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tv   Oral Histories  CSPAN  May 25, 2015 11:10am-12:06pm EDT

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contradict the narrative, but it certainly complicates it and adds layers to it. >> leslie swift, thank you very much. >> thank you. my name is kurt klein. i was born on july 2nd 1920, in a town called waldorf which is very close to hidenberg, in germany. >> tell me about your parents and your family. >> well i glue up in the post world war i era, and of course, those were really difficult times, and my parents were struggling to get along during the economic chaos that existed during those times. you may remember there was this very serious inflation i mean,
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ludicrous in a sense such as has never been seen before or since, i believe. and that made it very difficult to carry on anything at all. my father had had a business that was made extremely difficult because of the economic conditions that existed after world war i. he was a broker for hops and tobacco and grain that he would buy from the farmers in the the town that we lived in. >> and my mother helped him all she could. and of course, they along with so many others were just struggling to exist in those days. i -- but still you mig say that
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i grew up in a middle class family, and, of course after going to elementary school in this town kpfs expected that i would go to high school in hidenberg. it was really then perhaps on a somewhat higher level than high school. but those were of course already quite eventful times and i grew up amid all this chaos of the different parties, of the weimer republic fighting each other and from my earliest childhood on saw the formation of the nazi party. and how they gradually gained
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strength and there were -- early on, there were perhaps times when one didn't take them all that seriously but it soon became apparent that they were a force to be reckoned with. >> in your life, tell me -- tell me about how this affected you. >> well, it affected me in the sense that later on especially, when people were won over by the nazis, they no longer were our friends or our neighbors as we had been used to it. and it also represented an ominous threat because from early on hitler and all the others made it quite clear how they felt about the jews and
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what they would be doing to the jews. but it also meant that sometimes -- you would see all these slogans on the wall. many of them directed against jews. so you had a feeling even earlier on that you were truly being singled out. you hardly new for what reason. but you knew that all this propaganda was directed against you. and it made it difficult at times to carry on because you -- you obviously, in my father's case, i don't know the details, but i -- you couldn't do business with people who felt that way. nevertheless things were still more or less all right.
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until hitler actually came to power. but i could see that the nazi party was gaining strength and so could the others. but actually nobody believed that they were capable of doing the things which in fact it turned out they later did. >> did you lose friends because of this atmosphere? >> once hitler was in power, i don't remember losing any earlier, but once pith ler was in power it -- there was a gradual alienation from the rest of my schoolmates. some of them were better than others, but many of them initially apologized for some of the things that hitler said he was going to do assuring us that he of course didn't mean
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people like us, my parents or our friends, and then gradually you could almost see the direct relation of their indoctrine nation in the hitler youth, let's say, of how much more hostile they became, until in the end they stopped talking all together or they might perhaps taunt you even then, it was well known that there were concentration camps, and they would say things to the effect that if you people behave you might be all right but if you don't watch out you might all wind up in con tragscentration camps. and long before then they had stopped associating with you. at first these people had been in my house constantly and i had been in their homes and they had
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eaten in their homes and i ate in theirs. and there was really no difference. i grew up considering myself a part of that sen never thinking i was going to be singed out for something like this. and i saw the gradual evolution of how all this changed and it was bewildering to someone growing up amid the turmoil of that period. >> can i ask you, what was high school -- with -- tell me about those years. what kinds of things did you do. >> well, actually i did all the things that any young man does or likes. i engaged in sports.
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just as the others did. i liked soccer. i liked books quite a bit, and that helped me later also when i was sort of shut off from the the outside world. but even early on i liked books. and i belonged to a an organization of young jewish young people who we went on hooks very often went mountain climbing swimming skiing we did all of the things that young people do and liked movies a great deal. also american movies in those days were quite popular. and i read books also by american authors. i remember such things as jack
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london and many -- mark twain, of course. huck finn. i did all those things. and so in that sense i had a normal upbringing. and then later on when all the other boys turned away from me and there were very few jewish friends in the town i lived in. nobody exactly my age, but other boys close to me. but no more than two or three. the rest of my jewish friends i found in hidenberg, which was, of course, large enough to have a large jewish population. and that to some extend made up for my not being able to associate with anybody in the town in which i lived. and i have some very fond memories of, for instance, of
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this organization that i mentioned of going off into the mountains and going hiking. sometimes for a few day trips, staying in hostels overnight, and those were all things that sort of made my formative years quite interesting and to some extent enjoyable. and that went on even after the nazis came to power, but it stopped when i was proximately 14. at that point my father was no longer able to send me to high school, which required tuition. and so it was thought best that for jewish young people at the
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time, it was quite common to learn a trade, and so i thaw about what i would like to be,s and sen i had always liked books, i chose printing as my vocation. and i did in fact, get a job in printing in the town where i lived. in fact, it was on the same street where i lived. and this man was willing to take me on and i worked there for a number of months, and then the authorities heard about it and made it impossible for him to keep me on. so then i had to stop that and later on, i worked for a jewish firm that was still in existence at that time. which was a tobacco factory where they actually made cigars.
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and i found some sort of a job until the time that i, in fact, left germany. but it was becoming more and more evident that jews should leave if anybody at all would have them, and not very many countries would have them. it wasn't quite that easy, but especially young people. it was suggested for young people to leave because there was obviously no future for them in jerm any. and so we too, came to that conclusion that i, and since we had some relatives in the states. that seemed to be the natural place to go. i was fortunate, and now in
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retrospect, i know that must have saved my life. my sister who was older than i, was in nurse training in nerm germany, but she also decided, of course, that it was time to leave, and someone vouched for her, and so she came here a year ahead of me and had she not been here, i would not have gotten out, because she was able to go7v#p#ter people and ask them for the necessary papers that one needed in those days an affidavit of support. and so she did that for me so that by 1937 i was able to leave also and come to buffalo, where at that time my sister lived and
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so did various other relatives, among them, an uncle and an aunt and their daughter, whose house i then stayed the first few years when i came to buffalo. i also was able after a couple of weeks. to find a job in printing again so that i could continue that training, and that is, in fact, what i my my career -- there were, of course, when i was still in jerm any, you could see the -- you know, the gradual, more and more repressive measures that were being directed at jews. the thing that i remember so
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well is being in school and and having to attend, it was mandatory, attend these propaganda films, and i still remember that vividly, because i could see it firsthand how the films like that affected, especially the young and how they swung them over unquestioned obedience to the nazi cause. but everybody was affected by them. the older people, too. and you could see that the more this propaganda worked on them, the the more they believed it. >> well i remember attending
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such films or listening to these speeches on the radio and i was a teenager then and wondering that -- how did i ever get into this position. i personally don't know any such people as they described. and how is this possible? and how is it possible to have all this venom directed at you when in fact you haven't done a thing, and you've just lived a peaceful life, and my parents were simply law-abiding citizens struggling to get along in a very difficult economy. and that of course was very very puzzling to me. but the point i was trying to make was that the nazis knew, like almost no one else, how to
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use the power of the media to sway people's opinions. you know. radio had come into its own during my early childhood, and they used that for propaganda purposes as no one else has before or since. and how that's they were able to sway people and get them to do the things they did. >> okay. let's move forward now. you had been talking about you in buffalo. >> right. well in buffalo i graduateded. i proved myself a little. i found some other jobs in printing and i, of course at that point we -- from then on, both my sister and i were trying
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to make it possible for our parents to follow us. i should mention that i also had an older brother who came to the states about a year after i did. although he initially settled down a down, and i forget the exact sequence. first in new york and then in boston and then new york again, i believe is how it was. and we of course tried very hard to get our parents to follow us. but those were difficult times here also. and it was not easy to get the necessary papers for my parents. at least, it was difficult to convince anybody that there was
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any immediate urgency about getting them out. the answer was usually yes in due time, after you have established yourselves. you will see them also. they will follow you. and so while we continuously worked on it. really nothing much happened. really until november '38, and then people began to take some notice. and of course, there was absolutely panic among the jews in germany about getting out. unfortunately is my parents hesitated a little too long about registering at the
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american consulate, and so they had a very -- they had a system of priority numbers in those days. and so they got a very high number, which made it impossible for them to contemplate leaving immediately. there were many attempts that we made at the time to have them leave on the basis that the children were asking for them. but as we eventually found out, you needed to be a citizen in order for i believe for 75, or something like that. and some people were outside the quota. but basically they had adhered to the quota system and the high priority numbers which of course everybody wanted to get out at the time.
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and so this went on and on. but in each letter, i -- it so happens that i have every letter that my parents every where to me during that period, from the time i left them. and each letter would be full of some news of more repressive measures that were taking place. so for example, they had written to us that now they had been forced to my father had been forced to sell his business, and the nazis had effectively throttle jewish businesses
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anyway. and had through their boycott pointed out through the german population they ought not to buy from jews or associate with them. and those measures were, of course, felt in pretty short order. and so that there came a point when my father was forced to sell his business and very short time later also the house that they were in simply because they couldn't keep that up. and after they had already made the arrangements of selling the house. but the man who fought it it was not going to move in until the following spring because he was doing renovating. and so it became an agonizing decision for them. should they stay in the house throughout the winter? largely without heat or other income, or should they e vail
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themselves of whatever was offered to them in very run down dip lap dated part of the town also. and should they take that while the taking was still good? and this is p what they were agonizing over at the point when kristallnach happened. after that all these orders were taken. and as it wound up, they moved in with another acquaintance. a jewish lady who, in fact the wife of the owner of that cigar factory for which i had worked and where my father had
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subsequently worked for a little bit in the office when he could no longer have his own business. she had an old house somewhere in another part of the town, and they were ordered to move to what was really above a stable. what had been a stable. it was not then anymore. and just one room. and obvious during kristallnacht we were to find out that some of my schoolmates, one in particular, had become the leader of this gang of hoodlums who had invaded my parents' house and lined them up against a wall and proceeded to smash all their furniture and everything they could lay their hands on. and they took my father with
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them that night and had to spend some time in the local jail, but was released a few days later, probably because of his age. but that was by far the better part of what happened on kristallnacht. because most men were simply sent to concentration camps. but what i was going to say about the gang that invaded my parents' house this was then a boy who had been in and out of our home and eaten at our table, and he led this gang in really making threats towards these elderly people, defenseless people. and treated them in the most
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abominable manner and vandalizing the placed. >> so you were hearing this all through the letters you received? >> well, some of it was only through veiled references they my parents were able to make. but we could usually -- we learned to read between the lines and we knew what they meant when they made references. for instance, they let us know that their furniture has been smashed because i still remember my mother used the phrase they were now possessors of many furniture. and all of this was confirmed to us by an uncle of mine fortunate enough to leave after those times. and because he had a daughter in
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england and a very influential son-in-law who got them out. and they also wound out coming to buffalo where i lived and where they had a son. so they were able to fill me in on some of the details of what happened. what did you do now? this is after kristallnacht. tell us about you very briefly so we can move into the war experience for you? >> well, i should however also mention that, you know we kept on trying, by every means. to get them out but at every turn something else happened. and the next thing that happened
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was in this 1940, in the fall of 1940, we received a letter from a relative in switzerland who informed us that -- he said, you will, of course, have read the reports in the newspapers of what has happened to your parents along with all of the jews about the problems. and that namely -- that at the women of the local authorities, they were told within 20 minutes to two hours to pack up things and take along with them. and they were in fact deported to the south of france. to what was then the unoccupied zone of france. to a camp that had at one time
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served as a refugee camp for the civil war of ref jews that came from spain. because it was near the pirspanish border. and they were simply dumped there without blankets, without adequate food. without anything and the germans told the french to take over. and so of course it took a long time until we then established some direct contact with my parents, because they -- at first they couldn't write. and when they did write it took -- those things took weeks and weeks in toez days. and also because there wasn't really a war going on. by that time, of course.
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and na in '39 of course, also added to our complications, when the war started. we were again set back incredibly far back, as far as trying to help them get out of there. because normal escape routes were out of the question. and you could only find certain ones. and that only if you had quite a bit of money to bribe officials and just for the passage and everything else. but at any rate being in the unoccupied zone of france was, at the same time, they were of course segregated. they were not allowed to live together there. men were in a different camp than women. but they were usually once a
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week allowed to visit each other. and then we got together and wrote to them. and this is quite a record of what went on in those camps. but whereas it was, of course a catastrophe that this happened to them. at the same time it still made it possible for them to perhaps get out easier than if they had remained in germany. because they could go to the american consulate if they were summoned by the consul. they were allowed out of these camps. and to take care of this matter. but somehow or other, there was always a flaw and always a new complication, and this dwentwent on.
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at every corner there was another obstacle. and we had passage for them many times, and they had to let those terms expire because their papers weren't ready and so they were moved. my father was sent to another camp and so it went on and on. and they could, in fact, with the right papers left by way of spain and portugal. we had a portuguese ship passage for them on several times. and each time something they could never get clearance on time. and this went on and on. in the meantime -- this was now
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running into 1942, and by the summer of '42, actually perhaps five, six weeks later, one of my letters was returned from there address unknown. left no forwarding address. and as we found out through a tracing bureau after the war, they were in fact deported to auschwitz. along with all the thousands and thousands who were there. this also was the time when i was inducted in the army.
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so that it all happened together, an i recently found a notice from the state department that reached us in november of '42, a time when i was already in the army. that said that they were now pleased to let us know that our parents had gotten clearance. this was three months after they had been deported. to auschwitz. but at any rate, i was inducted in the army and to me it was a great relief and also perhaps a source of pride that i was able to finally do something about this. we had been literally paralyzed
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for years. always at the women of the -- whatever authorities were in charge, and now i was finally able to fight this big evil. and i was in the army, and actually never finished basic training before they found out that i had language capability, and in those days, of course they were looking for german speaking personnel, and germenan speaking personnel that no doubt they could trust. so that i was pulled out of from the -- away from the unit that i had been assigned to in those days and sent to a military intelligence training center in
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maryland, in fact. and we were assigned different jobs of either a warrant or some military government or some other activities and i wound up with a unit that was charged with a prisoner of war interrogation. and we first went on maneuvers and this was now 42 -- no this was '43. and later by the end of that summer, we were sent overseas. t first to england and then i
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spent nine months in northern ireland where i was assign thoded to unite where i went through the actual battles with. namely the fifth u.s. infantry division. and as such was attached to a regiment and my job was, of course, to -- to interrogate prisoners for whatever tactical information they could give. and that's what i did. i went through the various campaigns. i went through normandy, not too much after d-day and went through the various campaigns and also in luxand later through
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germany and firtsst in the north in the rural area, and another time more in the south, but at one time we were called # and we wound up in chekslovakia, and this was now towards the end of the war. and we were in a town of -- called elionorenheim, and from there, these were the final stages of the war that it was becoming quite obvious that it would soon be over. but a report reached us that the town a few miles away from there was able to surrender because they were flying white flags from their houses and so it
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became my job along with a very small medical detachment and the military government detachment to go to that town and take the the surrender. it was my job to see if there were still any german soldiers prisoners, i mean soldiers there. and we went to that town, just about three jeeps, on the evening of may 6th. and the military government colonel took care of the civilian surrender with the mayor of the town. and as i went about my business looking for germans, and i only found a few in a german field
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hospital. they had converted a schoolhouse into a hospital, and i found a few of them and made arrangements made mental notes what to do with them the following day. we were not in any decision to do anything right then and there. but we -- it was late in the day and we -- the war was still going on. we still had received some shelling even on the way to the town. but so we decided to go back to our unit about six or eight miles away from there. and it was getting dark. so when we got back i compared notes with the military government colonel and he told me that in fact they had come across a group of about 120 jewish girls who had been dumped
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into an abandoned factory by their ss guards and that we would see what could be done the following morning. that was the first inkling i had of that particular incident. the following morning i went back with greatly augmented group of people and medics were there in great numbers and again with the military government colonel also and i drove into that factory and i saw this courtyard and there were some -- what i can only describe them as living skeletons walking around going about certain chores such
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as getting water in the courtyard. and over in a doorway i saw another -- leaning against the doorway and she seemed to be in slightly better condition than the rest that i had just seen. and i walked over to her and i think both in english and german and because i assumed of course that she spoke german. and which she confirmed and i -- i wanted to see of course, where the rest of her companions were and i asked her about that. and she just motioned me in and we went inside and.
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that was of course a scene of devastation that nobody who has ever seen it will ever forget. i mean these girls, young women, mostly were lying on scraps of straw that they had found and in various stages of disease or close to death. and i mean it was just simply something that one couldn't believe that anybody would permit that. and the young woman i had seen there did a most remarkable thing that that really -- i mean, it just shattered me.
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when we came into this large room where all of these women were lying she pointed at them and then quoted something from a well known german poem called the divine. and the words freely translated mean something like nobel the man -- she made a gesture, helpful and good. and that really simply devastated me. and i started to talk to some of them and one of them addressed me in english and when i tried to reassure her that she was all right, she went like this and said, no it's too late too
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late. and in fact, i heard later that she did die only hours later. of course, our upt made immediate arrangements to take care of these girls. we evacuated the hospital of whatever germans were still in it and we took them to the hospital and where they came under the care and supervision of our american doctors. i should mention perhaps that this girl i met first and who was my guide is -- has been my wife of 44 years. and that we have eight grandchildren, three children and eight grandchildren.
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this was still may 7th and that was just when the war was coming to an end. and i mean, i was totally shaken by this experience but i had to go back to my unit because now all of these german troops were surrendering and i really had my hands full for a few days. and when i was able to get back to the hospital a few days later, i of course wanted to -- i saw all of the girls but wanted to see this girl in particular. and i found that she had in fact also collapsed on the admittance to the hospital and listed in critical condition.
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and at one point during that time doctors wanted to amputate her legs and fortunately she was right. despite the fact she was that ill, carried on for quite a lively conversation. and she -- when i was ready to leave, she gave me a few sheets of paper and they happened to be some thoughts that she had expressed on the liberation and what it was in fact was an ode to her liberating americans. and perhaps you can see why i became interested in her. it -- she was an unusual person with a certain aura about her
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that i just knew i had to get to know her better. and from that evolved our relationship and i was able to visit her later, still in the hospital even after i was transferred from the immediate area. i would still come back a few times and later on made it possible for her to be near her where i was and i found her some lodging as her and her friend in munich where i had been transferred after the war. our stories are came to a climax when we married about a year later in paris. i had been -- i had gotten to
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leave from the army by that time and gone back to buffalo but came back to paris and after a great deal of difficulty with the local authorities there, we finally got married. and that is our story. it -- -- it's difficulties to think back to those times and think we are really those people but that is what happened to us. >> while i was in the army among other things what happened to me was that i -- that one of the german soldiers that were brought to me for interrogation
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happened to be hitler's choefer, he gave me the story about the bunker in berlin which has gone down in the history books as being the definitive story of hitler's last days. he told me how he -- how hitler had instructed him personally to dispose of his remains by pouring gas over their bodies and in the courtyard of that bunker. because they didn't want any remains to fall into russian hands, russians had of course taken berlin or taking it shortly thereafter, he carry the out all of those orders and that is the story that came down to
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me and i see by the history books also to others that is apparently how it happened. >> did he describe the last days in the bunker? >> he did but i don't have a very detailed riks recollection of that. it must have been chaotic but i can't tell you details that you know that would throw any light on it now. i do remember that he described his personal duties that hitler had instructed him to do. and so that i think that in fact no traces were ever found by the russians of hitler and eva brown, his mistress.
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as i said before, unfortunately we found out after the war that my parents along with so many others had be deported to auschwitz. so i certainly knew if not firsthand at least had an understanding for what had gone on during the war. i will say this, that i always -- i really did think the nazis -- i knew the mentality and i did think them capable of doing the things which in fact they did they did do. nothing truly surprised me. i merely didn't know the details. i also always knew that it would come to a war even as a young boy the signs of it were there
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and the turmoil of that world and quest that the average german had at the time. i knew it would come to another war in which i no doubt would be involved. >> in 1945, 70 years ago,al lied forces liberated the nazi concentration camps. for the next several weeks here on american history tv, we'll hear holocaust stories from those who lived them. these interviews are part of the oral history collection at the united states holocaust memorial museum in washington, d.c. next gerda klein talks about how the invasion of poland drastically changed her life. she calls being sent to a jewish guilty ghetto with her family and being forced on a death march in 1945. this oral history is almost two
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hours. >> i was born on may 8th in the most southern western part of poland and in a town called -- polish -- by both names and it in the foothill of the mountain range. >> would you tell me about your parents and about your family as a young girl as a child. >> well, in retrospect, my parents seemed absolutely saintly and everything seemed marvelous. i know it couldn't be that way and must have rained at times but my memories is very vivid and i cherish it very much and don't see why i should change. this is perfection. i had one older brother, five years older than me, his name with a arthur. my parents names julius and
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helena wooizman. we lived in a large old home outside of town. it was a huge garden, many fruit trees and flowers and wonderful thing for children to roem in. i had ten cats, all black and knew all their names and now my children and grandchildren can now recite the name of my cats. my brother had two dogs. i used to love swimming in summer skiing in winter. and by and large i had a marvelous childhood. >> what about school? >> i went to public school first and then until the war broke out took catholic school called notre dame a private girl's school. however, it was about i would say a quarter of the girls in school -- in my class were jewish. that was the natural

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