Surviving the Holocaust
By Morgan Fielding
S
tanding in a line, 18 year old Sally Recht is cold, hungry, and tired: she has been walking for a long time. Men dressed in posh uniforms, a band worn around their biceps had the swastika etched into the cloth. They stood around the line with guns and strong German shepherds, not only leading them but entrapping them. One of the men yells in German, time to move, before Sally could react she tripped up on the first step. One of the German shepherds lunges at her and lets loose a flurry of attacks. Sally falls to the ground, the dog biting at her flesh, ripping and tearing. The dog is pulled back and the attacks are halted. Before she can get up off the ground, the group continues to march right over her, pushing her into the ground. Sally thinks to herself “Is this what it’s like to be dead?”
2
It has been 72 years since the end of World War II in 1945. Personal experiences are disappearing rapidly. It is important to keep history alive and to know the disasters and atrocities that occurred so we can more readily prepare ourselves in the future to avoid the same mistakes. In recent years people have been scrambling to save these experiences before they are gone forever. With this documentary I am adding a single story to the millions that already exist, and only a glimpse into the many stories within Sally’s life. This is Sally’s story of her survival through the holocaust and through the rest of her life coming to America.
“We knew there was going to be war. We were excited”
Sally grew up in Starachowice, Wierzbnik, in Poland with her mother, father, brother, and four sisters. They owned a tailor shop and were well off and happy with their lives. Sally and her sisters knew there was going to be a war and were even excited because they didn’t know of the horrors to come. Sally and her sisters went to a school nearby, but in September of 1939 the invasion came roaring into their city. Sally recalls, “The skies were black with planes and bombs.” Sally and her sisters went back to their parents shop and hid under the front counter while outside the rage continued. Her family thought that moving to a smaller town would be safer, however they soon found that their original home in the city was near an ammunition factory which granted it extra safety from bombings. Sally’s brother went out to pray one day and was killed by the Nazis for no reason at all.
Shortly after, they turned her part of the city into a ghetto where they forced the Jews to live in small houses with 15-20 people per house. In 1942 Sally’s family was forced outside and her grandparents knew they would not make it so they stayed in their home. The rest of the people on the block were also forced out into the street. They were lined up on the block and they had no idea that that was the last time they would see their house for four more years. Sally would later find out that her grandparents stayed in their house because they knew they would die anyway. They covered themselves in white sheets, awaiting death and were killed by the Nazis. Sally was separated from her parents but was kept with two of her sisters. They were put in three camps before ending up at Auschwitz. She later found out that her father cut a hole in the side of a train to free some prisoners, but didn’t free himself because his brother in law was sick back at the camp where he was being held, and her father didn’t want to abandon him. In the camp Sally was put in a lot of horrible positions. “It was HELL,” Sally said. There was hardly any food. The sleeping quarters, if you could call them that, were cramped and disgusting.
They had to work all day waking up at 5:00 in the morning until 9:00 at night. On Jewish holidays they would give them what they called double beatings just to solidify the hatred of them and make them feel inferior. A sto ry f rom anot he r p erson in t he sam e c am p as Sally tells about a “good” d ay in Ausc hwit z . They would wake before dawn and would be rushed out of their barracks. During the winters you might not even get time to get you shoes on and you would have to go out in the
cold snow. The Germans would then march them to the work camp with only a coffee and a small square of black bread, or they wouldn’t even get breakfast at all before the start of their work for the day. They would then do various task like cutting down trees, do laundry, make shoes and other tools for the germans they would then be allowed to go back to their barracks at nine o’clock at night.
One day she was marched out on what they called a death march. Sometimes they would just lead them to work but the most common was that they were walking them to their death or to a mass grave. It is at this point we come back to Sally standing line with the guard dogs biting at her flesh.
3
After lying on the ground for some time she got back up, realizing she was still alive and caught back up with the group. They were liberated out on that death walk away from the concentration camp by some Russians with a Polish translator. She was then was put with a family for a time that gave them food and beds, though they would sleep on the floor, being used to the rough sleeping conditions. Sally recalls, “Now I wish we didn’t take everything (the food) and were more appreciative, but we were kids and didn’t know.” Sally and her sisters went back to their home in Poland, but were told by Polish people that had moved into their house and that their home was no longer theirs. Eventually Sally moved to Germany to attend school to be a dental technician. She finished schooling and moved to America in 1950. She came by the boat on which she met her husband. They got married in San Francisco, and remained married until he passed away in September 2016. In moving to America Sally was excited to get her life started. She began in San Francisco with her sister, brother in law, and their two year old child.
They were very grateful for all the nice things that they had including proper electricity. Sally’s future husband Harry was sent to denver originally but was able to eventually joined her. At first Sally would talk about being in Auschwitz to other people. One time she told the dentist she worked for and he took her out to lunch and treated her
"It was Hell"
like royalty. The other dental assistants would start to bully her due to the treatment she received. Sally decided that she wouldn’t tell people anymore. “We will never forget but we didn’t want the pity people gave us,” she said recalling the moments from her memories. Eventually Sally and Harry, earned enough money bought a liquor store, and started their family. While owning the store they were robbed a few times. “We just took out the money and gave it to the man,” Sally recalls the encounter, “it was the best we thought we could do.” Sally’s two sons were very successful. One
Sally has had a very long life, though it started with hardship and heartbreak. Just like the tattoo ingrained in Sally’s arm she persists and continues to enjoy life without the need for pity. She is one of the strongest people you will ever meet and has made the best of her time in this world. The final thing Sally wishes for you to know is that “you can do anything!”
of them was even called into Stanford medical school and is now a dermatologist in Sunnyvale. They had two children who went on to be very successful. One of them was recruited to go to Stanford Medical school and is a dermatologist in Sunnyvale. Sally now lives in Mountain View by herself and has a caregiver that helps her five days a week.
5
Works Cited Rowena Hernandez. Personal interview. Febuary 13 2017 Jewish Family and Children’s Services of San Francisco, the Peninsula, Marin and Sonoma Counties, Outcomes, Connects teens to Holocaust Survivors - 2010 Sally Recht. Personal interview. January 23 2017 Sally Recht. Personal interview. Febuary 2 2017 Sally recht. Personal interview. Febuary 10 2017
6
Bio
Morgan is a junior at Freestyel Academy who is is very interested in history, how it affected people, and the world. In his spare time he likes to read alternative h i s t o r y books, in which an event in history is changed such as the axis winging WW ll. His entire life he has been interested in astronomy and space in general and hopes to share that love witht the world ether through science or through animations.
7
8