United States Holocaust Memorial Museum The Power of Truth: 20 Years
Museum   Education   Research   History   Remembrance   Genocide   Support   Connect
Donate
Enciclopedia del Holocausto

 

 

 

Los trabajos forzados — Testimonio

Boleslaw Brodecki
Nació: 1921, en Varsovia, Poland

Describe las muertes en la horca, y su impacto sobre los prisioneros [Entrevista: 1989]

La transcripción completa:

When we would go back from work we had to watch hangings before supper. They had two or three sets of wires, electric wires and, and the people to be hanged, they put them between the wires. And they might stay there for three days with no food, urinating on themselves. And they bring them up when, when we come from work. And they put a table and a chair and they hang them and they read some funny sentence and they kick the chair out. And a lot of them would er...actually one was shot before they were, he were hanged, but he started crying, "You murderers. You're going to lose the war. Hitler going to die," and all that. And the guy just went [makes the sound of gun shots] and they hanged him on the top of that. And we just got so cold that it didn't bother anybody anymore. Looking at dead people, looking at people getting hanged, you know...you get so...just like watching a movie and, and you feel like you have to do or how do you react to things, you know. But for some reason you get back to normal. You see somebody hit by a car or something. I think with time you come back to your own self, you know what I mean.

When we would go back from work we had to watch hangings before supper. They had two or three sets of wires, electric wires and, and the people to be hanged, they put them between the wires. And they might stay there for three days with no food, urinating on themselves. And they bring them up when, when we come from work. And they put a table and a chair and they hang them and they read some funny sentence and they kick the chair out. And a lot of them would er...actually one was shot before they were, he were hanged, but he started crying, "You murderers. You're going to lose the war. Hitler going to die," and all that. And the guy just went [makes the sound of gun shots] and they hanged him on the top of that. And we just got so cold that it didn't bother anybody anymore. Looking at dead people, looking at people getting hanged, you know...you get so...just like watching a movie and, and you feel like you have to do or how do you react to things, you know. But for some reason you get back to normal. You see somebody hit by a car or something. I think with time you come back to your own self, you know what I mean.

Boleslaw y su hermana mayor fueron criados en el barrio judío de Varsovia. Los alemanes atacaron Varsovia en septiembre de 1939. El padre de Boleslaw no quería dejar detrás a sus parientes enfermos, así que Boleslaw y su hermana se escaparon en un tren que iba hacia la frontera soviética. Los alemanes invadieron los territorios soviéticos en 1941, y en 1942 Boleslaw fue encarcelado en un campo de trabajos forzados. Fue deportado al ghetto de Theresienstadt, donde fue liberado por las fuerzas soviéticas en 1945.

— US Holocaust Memorial Museum - Collections

Copyright © United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Washington, D.C.