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We started trying to go back to Poland. We submitted the papers [to the repatriation committee] and the day came when we went home. It was a cattle wagon. To heat that wagon, there was a small heater there with a pot of water standing on top of the heater. Someone moved that pot and the water spilled on my leg. We were traveling for four weeks and I was in those wagons with that leg. Whenever there were any stations, we'd go to a medical point and someone would make these makeshift wound dressings. And we traveled and traveled until we reached Poland.
I only remember that the train was supposed to stop in Wroclaw [a city 350 km west of Warsaw]. We stopped in Lodz along the way. We got off the train for a moment [in Lodz] and then we got back on and went further. People started getting off after we passed Wroclaw. And I kept sitting. Everyone had a designated place to go. The Regained Territories [11]. People didn't worry about that, they got off wherever they wanted. But my husband said he wouldn't. Because he would go where they told him to.
In Pieszyce those who were already there went looking for their [family members] after such trains arrived. [Editor's note: Pieszyce, a town approx. 50 km southwest of Wroclaw. In the middle ages it was known as Pieszyce, later, when it was part of Germany as Peterswald, after WWII the town became a part of Poland again as Piotrolesie. In 1947 the name Pieszyce was restored.] And this brother-in-law of ours [Chaim Poltorak], the one who was in the army, came to the station! He was there as a military settler. That means that he was in the army, later when he left the army he got this farm which used to belong to the Germans. What great happiness, he said, 'I'll take you from here.'
My husband, of course, didn't want to go with him, he wanted to go where they told him to. I said, 'If you want to, then stay here, I'll take the children and go.' [Editor's note: the station where they were supposed to get off was even further than Pieszyce and Dawid, who was strict about following orders, insisted he would not get off the train in Pieszyce]. But he didn't let me get off alone. So we all got off.
I only remember that the train was supposed to stop in Wroclaw [a city 350 km west of Warsaw]. We stopped in Lodz along the way. We got off the train for a moment [in Lodz] and then we got back on and went further. People started getting off after we passed Wroclaw. And I kept sitting. Everyone had a designated place to go. The Regained Territories [11]. People didn't worry about that, they got off wherever they wanted. But my husband said he wouldn't. Because he would go where they told him to.
In Pieszyce those who were already there went looking for their [family members] after such trains arrived. [Editor's note: Pieszyce, a town approx. 50 km southwest of Wroclaw. In the middle ages it was known as Pieszyce, later, when it was part of Germany as Peterswald, after WWII the town became a part of Poland again as Piotrolesie. In 1947 the name Pieszyce was restored.] And this brother-in-law of ours [Chaim Poltorak], the one who was in the army, came to the station! He was there as a military settler. That means that he was in the army, later when he left the army he got this farm which used to belong to the Germans. What great happiness, he said, 'I'll take you from here.'
My husband, of course, didn't want to go with him, he wanted to go where they told him to. I said, 'If you want to, then stay here, I'll take the children and go.' [Editor's note: the station where they were supposed to get off was even further than Pieszyce and Dawid, who was strict about following orders, insisted he would not get off the train in Pieszyce]. But he didn't let me get off alone. So we all got off.
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