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"I was 17. I was free, but what it meant I wasn't sure." | |||
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Norbert Wollheim Born 1913 Berlin, Germany 
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I remember that very well, very well, that morning of, of May 3, 1945, when we saw the American flag hoisted uh, uh, uh, in...hanging from the trees in the forest near Schwerin, and then we realized that we had been just reborn, and had all received a new lease on life. Uh, I remember, uh, we, we embraced each other. I was in a small group of, uh, people, and, and we were laughing, and we were crying, and, was a tremendous, uh, uh, feeling of relief, but also of burden because we realized that, uh, this moment for which we have waited years and years, we couldn't share with, uh, those of us who deserved it--our own families. And we realized also something else, especially the Jewish, uh, uh, persecutees--that we had no home left to go to. I personally knew that going back to Berlin would be hopeless. I couldn't find anybody anymore. And I was, uh, therefore, I had to settle for a certain transitory existence somewhere else. I knew I wouldn't stay in Germany, because for me Germany was one big cemetery. And therefore, uh, it, it, it, it was especially--and this is the specific situation for the, for the survivors, for the Jewish survivors. The world was celebrating, I remember how jubilant the Frenchmen were amongst us when he saw the tricolor hanging from, uh, from the roofs in Schwerin, and they were dancing. We couldn't dance. We had no right to dance. So, that was the moment of, of, of tremendous elation, but also tremendous sadness. | ||
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Edwarda Kleinfeld Rorat Born Warsaw, Poland 
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There, there was music playing. The bands were playing in the village, and it was like very festive. People were standing on this dirt road and waiting for some cousin and a loved one returning from wherever they were during the war. And it's strange that I had some expectations, also, that maybe my parents would be there. So I was waiting there, also, standing and anxiously looking who is walking. Uh, and there were many people united in the village. They were returning from wherever they were, underground, elsewhere, they were returning. And then, eventually, nobody was there anymore, and the band stopped playing. And it became clear that my parents were not coming. It's very strange because I knew at some level they were killed, of course. And yet, somehow the hope was there. | ||
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George Salton Born 1928 
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I ran in that direction and as I came onto that place I noticed many prisoners yelling and screaming and jumping and dancing. And there standing amongst them were seven giants, young people. They must have been 18 or 19...American soldiers. There were seven or eight of them standing inside the camp. Apparently they cut the wire and came into the camp. They were bewildered by us. Wild and unkempt and dirty and, I'm sure, smelly people, jumping and dancing and trying to embrace them and kiss them. And I did too. I also joined the crowd and yelled and screamed and somehow knew that the day of liberation has come. It was a strange feeling for me, however, because as I remember it, on the one hand, I was, I was overwhelmed by this unexpected and unhoped for encounter of freedom, but at the same time, what was happening was outside of me. I really...I didn't know what to make of it. I knew I was free, but I didn't count on it. I somehow didn't know what it meant. And I knew it was great, but I, I was overjoyed because all people around me were overjoyed and were singing and dancing and, and...but I, I was 17. I, I was free, but what it meant I wasn't sure. | ||
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Abraham Klausner Born in the U.S. 
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The, the compulsion, or the drive, was so great that people broke out of camps and walked, traveled--there weren't any forms of transportation across Czechoslovakia, Poland, into Russia--looking for, uh, for, for fragments of families. And people came out of east Europe into Munich, and we set up a large tracing program. Besides the, the books that were published, we had a center in Munich at the Deutsches Museum first where people came from all over Europe and came asking about their family. Interesting thing was that we put a table out in the lobby, so to speak. People would come and tear the pages out of the book and we would have to feed the table with books and then we would nail the pages down so they would last a little longer. But if a person came and found no name in the, in the book, they would go over to the wall--it was a very large wall--and they'd write a note on the wall saying, for example, "I was here"--addressing it to a parent or to a child--"I've been looking for you, and I will be here or going there," so that there'd be some point at which they might be able to connect. We were very much involved in looking for children in eastern Europe. People who had left their children either with Christian friends or others wanted to find those children and so we had to set up a program for the search of children, which was haphazard but in many cases it was very effective. | ||
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Fela Warschau Born 1926 
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First of all, we had the clothes which we were wore there, which was full of disease and lice. We had to go through showers, then some powder. I, I couldn't tell you what it was, but I know, disinfected with a powder. They gave us different clothes also. And then we were transported to the other brick buildings. We were assigned so many people to a room, and there were bunk beds there. We shared the room with other people. We were weak enough to get along with everybody, we were all happy just to be alive and be liberated. But you see, um, reading the lists from other camps--from the survivors that lived through this--we did not find anybody which...at this point, what kept me going was all this, and I was fine, but when I didn't find anybody, this is the time we almost...I caved in. I only lived with that hope that I will meet my family. I had such a wonderful home life, such loving parents, and I had two brothers, and besides that...I don't count the rest of the family like uncles and aunts and cousins. I think it was almost close to 60 people our rela...we had such a big relation, and none of us survived to the end. There was my sister and I and two cousins that survived all this. | ||
| Copyright © United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, D.C. | ||||
