Bill - Poland 

Bill was born and raised in Miechow, Poland. He comes from a Jewish family. In 1936, Jews made up about 15 percent of the city's population. The Jewish population was located in a specific part of town, not far from the temple. Bill started to go to a public school at the age of seven. There were six Jewish students in his class and they all sat at the back of the classroom. At age 13 he underwent his Bar Mitzvah, for which he had to become quite versed in the Torah. Bill was part of the Zionist organization. They went to various youth camps and for a few months he went to work on a farm in preparation for living in Palestine. Bill was also deeply involved with becoming a rabbi.

Bill's family consisted of his parents and his four brothers and sister. During the year of 1936, Bill learned the trade of tailoring from his brothers. His father would leave early in the morning and go to local villages to buy goods from the farmers, to bring them back into the city to sell them. His father dressed in a black coat and had a beard, which was considered the typical Jewish look, and he would sometimes get assaulted on account of this. Jews were looked upon as second class citizens, and labeled as "Christ killers."

On September 1st 1939, Hitler invaded Poland. The Polish army was routed and Bill's brother Lemuel was killed in the retreat. The people braced for the worst, but hoped against hope that things would get better. The Jewish population was particularly vulnerable. There was an unwritten law that Jews couldn't own land. They had no police protection, and the police themselves were ordered not to prevent crimes committed against them. The Germans set up labor and concentration camps where they sent Jews and other so-called non-Aryan types. Many of these camps were in Poland. At these camps, the prisoners were forced into labor, starved, mistreated and killed.

In 1940, Bill's family was sent to the Miechow ghetto. There were no schools, but secret classes were held. Life was continued to be lived by the residents as best they could. There were even weddings. Bill often had to sneak out of the ghetto to get more food for his family. One of his other brothers died in a labor camp, Julag I.

One Saturday in 1942, the ghetto was emptied by the Nazis. The Jews were given 10 minutes to pack. Bill's family were prepared, they had packed the day before. Sugar was the most important thing to have, it was a source of nourishment. Cattle cars were waiting to transport them to an unknown destination. Bill was asked by his seven year old niece, "Uncle, where are we going?" He remembers those words clearly today. The train traveled 40 kilometers over three days and two nights. People were packed in like sardines, so crowded they had to sleep and relieve themselves in a standing position. They came to arrive at a labor camp. Here they had water, air to breathe, and bunks to sleep in. They worked on the railroad. Bill was selected out to work in a tailor shop in the S.S. headquarters, making uniforms. This camp was run by Ukrainians, who were worse than the Germans. These guards would take bribes and then go back on them, and were so cruel as to make the prisoners drink their own urine.

Bill caught typhus and had a high fever, but he had to keep working; they killed those who could not work. In 1943 the camp was evacuated. Once again Bill was forced to move, but this time to Skarzysko, a munitions factory. There he worked 10-12 hours a day carrying artillery shells. He had a Polish foreman who enjoyed killing.

Next, Bill was sent to Czestochowa. This time he worked in a steel factory. It wasn't a bad place to be, the guards were relatively humane. He was also asked to make trousers.

In 1945 he was shipped to Buchenwald, his fourth trip by cattle car. This was a liquidation camp; it had a crematorium. By the time they were unloaded, quite a few were already dead. A selection was made right away. It was a very cold morning, and they had to take off all their clothes, so that every part of their bodies could be examined. All of their body hair was shaven off, and they were dunked in large vats of disinfectant, which was very painful. Then they were driven into another area, still naked. In a shower room they were given bars of soap, which was engraved RIF, pure Jewish fat. At Buchenwald they melted bodies to make soap. He was driven, again, to another area where he was given some clothes - a shirt, jacket, pants, and leather shoes. These leather shoes would turn out to be a big plus later on.

After two weeks in Buchenwald, Bill was sent by train to Stratsfurth. Here he worked underground manufacturing airplane parts. They had to work underground because of all the bombing on the surface. Below ground there was a shortage of oxygen, and if you fell asleep you were beaten or shot. On April 1st 1945, the camp was abandoned. They marched out from Stratsfurth for 30 days. The first day alone they covered 25 kilometers, with little food to eat. People dropped like flies. At one point the prisoners were camped in a barn for over a week. There were some French prisoners who taught them which grasses they could eat to stay alive. Soon there was no more grass. During the march, they passed through a city where the citizens attacked and beat them. The guards had to protect the prisoners.

In Annanburg, Germany on May 8th 1945, Bill and his fellow survivors were liberated by the Russians. Out of 900 who marched out from Stratsfurth, only 180 had survived. It had been a terrible ordeal. Bill weighed only 75 pounds.

He and some others were taken by the Russians to stay in a German house. They received good treatment, but only because the German woman who cared from them was under threat by the Russians. Sick, Bill was taken to the hospital, where he regained some strength. He returned to his hometown of Miechow, hoping to find some surviving family. There was no one there to find. Later through the Landsberg Displaced Persons Camp he found a sister who had survived.

Bill's uncle had been in the United States since 1915. It was because of him that Bill came to the U.S., and moved to Buffalo with his wife and child. Today Bill is retired, after a very successful career as a tailor. He has two sons, and five grandchildren. He made for himself a new life, but the horrible memories of what he was forced to endure will always be with him.

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