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Margot, my aunt, and my grandmother were deported before we got to the Baron Hirsch camp [12]. We did not know it, only a posteriori. How could we have known? Yes we did know that the ghetto of 25th March Street was evacuated [13], but we didn’t know anything else.
I want to come back to the Matarasso family, who lived in our house. He had a lot of money, of course. He had a jewelry shop and such things. It was a very wealthy family, and they found a way to survive. But he was on the list of rich Jews that the Germans knew about. These people the Germans had occasionally forced money out from. He was listed, in other words, in their records. The Germans found out immediately that he had escaped, and they made it sound as if my mother was to blame. She, as the house owner, was supposed to have let the Germans know that they had left. So they arrested her.
It so happened that my brother, who was much younger than I, was at home. This was taking place during the second or the third deportation load, in March 1943. They informed me in the Community where I worked as a volunteer, and I immediately ran to see what was going on. Since I knew German, I went straight to the Gestapo. There I found out that they kept her there. I tried to protest and say this or that, but of course it was not taken into account, and they ordered us to leave immediately. To take our personal belongings and to go to the Hirsch camp, in the old railway station. We went there on the very same day, of course. There was nothing to be done.
We stayed there for a fortnight with my mother, where, upon a conversation, we found out that the Italian consulate was providing certificates to Italian families in order to move them to Athens, which was occupied by the Italians. This we hadn’t taken into account before.
My mother, who was a daughter of an Italian citizen, thought then that she too could acquire a permit and leave from Macedonia [Greek Macedonia, occupied and administered by the Germans] to go with us to Athens. But the thing was that for these procedures she had to leave the camp and go to the consulate, and leave us behind in the camp. For two days she was beside herself, she cried continuously, it is difficult to describe her feelings.
She managed to get out of the ghetto because she went to the Germans’ collaborators and explained the situation to them. And some of those Jews that were there and were helping the Germans knew my mother and they knew that she really was an Italian’s daughter. She said, ‘I want to go out to get the papers so I can leave,’ and they accepted it. It wasn’t easy to get out, you had to have a good excuse. The permission for her to get out of the camp was given orally by the Germans, after a recommendation. The application was carried out by the collaborators.
Finally she managed to leave. It took her ten to twelve days. I don’t remember exactly how many days were necessary for the procedure. She went back and forth to the consulate to acquire the necessary papers, to prove she really was an Italian’s daughter, and to come to pick us up in order for us to leave. And we did.
My brother and I stayed in the Baron Hirsch camp for six or seven weeks, for something like two months. [Editor’s note: this period is significantly longer than the period Mr. Saltiel’s mother was away, so it must be inaccurate.] During this time trainloads left every five days. These deportations didn’t take place according to some name list, they deported anyone they could lay their hand on, crowds of people. The Germans raided one house after the other, yelling, ‘Raus, raus’ [‘Out, out!’] and chased them to the old train station where they loaded them on the wagons. The camp was empty and three or four days later more people would arrive.
We were young and had this hope that we might leave and therefore we hid. We had no protection, simply out of cunningness. We hid under the beds. During this time of course we stayed without food, because during the days the people were imprisoned they somehow fed them. But in the days the ghetto was empty, there was no food. During this time we had absolutely no contact with our mother. So we stayed there without our mother for 15 days.
After that she came and picked us up. We went to Evzonon Street, gathered our things, and realized our house had been looted. The house had been emptied of its Jewish lodgers and people had stolen everything. In the meantime we had given certain things to the Italians also, in order to thank them for helping us.
I want to come back to the Matarasso family, who lived in our house. He had a lot of money, of course. He had a jewelry shop and such things. It was a very wealthy family, and they found a way to survive. But he was on the list of rich Jews that the Germans knew about. These people the Germans had occasionally forced money out from. He was listed, in other words, in their records. The Germans found out immediately that he had escaped, and they made it sound as if my mother was to blame. She, as the house owner, was supposed to have let the Germans know that they had left. So they arrested her.
It so happened that my brother, who was much younger than I, was at home. This was taking place during the second or the third deportation load, in March 1943. They informed me in the Community where I worked as a volunteer, and I immediately ran to see what was going on. Since I knew German, I went straight to the Gestapo. There I found out that they kept her there. I tried to protest and say this or that, but of course it was not taken into account, and they ordered us to leave immediately. To take our personal belongings and to go to the Hirsch camp, in the old railway station. We went there on the very same day, of course. There was nothing to be done.
We stayed there for a fortnight with my mother, where, upon a conversation, we found out that the Italian consulate was providing certificates to Italian families in order to move them to Athens, which was occupied by the Italians. This we hadn’t taken into account before.
My mother, who was a daughter of an Italian citizen, thought then that she too could acquire a permit and leave from Macedonia [Greek Macedonia, occupied and administered by the Germans] to go with us to Athens. But the thing was that for these procedures she had to leave the camp and go to the consulate, and leave us behind in the camp. For two days she was beside herself, she cried continuously, it is difficult to describe her feelings.
She managed to get out of the ghetto because she went to the Germans’ collaborators and explained the situation to them. And some of those Jews that were there and were helping the Germans knew my mother and they knew that she really was an Italian’s daughter. She said, ‘I want to go out to get the papers so I can leave,’ and they accepted it. It wasn’t easy to get out, you had to have a good excuse. The permission for her to get out of the camp was given orally by the Germans, after a recommendation. The application was carried out by the collaborators.
Finally she managed to leave. It took her ten to twelve days. I don’t remember exactly how many days were necessary for the procedure. She went back and forth to the consulate to acquire the necessary papers, to prove she really was an Italian’s daughter, and to come to pick us up in order for us to leave. And we did.
My brother and I stayed in the Baron Hirsch camp for six or seven weeks, for something like two months. [Editor’s note: this period is significantly longer than the period Mr. Saltiel’s mother was away, so it must be inaccurate.] During this time trainloads left every five days. These deportations didn’t take place according to some name list, they deported anyone they could lay their hand on, crowds of people. The Germans raided one house after the other, yelling, ‘Raus, raus’ [‘Out, out!’] and chased them to the old train station where they loaded them on the wagons. The camp was empty and three or four days later more people would arrive.
We were young and had this hope that we might leave and therefore we hid. We had no protection, simply out of cunningness. We hid under the beds. During this time of course we stayed without food, because during the days the people were imprisoned they somehow fed them. But in the days the ghetto was empty, there was no food. During this time we had absolutely no contact with our mother. So we stayed there without our mother for 15 days.
After that she came and picked us up. We went to Evzonon Street, gathered our things, and realized our house had been looted. The house had been emptied of its Jewish lodgers and people had stolen everything. In the meantime we had given certain things to the Italians also, in order to thank them for helping us.
Period
Interview
Nico Saltiel