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[Page 337]
by Lusia Fuchs, Jezierna
Translated from the Polish by Dobrochna Fire
In the Jewish section of Zborów, On the main street in the center of town, Stands a rather large twostory building That is neither very old nor very new.
You know this building well, my friends,
A curved staircase leads up to the residence
He is our representative everywhere,
We have to think: the Master of lightening
Our Duce.[1] We are his to own,
If someone should ask,
This famed institution
The Judenrat, but above all its members,
There are thirteen of them, you know.
One can see from His Excellency Obmann's words
When he leaves the Judenrat building
We invariably all wish him the same
He is respected by both great and small,
He gets along well with the Nazi authorities.
When he walks down the street with them,
It took such effort, conniving, deception, and toil
He himself arranged their order. I'll tell you in secret
His greatest flaw,
Only then is he relieved, does he revel, does he live,
He gets the greatest satisfaction from the action
He is not ashamed of this,
Have you seen him, good people,
Onto heads or backs, women, children.
All in all, this ruling creep,
I have devoted enough space to you, Obmann.
After him, I must say with pathos, goes
A puffy face, bloodshot eyesyou can see
Whoever knows how he lived before the war
He should be congratulated
You all know about this well,
There is nothing I wish to write about Schwab;
The camp Hauptverbindungsmann[5]
And what are you so proud of, Sanie dear?
Not much space on my paper
I proclaim, may it be known for all time,
We can't complain about Rosenberg;
He is polite, but is this politeness inborn,
Leibaleh Kronisch, the housing clerk,
People pursue him, quite a few waking him
It's too wet and leaky for one, too dry for the other.
This one complains of the darkness, like being buried alive.
One has a burst pipe in his kitchen,
Everyone comes to him. Everyone sincerely wishes that you,
His most secret desire is
You all know the tall old gent, on daily duty at the secretariat.
Listen up, our dear medic, why do you not take
The Judenrat's cashier is in charge of rations.
With his cap tilted a bit over his eyes,
His hat may be tilted over his eyes,
He still knows how to make eyes at someone,
He never parts from his briefcase,
Better for him. Our Marder from Jezierna
He does not have Schwab's chutzpa
The one who should be judged among all others
He left his wife and daughter in the Jezierna camp,
He fondles them, and the girls flock to him
They call him old man. He believes they love him,
I have finished describing you all.
But this is not yet all.
Your shindigs, drunken carousals, parties, the excitement!
There would not be enough room. In all this hoopla,
Although you may consider yourselves to be better,
I may have here used too many words. |
by Menachem Duhl
Translated by Maya Avis
These lines were written by Lusia Fuchs, daughter of Shaul Fuchs and Nusia (nee Heliczer), in the Zborow ghetto. This young child was also one of the forcefully removed Jews of Jezierna.
She was 15 years old when she wrote these lines. Through the eyes of a child she witnessed the events around her, the demolition and the daily reality which, taken all together, brought her to understand the tragedy of her people, who were sentenced for eradication.
She also saw those few Jews who, at the expense of the persecution and misery of others, were able to live good lives. This wounded her young soul even more. Her wish was that the Jews from the Jezierna that once was, who remained among the living, would know how those days had been; that the whole world would know how the Jews had lived, how they were persecuted and destroyed in the ghetto. These very lines are the voice of one of our martyrs that calls out to us from the grave: DO NOT FORGET!
Dozia Blaustien, who was saved by a miracle, entrusted us with this poem for publication and we are fulfilling the composer's last wish by printing it in Polish, the language in which it was written.
Perhaps, while reading these lines, not just one will shed a tear, and will recall the author. This will be her compensation.
May this be an eternal memorial to her.
Editor's Note:
There are no page numbers in the last section of the book, which contains articles written in various languages.
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Compiled by M.D.
Translated by Doron Friedman
YAD VASHEM _ Remembrance Authority of Holocaust Martyrs and Heroes
19th of Kislev, 5720
To
Mr. Mendel Duhl Dear Sir, Under Discussion: War Criminal Richard Dyga The prosecution in the town Waldshut, Germany contacted us with a request to assist them in finding witnesses survivors of Jezierna Camp near Tarnopol, who can testify regarding the activities of the war criminal, commander of the camp Richard Dyga. We have been told by our friend N. Blumenthal that you would be able to assist in the mitzvah of bringing the wicked to justice. We would be grateful if you could provide names of people who have knowledge of the aforementioned criminal. |
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Sincerely, (signature) Dr. Y. Kermish Director of the Archives |
Translated from German by Shoshana Rappeport
Waldshut, the 5th of February 1960
State Prosecutor at By Air Mail
Mr.
Re: Proceedings against Dear Mr. Blumenthal, I have received notification from Magistrate Naumann, the investigative judge at the Giessen district court, that you may be able to give information as a witness in an investigation currently proceeding here. I am conducting an investigation against the former camp commander of the forcedlabor camp Jezierna in the Tarnopol district, Richard Dyga, who comes from upper Silesia. If you have any knowledge or are in possession of any documentation I would be grateful if you would communicate this information. Should witnesses be known to you I request notification concerning the possible addresses. |
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Respectfully, (signature) Dr. Angelberger |
Translated from German by Shoshana Rappeport
3.1.1960 To the State Prosecutor at the Waldshut District Court Attorney General to Dr. Angelberger Bismarckstr. 23 Waldshut, Germany Dear Dr. Angelberger,
We hereby confirm the receipt of your esteemed letter dated 2.12.1959, file number 1 Js 8658/59, regarding Richard DYGA, former director of the central work camp Jezierna in the Tarnopol district. |
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Copy: Mr. Attorney General Schüle | With great respect, (signature) Dr. J. Kermisz Director of Archives |
Translated from German by Shoshana Rappeport and Ayelet Ophir
Jerusalem, 14.2.1960 To the State Prosecutor at the Waldshut District Court to Dr. Angelberger Attorney General Registered Post Waldshut Bismarckstr. 23 Dear Dr. Angelberger, Regarding: War criminal Richard DYGA We confirm with thanks the receipt of your valued letter of 27.1.1960 with the enclosed photographs of war criminal Richard DYGA. We also thank you for the information about the confrontation of DYGAS by Mr. Simon Wiesenthal, engineer. We are endeavoring to find further incriminating evidence against DYGA and will forward such to you without delay.
With regard to witnesses who presently live in Poland whose addresses we gave you in our letter of 24.1.1960, we would like to add that it is possible to make contact either directly or through the Jewish Historical Institute, A1. Gen. Swierczewskiego 79 Warszawa/Poland. |
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Copies: Simon Wiesenthal, Eng. Linz
M. Dol |
Respectfully, (signature) Dr. J. Kermisz Archive Director |
Translated from German by Shoshana Rappeport
Jerusalem, the 25th of March 1960 To the State Prosecutor AIR MAIL REGISTERED at the Waldshut District Court to Attorney General Dr. Angelberger Bismarckstrasse 23. Waldshut, Germany Regarding: War Criminal Richard DYGA Dear Dr. Angelberger, In continuation of our letters from 3.1.1960 and 14.2.1960 we would like to inform you that besides the persons named in those letters we have been able to locate the following witnesses:
In regard to the last witness named, we would like to mention that DYGA murdered her father. |
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Respectfully, (signature) Dr. J. Kermisz Archive Director |
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Copy: Attorney General Schüle Central Office of the State Judicial Administration Schorndorfer Str. 28, Ludwigsburg/Germany
Mr. Simon Wiesenthal, Engineer |
Translated from Polish by Professor Tomasz Rutkowski
227/94
Concentration camp (lager) in Jezierna was created in February 1942 solely as a labor camp (arbeitslager) for maleJews, which was later converted to an extermination camp (vernichtungslager). Initially, a labor office (arbeitsamt) sent prisoners and then the Gestapo. A type of work building roads. Working and living conditions were unbearable. The camp was guarded by Ukrainian police posts surrounded by a high fence with barbed wire. The sanitation below any criticism. Long time there was no infirmary and sick people were lying together on a single bunk with healthy, and even after death they lay for a few days. High mortality from typhus. Often they died from exhaustion and the blows they received from the executioners. Local people, Ukrainian, helped camp executioners. And [they died from] cases of denunciation, accidents, because of elimination from the concentration camp, which were on the daily agenda. Often there happened also murders of Jews, asking for a piece of bread, which were committed by peasants from the same village. When someone of the prisoners (lagerinsas) managed to escape, they would hang in public ten innocents, to terrorize. For minor offenses [prisoners] were shot, beaten and often hanged publicly. In the concentration camp they killed about 20 thousand Jews either from starvation, disease and execution. lania. [slaughtered like deer]
The concentration camp was burned down in August of year 1943.
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/ Dr. Liblich / | |
Histor. Kommiss. Stuttgart / J. Eiger / |
Translated from Yiddish / Hebrew by Sari and Daniel Avis
Devora Lempert was invited to submit testimony in the trial against war criminal Richard DYGA
By Air Mail
in Waldshut Mrs. Dwora Lempert |
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State Prosecutor at the District Court of Waldshut Tel. 336, 337, 673 |
Nordaustr. 18 Nes Cyjona / Israel |
Hannah Reichman, born Katz, now in Toronto 26. 1.1960 Dear Mr Duhl, We received your letter and read it with sadness. The murderer, who killed our loved ones, is still alive! 17 years have already passed and this terrible murderer is still walking free in the world. What kind of a world is this? You write to me about giving testimony. Of course I will testify. I will remember everything he did. Write to me as to where I should go. We will publish it here in the newspapers. Maybe here in Canada there is someone else who was in the Jezierna camp. There were Jews there from many cities and towns. I remember how the murderer Dyga, the camp chief, beat and killed Jews in the street. We wish you and your family well, Hannah and Max Reichmann |
Translated from Polish by Dorota Poteralska
I. Steinberg 5116 Ft. Hamilton Pkwy. Brooklyn 19, N.Y. Mr. Maximilian Dul Brooklyn, 18 /XI / 1960 Dear Mr Dul ! I took care of the Dyga matter immediately after receiving your letter, in which you informed me about Dyga being arrested. At the same time my lawyer got to know about it and took care of the case personally, which he knew well from my testimony in the Wiedergutmachtung [reparations] case. I know that, being a man of law, he knew how to present it well. A few weeks ago I received a letter of summons from the German embassy for 22 November, to give my testimony in the case. The forementioned lawyer offered to accompany me to the embassy. When am there I will certainly say that in addition to shooting and tying up Jewish people, he let them freeze, leaving them outside in the winter naked. One of them was the fatherinlaw of the pharmacist from Jezierna. |
My name is Dozia Blaustein and I am one of the few survivors from my hometown, Jezierna.
I am the daughter of Ben-Zion Blaustein and Rosa Lechowitz. The names Blaustein-Lechowitz were well known in Jezierna, therefore there is no need for further explanation. We were two children, an older brother, Moishe, named Munio, and myself.
Before the days of the second war, Jezierna had a beautiful and intellectual Jewish community, in which my parents as well as my brother played a great part.
With the outbreak of the second war, and the Nazi occupation, the Jews of Jezierna shared the destiny of the other Jews of Poland. On a rainy Friday, a few days after the occupation, the Nazis did what they called Aine-Accie and a great percentage of the male population were shot and buried, half dead and half alive, at the outskirts of the town. In that particular massacre my father and brother survived. Since that day life became a constant fear, and survival a struggle.
Shortly after the massacre, the Nazis ordered the formation of a Judenrat (a Jewish committee, composed mostly of Jews). Their first law was that every Jew must wear a ten inch wide arm-band with a blue Star of David, and on our windows there had to be posted a ten inch Star.
We all had to do forced labor, and as young as I was I was assigned to the fields to cut the crops. Shortly after, the Nazis formed the first labor camp in Jezierna and the first to be thrown into the camp were the male youth, among them my brother Munio. At the time of the founding of the camp in Jezierna, the remaining Jewish families from Jezierna and the other neighboring towns were sent to a ghetto in the city of Zborow. Unfortunately, Munio never passed the barbed wire, except when working and in July of 1943 the camp was liquidated. Among those few hundred Jews my brother Munio, age 20, met his death.
Life in the ghetto and the living conditions are well known to all of us today. My parents and I shared a three room apartment with four more families. From day to day hunger became more acute and the sanitary conditions worsened. This led to an outbreak of typhoid. People were dying daily by the dozen, but G-d was good to us and we escaped the epidemic. Once in a while the people of the ghetto had to pay a contribution toward The Party. In a short time all of the gold, silver, furs, and any valuables were collected and given to the Nazis.
While in the ghetto we were all assigned to forced labor. Some of us went to build roads, others to factories, and still others went to sew clothing for the Nazi soldiers. I was assigned, with another group of girls, to do the laundry and work in the gardens of the Gestapo Headquarters. A pass was issued to us and every morning we used to leave the ghetto for work and return at night. The work wasn't hard, but we were slapped without reason--but for being a Jew. The worst punishment we received from the Nazi officers was their harsh and sadistic statements about the Jews. Often they would give us their camouflage raincoats to be washed; these raincoats were splattered with blood and they reminded us that this was the blood from other Jews of other ghettos and this was what awaited us the Jews of the Ghetto of Zborow.
Outside the Ghetto of Zborow a forced labor camp was created. In the early spring of 1943 my father was taken into the camp. My mother and I remained inside the Ghetto. I kept on working at the S.S. Headquarters.
Food was getting scarce. Some Gentile people, with heart, used to smuggle some food into the Ghetto. Between those bringing in food, there was a young man from my hometown by the name of Kola Leskof. His father was a good friend of my father and during one of his trips, Mother asked Kola if he could hide us. Without giving it a thought Kola agreed. It was hard to believe that without one word said or thought, this young man should sacrifice himself to hide two Jewish women, but we had nothing to lose; by staying in the Ghetto we knew what was coming, and by leaving we had a chance to survive.
At the end of April of 1943, with the help of a Gentile family from Zborow, we escaped. We were quite lucky, for we made it to Jezierna to the house of the Leskof family. As Kola had promised, they accepted us and made shelter for us in the attic. For a Gentile family to keep Jews the punishment was death. The Leskof family shared with us every piece of bread they had.
In May of 1943, the Zborow Ghetto was liquidated and in July of 1943 the Camp of Zborow, where my father was kept, met the same fate. The day my father and brother died Kola came to the attic to see us. His grief was profound and I remember, as if it were yesterday, his telling Mother, Even if I have to give my life, I shall protect you and shelter you. I shall never forget Kola and his smiling face, for he too met his maker a year later.
We stayed at the Leskof home throughout the winter, until March of 1944. At that time the Russians were advancing and the battlefields were at the outskirts of Jezierna. The Leskof's house was burned by the Germans, for the simple reason that it obstructed the view of the battlefield. We had nowhere to go but into the woods. We wandered from place to place and it seemed that G-d was guiding us out of trouble.
In July of 1944 we were liberated by the Russians. After a short time in Jezierna we moved to Tornopol, where we lived with a few Jewish families.
In 1945, after the worst was over, we were allowed to leave the Ukraine and go to Poland. We settled in Byton and waited for a pass to leave for America, where my mother has brothers and a sister. Unfortunately, my mother's health was deteriorating and as soon as she was confined to bed, in 1946, her brother, Moris Lechowitz, came from Russia and joined us in Byton, for he was alone, as his wife, Netka, and three children lost their lives in a concentration camp in Poland. Together with Mother, in a stretcher, we left Poland to go to Paris. After a few months in Paris, Mother died.
On January of 1947 my uncle Moris and I left France for the United States. Behind I left only graves and bad memories, but I had to forget all this, for I was going ahead to an unknown country in search of happiness and a better tomorrow.
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