Chapter Six: Auschwitz

Arriving at Auschwitz, the cattle car doors were opened, and we were greeted with shouts to get out and ordered to leave the luggage behind. The men lined up separately from the women to pass an S.S. officer for a selection. As we passed the officer, he motioned with his right thumb to the right or to the left. We did not know what this meant. We found out later that all the people sent to the left side were taken directly to the gas chamber. The luggage was removed by inmates who were well fed, - they were the elite in the camp. This commando was called Canada.

The men selected for work, my brothers and myself included, were re-loaded in the same cattle cars and in the evening the train left Auschwitz - destination unknown.

While we were waiting to get back into the cattle cars, a big truck was parked nearby, those who could not walk and the children were hoisted into the truck. The children had a premonition that their end was near, some of them started to cry. My teacher's six year old son calmed the other children saying "do not cry, maybe our parents do now know that we are going to be killed, let's spare them the pain."

When we arrived at Auschwitz in the morning, an orchestra from the inmates were playing Beethoven's seventh symphony, which gave us the illusion that it was not as bad as we originally thought.

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