Mr. Ben Hiller’s Story of Survival
The Jewish Home | MAY 12, 2022
102
and Gratitude By Malky lowinger
A
52
OctOber 29, 2015 | the Jewish Home
At the hachnosas sefer torah dedicated by Mr. Hiller’s family and friends in honor of Mr. Hiller turning 100 and in memory of his entire family who were killed in the Holocaust
n elderly gentleman, noble and serene, faces an audience and proceeds to tell the story of his survival calmly and meticulously. It’s a story that he’s told over and over again, but he never tires of telling it. Because Mr. Ben Hiller, who lived through the unimaginable, is determined to let the world know what happened to his family and his people over seventy years ago. And maybe now, more than ever, the world is ready to listen. Mr. Hiller just celebrated his 100th birthday, ka”h, and while he’s slowed down somewhat, according to his son, R’ Shmuel Leib, he still goes to the gym on a regular basis. Mr. Hiller’s greatest joy is attending the simchas of his beloved offspring. He’s not speaking in front of worldwide audiences anymore, but his story has been documented and published, and his previous interviews can be viewed online. The words “Hitler” and “Nazi” are being bandied about freely these days. It seems anytime someone wants to express anger or resentment, these words are carelessly used. So it might be wise to take a moment to think about what those terms actually mean and to recognize what absolute evil really is. We may think we know it, but we have no clue.
B
en Hiller grew up in Grojec, a city near Warsaw in Poland, where his father owned a leather business. He had six siblings, and he lived a happy and deeply religious life. Mr. Hiller points out that even well before
World War II, the Polish people were rabidly anti-Semitic. But that didn’t compare to what was to happen in the coming years. Unfortunately, Ben’s older brother had the distinct
“Can you imagine my fear? I never knew if I would live another day.”
“honor” of being one of the very first victims of the Holocaust. When the Germans invaded Grojec, they randomly chose seven Jews and jailed them. Ben’s brother was among them. “My parents tried everything they could to free him,” Ben remembers, “pleading and offering bribes.” To no avail. After two weeks, they were all murdered. It was just a harbinger of things to come, but for Ben’s family, it was the moment when everything began to unravel. “I was only sixteen,” Mr. Hiller recalls, “when my life was overturned.” There was no time to mourn his brother, says Mr. Hiller, because just days later, all the Jews of the town were rounded up and brought to the Warsaw Ghetto. Life in the ghetto was extremely difficult – the freezing
temperatures, heavy snowstorms, rampant disease, difficult work, and unrelenting pangs of hunger plaguing the inhabitants of the ghetto on a regular basis. In measured words and perfectly articulated English, Mr. Hiller tells the story of how he managed to escape the ghetto out of desperation and travel by train back to his native Grojec in an attempt to collect the money owed to his father by some of his gentile customers. Young Ben thought that these valued customers who previously enjoyed a wonderful relationship with his father would help his family in their time of need. Needless to say, that didn’t go very well at all. Ben did not return to the Warsaw Ghetto but wandered from one city to the next through the forests, sometimes in knee-deep snow. He eventually contracted pneumonia and was hospitalized for two weeks. Ultimately, Ben was recaptured by the Nazis and forced to work in a chemical factory in a large slave labor camp. He describes the inhumane conditions and the constant terror. “They gave me a pajama and wooden shoes, and that was my clothing,” he says. “I slept with no mattress, no cushions, no covers. That’s how we slept at night.” The chemicals Ben worked with in the factory were poisonous and turned everything that he touched yellow. “We worked every day like this with no hope,” he said. “Can you imagine my fear? I never knew if I would live another day.” And yet, his faith remained intact. “
