First Person with Helen Goldkind
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BILL BENSON:
Good afternoon and welcome to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. My name is Bill Benson and I am the host of the Museum’s public program, First Person. Thank you for joining us. We are in our tenth year of the First Person program. Our first person today is Mrs. Helen Goldkind whom we shall meet shortly.
This 2009 season of First Person is made possible though the generosity of the Louis and Doris Smith Foundation, to whom we are grateful for again sponsoring First Person. And I’d like to let you know that Mr. Louis Smith is with us in the audience today.
[Applause]
First Person is a series of weekly conversations with survivors of the Holocaust who share with us their firsthand accounts of their experience during the Holocaust. Each First Person guest serves as a volunteer here with this Museum.
Today ends our First Person programs on Tuesdays for this year, but we will continue our Wednesday First Person programs through August 26. The Museum’s website at www.ushmm.org, that’s www.ushmm.org, provides a list of the upcoming First Person guests until the end of August.
This year we are offering a new feature associated with First Person. Excerpts from our conversations with survivors are available as podcasts on the Museum’s website. A number for this year have already been posted, and Helen’s will be posted sometime in the next few weeks. The First Person podcasts join two other Museum podcast series; Voices on Antisemitism and Voices on Genocide Prevention. The podcasts are also available through iTunes.
As most of you know, on June 10th, a man came to this Museum and tragically took the life of Officer Stephen Johns. Officer Johns, in giving his life, and his fellow officers stopped the gunman before he could cause more horror and harm more people here in this Museum. We ask you to join us for a moment of silence in honor of Officer Johns and his family.
Our first person today, Helen Goldkind, will share her first person account of her experience during the Holocaust and as a survivor for about 40 minutes or so. Depending upon time, we hope to have an opportunity for you to ask Helen some questions. Before you are introduced to her, I have a few announcements and requests of you. First, if possible, we ask that you stay seated throughout our one-hour program; that way we minimize any disruptions for Helen as she speaks. Second, if we have time for a question and answer period at the end of the program, and you have a question, we ask that you ask your question, make it as brief as you can. I will repeat the question so everyone in the room, including Helen, hears the question, and then she’ll answer you.
If you have a cell phone or a pager that has not yet been turned off, we ask that you do that at this time. If you have passes for the Permanent Exhibition today, please know that they are good for the entire afternoon, so you can stay comfortably with us and then go to the Permanent Exhibition.
The Holocaust was the state-sponsored, systematic persecution and annihilation of European Jewry by Nazi Germany and its collaborators between 1933 and 1945. Jews were the primary victims; six million were murdered. Roma and Sinti, or Gypsies, people with mental and physical disabilities, and Poles were also targeted for destruction or decimation for racial, ethnic, or national reasons. Millions more, including homosexuals, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Soviet prisoners of war, and political dissidents also suffered grievous oppression and death under Nazi tyranny.
More than 60 Years after the Holocaust, hatred, antisemitism, and genocide still threaten our world, as we so dramatically saw here on June 10th. The life stories of Holocaust survivors transcend the decades and remind us of the constant need to be vigilant citizens and to stop injustice, prejudice and hatred wherever and whenever it occurs.
What you are about to hear from Helen Goldkind is one person’s account of the Holocaust. We have prepared a brief slide presentation to help with her introduction. I’m experiencing just a little bit of a technical difficulty up here, so I can’t see the screen, so I’ll keep glancing over my shoulder just to make sure I’m in the right place. So, please bear with me as I do that.
We begin with this portrait of Helen Lebowitz Goldkind. Helen was born in 1928 in Volosyanka, Czechoslovakia. Helen was one of seven children born to a close knit Jewish family. On this map of Europe, the arrow points to Czechoslovakia. Helen’s father owned a shoe store in their home town of Volosyanka. When Hungarians closed her family’s synagogue, her grandfather, fearing for the safety of the synagogue’s torah scroll, secretly brought it home. In 1944, Germans occupied her family’s town. Hungarian officials ordered that the Jewish star be worn and they rounded up Jews sending them to the Uzhgorod Ghetto. On this map of Czechoslovakia, the arrow points to Uzhgorod. Helen’s family was deported to Auschwitz. The arrow on this map of major Nazi camps shows the location of Auschwitz.
Helen was sent to work on a forced labor brigade in a Nazi munitions factory at another camp. Toward the end of the war, Helen was sent to the Bergen-Belsen camp. The arrow on this map indicates the route from Auschwitz to Bergen-Belsen. And here we see a photo of Bergen-Belsen. Helen was liberated from Bergen-Belsen on April 15, 1945. And here we see a photo of liberated survivors. Helen emmigrated to the United States in 1946, and we close our slide presentation with a photo of Helen at her wedding to Abe Goldkind in 1947. And I’ll leave that with you for a moment.
Helen came to the United States in 1946. She married her husband Abe in 1947. They would move from Richmond, Virginia to Baltimore soon after their marriage. Helen and Abe had three children. One daughter is a micro-biologist in the United States Army and their other daughter is a psychologist. Their son is a gastroenterologist with the United States Navy. Helen and Abe would eventually move to Florida, but Helen moved back to the Washington, DC area in 2000, after Abe passed away, so that she could be close to her children and grandchildren. Helen has eight grandchildren ranging in ages form 14 to 32, and she has seven great grandchildren. Helen volunteers at the Membership and Donor Desk where you’ll find her on Thursdays. She also speaks frequently to groups here at the Museum as well as at other settings. And with that, I’d like to ask you to join me in welcoming our first person, Mrs. Helen Goldkind.
[Applause]
Helen, thank you for joining us, and thank you for your willingness to be our first person today.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
You’re welcome.
BILL BENSON:
When Czechoslovakia was partitioned and then occupied by Hungary, you were living in the town, your home town of Volosyanka.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Right.
BILL BENSON:
Your family had lived there for several generations. Before we talk about the coming of war and the Holocaust, share with us a little bit about your early years, what life was like for you and your family in your home town of Volosyanka.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Well, actually it was a very happy life, because my mother had six brothers and a sister, and they had children and, you know it was a family life. I don’t know how to explain it any better, but I was a very happy child. It was wonderful. You know, living with grandparents, they’re so protective of you, especially when we’re just seven. I always loved running there to my grandparents. It was wonderful.
BILL BENSON:
We saw that your father had a shoe store. Tell us about your father and your mother. Tell us what you can about them.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Well, I had very good parents. My father had a Bata store. But the Hungarians fought Ally—the Hungarians occupied Czechoslovakia, but they were allied with the Jews and being that the Bata store was a franchise, so Jews weren’t allowed to own a franchise. So, he was just doing whatever he could to make a living. But, we had a cow. I remember, and my grandparents had cows, so we had enough milk and bread. We didn’t have, you know, luxury, but we survived all right, and especially, we were still together. That was the main thing.
BILL BENSON:
Helen, you had an uncle who was a pretty high ranking person in the Czech army. Can you say just a little bit about that?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Oh my God. Matter of fact, I have a picture of him. That the Czechs were really a democracy. I think if they would leave them alone, Europe would have been like America. Actually, the Czechs didn’t care whether, whatever you are, but if you had the capabilities, this is what counted. So, this is, this is him.
BILL BENSON:
That’s your uncle.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
My mother’s brother, yes.
BILL BENSON:
Helen, you had told me that you, you had described your synagogue as a beautiful synagogue, and you remember that don’t you?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Oh, I remember my, our synagogue was a beautiful synagogue. It was made out of stone. And everything that went on, you know, like weddings and all that was done in that synagogue. I have very good memories about that synagogue. I even remember when we were going to the synagogue, my father holding my hand. I had a little brother, six years old, and I feel his warm hand. It was a good time.
BILL BENSON:
Helen, you, beside your brothers and sisters, did you have a large extended family?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes, very large.
BILL BENSON:
Lots of cousins and…
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And to tell you the truth, you know I had a aunt that was born here in the United States. She came to Europe visiting with her parents, so my uncle who happened to fall in love with her, and they got married. They had two gorgeous kids, and she was planning going home to the United States, but she got caught in the war. But she still thought that, you know no matter what happened—we didn’t foresee this tragedy—but she felt she was safe, because she was an American.
BILL BENSON:
When Hungary occupied your community, you and your family, neighbors, lived under Hungarian rule for several years.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah.
BILL BENSON:
Tell us what you remember about the changes that were forced on you once the Hungarians took control of Volosyanka and your community and your surrounding country.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Well, I have many, many you know, friends, and a lot of them were non-Jewish. You know, I had cousins to play with, but you know, I remember walking to school with friends that weren’t Jewish. And I could sit near anybody that I wanted to, you know, near my friend, near my cousin. It didn’t make any difference.
BILL BENSON:
In the classroom, for example, no difference.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
No problem. But when the Hungarians came in, I had to sit in the back, and we were never called on. I was little. I couldn’t understand why yesterday she was my friend, and all of a sudden they were pulling back, you know? Evidently they were told at home that if your friend is Jewish, try to pull back, and that’s what happened. When we came home, that went on, and we came home and we told our parents, you know, “They never call on us. We’re just there in the back, and nobody even bothers with us.” So, my father was very much for books and he wanted it his kids to be educated. So, there, he went and hired a teacher that was let go because he was a Jew. So, he came to our house, and he was teaching us. You know we were seven kids, so there was a class by itself. But then after a while, after a while, you know, the Jews from the town did send their kids to our house and our house became a school, sort of for Jewish children.
BILL BENSON:
A real classroom and the numbers grew there.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes, yes.
BILL BENSON:
Were you going, still going to the public school at all or were you no longer in the school?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
No, we were taken out, because we were wasting our time.
BILL BENSON:
Right, right.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
We were wasting our time. That’s what our parents…
BILL BENSON:
And that’s the time when your father lost his shoe business as well.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah, right.
BILL BENSON:
And once he had lost it, his livelihood, how did the family make ends meet so that you could eat and get by?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Well, as I said before, you know we had a cow, so we had milk. My grandparents lived nearby and they also had a cow or two. So, we had enough milk and bread. We, we didn’t have any luxury. There were potatoes. So we had potatoes. But it was, as I said before, it was okay, because we were together. So we didn’t eat meat. We didn’t eat a lot of things. It didn’t bother us.
BILL BENSON:
But at least your basic needs were being taken care of at that time.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes. Yes.
BILL BENSON:
Of course, Helen that would all change tremendously once the Germans came. Once they occupied Czechoslovakia and Hungary they included taking over your town. By then you were an early teenager. Tell us what happened in your community and your family once the Nazis were now in control and completely in power in Volosyanka.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
That’s a tough one to talk about. Once the Germans came in—You see what happens to me?
BILL BENSON:
Take your time.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Once the Germans came in, they told that all the houses have to have a Star of David on the house. And we weren’t allowed to go out after a certain hour. You know, they closed the synagogue, but my grandfather was a relig—I mean we were religious Jews, so the older people went to my grandfather to pray, because he had a Torah scroll. He had six sons, so they managed to get a Torah scroll out of the, out of that synagogue.
BILL BENSON:
To, in order to save it?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
In order to save it. And, so the Jews weren’t allowed to gather. So, the religious Jews took, you know, all Jews, they took a chance and they went to my grandfather. So, my grandfather’s house became a synagogue, you know. They gathered there. In no time the Germans gave out an order that all the Jews should go to the square. But, what they also said that we can pack a small suitcase and take it with us, because we’re gonna be on a farm, and then we’ll come back.
So, everybody worried “What should we take?” You know, locking the doors. And my grandfather, all he wanted was the Torah scroll. Because he said, “Listen, our civilization comes from the Torah scrolls, from the Ten Commandments. And how are we gonna live who knows where?” So, he felt it was very important for him to have the Torah scrolls. So, my grandmother went and she wrapped the Torah scrolls in a white sheet, I remember. And, um…
You know, and we went to the, you know, to the square. When we got to the square, they took us with trucks to Uzhgorod, and that was a ghetto. You know, we were sleeping on the floor. It was a brick factory. That ghetto was a, you know, made out of a brick factory. And we really didn’t know what tomorrow would bring.
BILL BENSON:
So the whole Jewish community was forced into a brick, into a brick factory?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Right. But my grandfather had a long beard. So they gave an order to, for the old people to come to the square, so my mother took my grandfather to the square. And, you know they took these Jews and they were cutting their beards, and they were beating them up, but there was nothing my mother could do, because then she would—oh my God.
She would get beaten up. So when they were finished with these old men—my grandfather was 86—when they were finished with these old men, my grandmother, my mother brought him home, and he was all bloody. And he was black and blue. And he wouldn’t talk. I have never seen my father cry, never. And that night, he was crying just to see what they did to a 96 year-old man. He didn’t talk for a few days. And so my mother didn’t know what to do with him. He wouldn’t eat. He wouldn’t talk. My mother had a scarf, so she went and hid his face in that scarf, and put his hat on. All of a sudden, he says, “I know you are worried that I’m in pain, but actually it’s how they humiliated me that hurted more.”
BILL BENSON:
The pain of his humiliation versus—
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes.
BILL BENSON:
—the physical pain.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes, but I’m real sure that he was in pain plenty.
BILL BENSON:
Absolutely. Did your grandfather go with you into the ghetto?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Well, then a few days later—I don’t know why they had to do this to him, because they knew where we were going to wind up. So, a few days later, they took us to the train station. And my grandfather, my grandmother, you know, we were all there together. They packed us into cattle cars. You know, I don’t know how many there were, but there was only like standing room only. So, there were old people and they couldn’t stand up, so you know, and it was terribly crowded. I remember I stood on my sisters, you know—
BILL BENSON:
Her shoulders?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
—shoulders, and I saw people working on the farms.
BILL BENSON:
So you were able to look out?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes.
BILL BENSON:
Up high?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes. I couldn’t, I was…I couldn’t see it, but if I, somebody held me up I could see, so the people were showing me this.
BILL BENSON:
People outside were doing this?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes. But, you see we couldn’t imagine what that meant, because you know, they never had a place where there were gas chambers waiting for us. You know there are wars. There are wars today, unfortunately, but to get to a place where you’re going to a gas chamber, that never happened. So, it didn’t even register what they meant. But they did try to show us what’s gonna happen. And, when we got to Auschwitz, there was a big sign, a round sign to say, “Arbeit Macht Das Leben Frei.” That means, “Work makes the person free.” You know. So, we still thought we’re on a farm, but the smell that came in from the outside— So, we came in, it was fairly light. So, they didn’t open up the doors. They were waiting until it’s a little bit darker. So, the smell was coming in like, you know they’re burning flesh. So, we said, “Well, they’re gonna let us out. We’ll see what’s going on.” But we knew already, it’s not a farm. Why would that smell be there?
So, it got darker, and we saw big chimney and we saw a, we saw like a fire, but when we got to Auschwitz they were capable of gassing ten thousand people, and they couldn’t get rid of the corpses. So, they just threw them on that pit, and then that was probably the smell. And, you know they were screaming, “Raus!” “Raus!” means, “Get out!” And my grandfather took the Torah scrolls and you know he was gone—and forgive me, but I have to call them the monsters. These monsters came over to him, and they told him to throw down the Torah scrolls, and he was trying to tell them it’s a sin. It’s a sin, and my mother saw that he was getting beaten up. She went to him, and she told, she told him to throw it down, and he wouldn’t listen to her. So…
BILL BENSON:
So he just kept hanging on to it.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
He kept on hanging on to it. Then they were scream[ing] at us that we should go to the right. My mother was still with us and she was holding onto my little brother. I have a picture of him. And my—I don’t know what happened, but I remember I looked back, and I saw he was on the ground but these monsters were still beating him. You know, I could see they were beating him. And I cried out from my heart, because I couldn’t cry out with my mouth. “Somebody go help him!” I didn’t know why they’re doing this to him. Nobody came to save him, nobody. Then as we were going to the right, my mother was holding onto my six year old brother.
BILL BENSON:
This is Ephraim?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah. And he had a book. He loved books. You know we never got any toys. You know, we didn’t feel like we’re missing anything but we did get a book on our birthday. And he loved this book, and he was carrying it. My mother was afraid they were going to come and beat him up, because he had to throw it away. So she was negotiating with him, and he went and gave my mother the book. And he had to watch her. She throws that book away and poor kid, he was so upset and crying. He couldn’t understand why he cannot have this book that he loved so much. And so he cried, and all of a sudden, a monster comes over and he was pulling my little brother away from my mother so there was a tug of war. But he was stronger, so he pulled my little brother away from my mother and my mother was screaming, “He is only six years old. How is he going to survive?” So she ran after him, and they beat her up. And she fell and they kicked her around and I remember when she got up, she was full of blood already. And that’s when they pulled, pushed her to the left.
BILL BENSON:
And that’s where you lost…
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Just let me take a little water. I’m sorry. I’m a little emotional.
BILL BENSON:
Helen, tell us of course that’s where you lost your mother and your brother.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
That’s when I saw my mother last.
BILL BENSON:
And what happened to you next?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
What happened to me next? Next they were shave—They took us into a place and they shaved our heads. They gave us showers, but we were quite a few girls, so it took a long time. So, after they shaved our heads and they did give us a shower and wooden clogs and a bowl and a then….After the shower we put on this striped dress, and when they were finished with all the girls, they took us to a barrack. But, when—I just bring this out. They had a plan so when we were going to the shower, on both sides there were flowers and trees. You know you would never, never think that there are gas chambers in back of… and they’re burning my family there. And—
When we went back, it was dark already, so we couldn’t see it but when we were going to the shower, you could see. Who plants, flowers, where you go to a gas chamber? But they did and when we came back, they put us back into a barrack, and I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t sleep. And they put…there were like bunk beds there. So I was on the top, somehow, with my sister.
BILL BENSON:
Is this Sylvia?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah. And there was a crack, and I saw on the wires people hanging. I said, “Sylvia, this is not a farm. Look what’s going on there.” She says, “Well, in the morning we’ll find out what’s going on.” Zählappell [roll call]. They took us out around four o’clock, five o’clock. We didn’t have a clock, watches, we didn’t have anything. And we had to stay there for an hour and we saw people hanging, you know, from these wires. We didn’t know they were electric wires, but that’s what it was.
BILL BENSON:
And they had—the Nazis had left them hanging on the fences.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
And the Nazis left them hanging on the fences to see, don’t try you’ll never get out of here.
BILL BENSON:
Helen?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
And after a few days they were on these fences a crew came with pitch forks and they were taking them off.
BILL BENSON:
Helen, you and your sister Sylvia would be selected for slave labor.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah.
BILL BENSON:
Tell us what they forced you to do and where you went from there. And you and Sylvia were now together.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Well, when we came from Auschwitz, you know we went to a train, and we were in the trains. We were already in the cattle cars. So, we heard a noise. And we thought, they’re gonna bomb Auschwitz, because, you know, there were still some Jews, and you know to bring them in. And we thought they gonna bomb Auschwitz, but bomb something. Bomb the railroads. But after a while, you heard this noise….Rmmm, Rmmm. You know, like something. We knew that there are bombs falling. And after a while, maybe 45—I don’t know exactly how long, the noise stopped and the train took off.
We found ourselves someplace in Germany, and first they took us to the munition factory and gave everybody a job. They put me near a machine to fill these bombs. They called it “spring stuff” in German, but I suppose it was gun powder, a yellow, very, very hot powder. And I had to fill these bombs. You know, with my whole body pour it in the wagon. And many times I got burned, and you know, I was right there with the smell that’s poisonous. So, we did that. I did that. All the girls…
BILL BENSON:
You’re 16 Years old and you’re doing this incredibly heavy labor.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
I don’t know if I was already 16. So, anyway, whatever it was I had to do this. Anyway, after a while, you know, we were hungry. It was cold. Well, anyway, then when they showed us where we need to do, they took us to the barrack. Okay. The barrack was quite far. I don’t know why the barrack was so far from the factory, but we had to walk. And when we walked, we walked in the snow. And there many times these clogs would fall off your feet. So, whoever was lucky and they had a piece of string found on the street or someplace, they would tie their clogs so that they don’t fall off or sometimes they would you know, take a piece of rope and if they found a piece of paper, they would put it, you know, near her body…
BILL BENSON:
Like to insulate with a little paper or something.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah, paper, whatever, maybe sometimes a rag. I don’t know. So, it was very, very, very difficult. In the morning we got a slice of bread and coffee. They called it coffee, whatever it was. But at night when we got home—for lunch there was nothing. At night when we came home we got a soup from potato peels, but there was sometimes a potato. And I knew that I cannot go on. I felt I, after a while, talking wasn’t…
BILL BENSON:
And everyday you’re marching that long distance to the munitions factory doing that hard labor and then march back to the barrack.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Right. So, after a while, I just felt, “I’m not gonna make it. I’m gonna fall someplace on the road.” So, I figured out—a lot of girls were doing this—because first of all, there were poison. At night they closed the doors, and the windows, so that they shouldn’t be bombed. So they, there was no ventilation there.
BILL BENSON:
And all these toxic fumes from filling bombs…
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes, our eyes were yellow, our bodies. Our little bit of hair were like, orangey. We didn’t look like people anymore. Well one day, I just felt, “I’m not making it,” so I didn’t, and I….So, I didn’t know how to do away with myself, and I just wouldn’t go out to the Zählappell. .
BILL BENSON:
And that, that was the roll call where you’re ordered to come out and line up.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Right. So, my sister looked for me. She couldn’t find me, so she came into the barrack and she saw me there laying and she picked me up. I thought she was going crazy because the way she picked me up, and she was shaking me. I said to myself, “I’m dying, and she’s crazy and that’s it.” The people that went to the gas chambers, there was, they didn’t know the world knows about it. As if anybody’s going to survive this, please tell the world. So, she had this thing in her, you know, that she needs to survive to tell the world that this is happening in the world. So, she pulled me out. She pulled me out, actually, and she was trying to bribe me. She said, “You know Helen, I know you’re hungry. I know you’re cold. I’m going to give you a piece of bread of mine, so you can hold onto our life.” And so, I went out with her, and then she was trying, if a German didn’t look, she was trying to come to my machine so that I can catch my breath, because this was going on for a whole day. Just to stay there was an effort for me. So she would help me out here and there. And finally, you know, after a long time, I’m just going in from one to the other.
Finally, the factory was bombed, and they brought us back to the barracks. And they didn’t open the door. We were always locked from the outside. And we took a look outside, and we saw it’s already daylight, and nobody is opening up the door. So we thought that they’re just gonna put the barrack on fire and it’s gonna be the end. But, some civilians came with a pickup truck, you know a half truck. It wasn’t a whole truck. And they put is in the truck. And they say we no longer being needed. And they’re taking us someplace else. They didn’t talk about Bergen-Belsen, but we wouldn’t have known what Bergen-Belsen is anyway.
BILL BENSON:
You wouldn’t have known…Right, right.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
We were about 2,000 girls in that factory. Maybe there was 400-500 left. I don’t know. You know we all got into this little pickup truck. We got to Bergen-Belsen, saw the name Bergen-Belsen, and they opened up a barrack, and that barrack—I want to tell you something. I don’t think anybody ever saw anything like that, because it was close the end to the war, and a lot of Germans left the place. But there was plenty still there, but they didn’t come to open up the door. So, you know, people were doing everything that they had to. There were a lot of dead already and people delirious. The lice were that big and the insects. And we had no place to sit, me and my sister. So, there were a few dead people near the walls. So, we moved them a little bit away, and so we sat there and we knew we were just waiting for us to die. It was so—
BILL BENSON:
You had said to me that, that there’s probably no greater hell than Bergen-Belsen.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
I was gonna say that Hell isn’t as horrible.
BILL BENSON:
As Bergen-Belsen.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
As Bergen-Belsen was. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Finally they opened up the doors, and we were liberated by the English. They opened the door and they see a horrible thing, you know. It was hell. Hell on Earth. So, they called—they were afraid of us there. They called Eisenhower to come and see this, because they never faced something like that. Well, you know, wherever Eisenhower goes, there goes the newsmen and the photographers, so they were snapping pictures. And that’s why I see them up there. Then, my sister got sick, you know from the lice, from, you know, the insects. So they took her away right away. And they took her away. I thought they’re going to bring her back tomorrow. I didn’t know that she was that she was delirious. She didn’t come back, so I went to look for her, because when the occupation took place, and when there were some times when the people were dying, they took their names yet. They asked them. So, I figured maybe somewhere there dead, and I’ll read the sign, and I’ll find her where she is.
So, as I was walking I saw like a mountain was moving. And I knew that a mountain doesn’t move, so I came closer. What happened was—you know there were so many lice and insects on the top of those corpses that from far away or maybe I was just so sick, I thought a mountain was moving. So, evidently what happened, I must have, you know fell down there, and when I fell down, my heart, you know, I looked like a skeleton with a heartbeat. But, the English, when they saw that somebody would move, I must have moved my leg or a foot, so they came, and they saw that I, you know, I still have a heartbeat and they picked me up. They picked me up and they put me in a makeshift hospital. You know they put up from tent. They made hospitals. But I don’t remember how I got there. I really don’t remember. After a while, I could lift my head up by my elbows, and I was looking for my sister. I knew she came to Bergen-Belsen, and I looked and looked. I couldn’t find her face, and so I fell back and I cried. And the nurse comes over to me. She says, “Why are you crying? You’re getting better.” I says to her, “You know what? I want to die. My life is not worth living.” I didn’t want to live alone. Well, I knew I was getting a little better, because I could lift my head.
BILL BENSON:
Right.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
She says, “Well what was your sister’s name?” I told her. And what they did, they went around—there were more of these tents, evidently, that I didn’t know. So, they went around looking, “Is there a Sylvia Lebowitz?” And they found her. They did find her, but she was very, very, very sick, and so was I. So, she came and told me that they did find her, and I looked at her and I said to myself, “If she’s lying to me, that would be really cruel.” Because then I started, you know, having hope that I would see her.
BILL BENSON:
Right.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
And, you know, it took about a couple weeks—something like—and they did bring her to my tent.
BILL BENSON:
And she was recovering?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
And she was recovering with me together.
BILL BENSON:
So, you and Sylvia at least were now together again.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes.
BILL BENSON:
Would you mind, Helen, sharing with us the story you told me about, about your cousin Freddy?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Oh my God. Uh, as I was looking, as I walked, I walked to look for my sister, the Germans—
BILL BENSON:
This was before you, you ended up—
HELEN GOLDKIND:
—fell, fell, fell.
BILL BENSON:
—in the field hospital, yes?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah. What the Germans did, they put the ropes around the ankles of the, you know, of the dead ones or whoever they found, and they were pulling them to put them on this mountain, whatever. And he, and I looked down, and it looked like my cousin.
BILL BENSON:
He’s pulling what you think is a corpse?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah.
BILL BENSON:
Okay.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
But, I looked down, and he looked like Freddy, but he had big ears, I remember. And I screamed. I says, “Freddy!” He opened his eyes, and this German got scared, so he took away the ropes from his legs, and he left him there or whatever. And then I fainted. And I wound up in—but I was telling my sister that.
BILL BENSON:
That you’d seen Freddy.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
That Freddy is alive. She says, “Oh, you are sick. You imagined it.” But Freddy did survive, but he does not remember that incident. He just does not remember that incident.
BILL BENSON:
But he connec—he attached himself to you and your sister once he was well.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Oh, it was a big problem, because he became Lebowitz.
BILL BENSON:
He changed his name to your name, right? Yeah.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
And he had an uncle in America and then the—you know that nephew’s Lebowitz, so they had a problem getting him here. So, because, you know, we didn’t want to be separated.
BILL BENSON:
Right. Right.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
We didn’t want to be separated, but caused some trouble, cause he was…Then he had to prove himself that he is Muellbauer, so the uncle can bring him out here. So, that took time, but he did come.
BILL BENSON:
He did come.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Okay, Yeah.
BILL BENSON:
Helen, you would end up being sent to Sweden for care. Tell us about going to Sweden and what that was like for you.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Okay. The Swedish Red Cross took out 600 girls. I believe, of course they didn’t tell me and, I believe they took out the sick ones and fairly young, because they older ones didn’t have a chance to survive, as sick as they were. So, they took, you know, I was between the 600 and my sister was between the 600. And, they took us with, you know, they take six people on stretchers. And, they got us in Swed—we were in Sweden and they were very nice. You know, they were washing us. To tell you the truth, I, we looked, really we looked like skeletons. And I was full, you know, eaten up from lice. And this “spring stuff” was hot, burned oh, you know. And I used to look at him, because this is the kind of people I knew, and you know here I come from a world with monsters, I didn’t know there are people, still people left that could even feed me. Doing these things, but that’s what the Swedes did for me. They brought me back to life. And then—
BILL BENSON:
Was Sylvia in Sweden too?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes.
BILL BENSON:
Yes, both of you.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
We didn’t get separated. They sent me to school, but they sent her to work in Göteborg. But they treated her nice, like any other person. And I was in school. And then they asked us if we have anybody out of Europe. And I remember that my sister went to America in ’38.
BILL BENSON:
In ’38.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
And, I told them her name was Lebowitz, Frances Lebowitz, and we’re from Czechoslovakia. And they put us in the papers. So…
BILL BENSON:
Papers in New York?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
In Brooklyn.
BILL BENSON:
There’s…
HELEN GOLDKIND:
I used to call it “Brookleen.”
BILL BENSON:
“Brookleen” and they were looking for “Brookeleen.”
HELEN GOLDKIND:
They were looking for a “Brookleen.” And, I don’t know if it was her friend that found us or she found us, and they called the Red Cross in Sweden, and they said, “Yeah, there are two kids from Czechoslovakia, but they were very sick, and that’s why they’re in Sweden.” And four months later, they tried to bring the families together. Four months later, we got the visas and we went. We came here.
BILL BENSON:
Mmhmm. To your sister?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
To my sister.
BILL BENSON:
And, and I think you told me that if your sister hadn’t been in the United States, you might have stayed in Sweden.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yes, I loved the Swedes. They were really the nicest people that I ever—especially after being treated like I was.
BILL BENSON:
Right. Helen, why don’t we, if you don’t mind, let’s turn to our audience and see if they have some questions they would like you, to ask you, and then if they’re a little reticent to do that, and I hope that you’re not, then I have tons. But, but at any rate, I‘d like to see if anybody would like to ask a question. If you do, please make it brief, and I will repeat it before Helen answers your questions. So, yes, ma'am right here.
[Inaudible]
The question Helen is, did you find any other members of your family after the war?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
No, no.
BILL BENSON:
No.
BILL BENSON:
No. Yes, ma'am, back there.
[Inaudible]
Question is how did what you experienced effect you as an adult? And you might, if you don’t mind Helen, you might talk about what you said to us earlier about how long it took for you to even talk about it.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
There was a lot of crying. You can’t imagine that if one of your grandmothers’ died, you know, you mourn. But if they take everybody away from you that you ever knew and loved, you don’t, you know, your heart is so broken in a thousand pieces that you don’t put it together so fast. So, but, how I got back to life is that what the lady wanted to know?
BILL BENSON:
Yes, how it affected you as through the rest of your life. And you were telling us that you were so worried about what it would do with, when you had kids. Would you, would you mind saying a little bit about that?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Yeah. Well, after a while, I was here. And, of course, I worked, and then I met my husband and we got married. And I had children. After my first child was born, I had a long talk with my husband. And I was so afraid that I’m gonna raise some monsters and I definitely didn’t want them to be…I wanted them to be good people. So, my husband, he suggested, he says, “You know, you cannot go on living with your past. You have to put it in an iron box and lock it, and just don’t talk about it.” And that’s what I did. We didn’t talk about it. I didn’t talk about it. But I cried a lot. Matter of fact, not long ago, my daughter told me, she says, “Mom, every time I was going home from, from school, I was only hoping you’re not crying.” But I didn’t tell, I was telling her that I have a headache. Somehow, I don’t know, I had too many headaches.
[Laughter]
Bill Benson:
Mmhmm. Got a question back there. Yes sir?
[Inaudible]
How did your parents explain to you what was going on during the time when first the Hungarians occupied then the Germans before, before you were sent to Auschwitz. Do you remember?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Well, my parents were very protective. They, they didn’t tell us something terrible will happen. Well, they didn’t know either, because we didn’t have no papers. We didn’t have no radios. We had to buy whatever the Germans were selling. You know, there’s so many people say, “Well, you know, the Germans didn’t know.” But there were laws against the Jews that went on and went on and went on. They didn’t say “We’re going to take the Jews and gas them,” but there were laws passed against Jews.
BILL BENSON:
Of course.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
But my parents were very protective. They didn’t, you know, they kept on telling, “We’re…it’s okay. The war will be over. We have difficulties, but it’s going to be okay.”
BILL BENSON:
Okay. I think we’ve got time for another question if somebody has one. Yes sir.
[Inaudible]
Question is, do you…?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Could it happen? Could it happen? I really think it could. I think the big, oh my gosh. I’m not having a good day. I think it could if we don’t speak up. The big problem was that people around the world didn’t say anything. I don’t know how many of you know that the first gas chamber was built for the German children that were born handi—
BILL BENSON:
Disabled.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Disabled. Well, but I understand that, you know, people were, you know, people did talk about it, but the Germans did it anyway. And I really think that the world knew except the victims didn’t know, and nobody spoke up. No country said anything. So Hitler felt that he could do whatever wants. So if we gonna see the haters still around, they hate you for nothing. They hate me for nothing. They hated my little brother for nothing. All he wanted to do was to read his books. And we could have it here, yeah. Whenever we see hate, we need to speak up.
BILL BENSON:
When Helen was telling us earlier, before we came up here about what she felt when she had her own kids, that what was most important was that they, they feel no hate. And, and…
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Exactly. Exactly.
BILL BENSON:
From all accounts, you’ve done an extraordinary job of having raised wonderful, wonderful children that are just very good human beings. And so…
HELEN GOLDKIND:
Thank you. Thank you.
BILL BENSON:
Helen, before we close up, I’d like you to just tell us how you met Abe. How was that?
HELEN GOLDKIND:
My God.
[Laughter]
How did I meet him? Oh yeah.
[Laughter]
Well, we were here already a few months, but we were very depressed, and we didn’t go anyplace. So my sister says, “Why don’t you go to New York?” You know. “You’ll see New York.” And so my sister had two friends. They, I didn’t have any friends. So, she says, “You want to go to New York?” Yeah, we went to New York, and all of a sudden, we hear, as we were walking in New York, we hear…music. And so we were peeking in and kids were having a good time. Music was playing. They were dancing. And every, you know. And these girls that came with me, I’m telling you, they were nice looking girls, because the boys came and they asked them to dance. And then I was stuck with two kids from Hungarian parents, and Hungarians teach their children Hungarian. So, they would say a word and they would laugh, and I looked at them. “What is there to laugh about?” I gave them dirty looks. Finally they left me.
[Laughter]
I couldn’t understand why they were laughing. I feel like crying and they’re laughing. So, anyway, I’m standing there and my husband comes, I mean, this guy comes over and he says to me, “You want to dance?” I says, “I don’t dance.” Then he says, “Come on. I’ll buy you a drink.” I says, “I don’t drink,” and I was so annoyed with him.
[Laughter]
And he’s standing there and he sees that I’m kind of strange bird here. “Why did you come here if...?”
[Laughter]
He says, “So why are you standing?” I says,“I’m waiting for my friends.” I had my sister and two friends. So, he says, “I’m gonna take you home.” I says, “No,” because my sister says, “Don’t go in a car, and be home before 12, before 11.” So, finally, these kids, these girls came and he says to them, “I’m taking you all home.” He had a car. So, I said to myself, “Uh.” You know, and they says, “Yeah they’ll go for the ride.” So me and my sister look at each other and say, “But you know Frances told us not to go in a car.” Well, we took a chance and, uh…
[Laughter]
…we went in the car. He took us to Brooklyn. He went and dropped off these girls, and he dropped me and my sister off the last. But in the meantime, it got so late. And, so we ran upstairs and we says, “Should we tell Frances that we came with a car?” So we says, “We have to tell her the truth.” So we came, but she was so upset. She was so upset. “I begged you not to go in a car. I begged you to be home.” She was very upset. Then I heard him say he’ll see me tomorrow, but I wasn’t paying any attention. I was so glad…
[Laughter]
…to go upstairs, because my sister was worrying. Next day, my sister was poor, and she had one bedroom. She had two children and husband and us. And so, when it came Sunday we were helping her clean up, and I was on the kitchen floor. You know, washing the floor, and the bell rang. She didn’t have a telephone. So, Frances says to me, “Would you go down and answer the phone?” I says, “Yeah. Sure.” So, I ran downstairs with dirty feet and I passed him. He says, “Where are you running?” I said, “Im getting the telephone.” He says, “I rang the bell.” I says, “How?” He watched me ring the, you know, ring the bell. And he came next door, because he was going to Richmond. He lived in Richmond. So, that’s how I met him.
[Laughter]
And he kept on coming back from Richmond.
[Laughter]
BILL BENSON:
He was a very smart fellow.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
I don’t know.
BILL BENSON:
Helen, I wanna thank you for sharing with us what is unimaginable to all of us and I know this was exceptionally difficult for you, but it was brave of you. So thank you for doing that. And thank you all for being with us today, and that we hope you’ll come back to another First Person program. We’ll do four Wednesdays in August, until August 26th. And that will conclude First Person for this year, but if you’re in Washington D.C. next year look for First Person, and try to come here on a Wednesday or Tuesday next year.
We’ll have another First Person program tomorrow. That’s Wednesday, July 29th when our first person will be Mrs. Livia Shacter who is from Czechoslovakia also. Mrs. Shacter lived under Hungarian occupation, just as Helen did, until 1944 when the, when Germany invaded Czechoslovakia and life became obviously far, far worse. The Nazis took Livia and her family in a box car to Auschwitz. She survived and came to the United States in 1947 as well. Please remember that you can access First Person excerpts as podcasts on the Museum’s website. You can also get them through iTunes, and Helen’s will be up on the website in the coming weeks. It’s our tradition at First Person that our first person has the last word, and with that, I’d like to turn back to Helen to close our program today.
HELEN GOLDKIND:
I can only tell you one thing. The suffering that my family and the Jews and non-Jews, you know, 20 million Russians, suffered from this. But the Russians had a war, so. But I think hate brought it on, because my little brother didn’t harm anybody. I didn’t harm anybody. It’s hate. I just want to say that when we were walking to work, kids, the German children, they were in a picket fence and they were screaming to us, “Verfluchter Juden.” They didn’t know me. They didn’t know, these kids. That hate is being taught. Kids are not born hating. They were taught, “Verfluchter Juden.” They didn’t think that I was a child with needs like they did. They only knew how to hate me and so I please beg of you, if we can just conquer this hate, that we might have a better world.
[Applause]
