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When they started setting up the ghetto [44], I ran away from Lwow. I was afraid of the ghetto, because I knew if they built a wall around us, or surrounded us with wire, then they’d have control over us. I decided to go to my mother, to Sosnowiec.
The only document I had was my gymnasium school-leaving certificate. I had this special ink which I used to erase all the data from the document and filled in a new name: ‘Emilia Dutkowska, Religion: Roman Catholic.’ I only left ‘born in Magdeburg.’ And with that document I set on my way from Lwow to Sosnowiec [in December 1941].
I stopped horse-drawn wagons, today this is called ‘hitchhiking,’ they offered me rides. I remember that I made the sign of the cross each time we passed a cross, so the drivers wouldn’t think I was Jewish. I was extremely careful...
I stopped in Sanok [approx. 220 km southeast of Cracow] along the way, where I had some friends with whom I was exchanging letters. Awrumek Gurfein and Marta, I don’t remember her last name, they were in the same organization as I was, in Akiba.
Before the war we used to meet at summer camps. I wanted to see them, because nobody knew what the following day would bring. I was depressed after my father’s and brother’s deaths, I wanted to cry on a friend’s shoulder. I was in Sanok for one day. Marta gave me her picture as a keepsake, in the picture she’s holding her little sister. Both Marta and Awrumek didn’t survive the Holocaust.
I reached a settlement, I think it was called Zloty Potok [approx. 20 km southeast of Czestochowa]. It was Christmas by then, it was December 1941. I could see the lights of a local recreation hall from far away. I entered that hall and there was some boy sitting there and decorating it.
The only document I had was my gymnasium school-leaving certificate. I had this special ink which I used to erase all the data from the document and filled in a new name: ‘Emilia Dutkowska, Religion: Roman Catholic.’ I only left ‘born in Magdeburg.’ And with that document I set on my way from Lwow to Sosnowiec [in December 1941].
I stopped horse-drawn wagons, today this is called ‘hitchhiking,’ they offered me rides. I remember that I made the sign of the cross each time we passed a cross, so the drivers wouldn’t think I was Jewish. I was extremely careful...
I stopped in Sanok [approx. 220 km southeast of Cracow] along the way, where I had some friends with whom I was exchanging letters. Awrumek Gurfein and Marta, I don’t remember her last name, they were in the same organization as I was, in Akiba.
Before the war we used to meet at summer camps. I wanted to see them, because nobody knew what the following day would bring. I was depressed after my father’s and brother’s deaths, I wanted to cry on a friend’s shoulder. I was in Sanok for one day. Marta gave me her picture as a keepsake, in the picture she’s holding her little sister. Both Marta and Awrumek didn’t survive the Holocaust.
I reached a settlement, I think it was called Zloty Potok [approx. 20 km southeast of Czestochowa]. It was Christmas by then, it was December 1941. I could see the lights of a local recreation hall from far away. I entered that hall and there was some boy sitting there and decorating it.
Period
Year
1941
Interview
Wygodzka Irena