IV: Mainly this picture is from, from this eh Kinderheim where In.., Indersdorf.
EF: Yeah.
IV: I think there is a picture with you and your..
EF: Yes, the name is misspelled.
IV: Yeah.
EF: {laughing} I do not know why we did not correct it.
IV: Yeah, yeah, yeah, {laughing}.
EF: It is, it is spelled the way it is pronounced in English.
IV: Yeah, but yeah.
EF: Because eh in Hungarian we pronounce "Forkosh".
IV: Yeah, yeah, "Forkosh".
EV: And eh I was looking at that and I, I, I cannot understand why we did not.
Because eh I, I do not know, if that may.., it is not even German.
It is not a German version {laughing}.
So I do not..
IV: Well so eh let us start eh.
EF: {breathing} OK.
IV: Can you tell me eh the story when you left your home, your home town, your family, when the Germans came into Hungaria.
EF: Oh..
CM: Also.., yeah but..
IV: Yeah but that is natural.
That is natural.
EF: {laughing} Yeah.
IV: OK.
EF: Well I eh, eh you know eh for, for the Jews in, in Hungary eh Romania things were pretty, pretty good, generally.
There was a, quite a bit of anti-semitism.
Sort of part of the {laughing} scene.
But eh otherwise, you know, we had a pretty good life and accepted in the community, and so on.
Eh I think it started eh pretty much eh at the start of the war, probably '40, '41 were eh, even though Ge.., Hungary was not occupied, but it was in eh allied with Germany.
And so they started with some laws against Jews, some restrictions.
Eh I probably some times in '41 I need to, got gradually stronger so that eh I think by the time of late '43 I think we were not allowed to leave the village.
So then eh in eh, eh '44 sp.., eh spring of '44 we were, we were deported.
And we were taken to the ghetto eh in Sathmar.
And eh, eh that is where we, we where eh I do not remember exactly how long.
It was probably a couple of months.
And from there transports were taken regularly to, to Germany.
Although we were not told where we were going.
We were told that it is some kind of a, a labour camp, labour.
{breathing} Eh so we got, we, we got on the transport eh to eh in, in, in eh I think it, it may have been June.
I really, my, my memory of dates is very weak.
I can, {laughing} it could be May, it could have been June.
I think it was probably June.
Eh we got on one of the transports.
And our whole family was eh..
We and we were in, in boxcars, closed cars.
So it was hot.
It was very crowded.
Eh but I think we were allowed to take eh food with us and something eh.
And eh, eh, eh the, the transport we were, eh I s..
Well I have to say, eh up to the Czech border we were accompanied by Hungarian soldiers.
We were guarded.
And I have eh this maybe some, where, where my brother's memory differs..
I, I do not remember seeing any Germans before we got to the Czech border, where the German SS took over, as the guards.
We are, up to then, it were from, from our, our village to Sathmar, we were accompanied by the local police.
A kind of which to call regional police, you know.
And eh, eh I do not know how we were guarded in ghetto, I think there was some kind of guarding and eh..
But eh, eh on the transport we were accompanied by Hungarian and at the border of Czechoslovakia the Germans took over.
And then eh we eh, we ended up in eh, in Birkenau.
Eh and that is, and that is where we were separated.
Eh men and women, different lines.
And then we could see the separation of, of the ages.
So that I was, we could, we could tell that eh some, something between 16 and eh maybe 50, you went to one side.
And younger and older to the other side.
And I do not know exactly how we knew that it was good to be in there, {laughing} in the right {laughing} age.
So I said, I was 16 which I, I was only 15 at that time.
Of course my brother was eh a little bit older.
So when they asked my age I think I said 16.
So I think I just made it to labour camp.
So from there eh, from there we eh, eh we ma.., so it, so there, after that eh we never saw our family again.
They, in, in the transport with us was eh my grandfather, paternal grandfather who was probably about 85, quite old and {breathing} my mother and eh three younger sisters.
My father had been arrested earlier.
Eh with some other kind of leaders of the community.
Probably in the fall of '43.
And eh so we did not see him again.
And we found out that he was in Auschwitz and were, and died there.
Eh we heard after.
So it, we then eh from eh Birkenau we, we marched eh to, to Auschwitz where we were processed.
We got the numbers, shaved.
We got the striped uniform.
And we got some speeches from some of the inmates.
{laughing} A sort of welcome, {laughing} like a welcoming committee {laughing}.
And eh I do not remember how long, it was not really long, we were in eh Auschwitz.
And from Auschwitz we marched to Buna, Buna Monowitz, which was a labour camp.
And that is where we were till the, the evacuation in eh late January, February.
So.
IV: And in this Buna camp, what kind of work did you do?
How..
EF: Well.
IV: Were you housed?
How was the food you became to eat?
Can you tell me..
EF: Well it, it was a large, large camp.
I do not know how many, but I would guess at least 10.000 people.
It was large, large camp.
Eh, eh it was barracks, you know, block, block, block house.
We had Blockältester, -ältester {laughing}.
And eh so it was a, it was eh bunks.
I, I think it was two or three where we slept.
And eh, eh we, we worked eh, eh the, the, the place, eh of course, we found out afterwards, it was a I.G. Farben eh complex.
And I do not know what other, {moving his head left to right} {laughing} what {laughing} things they made there, but we eh most of the time I remember working in a, in a, in a work in a eh machine shop.
And doing a lot of filing of eh.. for what purpouse I, I {laughing} do not know {laughing}.
Eh it, we, we were, it was mostly eh, eh mostly prisoners were at the camp.
And in some of the buildings there were British prisoners of war.
And I remember we were ju.., we were kind of jealous of them, because they were in pretty good shape.
And we, we were not.
And, and they could of course, they could get packages, red cross packages, so they..
Eh and there may have been some other nationalities, too.
So that was, and then eh sometime later, I suppose into the winter they started bombing the, the complex.
And I, I do not know, I still do not know.
I, I maybe could have found out, whether it was Russians or, or, or British or maybe even American.
I do not know who was bombing it, but they bombing almost every night.
And they were not bombing the camp, just eh the factory area.
So after that mostly what we did, was clean up, from the, from the bombing {laughing}.
I, I understand there was some coal, there was some coal mining there and some..
Something they were making out of coal.
But I, I was not involved in that, so I..
So that is the work I remember that we, we would eh, we would, we would have, you know the, meet, Appellplatz meeting everybody.
And then march out in, in eh I do not know what, what's called Abteilung.
Usually with a, with a Kapo, they had, who would be in control.
And eh maybe sometimes smaller groups, or larger groups.
IV: Counting the Appell..
EF: Yeah, always, always counting, yeah.
And eh it would be quite, quite early in the morning we were woken by some kind of eh be.., not bell, but you know, ringing, like ringing, very loud {laughing}.
And very early.
And eh breakfast eh was, was some Ersatz-Coffee and a piece of bread.
This, that kind of thick, eh like, like a part of a brick, you know, dark bread.
Eh and I think we, we got a piece of margarine, mar.., margarine with that.
And that was breakfast.
At, at eh noon we got eh a soup, which was quite thin.
Eh and then at night, when we got back to the barracks we got a soup again.
And that was a little thicker, usually had more things in it with.
Eh that was our, our menu.
And that piece of bread was like a piece of gold.
I mean, we tried to save some, you know, so you were hungry later, you try to have.
And you guarded it {laughing} so that somebody did not steel it, you know.
Eh so it, it was eh very, very clearly a starvation diet, which eh..
Eh and with, with the work we were doing was obviously designed that we would not last too long {laughing}.
{moving his head} Eh so..
IV: Well the bombs..
EF: Well then, then yeah, the bombings, so though, that got just more frequent and eh..
I think we had some idea.
You know we did, we got no news whatsoever.
I mean, no papers, no radio, nothing.
So we really did not know what was going on in the world.
But when we were been evacuated I think we kind of figured out that it, that it had something to do with the Russians {laughing}.
And of course, that was what it was.
The Russians were getting close.
They evacuated Auschwitz and Buna and maybe there was some other camps around that I do not know.
Eh so then we, we traveled, we marched some of the time.
And I remember you know and with groups of eh I think probably 200 sep.., separated.
And I think that is the one place we were, I was separated from my brother, I was..
But I, I got into the end of one group and he got in {laughing} to the beginning.
That was the only time that eh, through the whole camp, that we were separated.
But we got together again.
Anyway, we marched.
I remember marching to towns you know and looking into houses and see, you know the lights and see people live normally.
How {laughing} {breathing} {shaking his head}..
It was just painful, you know.
And at that, and of course we were guarded by the SS.
But eh at least for me, I suppose it occured to other people too, was time that you could try to escape.
Because we, like we march to towns where.. {breathing}
I had the impulse, but I did not carry it out.
I, it was just too scary {laughing} you know, it.
Eh it would be like eh taking a leap, a leap of faith where, you do, you do not know, if you would maybe immediately get shot or maybe make it.
And you were in a territory that you did not know.
So anyway, I, I think some people probably did, did this, tried to escape.
{breathing} But anyway we did not do it.
So we, we, we marched eh and we travelled by train, some of the time.
I think we went to Czechoslovakia, part of Czechoslovakia.
{breathing} Where eh we got some food where people where we were passing under a eh a bridge.
And people on the bridge were throwing some eh bread into the..
Oh it was open, open cars, eh o.., open boxcars.
And eh so that was very welcome.
And of course we kind of fought over every bit.
I think my brother got some food in, that situation which he remembers quite well and I do not.
And my brother and, and this other friend, this eh, was, we are as from the same town, from the same village.
He says he found, he got some eggs.
{moving his shoulders} I do not know how {laughing}.
Anyway, so eh I think we got to eh finally got to Oranienburg.
Which I think I was told is near Berlin.
I am not absolutely sure.
And eh there we were a very short time and eh..
Mostly what I remember from Oranienburg was that we took, we got to take a shower there.
And after that trip {laughing} from Buna, it felt really good to have a shower {laughing}.
And from there eh to Flossenbürg which eh I do not have a real clear memory.
It eh it probably was by train.
And in Flossenbürg we stayed eh {moving his shoulders} I do not know a month, maybe more?
Until we, they started to evacuate us again.
IV: Can you remember, there is some, something.
How the camp was?
How, how they welcomed you?
What you had to do?
How you have been housed?
How the food was?
EF: It, it..
IV: How the situation at this time was in the camp?
EF: In, in Flossenbürg?
IV: In Flossenbürg, yeah.
EF: You know I, I, I really remember very little detail.
Mostly what sticks in my mind that eh the barracks were quite crow.., very crowded.
And I remember of sort of eh being housed in a corner with some, eh some of the people from our, from our area, from our village.
Or at least that area.
And there I remember talking eh.
It may have been a, I remember having some kind of a religious ceremony, briefly.
Eh it, it, it seems like it would have been around the time of Passover.
It could have, could have had something to do with eh Passover.
And eh I remember that we were, we had the problem with lice quite a bit.
Then we were deloused several times.
And I think they used to spray us under the arm.
I do not remember being shaved.
Eh in fact the only place I remember being shaved, completely shaved everywhere, is, was in Auschwitz when we first got in.
But it may have happened in Flossenbürg and.
As far as.., eh we were, we did not work.
As far as I can remember we did not do, we simply were, {moving his shoulders} were there.
I, I do not, I really do not have a good memory eh {laughing}.
How we spent the day, the whole day?
Eh some, some other people probably would remember maybe better.
Eh I do not remember the kind of food we got.
You know the, the, the food we got at Buna it is very clear to me.
You know the, but of course it was very regular.
You know every day and for a longer time.
But what we had to eat at Flossenbürg I, I do not remember.
Because by that time we were in pretty poor shape {confirming with his head} you know, skinny, not strong and so on.
{breathing} So I, I really cannot give very much detail about eh the time in Flossenbürg.
But eh and then we were evacuated and eh we got on that march.
Although we started out by train, you know, not..
IV: Yeah.
EF: Not marching.
We started out by train.
It was open boxcars.
And eh, eh the problem was that eh as soon as the locomotive start.., started moving some planes would come and strafe it.
And just knock it out.
IV: Yeah.
EF: So we, we could not really move by train {laughing}.
I think the, the Germans, the guards figured out pretty quick that the train was not going to go any place.
Eh and one time eh one of the planes actually strafed the, the, the train.
So eh, eh quite a number of people who were killed.
I do not know though, I assume it was a mistake.
Because otherwise they only hit the locomotive.
But this one time it strafed.
{swallowing} In fact the, the person next to me was, was shot.
His, his chin was like hanging down like that and I was, yeah.
{breathing} So it was just a matter of luck, really.
Eh, eh but then a.., anyway it, obviously the train was not going to move eh.
So then they started us under march.
I think in groups of what 200 and eh.
And eh actually we were getting strafing on the road, too.
So it turned out that we marched mostly at night and in the day time we would be in a forrest.
And eh just you know try to rest and sleep.
And of course this was like, it has been described the death march.
And if you could not make it, eh if you fell down you were shot.
There was a, there was one, one SS man with, with a, with a dog.
That was quite of, sometimes accompanying and you could see him in the back.
And I think we referred to him as the angel of death.
Eh he made sure that nobody who was, who was left survived {breathing}.
Eh we had very little food eh, eh I, during that, I and this was a matter of weeks, maybe a couple of weeks or some more.
I cannot remember exactly.
{breathing} Eh, eh very little food.
I think there was still snow on the ground.
So this would be a late March, Ap.., late March and into April.
It was cold, you know, rainy.
Eh our feet were soaked.
We had, we had eh the shoes, we still had the shoes with the wooden eh soles and eh, eh canvas type thing which were falling apart.
{moving his head} And eh my toes were pretty much frozen.
I think they were kind of hanging on {laughing} {breathing}.
And food very, very little food.
I do not, I, it is, it seems like you got some potato at some place.
How?
We were, because maybe we would, stopped near a, near a town, near a village and..
Somebody would get some potatoes or something.
{breathing} You know we had to sing "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles.
Drei Kartoffeln, das ist alles?" {laughing}
Eh some potatoes I think were probably the only thing that we had to eat on that.
Eh anyway what, what I remembered then eventually we got into a village and into a barn.
A large barn which I think those of us who were left in that 200 group which maybe I do not know was maybe half {moving his shoulders} of what we started of.
Or even less perhaps.
And, and that was the first time that we, that I as, as I remember it was, where I could sleep, really sleep.
And I remember at least we had the memories that I slept like something like 24 hours straight.
And so we got a good rest, you know it, it the barn was closed in and it was straw.
So it was like a luxury, a perfect luxury.
You have to, sleeping in on a forrest first {laughing}, in the, in that time of year.
And the next thing I remember was a, as eh when I woke up was that there was some shooting and some sn.., yelling outside.
And eh finally somebody opens the door to the barn.
And we see some of the German soldiers kind of running back and forth.
Eh there is some shooting.
And we just start running.
And, and then we see tanks, tanks coming down the hill.
Eh and we were eh a little confused, because we had no idea that the Americans were {laughing}..
We did, really had no idea that..
I mean, how could it be Americans from across the sea like that?
So we, we really were thinking that it is Russians.
It is a Russian tank, except there, there is a, the colour of the star did not fit.
Because it was white.
And we knew the Russian star was red.
But we found out pretty quickly it was Americans.
And then thin.., they eh and we ran towards the tanks.
And I think there was shooting back and forth.
And eh the soldiers just eh motioned us to keep going.
Which we did.
And I think eh eventually some of this threw us some chocolates or some other thing, maybe.
Eh but basically we moved eh, we just kept moving back from where they were coming {laughing}.
Eh and that, that was liberation.
And I, this, my brother probably told you this, because we both certainly remembered was that eh as, as we are walking, moving back, just, just walking.
Eh my brother had a, he lost his shoes and he was, he was barefoot.
And eh one of the American, and, and eh this was a, a, eh, a, a, a truck of prisoners of war.
And the truck was, you know the, the roads were very bad, muddy and so on.
And this {laughing} truck was stuck.
And eh, and eh American soldiers were making the prisoners push the truck, try to get it moving.
And eh one of them saw my brother without shoes.
He made one of the German soldiers, it could have been an officer, because I think it was boots.
And made him take off his boots and give it to my brother.
So eh, eh it, now I talked recently with my brother about it.
He remembers it as a tank.
But I am pretty sure {laughing} it was a truck.
Eh it, they would not transport prisoners of war on a tank.
And they were, eh I am sure it was one of those two and a half ton trucks and full of, of prisoners of war who were been taken some place {moving his shoulders}.
{breathing} Anyway then, then we, eh were we ended up eventually exactly how I do not know.
And eh I th.., I remembered that some of the towns eh Stulln and Schwandorf I think was some place nearby.
Anyway we ended up at this Russian eh Russian prisoner war camp eh.
And eh that is were, there were these Serbian eh prisoners, who were Jewish actually.
Which we were very, very surprised that a Jews were actually kept as prisoners of war, Ser.., Serbian nationals.
And I think one of them was a doctor, either a doctor or medic eh.
And so we got some treatment.
I got some treatment for my toes, so safe, safed my toes.
You could still kind of see the marks, but at least I have all my toes {laughing}.
And eh so they kind of took care of us a little bit eh medically.
And eh, eh we were eh we enjoyed the Russians you know.
They were very jolly guys.
You know, they like to drink {laughing}.
They, {laughing} whatever they could find.
They would drink like eh they found a, eh any kind of alcohol.
And eh also they like to sing.
And we learned quite a few of the Russian songs {laughing} there.
And eh a lot of the Russian cursewords.
{moving his head} Eh and eh so we would start getting a eh gaining some strength already in that, in that place.
And eh from eh in one thing eh for even, even though eh you know, we were pretty young, but we knew, we were smart enough to know that we would have to watch what we eat.
That we would not eat too much and not eat too eh..
IV: Too fat?
EF: Heavy, heavy..
IV: Heavy.
EF: Food.
And, and for some reason we knew that and we watched it.
And I think we may have gotten a little bit of diarrhea but not bad.
But many, many people got diarrhea quite badly and {breathing} sometimes fatal.
So eh, eh yeah and eh at that time, because while we were wa.., walking, eh before we got to the camp you know it, it was interesting that the population, the German population was like it was complete hiding.
Like they just disappeared.
You would go into a house and there was nobody there.
So we were just eh you know take some food, take some cloth.
{moving his shoulders} Move on.
I, I, I just gather, I assumed that eh the German civilians were afraid and they were just hiding.
But that is the way it was as, eh during this part.
So after eh, then eh we got into eh we got into touch with some American GI's.
We found a Hungarian that we could talk with, you know.
And I think maybe one Jewish person.
And eh we got to work for the Hungarian {shaking his head}, for the Americans.
And, and eh I think at that time we stayed in that camp, in that Russian prisoner war camp.
We work for, the GI's had a base there and we work for them and we got very regular food.
And that is where I think at least took some months where we really gained back our strength and, and health.
And how we got from there to Indersdorf, I do not know {laughing}.
But somehow that is where we ended up {laughing}.
IV: Yeah, and that is where we end our..
EF: Yeah.
IV: But there is one ques.., so it has been eh, you left eh your home town in..