Simon was reunited that night with his father, a shopkeeper, although they spent the remaining years of the war hidden separately by Catholic families. Leon Gronowski died within months of the end of the war. I told my mother: 'Now I can jump.' He was liberated from Bergen-Belsen in 1945 and lived until 2008. At the time, Belgians who failed to turn in Jews to the Gestapo would be shot and the woman took Simon to the local police officer. "We were packed like a herd of cattle. His father, Leon, had been in hospital when the Germans had raided their home a month before. "I was used to the woods because I'd been in the cub scouts. An effort to deport the Danish Jews in September 1943 failed when the resistance in Denmark , alerted to the impending roundup, assisted the mass escape of … George Ginzburg was born into a Jewish family from Berlin. US parties wrangle after Trump shuns Covid bill, Man accused of Daniel Pearl murder to be freed. He has children and grandchildren. 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Simon knew he risked arrest but, by dawn, he knew that he would need help. Show more. Auschwitz, poland, world war 2, concentration camp victims after disembarking from a freight train at the station near the camp. How could we empty it? Of the 233 people who attempted to escape from the 20th convoy with Simon Gronowski, 26 were shot that night, 89 were recaptured and 118 got away. Just didn't like the way he puts Americanisms into Polish people's mouths in 1943. The SS guards obeyed and the car drove to freedom – allowing the men to become four of only 144 prisoners to successfully escape Auschwitz. An SS investigation yielded no results. On the evening of April 19, 1943, train 801 left Mechelen transit camp near Brussels carrying 1,631 Jews to Auschwitz. Conditions inside the train were atrocious. Leo Bretholz, who made a daring escape from the Nazis by jumping off a moving train en route to Auschwitz, died Saturday at his home in Maryland. In … First I stood there frozen, I could see the train moving slowly forward - it was this large black mass in the dark, spewing steam. On 19 April 1943, a train carrying 1,631 Jews set off from a Nazi detention camp in Belgium for the gas chambers of Auschwitz. The Israeli premiere of 72-year-old Lindwer’s film, The Train Journey, at the Jerusalem Cinematheque on January 28 (6:30 p.m.), is part of this year’s International Holocaust Day events. Transaction Publishers. It was a French train… From there, Simon and his mother and sister were transferred to the Kazerne Dossin, a detention camp 30 miles away in Mechelen, Flanders. Outside, the vast camps of Auschwitz-Birkenau sprawled across more than 400 acres of Poland’s southern countryside. “According to my sources, some sixteen thousand Jews have been deported to date. Robert Maistriau, one of the resistance members, recalled that terrifying moment later in his memoirs. According to some sources, it was also unique in that although 70% of the women and girls were killed in the gas chambers immediately on arrival, the remaining women were sent to Block X of Birkenau for medical experimentation. 1. In February 1943, 11-year-old Simon Gronowski was sitting down for breakfast with his mother and sister in their Brussels hiding place when two Gestapo agents burst in. George Ginzburg. In this photo, taken in 1945, the tracks are strewn with snow-covered personal effects … Quick, Quick, get out of here!". George Ginzburg. As for the three young Belgian Resistance members who stopped the train, Youra Livschitz was captured later and executed. I was still in my own little world, where I was a boy scout," he says. I was in the rear right corner of the car, with my mother. An hour later, men in Simon's wagon succeeded in breaking open the door. But then at a certain moment, I felt the train slow down. He was 93. PM hails post-Brexit free trade deal with EU, Santa explains what a Covid Christmas looks like. Simon's sister Ita, 18, arrived in Auschwitz on the next but one convoy, and also died there. ", But the train slowed to a stop for a second time that night and the German guards began shooting again, this time in Simon's direction. I was very excited and it took far too long until I had cut through the wire that secured the bolts of the sliding door. Just finished reading "The Auschwitz Escape" by Joel C Rosenberg. Witness History. Find the travel option that best suits you. "I thought to myself, 'Goodbye my Brussels, my Belgium, my father, my dear sister, my family and my friends'.". "My mother held me by my shirt and my shoulders. How could we use it? "There was no food, no drink. Today he lives in Brussels and still practises law. I didn't decide what to do, it was a reflex. This would be bad enough, but there are reports that Auschwitz is not simply a slave-labor camp, as it has been described. There was a pale gleam coming from a vent in the roof but it was stifling and there was no water to be had.". Soon after the train … The air was crisp and cool and the noise was deafening.
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