary safekeeping. She also usually encountered a few guards and officers who remembered her as the “one clean Jew” from Geppersdorf and put her to work in the laundry and as a seamstress.

Ala always tracked her down. “My aggravation has been boundless. I sent you a parcel with clothes and you had already left,” Ala wrote from Bedzin, no longer a supervisor at a workshop, but now a staff member at Merin’s Council. She did not allude to the August 12 deportation, although she was aware that Sala’s parents had been taken.

Bedzin

September 20, 1942

My beloved child, Sarenka,

I was already very worried about you when I heard that you were transferred to another camp. I wish you all the best. If you have a chance, tell me what kind of work you’re doing, how you feel, etc.

I’m working as a secretary in the Council and I am very busy. I received a card from Bernhard yesterday. He is still as competent as ever and is working a lot now.

Little Sala, I’ll send you some clothes. Don’t worry about your parents, everything is fine. Do you have everything you need at work? Are you still working as a seamstress? Sala, you’ll also get shoes from me, just tell me how long you will stay there.

I kiss you. Happy New Year!

Ala

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