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The person in question has given us the following information: There were 180 Jewish families living in Sashalom. Most of the heads of families were merchants. My father had a glass and porcelain shop. Later, when his trade license was taken away, he worked as a tailor. I did not have siblings. The livelihood of our three-member-family was secured. After the German occupation Jews could live only in those houses where the landlord was Jewish. The buildings were marked with yellow stars, but since these buildings were scattered around the city, there was no ghetto in Sashalom. On June 29 policemen circled the Jewish buildings and on the 30th we had to march to Rákosszentmihály. Previously the gendarmes had robbed us of everything and they took our money too. However they took a protocol of this act. Later we were entrained and taken to the Budakalász brick factory. In Budakalász we lived in utter filth. We slept outdoors. There was a young SS soldier here: a short, blond boy, who walked around with a whip and constantly beat us. The gendarmes were cruel too: they kept robbing and beating us. We spent a week here with my parents. We were deported together to Auschwitz in cattle cars. After the arrival we were torn apart; ever since I do not know anything about them. I did not work in Auschwitz, but suffered a lot from the roll calls and the hunger. The most terrible was to be disinfected by the SS. We had to undress in front of them. In August I was taken to Frankfurt am Main, to a work camp. In Frankfurt we had a cruel boss. He stole the large part of the food and we were given only cold and fatless cabbage soup. The evil female overseers harassed even the older women. For the smallest reasons, the boss locked up the prisoners in the basement where they were given 50 blows. The beating had to be performed by two Jewish girls. If they were reluctant to do so, then he beat them. We suffered a lot here. Even our hair was cropped out of pure viciousness. Our clothes were stolen, we walked around in rugs. We worked for the Organisation Todt. Despite the regulations, we were sent to work even when it was raining. I was sawing wood for 13 months from 7 am to 6 pm. Thirteen of us supplied the military camp with wood. The boss was still not satisfied with the performance and threatened to lock us up in the basement. The food supply was terrible. Our next station was the Ravensbrück concentration camp. There was no work there. The Polish capos stole the Jews’ food. After four weeks we were taken to Zillorthal. We were quite well off here, the leaders behaved decent. We lived in a heated camp, we were treated fairly and satisfactory food was provided. We worked in a weaving mill. We were fine in Nordhausen too. We worked in an aircraft factory. We stayed in an apartment with central heating and we had our own dining room and kitchen. The food was clean and the treatment was tolerable. Our sufferings started in March. We were dragged to Mauthausen on foot. We were beaten on the way. We were not given food and the weak were shot down by the SS. The starving continued in Mauthausen. I was quite apathetic when we were dragged further to Günskirchen. Our sufferings were extreme and if the Americans had not arrived in time, we all would have starved to death. After our May 4 liberation we all could live like human beings again.

Labour Service