Read Online A Lucky Child: A Memoir of Surviving Auschwitz as a Young Boy by Elie Wiesel, Thomas Buergenthal - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Elie Wiesel, Thomas Buergenthal
Tags: United States, General, Social Science, Historical, History, Personal Memoirs, Biography & Autobiography, World War II, World War; 1939-1945, Military, Biography, Europe, Holocaust, Eastern, Jewish Studies, Poland, Holocaust survivors, Jewish children in the Holocaust, Buergenthal; Thomas - Childhood and youth, Auschwitz (Concentration camp), Holocaust survivors - United States, Jewish children in the Holocaust - Poland, World War; 1939-1945 - Prisoners and prisons; German, Prisoners and prisons; German
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As time went on, they became routine; but I remember only
the first. The dignity and humanity the young prisoner demonstrated moments before his death — and the disdainful refusal
of the other condemned men to plead for their lives — no doubt served over time to reinforce my conviction that moral resistance
in the face of evil is no less courageous than physical resistance, a point that has unfortunately been frequently lost in
the debate over the lack of greater Jewish resistance during the Holocaust.
Our life at Henryków came to an end abruptly one morning in July 1944, almost a year after we got there. A large contingent
of German soldiers entered Henryków and ordered all of us to line up in front of the barrack. Then we were marched under heavy
guard to what I believe was the freight railroad station of Kielce. When we got there, we found that the prisoners who had
ended up in Ludwików when the labor camp was liquidated were already at the station. Here a freight train was waiting for
us, and we were all ordered to get in. The doors were then locked from the outside. There was little light in the cars, although
we could look out between the slats on either side. I saw that the last car of the train was an open cattle car bristling
with heavy machine guns pointing in all directions. Soldiers with submachine guns sat in little cabs above each car.
As we were boarding the train, we heard various announcements over the loudspeaker. One informed us that our next destination
would be a factory in Germany where we were needed. This announcement was greeted with considerable relief and for a while
seemed to silence the whispered rumors that we were on our way to Auschwitz. While I could not quite imagine what Auschwitz
was really like, I had heard terrible stories about it, and I could sense that the mere mention of the name sent shivers down
the backs of my parents and the other grown-ups.
Many hours passed as the train moved through the Polish countryside. Asked where he thought we were being taken, my father
assured everybody in our car that the train appeared to be moving toward Germany, not Auschwitz. Having studied at the university
in Kraków, not far from Auschwitz, my father knew that part of the country well. Sometime later, I heard my father whisper
to my mother that the train had veered off the route to Germany and was moving in the direction of Auschwitz. Others soon
realized what was happening. People began to cry and pray; others huddled together in whispered conversations. I remember
my father taking a big gulp from a small bottle of vodka before passing it to my mother. My mother kept squeezing my hand
and hugging me from time to time.
Two men in our car started to pry open some floorboards in the middle of the car. Similar escape plans were apparently being
hatched in other cars. As it got dark and while the train was traveling near a forested area, machine-gun fire, coming from
the last car, exploded all around us. Our guards must have spotted those who were trying to escape by sliding through the
holes in the floor of the cars and lying very flat between the rails. We never found out whether any of these prisoners made
it. The train did not stop, and the shooting continued for some time. There appeared to be some additional escape attempts,
followed by more gunfire, but the rest of us resigned ourselves to the fact that we would soon be arriving in Auschwitz.
CHAPTER 4
Auschwitz
I WAS TEN YEARS OLD on that sunny morning in the first days of August 1944 when our train approached the outskirts of the concentration camp
of Auschwitz. Actually, as we were to find out later, we were on our way to Birkenau, located some three or four kilometers
down the road from Auschwitz proper. It was in Birkenau that the gas chambers and crematoriums had been erected, and it was
here that millions of human beings died. Auschwitz proper was merely the public
the first. The dignity and humanity the young prisoner demonstrated moments before his death — and the disdainful refusal
of the other condemned men to plead for their lives — no doubt served over time to reinforce my conviction that moral resistance
in the face of evil is no less courageous than physical resistance, a point that has unfortunately been frequently lost in
the debate over the lack of greater Jewish resistance during the Holocaust.
Our life at Henryków came to an end abruptly one morning in July 1944, almost a year after we got there. A large contingent
of German soldiers entered Henryków and ordered all of us to line up in front of the barrack. Then we were marched under heavy
guard to what I believe was the freight railroad station of Kielce. When we got there, we found that the prisoners who had
ended up in Ludwików when the labor camp was liquidated were already at the station. Here a freight train was waiting for
us, and we were all ordered to get in. The doors were then locked from the outside. There was little light in the cars, although
we could look out between the slats on either side. I saw that the last car of the train was an open cattle car bristling
with heavy machine guns pointing in all directions. Soldiers with submachine guns sat in little cabs above each car.
As we were boarding the train, we heard various announcements over the loudspeaker. One informed us that our next destination
would be a factory in Germany where we were needed. This announcement was greeted with considerable relief and for a while
seemed to silence the whispered rumors that we were on our way to Auschwitz. While I could not quite imagine what Auschwitz
was really like, I had heard terrible stories about it, and I could sense that the mere mention of the name sent shivers down
the backs of my parents and the other grown-ups.
Many hours passed as the train moved through the Polish countryside. Asked where he thought we were being taken, my father
assured everybody in our car that the train appeared to be moving toward Germany, not Auschwitz. Having studied at the university
in Kraków, not far from Auschwitz, my father knew that part of the country well. Sometime later, I heard my father whisper
to my mother that the train had veered off the route to Germany and was moving in the direction of Auschwitz. Others soon
realized what was happening. People began to cry and pray; others huddled together in whispered conversations. I remember
my father taking a big gulp from a small bottle of vodka before passing it to my mother. My mother kept squeezing my hand
and hugging me from time to time.
Two men in our car started to pry open some floorboards in the middle of the car. Similar escape plans were apparently being
hatched in other cars. As it got dark and while the train was traveling near a forested area, machine-gun fire, coming from
the last car, exploded all around us. Our guards must have spotted those who were trying to escape by sliding through the
holes in the floor of the cars and lying very flat between the rails. We never found out whether any of these prisoners made
it. The train did not stop, and the shooting continued for some time. There appeared to be some additional escape attempts,
followed by more gunfire, but the rest of us resigned ourselves to the fact that we would soon be arriving in Auschwitz.
CHAPTER 4
Auschwitz
I WAS TEN YEARS OLD on that sunny morning in the first days of August 1944 when our train approached the outskirts of the concentration camp
of Auschwitz. Actually, as we were to find out later, we were on our way to Birkenau, located some three or four kilometers
down the road from Auschwitz proper. It was in Birkenau that the gas chambers and crematoriums had been erected, and it was
here that millions of human beings died. Auschwitz proper was merely the public
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