This Grandmother’s Terrifying Experience During The Holocaust Reminds People Of How Cruel Nazis Were
The granddaughter of a Holocaust survivor, Katie, decided to share the heartbreaking story of her beloved grandmother on Tumblr. Her grandmother was only 2-years-old when Hitler marched into Poland in 1939. The girl was too little to understand how horribly this political shift would change not only her own fate but also the fate of the whole nation.
Despite the fact that Katie’s grandmother survived one of the most terrifying events in history, she was left traumatized for the rest of her life. “Those horrors did not fade with time,” Katie says. Witnessing the deaths of people she knew and loved, being forced out of her home to live in a concentration camp and suffer under horrible conditions left a painful wound, which was reopened 56 years later when she returned to the gates of the concentration camp. This was the first time Katie heard her grandmother’s horrific story and was inspired to share it with others for a very important reason. Scroll below to learn why!
More info: marilyns-child.tumblr.com | twitter.com
The granddaughter of a Holocaust survivor, Katie, decided to share the heartbreaking story of her beloved grandmother on Tumblr
Image credits: Katie
Here’s how people responded to the story
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Share on FacebookWe should learn from history so that it doesn't repeat itself. Sadly a lot of people never learn and so Trump gets elected president. He used the same method like Hitler did: Pick an ethnic group and blame them for everything that's wrong. Promised the poor that he will take care of them. Promised jobs, and a better economy so that everyone gets a better life. And now he is in power he's picking fights with almost every other country in the world. (Russia, Turkye, China, and every European country). That man is a threat to America and to the world.
the flack comes from WW2 and was to decieve the enemy - think it was aluminium strips
Load More Replies...My grandmother lived through WWII, in Amsterdam. As a young girl, she was very nearly taken away by Nazis, who thought she looked 'Jewish' because of her darker complexion and darker hair colour. My Great Grandmother had to march down to their office and insist that she was a 'good catholic girl' to get her free. She was saved. Her best friend and neighbour, however, wasn't so lucky. After those neighbours had been taken away, she never saw them again. Later on, many were starving since the Nazis were blocking all aid to the Dutch citizens. One relative, a single young man, starved himself to death giving all of his food coupons to his brother who had 5 children. My Grandmother herself very nearly starved to death as well. The Nazis held onto Holland with a death grip, and as a result, it was the one of the very last countries to be liberated. So when I see anyone trying to justify hate toward other people for the way they're born, race, etc... it makes my blood boil.
it is so important that the people the nazis tried to 'delete' from history have their voices forever heard, not just on a 50th, 100th or 200th anniversary, but always, what happened to her Grandma happened to so many innocent people in so many ways. So many of these had stories that will never be told, but the ones that survived had and have the power to change and save the lives of many more to come. I've just finished reading The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris, I would strongly recommend this to anyone who has an interest in this sort of thing. Also the book Maus by Art Spiegelman.
You just cannot read or see the things that happened from Natzi Germany without being overcome by emotion - and all they stuff that happened throughout the rest of Europe that had a Jewish population - is almost unbearable - but we have to bear it to ensure it cannot be repeated
Load More Replies...Also @vonskippy, because I cannot reply directly to his/her post: you're wrong and I am living proof. I had eye surgery when I was 18 months old. I was awake for that surgery, frozen into stillness by drugs. The surgeons plucked my eye out of it's socket, cut a muscle behind the eye, and put the eyeball back in place. The doctors told my parents not to tell me anything about the surgery, as they believed it would only traumatize me. For years, I had a recurring dream - a nightmare - about my eyeball dangling from its socket, held to my socket by "slimy, stringy things." I told my parents about this dream and their only reply ever was, "Mm, that's terrible sweetie." Nobody told me about the surgery until I was 16 - that's when I told my stepmom about the nightmare. She replied, "For goodness sake, has no one told you about your surgery?" She described it to me. I never had that dream again. Not even once. Yes, little ones can and do remember trauma.
Yeah, the reason we forget most of our memories when we are young probably comes down to the fact that we have very few meaningful memories to hold on to, eating, sleeping etc are not the type of things that even as adults we remember, your eye surgery much like what happened to this women, even if it was not something you fully understood at the time would have stuck with you as it would have been very distressing.
Load More Replies...My dad was 17 when he joined the Royal Canadian Navy during WWII. He persuaded his mom to sign the papers by threatening to run away and join up under a false name. He joined the navy TO FIGHT NAZIS. He said he would've joined the army but they wouldn't let him in with his flat feet. So he joined the navy. He said they knew about the camps by then, and he had to do something, anything, to stop these insane fascists. Yeah, my skinny, 5'6", 17-year old, flat-footed, pre-me father. WTF IS WRONG WITH ANYONE WHO FLIES A NAZI FLAG IN THE 21ST CENTURY. They are all NOTHING but cowards, terrified of having to share a world with people who are not exactly like them, desperately in need of some fascist dictator to lead them because they have no courage and inner compass of their own. My skinny, short, 17-year old father had more guts than them.
it honestly makes me sick to think that people can think that it's ok to treat people like this!?!!?!
Load More Replies...This is why all this c**p about hate speech being protected by law is b******t, every single genocide has started with someone whiping up hatred about a group of people, be it the Nazis in Germany or the Hutu killing the Tusi in Rwanda, it's all the same. The Alt-right trying to piggybank their hate on the back of freedom of speech needs to be called out, it's no longer a debate when they get enough idiots to start putting their "freedom of speech" into action, it's too late.
So we just use ignore and ban and censorship? Even if it would be for good sake, but power determined by usage too. And democracy's one most important fundament, is to avoid the power using methods wich could harm the society. That's why the law enforcement, the judicature and the goverment are separated to each other, to control each other to make the power balanced, and that is why citizens have rights. If you take the right from a group even when it's for good, you make a precedent, that rights can be removed by any reason. So even if you get succes in short term, you actually undermine the system in long term. And actually, just act like a fascist too... The democratic way is education and communication.
Load More Replies...Growing inequality, fewer and fewer opportunities to find work for those who have no education to speak about, the ease of spreding disinformation and invented "truths" online are all creating fertile soil for cold blooded demagogues and populists. As the German people found out much too late, they should not have listened. We must not listen now.
Why is this getting down voted you make some good points?
Load More Replies...I was moved by your telling of your Grandmother's story. It made heart ache with sorrow and pain of what she and others went through during that time. I can not even imagine what fear and helplessness that people must of felt. It also made me think of the madness that is going on today and the growth in inequality. It make me very fearful of what our future will be.
Those nazzis were barbarians just like those tyrans oppressing their own people in the middle east and terrorising around every now and then. A truly "superior race" would NEVER do those atrocities.
It's easier to consider them like barbarians, as you say, rather than average humans, because it's getting their actions further away from ourselves, it allows us to think that WE would NEVER act this way. Truth is, we don't know that. Not until it happens to us. We don't know what we're made of until we have to find out. Truth is, every human on this planet is a human. Not a monster, not a barbarian, not a devil. Do you think they wake up every morning wondering how thay can manage to do the most evil, harmful, possible thing to the most numerous possible people ? They don't feel any different than you and me. They think they do what they have to do. I believe the only difference is that they think they are better than others or that they know better and that this allows them to do what they do, "for greater good". They really believe they act for the better in the long run and they're just making sacrifices in the short run...
Load More Replies...My mum was in London when the Govt decided to take all the children away from their children and put them in homes in the country like the Lion, the witch, and the Wardrobe. My mum was 6 when she left on that train with her 5 brothers and sister. She did not come back until she was 16. Her parents were Orthodox Jews. The children were taken and given to Christian families to hide them out. They were not all wanted. She had a friend who was locked in a closet and went mad. Her brother Davy was sent to a man like Fagan who sent the kids out in the morning and they couldn't come back until they stole something. Mom believes she is Christian now. The Jews lost their children to their faith all in one generation. But they were alive. When mum came back she got a job in a department store. It was three stories and she worked in the first floor. It got bombed. She woke up to see daylight. She did not tell us about our heritage. I found out from her eldest brother when we visited him when I was 19. She said she was shielding us from it. That "they" kept records. They are still around. She told me of sleeping in the subway tunnels when she was little and saying the prayer" Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my souls to keep..if I die before I wake. I pray the Lord my soul to take." It is a pray for children in War.
Im a Chinese. Though none of my families have experienced these terrible things ,we know about it a lot.Whenever i read these reports,I think of the Nanjing Massacres.The world should face up history and face future.
My Granddad was polish catholic, he narrowly avoided the Kaytn Massacre only to find himself on a trek to a POW camp in Siberia. He managed to survive and when the Russians switched sides he was freed, he didn't talk about what happened many people dies on the journey let alone in the camps. He trekked back across Syria to join the British fighting forces. My great Aunt meanwhile was still in Poland she ran a pharmacy and was a doctor, we have pictures where the shop has been completely commandeered for the Nazi's and one small window is left for Polish patrons. I think she was considered to be too useful at the time to dispatch of.
Powerful. Zero tolerance for these modern day imbeciles who embrace this horrendous philosophy.
The picture illustrating the horrific fate of victims of the Nazi Germany regime comes from The Schindler’s List by Steven Spielberg. As far as I know, the little girl in the picture and movie did exist and her presence among the terrified crowds was reported by countless survivors of the Ghetto purge. Miraculously, she survived, too. Her name was Roma Ligocka, as an adult person she wrote a number of books and memoirs from the Second World War. A bit about her here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roma_Ligocka
In Italy we had rebellion to the Nazi during the last years of war, a woman of 23 was helping the partisans(the rebels) . The Nazi found out so they came to her house and killed her. She was pregnant, they took her eyes out, cut her belly and the body was found weeks after in a ditch.
There are some "pride" groups that should be illegal and the KKK and neo-nazis are a few examples of them. There is nothing you could say to me that makes it okay to be racist. We all bleed red.
Every single family in Poland has such stories, mine too, even if we did not belong to the 10% of Polish families having Jewish relatives at the time. My great-grandmother who was threatened to be sent to the camp in Stutthof had such an anxiety neurosis that she was told by her doctor she could die from that alone. She was advised to get pregnant to ease it and it helped to some extent. I find it interesting that such terrible conditions can actually affect genes, that is whole generations in a country like Poland that was a war-zone. Sadly these stories tend to disappear with the tellers. Thank you for sharing.
you cannot EVER repay 3 generations of persecution and 8 million deaths - i do feel sorry for young german people having to live with this
We as the children and grandchildren of the german people from the 30's and 40's were born and raised with acute consciousness about where racism leads. I was born in 1976 and I don't remember the first time I heard about the camps and the massmurdering. I don't remember the first time I saw the images of piles and piles of barely recognizable naked human bodies. I've been raised with this etched in my soul. Thay did this. WE did this. *I*, as a German, have the personal responsability of remembering this forever and never, EVER, allow it to come back to life. I feel like the Guardian of a dragon roaring in its cave, grumbling in its sleep, terrorized it might wake up. I don't get to watch this happen again and do nothing about it, not raising my voice. Because I know where it leads, we've already been there, and it's nothing but Hate and Death.
Load More Replies...Unfortunately your story is flawed, experiences do not change DNA. I am a professor of biology and this simply isn't true. While I understand your anger and the trauma your grandmother endured, blaming 'neo-nazi's' for the problems in the world is wrong.
Great that you opened and revealed this heartbreaking story to the word. The more people that hear this, the more people will realize how cruel and sad that period of time was, this the more people will acknowledge and dare not to repeat the same mistake. That was a horrible time to be alive, unfortunately especially for Jewish people. People should not be punish for there beliefs. And if anyone disagrees with anyone else about there belief/opinion- act on yours appropriately.
30 years ago, I visited a Concentration Camp while I was visiting Germany... In the middle of this beautiful, manicured country was this - place. It made the little hairs on my arms stand up...and chills run down my back.. And then - I went on to view the exhibits and memorabilia of the place... I think - anyone - who even Thinks being a Natzi is " cool" should be taken to one of these places - or- at least- made to watch one of the documentaries that were made of these places when they were discovered. Too many things, in this country ( USA) have been "sanitized". Events " softened " because - the REAL events are to "Harsh " for people to view. I agree - some things are too horrible to unsee - but the idea that the Holocaust "didn't happen " or that " it wasn't that bad" is insane!! Some survivors of that tragedy are still alive. There are also many interviews and accounts of that tragedy that have been filmed.
And now all you self righteous commenters are the ones supporting bringing more Muslims into Germany and the rest of Europe where they can abuse the Jewish people, and the ones supporting the fake state of Palestine when they send bombs at women and children. You people just want to hate for the sake of hating, not out of any kind of real caring for the Jewish people.
Actually my grandmother had quite similar story - although her mother was taken to one of Nazi Camps in Germany and probably raped by Nazi soldier she got pregnant there. Her "luck" was that she worked for Nazis in their house not on the camp, so they took the child (my grandma) to raise as theirs and treated her very well. She was forced not to speak Polish, so when the war ended and great-grandmother took her back to Poland she only spoke German. But this story way worse shows what War did to people minds, because my great-grandmother actually hated little "German" girl she had, so she was firstly staying with some nuns and after when she learned some Polish, her mother took her back but beat and bullied her. After she get married and move out to the different city, mother never replied to any letter and they met when she was dying and finally felt some guilt.
Didn't Poland have a huge white supremacist rally recently? And didn't they pass a law that says you can't say Poland did anything bad during the Holocaust? We can't forget these things.
no not really like that, as there are few nationalists, these rallies attract just regular people, proud to be patriotic. Remember, that any form of patriotism, visible one is seen badly in modern Europe. No, you would not walk far away wearing nazi flag or symbols on a polish street. Second part, this law was against blaming POLISH STATE for taking part in the Holocaust. Not banning to say, that some Poles could take part of it. This is huge difference
Load More Replies...I've got chicken skin. It's all so horrible that it's unbelievable how a human can do to another human.
"My family is German, I hate Jews"... what? I thought that people from Germany these days are, as a general rule, *more* open-minded and caring because they have been living - more than anyone else - with the shame of the horrors of WWII.
Yes, this made me shudder with confusion too...
Load More Replies...I just love Jewish people - and I dont think I even know any - I just want to love them for all the terrible things they, their families and their entire religeon have suffered for centuries
you cannot see more beautiful Jewish people than Sreisand and LLeunard Cohen or anyone more talented than Mel Brooks or Charles Aznavour and so many many creative people - All we can do is weep for them and ensure it cant happen again
Load More Replies...I'm horrified at reading this as is or would be any human being with a shred, a single shred of decency and compassion. But what is this BS about Trump? How can this horrible story be twisted around for someone to make political and absolutely false comments about? His own daughter and son-in-law are Jewish! He supports Israel more than his predecessor, whom you obviously love, in your misguided, misinformed way! Just ask Netanyahu himself! It's important that we rid the world, or at least, diminish the impact of these truly lesser human beings who are barely human, more like monsters. But don't go spouting your lies to feed an illegitimate political agenda based on more lies!one day, you may actually realize it, Trump is what's standing between us and similar atrocities that the lying, illegitimate, psychopathic monsters are trying to lead us to! Go ahead and downvote me if you will, if that's your knee jerk reaction to the truth when it disagrees with your indoctrinated passions...
You f*****g Trump lovers disgust me! Deny, deny, deny. That's all you'll ever do. God forbid you just admit that you got played by this f*****g r****d instead of continuing to try to defend him. You look stupid and you're making this country look stupid. Why don't all of you go join the "Space Force" so we don't have to deal with you pathetic mother f*****s anymore.
But check the facts. He's done nothing to support racism except when you listen to the lies of the lamestream media. I'm disgusted and disappointed that so many of you believe the bull. I hope you're actually bots put into place by the illegitimate powers that are trying to screw this country up. Put your non-rose-colored glasses on and stop drinking the koolaid!
Err...the person who was born and raised in Outback Australia never heard of the Lost Generations then??
Free speech that is still respectful to all human races and ethnicities is one thing (completely fine). Hate speech, however, is when clearly some vicious person is trying to isolate a group of people for their skin color, race, ethnicity or gender.
Load More Replies...Do you mean this person's account or are you a holocaust denier? Just go back and study the Nuremberg trials. The allies compiled 3000 tons of evidence including interrogations with those directly involved in the extermination program. None of them denied it, all tried to deflect their responsibility on superiors. It was a very ridiculous defense in 1945 to deny the holocaust with all the fresh and obvious evidence so the SS commanders' best trial defense was to shift the blame and claim they carried out legitimate state orders.
Load More Replies...Oh yes and it's so easy to hide within the anonymity of the internet. Go show your face coward.
Load More Replies...Total utter b******t. This statement is at odds with current research by several groups including Peterson's and Fivush's. Cultural factors, early verbalization and rapid transition through cognitive development stages, epigenetics, external stressors - they all influence whether early memories are retained or lost later via pruning. From a personal standpoint I remember things from 2-4 years of age. I remember the exact shape of the cracks in the porch of the house where I lived until 3 years old, the smell and feel of the vinyl couch we had then, the taste of the medicine they gave me to help me sleep after my parents divorced, and the face of the doctor that sutured my injuries after an accident when I was four, among many other things. In fact the older I get the clearer I remember them compared to the memories from my 20s. Given the nature of this trauma and the fact that it likely was NOT discussed, the recollections are very likely genuine and authentic to OP's grandmother.
Load More Replies...We should learn from history so that it doesn't repeat itself. Sadly a lot of people never learn and so Trump gets elected president. He used the same method like Hitler did: Pick an ethnic group and blame them for everything that's wrong. Promised the poor that he will take care of them. Promised jobs, and a better economy so that everyone gets a better life. And now he is in power he's picking fights with almost every other country in the world. (Russia, Turkye, China, and every European country). That man is a threat to America and to the world.
the flack comes from WW2 and was to decieve the enemy - think it was aluminium strips
Load More Replies...My grandmother lived through WWII, in Amsterdam. As a young girl, she was very nearly taken away by Nazis, who thought she looked 'Jewish' because of her darker complexion and darker hair colour. My Great Grandmother had to march down to their office and insist that she was a 'good catholic girl' to get her free. She was saved. Her best friend and neighbour, however, wasn't so lucky. After those neighbours had been taken away, she never saw them again. Later on, many were starving since the Nazis were blocking all aid to the Dutch citizens. One relative, a single young man, starved himself to death giving all of his food coupons to his brother who had 5 children. My Grandmother herself very nearly starved to death as well. The Nazis held onto Holland with a death grip, and as a result, it was the one of the very last countries to be liberated. So when I see anyone trying to justify hate toward other people for the way they're born, race, etc... it makes my blood boil.
it is so important that the people the nazis tried to 'delete' from history have their voices forever heard, not just on a 50th, 100th or 200th anniversary, but always, what happened to her Grandma happened to so many innocent people in so many ways. So many of these had stories that will never be told, but the ones that survived had and have the power to change and save the lives of many more to come. I've just finished reading The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris, I would strongly recommend this to anyone who has an interest in this sort of thing. Also the book Maus by Art Spiegelman.
You just cannot read or see the things that happened from Natzi Germany without being overcome by emotion - and all they stuff that happened throughout the rest of Europe that had a Jewish population - is almost unbearable - but we have to bear it to ensure it cannot be repeated
Load More Replies...Also @vonskippy, because I cannot reply directly to his/her post: you're wrong and I am living proof. I had eye surgery when I was 18 months old. I was awake for that surgery, frozen into stillness by drugs. The surgeons plucked my eye out of it's socket, cut a muscle behind the eye, and put the eyeball back in place. The doctors told my parents not to tell me anything about the surgery, as they believed it would only traumatize me. For years, I had a recurring dream - a nightmare - about my eyeball dangling from its socket, held to my socket by "slimy, stringy things." I told my parents about this dream and their only reply ever was, "Mm, that's terrible sweetie." Nobody told me about the surgery until I was 16 - that's when I told my stepmom about the nightmare. She replied, "For goodness sake, has no one told you about your surgery?" She described it to me. I never had that dream again. Not even once. Yes, little ones can and do remember trauma.
Yeah, the reason we forget most of our memories when we are young probably comes down to the fact that we have very few meaningful memories to hold on to, eating, sleeping etc are not the type of things that even as adults we remember, your eye surgery much like what happened to this women, even if it was not something you fully understood at the time would have stuck with you as it would have been very distressing.
Load More Replies...My dad was 17 when he joined the Royal Canadian Navy during WWII. He persuaded his mom to sign the papers by threatening to run away and join up under a false name. He joined the navy TO FIGHT NAZIS. He said he would've joined the army but they wouldn't let him in with his flat feet. So he joined the navy. He said they knew about the camps by then, and he had to do something, anything, to stop these insane fascists. Yeah, my skinny, 5'6", 17-year old, flat-footed, pre-me father. WTF IS WRONG WITH ANYONE WHO FLIES A NAZI FLAG IN THE 21ST CENTURY. They are all NOTHING but cowards, terrified of having to share a world with people who are not exactly like them, desperately in need of some fascist dictator to lead them because they have no courage and inner compass of their own. My skinny, short, 17-year old father had more guts than them.
it honestly makes me sick to think that people can think that it's ok to treat people like this!?!!?!
Load More Replies...This is why all this c**p about hate speech being protected by law is b******t, every single genocide has started with someone whiping up hatred about a group of people, be it the Nazis in Germany or the Hutu killing the Tusi in Rwanda, it's all the same. The Alt-right trying to piggybank their hate on the back of freedom of speech needs to be called out, it's no longer a debate when they get enough idiots to start putting their "freedom of speech" into action, it's too late.
So we just use ignore and ban and censorship? Even if it would be for good sake, but power determined by usage too. And democracy's one most important fundament, is to avoid the power using methods wich could harm the society. That's why the law enforcement, the judicature and the goverment are separated to each other, to control each other to make the power balanced, and that is why citizens have rights. If you take the right from a group even when it's for good, you make a precedent, that rights can be removed by any reason. So even if you get succes in short term, you actually undermine the system in long term. And actually, just act like a fascist too... The democratic way is education and communication.
Load More Replies...Growing inequality, fewer and fewer opportunities to find work for those who have no education to speak about, the ease of spreding disinformation and invented "truths" online are all creating fertile soil for cold blooded demagogues and populists. As the German people found out much too late, they should not have listened. We must not listen now.
Why is this getting down voted you make some good points?
Load More Replies...I was moved by your telling of your Grandmother's story. It made heart ache with sorrow and pain of what she and others went through during that time. I can not even imagine what fear and helplessness that people must of felt. It also made me think of the madness that is going on today and the growth in inequality. It make me very fearful of what our future will be.
Those nazzis were barbarians just like those tyrans oppressing their own people in the middle east and terrorising around every now and then. A truly "superior race" would NEVER do those atrocities.
It's easier to consider them like barbarians, as you say, rather than average humans, because it's getting their actions further away from ourselves, it allows us to think that WE would NEVER act this way. Truth is, we don't know that. Not until it happens to us. We don't know what we're made of until we have to find out. Truth is, every human on this planet is a human. Not a monster, not a barbarian, not a devil. Do you think they wake up every morning wondering how thay can manage to do the most evil, harmful, possible thing to the most numerous possible people ? They don't feel any different than you and me. They think they do what they have to do. I believe the only difference is that they think they are better than others or that they know better and that this allows them to do what they do, "for greater good". They really believe they act for the better in the long run and they're just making sacrifices in the short run...
Load More Replies...My mum was in London when the Govt decided to take all the children away from their children and put them in homes in the country like the Lion, the witch, and the Wardrobe. My mum was 6 when she left on that train with her 5 brothers and sister. She did not come back until she was 16. Her parents were Orthodox Jews. The children were taken and given to Christian families to hide them out. They were not all wanted. She had a friend who was locked in a closet and went mad. Her brother Davy was sent to a man like Fagan who sent the kids out in the morning and they couldn't come back until they stole something. Mom believes she is Christian now. The Jews lost their children to their faith all in one generation. But they were alive. When mum came back she got a job in a department store. It was three stories and she worked in the first floor. It got bombed. She woke up to see daylight. She did not tell us about our heritage. I found out from her eldest brother when we visited him when I was 19. She said she was shielding us from it. That "they" kept records. They are still around. She told me of sleeping in the subway tunnels when she was little and saying the prayer" Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my souls to keep..if I die before I wake. I pray the Lord my soul to take." It is a pray for children in War.
Im a Chinese. Though none of my families have experienced these terrible things ,we know about it a lot.Whenever i read these reports,I think of the Nanjing Massacres.The world should face up history and face future.
My Granddad was polish catholic, he narrowly avoided the Kaytn Massacre only to find himself on a trek to a POW camp in Siberia. He managed to survive and when the Russians switched sides he was freed, he didn't talk about what happened many people dies on the journey let alone in the camps. He trekked back across Syria to join the British fighting forces. My great Aunt meanwhile was still in Poland she ran a pharmacy and was a doctor, we have pictures where the shop has been completely commandeered for the Nazi's and one small window is left for Polish patrons. I think she was considered to be too useful at the time to dispatch of.
Powerful. Zero tolerance for these modern day imbeciles who embrace this horrendous philosophy.
The picture illustrating the horrific fate of victims of the Nazi Germany regime comes from The Schindler’s List by Steven Spielberg. As far as I know, the little girl in the picture and movie did exist and her presence among the terrified crowds was reported by countless survivors of the Ghetto purge. Miraculously, she survived, too. Her name was Roma Ligocka, as an adult person she wrote a number of books and memoirs from the Second World War. A bit about her here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roma_Ligocka
In Italy we had rebellion to the Nazi during the last years of war, a woman of 23 was helping the partisans(the rebels) . The Nazi found out so they came to her house and killed her. She was pregnant, they took her eyes out, cut her belly and the body was found weeks after in a ditch.
There are some "pride" groups that should be illegal and the KKK and neo-nazis are a few examples of them. There is nothing you could say to me that makes it okay to be racist. We all bleed red.
Every single family in Poland has such stories, mine too, even if we did not belong to the 10% of Polish families having Jewish relatives at the time. My great-grandmother who was threatened to be sent to the camp in Stutthof had such an anxiety neurosis that she was told by her doctor she could die from that alone. She was advised to get pregnant to ease it and it helped to some extent. I find it interesting that such terrible conditions can actually affect genes, that is whole generations in a country like Poland that was a war-zone. Sadly these stories tend to disappear with the tellers. Thank you for sharing.
you cannot EVER repay 3 generations of persecution and 8 million deaths - i do feel sorry for young german people having to live with this
We as the children and grandchildren of the german people from the 30's and 40's were born and raised with acute consciousness about where racism leads. I was born in 1976 and I don't remember the first time I heard about the camps and the massmurdering. I don't remember the first time I saw the images of piles and piles of barely recognizable naked human bodies. I've been raised with this etched in my soul. Thay did this. WE did this. *I*, as a German, have the personal responsability of remembering this forever and never, EVER, allow it to come back to life. I feel like the Guardian of a dragon roaring in its cave, grumbling in its sleep, terrorized it might wake up. I don't get to watch this happen again and do nothing about it, not raising my voice. Because I know where it leads, we've already been there, and it's nothing but Hate and Death.
Load More Replies...Unfortunately your story is flawed, experiences do not change DNA. I am a professor of biology and this simply isn't true. While I understand your anger and the trauma your grandmother endured, blaming 'neo-nazi's' for the problems in the world is wrong.
Great that you opened and revealed this heartbreaking story to the word. The more people that hear this, the more people will realize how cruel and sad that period of time was, this the more people will acknowledge and dare not to repeat the same mistake. That was a horrible time to be alive, unfortunately especially for Jewish people. People should not be punish for there beliefs. And if anyone disagrees with anyone else about there belief/opinion- act on yours appropriately.
30 years ago, I visited a Concentration Camp while I was visiting Germany... In the middle of this beautiful, manicured country was this - place. It made the little hairs on my arms stand up...and chills run down my back.. And then - I went on to view the exhibits and memorabilia of the place... I think - anyone - who even Thinks being a Natzi is " cool" should be taken to one of these places - or- at least- made to watch one of the documentaries that were made of these places when they were discovered. Too many things, in this country ( USA) have been "sanitized". Events " softened " because - the REAL events are to "Harsh " for people to view. I agree - some things are too horrible to unsee - but the idea that the Holocaust "didn't happen " or that " it wasn't that bad" is insane!! Some survivors of that tragedy are still alive. There are also many interviews and accounts of that tragedy that have been filmed.
And now all you self righteous commenters are the ones supporting bringing more Muslims into Germany and the rest of Europe where they can abuse the Jewish people, and the ones supporting the fake state of Palestine when they send bombs at women and children. You people just want to hate for the sake of hating, not out of any kind of real caring for the Jewish people.
Actually my grandmother had quite similar story - although her mother was taken to one of Nazi Camps in Germany and probably raped by Nazi soldier she got pregnant there. Her "luck" was that she worked for Nazis in their house not on the camp, so they took the child (my grandma) to raise as theirs and treated her very well. She was forced not to speak Polish, so when the war ended and great-grandmother took her back to Poland she only spoke German. But this story way worse shows what War did to people minds, because my great-grandmother actually hated little "German" girl she had, so she was firstly staying with some nuns and after when she learned some Polish, her mother took her back but beat and bullied her. After she get married and move out to the different city, mother never replied to any letter and they met when she was dying and finally felt some guilt.
Didn't Poland have a huge white supremacist rally recently? And didn't they pass a law that says you can't say Poland did anything bad during the Holocaust? We can't forget these things.
no not really like that, as there are few nationalists, these rallies attract just regular people, proud to be patriotic. Remember, that any form of patriotism, visible one is seen badly in modern Europe. No, you would not walk far away wearing nazi flag or symbols on a polish street. Second part, this law was against blaming POLISH STATE for taking part in the Holocaust. Not banning to say, that some Poles could take part of it. This is huge difference
Load More Replies...I've got chicken skin. It's all so horrible that it's unbelievable how a human can do to another human.
"My family is German, I hate Jews"... what? I thought that people from Germany these days are, as a general rule, *more* open-minded and caring because they have been living - more than anyone else - with the shame of the horrors of WWII.
Yes, this made me shudder with confusion too...
Load More Replies...I just love Jewish people - and I dont think I even know any - I just want to love them for all the terrible things they, their families and their entire religeon have suffered for centuries
you cannot see more beautiful Jewish people than Sreisand and LLeunard Cohen or anyone more talented than Mel Brooks or Charles Aznavour and so many many creative people - All we can do is weep for them and ensure it cant happen again
Load More Replies...I'm horrified at reading this as is or would be any human being with a shred, a single shred of decency and compassion. But what is this BS about Trump? How can this horrible story be twisted around for someone to make political and absolutely false comments about? His own daughter and son-in-law are Jewish! He supports Israel more than his predecessor, whom you obviously love, in your misguided, misinformed way! Just ask Netanyahu himself! It's important that we rid the world, or at least, diminish the impact of these truly lesser human beings who are barely human, more like monsters. But don't go spouting your lies to feed an illegitimate political agenda based on more lies!one day, you may actually realize it, Trump is what's standing between us and similar atrocities that the lying, illegitimate, psychopathic monsters are trying to lead us to! Go ahead and downvote me if you will, if that's your knee jerk reaction to the truth when it disagrees with your indoctrinated passions...
You f*****g Trump lovers disgust me! Deny, deny, deny. That's all you'll ever do. God forbid you just admit that you got played by this f*****g r****d instead of continuing to try to defend him. You look stupid and you're making this country look stupid. Why don't all of you go join the "Space Force" so we don't have to deal with you pathetic mother f*****s anymore.
But check the facts. He's done nothing to support racism except when you listen to the lies of the lamestream media. I'm disgusted and disappointed that so many of you believe the bull. I hope you're actually bots put into place by the illegitimate powers that are trying to screw this country up. Put your non-rose-colored glasses on and stop drinking the koolaid!
Err...the person who was born and raised in Outback Australia never heard of the Lost Generations then??
Free speech that is still respectful to all human races and ethnicities is one thing (completely fine). Hate speech, however, is when clearly some vicious person is trying to isolate a group of people for their skin color, race, ethnicity or gender.
Load More Replies...Do you mean this person's account or are you a holocaust denier? Just go back and study the Nuremberg trials. The allies compiled 3000 tons of evidence including interrogations with those directly involved in the extermination program. None of them denied it, all tried to deflect their responsibility on superiors. It was a very ridiculous defense in 1945 to deny the holocaust with all the fresh and obvious evidence so the SS commanders' best trial defense was to shift the blame and claim they carried out legitimate state orders.
Load More Replies...Oh yes and it's so easy to hide within the anonymity of the internet. Go show your face coward.
Load More Replies...Total utter b******t. This statement is at odds with current research by several groups including Peterson's and Fivush's. Cultural factors, early verbalization and rapid transition through cognitive development stages, epigenetics, external stressors - they all influence whether early memories are retained or lost later via pruning. From a personal standpoint I remember things from 2-4 years of age. I remember the exact shape of the cracks in the porch of the house where I lived until 3 years old, the smell and feel of the vinyl couch we had then, the taste of the medicine they gave me to help me sleep after my parents divorced, and the face of the doctor that sutured my injuries after an accident when I was four, among many other things. In fact the older I get the clearer I remember them compared to the memories from my 20s. Given the nature of this trauma and the fact that it likely was NOT discussed, the recollections are very likely genuine and authentic to OP's grandmother.
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