| Len's cousin
Germans invade II
Len: Today is the twelfth of June, 1988. Just tell me who you are. I have lots of tape.
Joe: OK. We are your cousins, the Berliners. What would you like to know?
Len: Well, your name, when you were born, where...
Joe: OK. We were all born in Lomza. I’m sorry, in Myszyniec, which was a suburb of Lomza.
Half an hour after the war started, they came into our town. One of the generals from the German army that knew my father, came into our house, and he said, “User Fuhrer gleicht nicht kein Juden,” and go to the Russians. So, we picked ourselves up, we took a wagon and a horse, and loaded up whatever we could, gave the keys to our neighbor, and we went on towards the Russian side. Where did we get to, do you remember?
Louie: First, we got to Ostrolenka.
Ostrolenka [official name Ostroleka] lies a few miles west of Myszyniec. For its Jewish history, see http://www.shtetlinks.jewishgen.org/ostro/ostro1.html
Joe: So, we came to Ostrolenka. And how long were we there?
Louie: First we went to...
Joe: First, we went to Lomza.
Louie: First in the war, we went to Ostrow Masoviecka [pronounced “Ostrov Masoversk”) There, the Germans took us over. Then we came back to our town.
Joe: We came back to Myszyniec?
Louie: We came back to Myszyniec. Then, after two weeks, after the holidays, they told us by 9 o’clock, all Jews must leave the town. They had a policy to sent all the Jews out of the small towns. So, they sent us to Ostroleka. And Ostroleka, the Russians was supposed to come in. But then, they changed the border because of the highway. So, they told us we had to go across the Russian border. That’s when the Germans came into Ostroleka.
So, we went across to Lomza, and we were going to go to Russia voluntarily.
Joe: Of course, in Lomza, when we were in Lomza, there were already bombing, because I remember distinctly Uncle Kalman’s store. They were in the textile business. And I remember distinctly that they were going, after the place was bombed out, they were going to collect some of the stuff that was remaining there in the store. Do you remember that, Wolf?
Louie: We didn’t really stay in Lomza. We went to Bialistok. And in Bialistok, we wanted to go to Russia.
Joe: No, that’s wrong. We didn’t want to go to Russia. That’s what happened. They gave us a choice, who wanted to go to Russia, or we want to go back to Germany. But we were so used, from the first World War, that the Germans were the good ones and Russia was communism, they were the bad ones. So we registered to go back to the Germans, and most of the Jews registered to go back to German, not to go to Russia. So, the said, “Fine, we will send you back to Germany.”
So, because we registered to go back to Germany, they [the Russians] came and they took us in to trains, and they said, “All right, we will take you to Germany.” But instead, they took us to Siberia as prisoners of war. You don’t remember that?
Apparently many Jews chose Germany over Russia after their experiences during World War I, despite the anti-Semitic policies of the Nazis. I have never seen this fact mentioned elsewhere.
Louie: Yes.
Joe: Well, all of us that didn’t register were taken to Russia that night. The ones that registered to go to Russia, they were taken to Russia, not as prisoners of war. The ones that registered to go back to Germany, they took us as prisoners of war, because we were enemy. Of course, that was a miracle from God that we were taken to Russia, because of people when they found out that we were really going to Russia instead of Germany, they jumped off the trains, and they were hiding, because they didn’t want to go to Russia. They wanted to go back to the Germans. Because they didn’t realize what was awaiting for them in Germany. How long did we stay in Siberia?
Louie: A year and a half. And it’s only two families from our town that were taken to Russia that survived. And maybe about 7-8 singles. From the whole town maybe 7-8 singles, boys and girls.
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