Personal Histories | Individuals


		Vladka Meed: "And I was with mine package on top of the wall, and the shooting got closer and I was sure that I, this time I am done."

	Vladka (Fagele) Peltel Meed Born 1923 Warsaw, Poland Describes the deportation of her mother and brother from the Warsaw ghetto to Treblinka	When it was the deportation and she [Vladka's mother] was deported together with my brother, I, I was, I want to take out from the Umschlagplatz [the assembly point], you know, and I thought that maybe I will bribe one of the policemen in our house. Whatever I have, I had a little watch or some others, and the policemen sometimes were able to take out people from the Umschlagplatz. And I went to him, and nothing worked, and finally I decided I will go together with them. I told them that I will be with, together when they will be deported, and I went to the Umschlagplatz, but I, somehow I couldn't decide and I couldn't make myself go there, because I knew from the underground that this deporting is leading not to other places. If it was my youth or I didn't go to her, and even today it bothers me. And she went with my little brother and I mentioned that from the Umschlagplatz he sent out the note that they are, he is hungry and they are going, at that time they were giving before the entry to the trains, bread and marmalade for the people to make them believe that they are going to be resettled into other cities when the truth was that they were being taken to Treblinka, to the gas chambers.


	Vladka (Fagele) Peltel Meed Born 1923 Warsaw, Poland Describes her reaction to the burning of the Warsaw ghetto as she watched from a building outside the ghetto	While being there at night, I saw the flames of the ghetto. And I saw also certain pictures which were seared in my mind. Some Jews um running from one place to the other and also seeing some Jews jumping from buildings, but I was observing this from a window and I couldn't do anything. And then flames burst into the ghetto. The Germans couldn't take over the streets, they start putting block after block on fire. They start burning the ghettos...the buildings, and this was the uprising which we...the small group on the Aryan side, we tried to get through. We tried to communicate. We decided even to go into the into the ghetto to be with them but it was everything was in vain. We didn't have any communication. We saw only tanks coming in, tanks going out, or some ambulances going in and we're listening to the shooting and in that time it was...they...we have to let the outside know what is going on.

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