Quinn+B

Holocaust Survivor

I’m Edith P. I was the youngest of my six brothers and sisters. Born in Czechoslovakia, my family was from middle class. Love and family were the greatest principles that my family could teach us until our community had to go to a brickyard with terrible conditions for two weeks. It all started in June 1944 when they loaded my family into cattle cars and hearing my father’s last words to keep my principles true. Later I was separated from my family and we were all shaved and taken to get assigned to our block. Auschwitz was where I was for six months and I’ve never been so humiliated and depressed with the pain of hunger running through my head. There was no life in Auschwitz, it was worse than a nightmare. The sun would not greet me, but only show the blood red color that reflected off of its outer layer. After being in Auschwitz, I was transferred to Salzwedel along with my sister in-law. We worked in a factory and then in the kitchen. Food was better than what I had had in Auschwitz but I shared some of my extra food with other people in the prison with me. On April 14, 1945, the American troops came and saved us. As soon as I got out of the camps, I went straight to America with my husband and three children. When I went to the concentration camps, something in me died. When you have memories like I have of seeing people die in front of yourself, something in you snaps. No one can say what I have gone through because no one knows how to react in a moment unless you are in it.

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