IV: Hello, hello, hello, hello...
Today is the..
What is the date today?
IH: The 25th...
IV: Today is April 25, 2013.
We are in the Flossenbürg Memorial and are speaking today with Stefan Hajdu from Hungary who spent the last ten days before the liberation in Flossenbürg. OK.
IV: Born?
IH: '29. 1929, July 21.
IV: Why don't you tell me a bit about your childhood, your family, how you lived.
IH: Yes. I was born in the Balaton lake region, the place I was born is called Taploca in Hungary.
My mother was born there too.
And my father was born about 100 km from there in Dombóvár.
My father had been an officer on the front with the Russians in World War I.
He was shot in the lung during wartime.
And afterwards he was a prisoner of war in Wladiwostok in Siberia for 2 years.
In 1920 there was a big timber business in Tapolca and the owner, and the others who ran it, died.
And they were looking for someone who could keep it running there.
And my father won that.
So after 1920 he was in Tapolca in a large timber, cement, bricks and roofing tiles, and everything needed for construction could be found in this store.
This is where he worked.
This is where he met my mom and they married in 1935.
My brother was born in 1926.
His name was György and I was born three years after György in 1929.
So Györy was born in '26 and I was born in '29, there in Tapolca, in this timber store where we lived too.
Because there was a big apartment there. It was a house and in this house there was a three-room apartment with a bathroom, even back then, and with a large kitchen.
And everything else that belonged in a house.
So that is where I grew up.
I had, as far as I can remember, was a very stable, good childhood.
And we went on lots of daytrips, took long walks.
My mom didn't work, was just busy with my brother and me.
So we were children, and had a very good atmosphere.
You could say we lived well.
From 9...my grandmother, from my mother's side, also lived in Tapolca.
And my grandfather lived too back then, and my grandmother.
Grandfather died in 1936.
And my grandmother was left alone.
After that we visited her every day.
Or my mother, or the children.
You have to know that in Hungary...we were very close to Austria.
And from 19..I think the annexation was in '38.
Before that there was strong antisemitism in Hungary.
We didn't feel it personally very much because my father had been awarded medals in World War I.
And when the laws came against the Jews it always said "except those who have medals from World War I."
And so I can say we didn't feel disadvantaged at all.
I started school in 1936.
In a Jewish school. That was a very small school, because...Tapolca is a small town.
There were maybe 8- 9,000 residents.
But it was a district town, so there werer lots of villages in the area and they all belonged officially to Tapolca.
And when the annexation came, in 1938, my grandparents resettled entirely from Austria to Hungary.
Because my grandparents lived in Vienna in the winter.
And during the summer months they were always in Tapolca, because next to Tapolca is Szigliget...where they had a large vineyard.
My grandfather was a wine merchant.
He made wine himself.
And bought a lot of wine from the neighboring areas.
And he brought it all to Vienna.
And sold it in Vienna because there was a strong interest there...they were very interested in Hungarian Balatan wine.
That was a fine, very good wine.
So that was until 1938, but my grandfather died in 1936 so that we slowly gave up the wine business.
And when the annexation came, it all ended, because we couldn't travel to Austria.
And it was Germany at the time.
Hitler was already there and it was a very unpleasant connection then because of the strong antisemitism.
So I started school in 1936 in the Jewish school.
We were maybe 20 children altogether in the Jewish school.
But I have to tell something interesting about this.
There was a large Catholic school in Tapolca.
And the Evangelic and Protestant children all came to the Jewish school.
That stood out for me.
Still today, I can only explain this in that the level was so much higher.
Lots of intelligent children were there.
Because...the Jews were all traders....and had businesses.
And the city was consolidated.
And it was very...pleasant for the people, and many people lived there.
Six hundred Jews lived in Tapolca.
So after four years in the Jewish school, I went to the secondary school.
We were all together there, from all religions.
But in my class we were 4 Jews, all the others were Catholics, Protestants and Evangelics.
It was just for boys.
So the...girls had a separate school.
We were together in the Jewish school.
So no problems with that.
Then {clears throat} in the school we did feel the strong antisemitism.
Because some of the children insulted us a lot.
I can't say beaten, because we were strong boys.
So they didn't beat us.
But they insulted us and said different things to us.
That was routine.
We lived with that.
It bothered me in the beginning but later I didn't even hear it.
So I went to school until 1943.
When that was over I couldn't learn anymore because it was forbidden for Jews.
They could, but only when there were at least 90% other religions and then the 10% could be from Jews.
But in a small town that wasn't possible.
So I couldn't go to Gymnasium (high school).
But then a chance opened up for me.
We had a very good neighbor, an electrician.
He installed the electricity in buildings.
He also repaired radios.
He had repaired all kinds of electrical devices back then.
I started working there, but not under contract.
But he was the only one who let me come every day and help out for as long as I felt like it.
Because he didn't report it.
IV: yes.
IH: So I was there for a while in '43.
And then a good friend of my ....parents came into a bookshop.
They had a printing shop.
And they said I should come to the printing shop.
And there I was also able to learn printing.
Because that was an interesting field.
And something intelligent.
Because they have to read a lot more, they have to know the letters and everything,
and know the grammar too.
So I went there.
But that was already 1944.
And the political situation in '44 was already worse.
Getting worse and worse, and we were already in the war by then.
Because Hungary had entered the war against the Russians.
And all our soldiers were near the Don river.
But our border was near Karpatok, not by the Don.
And the Don was several thousand kilometers.
But there were more than 200,000 Hungarian soldiers there.
And then it happened that the Russians came.
And the 200,000 Hungarian soldiers remained there.
They froze and were killed in the offensive by the Russians.
That was the biggest shock for Hungary, that they lost 200,000 soldiers.
And many Jews were among the 200,000 soldiers too, but the Jews weren't soldiers.
The Jews were called up by the military but only assigned to work groups.
But they were all at the Don too, in work groups.
And did everything that was necessary on the front.
So this loss of 200,000 was a great shock for Hungary.
They were a little more restrained back then with the antisemitism, because it was for everyone.
The war didn't ask -- who is a Jew and who is not a Jew.
War is war.
So you have to know that. That I went to school in this time.
And then I felt too, that many people had started thinking.
And that the antisemitism in the last year, 1943, wasn't as strong.
But the government had antisemitism, lots of it.
IV: propagated.
IH: Spread propaganda, yes.
IV: But in your everyday life not much had changed from this? In your family?
IH: No, not at all.
Because my father had all these medals from World War I.
So I worked in the printing shop until March 1944.
1944, March 19. It was a Sunday, they occupied all of Hungary in the night.
The German troops arrived.
The Hungarian leadership had been invited to the Führer in Berchtesgaden.
So there wasn't any leadership at home in Hungary.
They were all with Hitler.
In the meantime the army...everything occupied. All of Hungary.
All Hungary is not big, it is a small country with 10 million inhabitants.
So it... from morning until evening it was over.
After the occupation a new government was formed and the new government was a really fascist government.
It...produced 36 laws against Jews.
And these laws had many disadvantages for us.
We had to go to the ghetto in May already.
We had to wear the yellow star.
We had to hand over radios, cameras, also cars, motorcycle, bicycles, everything.
Jews were not allowed to keep anything.
And we had all of those things.
We had a Leica camera.
My father had a motorcycle.
I had a bicycle.
We had a...a radio.
We had to hand over all of that.
At that time they gave a paper for it.
But when we came back, we asked.
"Ooooh, that government is long gone.
We don't know what happened to it."
So everything was gone.
And when we went to the ghetto, all the Jewish houses and apartments were plundered.
Nice paintings, nice rugs, everything that we had built up in my parents'...in 20 years, everything was gone.
We were in the ghetto for about four weeks.
That wasn't so bad because my grandmother lived on the street where the ghetto was so we went to our grandmother.
And it was very pleasant there.
But that was only for three or four weeks.
Then they collected all the people from the area around Tapolca into the Tapolca ghetto.
When that was over, then they brought the Tapolca ghetto and all the other small-town ghettos together into the district capital.
So that we... we were 800 people in Tapolca, 800 Jews.
And then we went to Zalaegerszeg, that was the capital of the district.
We were 4000 people there.
From all over. From the whole district.
We were there for four weeks.
But in the last week, each person was called into the office individually with their luggage.
Everything of value was taken away.
Everything...rings, earrings, necklaces.
So everything, everything edible, or made of silver or Alpaca.
Took everything away.
And a week later deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau.
That was 1944, June.
Then we, the whole family, and all our acquaintances and all my childhood friends who I had gone to school with, arrived in Auschwitz.
That took four days, before we got from Zalaegerszeg to Auschwitz. That was an...
IV: by train.
IH: unpleasant trip, because it was June, and in June it was hot.
It was over 30 degrees.
We were 70 people squeezed into railway wagons.
And many old people, many children and everything.
And many of the old people died along the way.
But they didn't open up.
In Auschwitz they said whoever is still alive should get out.
We got out there.
We had no idea where we were.
Why we were there....and what was going to happen to us.
We had to go through a gate.
Dr. Mengele was waiting for us, very friendly.
He said: "You go left, you go right, and you go to work, you go to the gas."
But he didn't say anything, he just pointed with his stick.
So I stayed with my father.
But all my other relatives, including my mother.
My mother was hanging onto grandmother.
Grandmother was sick and already 70 years old.
And so she also went to the gas chamber.
With many, many relatives and many friends of mine.
One schoolmate came to me, all the others went to the gas chamber.
Auschwitz was upleasant...uh that was Auschwitz-Birkenau.
Birkenau was unpleasant. Bad atmosphere.
It was the Germans too, were always screaming.
And it was so terrible for us.
For those who had come from a small town.
We had no idea what this was.
So then they had us there...we were there for maybe ten days.
For these ten days were had to stand roll call for hours.
They counted, and calculated.
Then out...now everyone goes back, now this.
That was ridiculous when I think about it now.
It made no sense at all.
But yes, they made us stand in the sun for hours.
and, and nothing happened.
After 4, uh, after ten days two large transports were put together.
And we were brought to Buchenwald.
In Buchenwald the atmosphere was much better.
It was overcrowded, so we arrived at...not just a small camp, but a tent camp.
Because the other barracks were all full. Overcrowded.
So that we were there for maybe four weeks.
for three or four weeks.
There were medical examinations, we were vaccinated.
Information was given.
And 4000 people were assembled.
And we...I was sent with my father to Zeitz.
I not sure if you know where Zeitz is.
Zeitz is about 60 km from Leipzig between Leipzig and Gera.
There was a huge petrol factory, not right in Zeitz, but in the outskirts of Zeitz.
It was called BRABAG, that is an abbreviation for Braunkohle-Benzinwerk AG-Werk Zeitz.
That was near the small town of Tröglitz, near Tröglitz.
And they built a large tent camp for us in Tröglitz.
Many of these 4000 people came from Hungary.
But they were also from Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Ukraine, Slovakia, a mixed group.
It was our job in the BRABAG to....the ruins.. uh, how do you say it...I don't know how it is called.
IV: clear out.
IH: Yes, to clear out. Because there were bombings sometimes and the work was suppose to continue.
That is why they needed prisoners, because they do everything.
They laid new railroad tracks because there were railroad lines inside the whole factory and tracks.
And that is where the huge containers were for petrol.
And they...they came and they left.
And when something was damaged, then the prisoners came and for a week they put everything back...everything was repaired.
So that is where we worked as of July.
LaterJuly, I think. Then we traveled, or early August, I don't know exactly.
It was a few days, I think, that were covered.
So I was there until January 1945.
But in the meantime my father had fallen ill.
He caught pneumonia.
Had a cold and after the pneumonia he became weak and it kept getting worse.
So in December he died, next to me.
Then I was left alone.
But there was a small group from my hometown of Tapolca that was still with us.
And these older people, the rabbi was still there, the teacher, the...father-in-law from the rabbi...
So many who had known me since my birth.
So we were together with this group.
They always helped a bit when it was needed.
But I was left alone
And ...there were always, often bombings there, where I was.
We experienced very many unpleasant things.
Because the tent camp was very cold.
It was already October.
And they had begun to build stone barracks and an entire camp next to the other cmap, that was called Rehmsdorf.
Our camp was set up in Rehmsdorf, next to the railway station.
So we systematically...resettled.
Early in the morning we went to the BRABAG works and we didn't return to Tröglitz, but instead to the new barracks.
It was a different group every day that went to the new barracks.
So that by December we were all in the new barracks.
And the tent camp was closed down.
My father had caught a cold in the tent camp, right at the beginning.
And at that time I had the opportunity to go with this Hungarian group into a very good barrack.
In Barrack 5, where there were many of these acquaintances.
Who always looked after us, so that we were well adjusted.
That we didn't feel alone.
So with my friend, with my schoolmate we were together until January.
Two...two things happened in January.
The first thing was that they announced that 800 prisoners could be exchanged with Buchenwald.
800 people go back and 800 new laborers come to Buchenwald.
First they assembled the people who were weak, the ones who couldn't work well.
Who had fallen ill early.
But they only had 200 people together.
600 to 800 were still missing.
And then it was announced: "Who wants to volunteer?"
"Who wants to go back to Buchenwald?"
We spoke about this with my friend.
My idea was, and I said it to him:
"Listen, it is bad here. It can't be worse there.
It could only be the same or better.
Should we try it?"
But we asked the older people what they thought, what they had to say about it.
They said to us: "We are staying, but you should do whatever you want."
We couldn't get any good advice.
That was the thing. Everyone was supposed to judge for themselves whether it was worth it going back or not.
They stayed there and the two of us went back to Buchenwald.
Now I have to say something about this.
No one from this group survived.
Because it was a death march before the liberation.
And everyone could...dead.
And the two of us stayed alive, we who went back to Buchenwald. But...
IV: Can we take a short break. I would like to ask you something before we continue.
IH: Yes, you can ask.
IV: You described that when you arrived in Auschwitz it was terrible.
But you didn't have any idea....what it was.
What it was about, this camp.
Did you know what happened to your mother and grandmother? Or did you find this out later?
IH: Exactly. Exactly as you said.
That no one..said anything.
We didn't know anything.
And we were very unsure because there was a block curfew at nine in the evening.
That meant, when it was dark, no one was allowed to leave the block.
But as curious people we looked out, through the door and through the windows there.
And we saw that the sky was totally red, because the crematorium, four crematoria were burning day and night.
And that was very conspicuous.
Some people said that they had the feeling that the old people and the ones who couldn't work, were maybe being exterminated there.
But how and what was happening with...that we didn't know.
Only a few said that it is very peculiar... to think about what that could be, the block curfew and everything all red over there.
But we didn't know any more.
Then we went away and some in Buchenwald said that all of those people had been gassed.
And burned too.
So also my parents, my..my mother, my grandmother, my buddies and everyone who couldn't work.
But that was just talk between people.
We didn't learn for certain until after the liberation.
Many months later.
So I have to continue, so when we were grouped together with these 800 people who were going back to Buchenwald,
something else, something big happened in Rehmsdorf.
The Americans bombed and destroyed the entire BRABAG works all night long on January 16.
Nothing left but stones on top of stones.
They did a very important job.
Destroying everything.
They dropped so many bombs that the town, it was 3 km away from the BRABAG, also got hit by a few bombs.
And a bomb also fell on our corner of the concentration camp.
But it wasn't destroyed.
It was open for days, but the SS were watching, no one wanted to leave.
We didn't know where we could go, nowhere.
The entire surrounding area was German and we didn't know where we were.
Where is Rehmsdorf? I had never heard of it.
I had heard of Zeitz, and then...it occurred to me that it is not the Zeitz that I was thinking of.
It was the Carl Zeiss Jena that I knew.
From the optics factory in Jena.
And back then I thought that is the same Zeitz. No.
Later I learned this because I was there after the war.
So after the ...bombing, three days later they sent us back to Buchenwald.
These 800 people. The others helped in the damaged village.
Everything had to be fixed up again for the people, the citizens there.
So the two of us, with my friend,
and I have to say, someone else too, I have to say Kertész Imre, Imre Kertész, the Nobel Prize winner, was with me the whole time.
He was with me in Auschwitz.. We came to Buchenwald together,
and he also went from Buchenwald to BRABAG, Kertész.
And Kertész.was sick because his knee was so big.
And ...he was in the hospital from late October.
But he came with me on the transport, the 800, back to Buchenwald.
I only say this because he is a well-known man, and a lot was heard from Kertész later.
Because they made a film out of the Kertész' novel.
And you should know that I worked for 43 years in film in Hungary.
That's how I came to have very many accquaintances.
I worked with many directors and many operators.
And my specialty was preparation. The laboratory.
I worked in the laboratory.
So when this film from Kertész was being made. His...
Then Lajos Koltai, the director, I knew him for 20 years through work.
Later he learned from someone that I was in the exact same camp, exactly where Kertész had been.
Then he came to me and asked me about everything.
And asked me to be an advisor on his film.
That I should help make the atmosphere and everything the way it was back then.
So I just wanted to add that I worked very hard on this film.
And my name is on it, that I was an advisor.
And I helped with lots of details, so that everything was done...right.
But that was just a...
IV: digression.
IH: Yes.
In Buchenwald we lost each other, my friend.
It wasn't possible for everyone to go at once into the baths, these 800 people.
We were in small groups.
And he went in with a different group.
And I went in with the last group.
And that was a major problem.
Because the last group was there at 5 o'clock in the afternoon.
It was already dark.
That was in January.
They forgot to bring us to a barrack.
So after the warm bath they left us outside for the whole night.
Minus three degrees.
And it was terribly cold for us.
But they didn't bring us to the barrack until the next day.
And I had a high fever because I had gotten so cold.
And I caught pneumonia.
After the pneumonia, they noticed right away that I had a high fever.
So I went to the resting barrack.
The resting barrack was a comfortable place, exactly like all the other barracks.
But we didn't have to stand for roll call.
We didn't have to stand in line for food, because someone brought it to us.
It was a quiet atmosphere and the whole barrack was nice and warm.
I was there from January to mid-March, until mid-March.
B...mid-March I was...I had recuperated so that I was brought to the small camp, to the children's barrack.
In...it was called the 66th Barrack.
Barrack 66, that was the children's barrack.
There were many Hungarian children there.
Everywhere I was, I was with Polish and French and Belgian children, so I could barely speak with the people.
No contact because we spoke different languages.
A few could speak a little German, I could speak a little German too back then, but that wasn't really contact.
So I arrived in the 66 in March 1944.
There was a very good atmosphere there, it was a good, young group.
I don't know where they got a radio from.
They had a radio in the concentration camp.
And we heard on it that the Americans were already in Erfurt.
And Erfurt to Weimar is not a great distance.
And Buchenwald is 7 km from Weimar.
And we also heard that the Americans were working there steady.
So on April 4 they said in the megaphone that all Jews should line up on the roll call grounds.
Because the evacuation was beginning.
But you have to know that there were more than 40,000 prisoners in Buchenwald.
Everyone knew that. They couldn't evacuate 40,000 people.
Where to? And why? With what?
So the Jews didn't line up.
A few went to the roll call grounds.
But several thousand hid in different barracks.
Us too, in the children's barracks.
We were there for two days.
I had to go out to the toilet.
And... many people for the transport were missing.
Those who were outside the barrack, like me, I went to the toilet.
I couldn't go back to my barrack.
The kapos had looked there.
When someone came out, they were sent right to the transport.
So we had to walk to Weimar.
Walked to Weimar. We arrived in Weimar in the evening.
And...in Weimar squeezed right away into open coal railway wagons.
And the train departed in the night but no one knew where to and what would happen.
And every second wagon had an SS guard.
An SS was in our wagon.
And we could speak to him and we asked him.
"Where are we going?" "No idea," he said.
Even they didn't know where the transport was going.
So we traveled longer at night, shorter during the day.
During the day we waited on the tracks at a station or somewhere outside.
And when it was dark, we picked up speed.
Then we moved 10 km forward, then 10 km back again.
It went on like that for five days.
So we arrived on April 9 at the familiar spot: at the Zeitz station.
That was afternoon, around two, three o'clock.
We arrived.
We were standing on the first track.
And the empty petrol wagons were standing on the other tracks.
But there were many because the bombing was in January, the empty wagons arrived and couldn't be filled, filled up.
So they stayed there.
And the American airplanes arrived.
They saw from above.
Four fighter planes.
And the four fighter planes saw: they are an excellent target.
And they flew down, bombing everything, with guns on top of it.
Back again, so back, back again.
This bombing lasted for twenty minutes.
In my wagon we were maybe 50, 60 people on top of each other, doing like this...
We got so much shrapnel.
90% in the wagon was dead.
Even the SS.
All dead. From the shrapnel.
I was standing in a large group like this.
And when the bombing was over I saw, he is dead, he is dead.
He is dead. Isn't moving. He either.
I wanted to get out.
But I couldn't.
For one, because they were lying on me. One on top of the other.
And secondly, because...I couldn't get my foot out.
So I tried to get the left foot out.
And then I noticed that my foot was torn off.
Here in the back, a piece of skin was still attached.
So it was hanging.
So that lasted about a minute.
And the others noticed, the ones that were still alive.
And they quickly opened the wagon door.
And sat me over there.
I held it here so that the blood wouldn't run out.
And...the prisoners came and the SS soldiers came, helped.
Took my shirt sleeve off.
And with it we made a...a bandage.
So the blood slowly stopped.
But what should we do with it?
Everyone did like this. It...
No one had ever seen anything like it.
And the SS, a humane SS, came to me.
Asked me if it hurt.
I said.. "No. I don't feel anything at all."
I hadn't noticed that it was torn off.
I don't feel anything..so...it was such a shock that the nerves suddenly...were not working.
Not at all.
And then he asked if I felt that in back, this skin.
No.
He took his pocketknife and cut it off.
There were a lot of prisoners there.
And they held me.
And a Red Cross group with doctors and First Aid wanted to come.
But they weren't allowed to come to us.
They had said "no."
They saw that it was a big problem, but they didn't let them come there.
I said to the SS who had cut it off:
"Please, please bandage and then I can wrap everything, maybe there is some."
He left and came back with a large amount.
W...Me and my comrades, who were there, and he helped too.
We wrapped it up.
But I have to say...I don't know if you know.
At that time the bandages were made of paper.
And this paper was soaked with blood in five minutes.
So with this stub, soaked through with blood...I made it to Flossenbürg.
Without medical care.
I did get one help.
The SS was dead.
They took his coat, and gave it to me.
Wrapped me in it, that is how they set me down.
And that is how I endured until I arrived here in Flossenbürg on April 14.
But I didn't arrive in FLossenbürg, but in Slovakia, in Tachau.
Tachau is around 8 or 10 kilometers from here.
But across the border.
Because the...railway line there was...not destroyed.
That's why they brought us there.
The ones who could walk, they were accompanied through the woods to Flossenbürg.
The seriously ill, like me...they were transport in cars, trucks that were there.
They laid me down on it and brought me through the woods to Flossenbürg.
My worst journey was from Tachau to Flossenbürg, on the dirt road through the woods.
Because I was already in pain but this transport, unforgettable.
Never in my life have I had such...pain as I did then on that trip.
I arrived in the sick station.
They left us at the sick station.
A male nurse arrived.
His name was Janos Bergmann
We found his name today on the list.
He asked in German what nationality I am.
I said Hungarian.
He was Hungarian too.
Then we started to speak Hungarian.
He asked me where I came from.
I said: "from Buchenwald."
"And what happened to you?"
I said: "We were bombed."
"And that was done by doctors?" "No.
No doctor has seen this.
It is just as it was after the bombing."
Then he took it off. It stunk.
This piece that hadn't gotten any blood for five days.
Can you imagine, with all the blood, with everything, it stunk.
He took me right to the bath, washed me and brought me right to the OP.
And here in the OP was a doctor, if I remember, his name was Dr. Pollack.
And he amputated me.
And I fell asleep in narcosis after the bath, and woke up a day later.
And then my leg was cut off here.
A little bit higher than where it had been bound.
Cut off a bit further.
But it was done very well medically.
But I weighed 34 kilograms.
I had caught a cold again from the short journey from the bombing to Tachau.
So I had pleurisy again, had pneumonia and was very weak after this operation.
So they had to put me in the sick station right away.
I got a very good bed.
I had a bed for me alone.
The last time I had my own bed was before Auschwitz.
Then we were...one moment...let's take a short break.
CM: Yes, rolling again. Thanks.
IH: Yes, so after the operation, as I just said, I was given my own bed.
Bergmann took care of all that...for me.
And I was lying there for a day,
And then the evacuation began, here in Flossenbürg too.
And again it started with the Jews.
First the Jews were to gather at the roll call grounds.
And early in the morning they took me out of the sick station and to the roll call grounds just in a shirt, the way I had been in bed.
Taken out of the bed, brought to the roll call grounds, laid me down there.
That was it.
But that was a cold morning.
And I was freezing.
There may have been frost because it was April.
And since it was cold, I kept sliding back a little, a little more.
Because some 10 or 15 meters behind was a large building.
And I wanted to lean on the wall.
So I slid, slid, slid.
And a prisoner came from the right.
A healthy, good... a Ukraine, as I later learned.
And he asked me: We're you going, comrade?"
I said: "To the sick station."
He took me, brought me to the sick station.
In the meantime, all the people...had begun the death march.
The sick people managed 10 kilometers, all in the mass grave.
And I went back to the sick station and Bergmann asked:
"Why are you here again?"
I lied: "They sent me here."
He said...he hid me in his own room.
He had an office.
He put me in his own bed, closed the door.
He said if they do a control or someone checks around, they shouldn't find me.
I laid there for a day and then he brought me back to my own bed.
And we stayed there until the Americans came.
But I have to say that it wasn't the Americans who liberated us.
The Russians came, early morning.
Two Russian soldiers came into our room with machine guns.
They were looking for Germans.
And in my room there were three Slavic - I'm not sure Serbian or Bulgarian - people, sick and they spoke with the Russians.
Because the Slavic languages are similar.
And said who we were and where they were because they didn't know where they were.
And then they learned that they were already in Germany.
Because the border was there, two kilometers, and they were only allowed to go as far as the border.
So they disappeared after a hour.
And the Americans arrived in the afternoon.
So I was liberated twice.
Once in the morning by the Russians and once in the afternoon by the Americans.
And the Americans called right away for ambulances, brought penicilin and lots of medicine right away.
So that the atmosphere became normal after a few days and there was everything that the sick needed.
We had come so far that we were given food and drink.
When...with the evacuiation they forgot to give food and drink, because everything was empty.
Everyone was gone, only the people in the sick station were there. So...
My friend made me tea, once, twice.
And had also brought something, so that I did get something.
Uh...Bergmann.
So we were there for a few days.
And then Bergmann arranged that an American doctor came and examined me.
And he determined that I had pneumonia, freshly amputated, which was a big deal.
Pleurisy, full of water in back.
And noticed that my feet and hands, everything full of water.
My kidneys weren't working.
So then they said, this is no good here.
After a few days they brought us to the SS..I'm not sure...apartment or SS barracks.
And in the SS barracks I was immediately given a German nurse.
She was called Sister Mariann.
And she took care of me day and night.
I was given grapefruit.
I had to drink every half hour...a feeding cup from this...liquid.
Was very good, full of vitamins.
They brought food too.
And prescribed a very strict diet.
No salt for a whole month.
No salt at all in the food I was given.
So that was my first ...how can I say...impressions of Flossenbürg.
I was there, I think for another three or four weeks.
And then they brought us to Weiden, to the municipal hospital.
They put us in a large room In the municipal hospital where there were 10 patients.
We were four people who were put in there.
And there were six Germans.
But the Americans wanted us to have better food.
We should have better medicine.
They got us everything, but not for the Germans.
That is why it was very...problematic that the Germans and the foreigners should be in the same room.
Then they did it differently.
And...they set up a special hospital for foreigners in Weiden, a DP hospital.
And that was in the Weiden Lyceum.
On Martin-Luther-Strasse.
I stayed there for a year after the liberation.
I was there until May '46.
I brought many documents with me. {clears throat}
From Weiden too, that I had registered.
They also wrote where I had come from, from Flossenbürg.
And what number I had in Buchenwald. 64823.
So it is all in my documents that I just gave to the lady there.
And I also have a picture of Sister Mariann, who took care of me.
And she wrote on the back:
"To Stefan. To this time. Was my patient in Flossenbürg camp and in Weiden."
And I just showed this picture.
And everyone looked. After 60 years I still have this picture.
And they made lots of copies, because Anna Andlauer wants to search.
Maybe Mariann is still alive.
But I don't know anything else about Mariann.
Just that she was from Göttingen.
And she was, she learned at the medical university in Göttingen.
And so she became a nurse during the war.
That I know. I don't know anything else.
So I was in Weiden... all of '45.
With the stump that was amputated in Flossenbürg.
They saw on an X-ray that a small tip from the bone remained.
And that had to be operated.
But my physical condition was such that ...better not to touch if possible.
They said, it stays.
If necessary, then it will be done.
In December 1945 it was cankerous and since it was cankerous it had to be operated within two days.
They operated on me three days before Christmas.
And noticed that the bone is very soft.
Could cut it with a ...knife.
So it was amputated further, all that was soft, they cut off up to the middle of my thigh.
That was December '45.
Then I recovered very fast.
In February, March I was already able to walk on my own in the city with crutches.
And it was the Jewish Easter.
I don't know if you know.
Very similar to the Catholic Easter.
But the Jewish Easter has the very strict rule that one is not allowed to eat bread for eight days.
Only Matzoh.
And it begins with a very big supper, which for Christ was the last supper.
And this supper is ceremonial, religious...done with strict rules.
In Weiden there was a Jewish committee and a Jewish society.
And they knew that two Jews were lying in the Lyceum.
They invited us and brought us there.
It was a very good group, mostly Poles.
There were also Slovaks...no Hungarians.
And there were Lithuanians, and from Latvia, from Estonia. A mixed group.
But it was a religious festive evening.
At one moment a strapping Polish boy sat next to me and asks:
"How are you?"
I say: "It's getting better."
He says: "Where had you come from back then?"
I said: "From Buchenwald"
"Buchenwald. Yes. And was Buchenwald bombed?"
"Yes," I said. "It was bombed."
"Is that where you lost your foot?"
"Yes," I said. "I was there."
"I held your shoulder when your leg was cut with the knife."
"And as long as I live I will never forget that."
"I have never in my life seen anything like that."
And he said: "That you are alive, that you are here, that is a miracle. That is a miracle," he said.
And as a Pole he had good...connections to Regensburg.
The Joint was there.
Joint was the Jewish aid organization from America.
There was the UNRRA. The UNRRA was from the United Nations.
And the Joint was extra for the Jewish prisoners, former prisoners and they gave a lot of help.
Packages every month...organized and sent clothes.
And they helped with a lot.
This Pole had connections to the Joint director in Regensburg.
Because the Regensburg Joint director...his parents came from Poland.
But he had been born in America.
He told him all about me and six weeks later two officers from the Joint came to the director in our hospital.
And they asked about my health...condition.
If it is possible that they could build a prosthesis.
They said that yes, that was possible.
But I would absolutely have to have good care.
And it was organized so that if I didn't feel good I could lie down.
So the Joint organized that in May.
So I was released from Weiden in May.
And they brought me to Regensburg.
In my apartment I was given a very nice room.
And the food came from the Jewish committee...I went there every afternoon and every evening.
I received food there.
And I was given the address and they took me to the place where artificial limbs were made.
So I went there every day with the streetcar.
And they helped me a lot there.
So that a good prosthesis would be made.
I don't want to talk a lot about it.
I learned how to walk there.
It was a walking school. To learn how to kick, how to walk up stairs, how to walk down stairs.
Because that is a serious problem when you don't have your own knee.
And I didn't have my own knee.
So I went their every day for six weeks.
After six weeks my prosthesis was ready.
Then I met with Mr. Levine.
The director of the Joint.
I said: "I am done. What happens now?"
He said: "Stefan, there are two possibilities."
You can go back to Weiden to the hospital or there is a children's camp not far from here near Ansbach in Strüth.
There are Hungarian children there.
You could fit in there if you wanted
You could be together with other children.
But if you don't want that you can also stay there and not be a part of this group.
I said: "I want that."
I want to go there and remain an individual person who can decide for himself what he wants to do and what not.
So I arrived in Strüth, that was in June 1946.
I was there in June, July, August.
I made very good friends with the people.
I was given my own room.
The others were together...five, six people in a room.
I did a lot together with the other children.
But the children went off to do farm work.
Because they all wanted to go to Israel and wanted to prepare themselves so that they knew how to work on the land.
So I helped a lot.
I was the connection between the group and the Americans.
Because I could speak German well at that thime and I could even speak a little English.
Because I always heard English from the Americans and from the Joint employees, so I began to undersand, I learned it.
So I was very useful to them, I was a great help.
And then they noticed that some of us were over 17 years old.
In 1946 I was already 17 years old too.
And all the others were mixed.
Some were 14, others were 17.
So they said we are 25 children over 16.
We are going to take a trip, they said, an excursion..
They asked me if I wanted to come too.
Yes, I'd like to go with you," I said.
I helped with getting the tickets...in Ansbach.
And...traveled from Asbach to Munich, and transferred in Munich.
We traveled to the Indersdorf cloister.
So we arrived in the Indersdorf cloister...we lied.
We said we came from Budapest.
From Hungary.
There were many Hungarian boys there.
And so these 20, 25 Hungarian children also went in, into this large group.
So I was there for another six weeks.
But a medical commission came and examined everyone, to give us medical care.
They knew right away that I had pleurisy again...wet.
And that can lead to high fever.
And they said I have to go to the hospital.
They brought me to Gauting near Munich.
There was a large sanatorium in Gauting.
I was there for four weeks.
They did a major examination.
They determined that I did not have a contagious tuberculosis.
I had a shadow on the lung.
And I had this wet pleura.
But I didn't really need treatment.
That's why they sent me to get fresh air in Bad Wörishofen.
And there was a large children's sanatorium in Bad Wörishofen.
Only children with lung diseases were there.
But not serious cases. The serious cases stayed in Gauting.
So just the ones that needed better air, good care and ... the good opportunities...they were all in Bad Wörishofen.
So I stayed there from late October 1946 until late November 1947.
And I recovered totally.
Since I was treated there and checked every week in Bad Wörishofen,
I had no more problems with my lungs and my pleura until today.
So that is my story, that has to do with the liberation.
Because later, in November, I returned to Hungary.
Because I learned that my brother was still alive, and two of my mother's sisters.
And they took me, they called.
"Stefan, come to Budapest. We will help you."
And they really did help alot.
And the next year in March I began working in the film studio, with the film laboratory.
So I worked there for 43 years.
And I went into retirement from there.
1992, January 1 I became a real pensioner.
That is my life, in short summary.
IV: Let's take a short break. I would like to ask a few things about Hungary...
IH: Yes, we can continue...
IV:...a short break. A sip.
IH: Before World War I, Hungarian-Austrian monarchy.
And the official language was German.
My father was an officer in World War I.
But even in the military they only spoke German.
So I heard a lot of German.
My mother and grandmother spoke German with each other.
I never spoke German but I heard it.
And in school we started to learn German.
But that wasn't much.
In Auschwitz, I really heard it for the first time,
because everyone who came before the commission was asked: "How old?"
IV: And then one had to speak German.
IH: My father said: "You should say 16."
I said "16."
"Good, you can go."
Because uh, we didn't know why.
Later we learned that anyone under 16 was sent to the gas.
They are children, they said.
And I was 15 in Buchenwald.
I wasn't 15 yet when I uh....came to Auschwitz, yes, that was later.
IV: Shall we go on?
CM: Yes, it's already rolling.
IV: It's already rolling. OK. I didn't know.
IH: So I learned simply from listening.
I never learned the grammar.
All that I can, I put together by myself, from what I had heard.
Since in recent years, for the last 12 years, I have been to Germany every year.
I was given an artificial limb from the pension office.
And provided the opportunity to recuperate each year.
And go to a bathing spa every two years.
But that came to an end in 2010.
They don't want that anymore.
They said we are foreigners. We are Hungarians.
Hungary is also part of the European Union.
They don't pay anymore.
Now I pay it myself.
But that is a big strain.
And I need this bathing spa because since I turned 80 I've had major problems with my healthy leg.
With my shoulder, with...everything.
These problems come with age, and can develop more slowly...
when one does some treatments at a bathing spa.
They have gymnastics there, and swimming.
And electric treatments.
So this is very important.
But unfortunately now I have to find an organization and someone who can help me, that the whole burden doesn't fall on me, the whole thing.
Or someone pays it all or gives something towards it.
But it is absolutely necessary.
I have to be honest .
IV: Besides these spas and artificial limb, do you also have...
IM: I don't have any problems with the artificial limb, they still pay that.
They just don't pay the bathing spa and the recuperation
Recuperation and ...is over.
But they give the artificial limb because I am recognized as war-disabled.
For that I get a pair of shoes, prosthesis shoes, every year.
And if necessary, the doctor examines me.
And if he says so I have to do a prosthesis repair.
And they pay for this.
Last year I had a problem.
I contacted the pension office.
And said that I need a new upper part, from here to here.
And they told me...
The doctor...also said that it is absolutely necessary and they paid for it.
But I paid for the bathing spa.
IV: Did you receive any other form of compensation from the German state?
Besides these recuperation spas, did they pay compensation?
IH: Yes, now, in recent times I receive a little...money every month.
Because they determined that I worked in the BRABAG as...
And after the war I was in different hospitals and DP camps for three years in Germany.
And the people from the insurance, Mitteldeutsche Versicherung Erfurt, also provide support with money.
So that is why I receive about 200 euros a month.
IV: Mmh. Now I would like to ask you: You just said that you told your story here for the first time.
IH: Yes.
IV: On the radio, at the school. And you said in Hungary you never spoke about all those years.
IH: In Hun...
IV: Can you perhaps say why this was? What the situation was like after the war? For Jewish citizens.
IH: One has to know that a lot of people returned to Hungary.
So there were, I don't know how many Jews were in Hungary before.
I don't know. I only know that 600,000 went to the gas chambers and perished, like my father and like Don.
I know that.
I also know that about 20,000 people came back. Jews.
And these 20,000 Jews, that is quite a lot for a small country like Hungary.
10 million inhabitants. And 20,000, for a long time the state was not interested in us at all.
Then somehow in uh '48, '49, negotiations were held with the German authorities.
But they didn't want to pay.
Because it was Russian territory.
And they weren't going to pay anything to the Russians.
The Hungarian Jewish committee didn't have any money.
And uh..but it made a list of all the people who were in the camps.
They had a connection but...they took care of social things.
We could go to a better hospital.
They paid the medicine for some, contributed some...money each month.
So they gave social aid.
But I worked.
I had a very good job from '48 to '92.
I...I got married, I had a family.
So I had much better social opportunities than the others who weren't able to work.
Or who didn't have a specialty or were...didn't have work.
So I didn't have very close ties to the Jewish community back then.
I didn't go to church either.
More than 30 years long.
Because I thought if there is a God, how could something like that happen, what happened to us?
Where was God back then when we were in Auschwitz, in Buchenwald, and everywhere?
Where was the God, when I arrived there?
That is why I wasn't in the chur---uh, synagogue for more than 30 years.
Not in any kind of church.
From Israel I learned that my friend, the one I lost in Buchenwald, lives in Israel.
And we got in touch.
He came to Budapest.
And we became friends.
We celebrated our 60th birthdays... together in Israel with my two daughters, not far from Aschkelon.
So with my friends...everything was okay with us again.
And afterwards he sent his brother-in-law to Hungary with his daughter.
Because they had lots of bad teeth.
And the dentists in Hungary are very cheap.
And work wonderfully.
That's why many many people from Austria and from Israel come to Hungary for dental treatment.
And I helped the people who came, the brother-in-law of my friend.
That was the brother of his wife.
The wife was Polish.
And at that time he said to me...His name was Binhas.
Binhas said to me: "Tell me, is there a synagogue here somewhere?"
I said: "Yes, In Buda."
"Let's go there."
"Hey, listen, I've never been there.
I only know where it is but I've never been there."
Then he said: "Yes, Let's go. I am curious," Binhas said.
I went with him.
We had an old Rabbi.
And now we see just how small the world is.
This rabbi was named Singer.
And this SInger asks me: "Where are you from?"
"I'm from the Lake Balaton region."
"Lake Balaton region. And your father?"
"My father is from Dombóvár.
That's about 60 kilometers from Lake Balaton."
"Dombóvár. Nice. I went to school in Dombóvár."
What was your father's name?"
I told him.
"I was invited to your grandparents every Saturday because I was a Jewish pupil."
Every day I went to a different family and was given lunch."
I was at your grandparents' every Saturday.
So we became very good friends.
Since then I go to the synagogue.
Unfortunately he died.
But he was such a good friend of mine.
He helped very very much.
And he asked me about the Holocaust problem.
And I once had a conversation with an educator.
But no one else asked me to talk about it.
And I am the only one in Hungary who came home without a leg. No interest.
IV: Did you speak with your family about it?
IH: What?
IV: Did you speak with your family about it, did you tell them about it?
IH: No. They never asked.
They don't want me to talk about it.
But they think it is an emotional problem with me.
I did tell some things.
And little details...but the entire story all together...
No one has heard it. Even my wife first heard it yesterday.
Yes. That's the way it is.
Hungary is very interesting. Antisemitism is very strong again.
IV: Today.
IH: Today. Yes. And the government is so center...
Yes. A little left, a little right.
But mostly for right.
And best friends with the rightwing extremists.
Because we have elections next year.
Now you can understand, why that is.
That is why the radicals can do anything.
{drinks} They need votes.
IV: Hmm.
IH: They need votes.
Otherwise they lose power. So, I...
IV: I'd like to ask you something.
IH: Go ahead.
IV: You have just told a lot of details. You were able to remember many things, names, days...
IH: A lot.
IV: And you spoke very little about how...about how you really felt, emotionally.
You were only a child.
You were 15 years old. You experienced many difficult things.
You often said, that wasn't so terrible, that was nice.
How did you...how did you feel?
Were you scared, did you know that you might die?
You saw many terrible things happening around you.
About which you told very little.
What was that like for you as a child all those years?
IH: Yes. That is a good question.
Many people have asked me this.
Well, I don't know if you can understand this.
I was a child.
A child believes very differently than an adult.
A child doesn't start to cry when he loses his leg.
"Oh, what will happen to me? What will I be able to do?
How will I live?"
Not for a single moment.
The only thing I thought was: should I tie this tight?
That should be bandaged.
And if possible, I should let live...stay alive.
Not look far off.
Not think about what could...happen.
A child doesn't think about something like that.
A child has a very different...how do you say it...atmosphere in his head.
Because he is not thinking far, not looking far, what is going to happen with him.
For example back in Strüth.
All the children were preparing for the move to Israel.
And in Israel they were going to work in farming and build up the land of Israel.
I understood. That was that goal. And there were educators.
And they talked about it.
I, I knew, if I have one leg... I have time.
When I am able to walk well, when I can uh...am healthy enough.
then I still have time to think about what I want to do.
There was an opportunity for me to go to America.
Because a cousin of my aunt.. uh from my mother, first cousin, lived in New York.
Her husband was a very famous doctor.
And she was an doctor too.
Named Lax.
And the Laxes did everything so that I could come to America.
Yes. But the politics.
The politics said, we only need healthy people.
We have enough sick people in America.
So we aren't going to import sick people.
I was sick, they said, out of the question. That was one thing.
Secondly, I had made close friendships with the boys.
They wanted to go to Israel.
And I asked: "What can I do?"
They said: "You can come along."
A new country is being created.
You are certain to find somethng that you can...where you can work well.
I understood.
Then I got sick. Went to Bad Wörishofen.
In Bad Wörishofen I was very good friends with the doctors.
I was 17, 18 years old at the time.
In '47, I was already 18 years old.
We spoke with the doctors.
And the doctors asked what my plans were.
I said: "Maybe I'll go to Israel."
And if a new homeland is being built, I'll find my place there.
And then the doctor said to me: "Listen,
Let me give you some good advice.
Don't go to Israel.
For your lungs, for your pleura, the climate in Israel is not good.
A person with a sick lung is not allowed to go into the sun for 10, 20 years.
Can't bathe in the sun.
Otherwise it starts all over again.
And many things can happen that can damage the health.
That is why, because I already had problems with my lungs.
He said: "I advise you to stay somewhere in Europe, or in a country where it is not too warm.
Where there isn't heat.
Because that is not good for you."
So Israel got put aside again.
At that time I learned that I have a brother living in Budapest.
Two aunts, two sisters from my mother.
And they called me. I didn't say yes or no.
I thought about it.
What were my other options?
I didn't have any other options.
In the last year in Bad Wörishofen I had the chance to leave the sanatorium and learn a skill.
I learned photography.
Alone. Alone. So that was a possibility.
Five or six Polish people registered there and I was the only Hungarian.
And I took this -- what is it called -- course there for three months.
And I did very well on the exam.
And that was a basis until today that I was able to start working with film.
I had wanted to go into film back then already.
I had said photography or film.
And I succeeded in getting into film.
Is what I told you a sufficient answer?
IV: Yes. Did you have a happy life?
IH: Very happy. Very happy.
I.. was at the same workplace for 43 years.
I loved this work so much that I sometimes went there at night to make sure everything worked out.
Because, uh, over time I not only learned, I became a leader, too.
I washead of the black-white department... I was the head.
And I had more than 70 people and very big responsibility.
Because every week we made the daily news show, documentaries, film reports, advertisements, military films.
So all kinds of films and between every year two, three feature films.
And they all went through my hands.
And I was responsible for getting it into the cinema on Thursdays.
So that was a very big responsibility.
And it was very important work.
And, oh, I had a feelng for it.
I had such a desire to do it.
And I was paid very well.
And the result was that I worked there for 43 years. Enough?
IV: That's enough. Thank you.
IH: My pleasure. I enjoyed doing it.
People are finally interested in my...
We have a saying: no one is a prophet in his own country.
I can say exactly that too.
No one in Hungary is interested.
Here more and more people are interested.
Yes. {clears throat}
IV: So now let's do a bit...