Theresienstadt
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TO UNDERSTAND DOES NOT MEAN TO FORGIVE I SURVIVE Theresienstadt by Robert Fischermann | 1 TO UNDERSTAND DOES NOT MEAN TO FORGIVE I SURVIVE | by: Robert Fischermann 2 | This book is dedicated to my wife Birgit who has been my life long support. I wouldn’t have been able to write this without her help during the difficult times as I lived again, and again, through my experiences. Written for the publication of the first Danish edition. | 3 Thanks Let me begin by thanking Pernille Ballebye, from the publishing firm, Gyldendals Forlag. It was she who asked me if I had ever thought of writing about my dramatic experiences. Pernille encouraged me to write and the process resulted in a very close collaboration with journalist Allan Sørensen, from the Christian newspaper, Kristeligt Dagblad. Without his help the book wouldn’t have been published. Therefore, I specially want to record my thanks for his contribution. I also want to thank Line Holm Nielsen for her encouragement during the writing process. And, my gratitude also goes to historic adviser Dr. Dov Levitan, of Bar Ilan University for reading the manuscript and his important comments. To my wife’s sister, Bente Batya Melchior, my thanks for reading, commenting and offering technical support. By the way, Bente and her husband Paul Pinchas, have offered to translate the book into Hebrew, so that our family and descendants who are not Danish speaking have the possibility to read about our family’s fate during and after the Second World War. Robert Fischermann, Jerusalem, Spring 2014 4 | Forward Every day I think about it. My family being arrested in Copenhagen, the journey to Theresienstadt and what happened during my time in the concentration camp. I also think of the person I have become because of Nazi persecution. Despite my memories, I had tried to distance myself from everything about the Holocaust. I had avoided films about Nazi crimes and if I attempted to read a book about this dark period I found that I either had to put it away, or force myself to read it and experience the subsequent emotional nightmares. In contrast to many European Jews I survived the war, but I have never managed to free myself of the horrors of my experiences. I relive the terror of being in the cattle wagon rumbling towards Theresienstadt; my time in the camp has always followed me. I heard about the death of my father and elder brother as they tried to flee to Sweden only after I had returned from the camp, a shock that turned the ending of the war into a real and continuing daily heartache. The eighteen months of the Nazi incarceration of my mother, my sister, my brothers and I changed my life in such a drastic way that I was previously unable to put thoughts into words. The need to forget or distance myself from this period has always been stronger than the wish to talk about it. Occasionally I think that my experience of the German persecution is behind me. But the starvation, the powerlessness, the humiliation and unthinkable events that I experienced as a 15-year-old is, and always will be, an inextricable part of my life. I Robert Fischermann am a concentration camp victim. The reason I have decided to communicate now is connected both to some new events and also to my age. As I write I am 85 years old. When one is young it is easier to suppress memories of traumatic events. As one gets older it becomes more difficult. Thoughts recur together with a desire to understand the importance of giving testimony for future generations. This becomes even more important when you belong to a diminishing group of survivors. Today it is still not easy to put my memories into words. We are talking about trauma in the deepest meaning of the word. Though my internment was a relatively short period in my life it has caused eternal scars on my soul, which cause me to make well calculated pauses every time I confront them. | 5 The catalyst that made me open up and broadcast my history happened in 2007 during a visit to my sister Fanny in Denmark. It was 62 years after my return from Theresienstadt and an unexpected turning point. Fanny had given me a book to read, ‘Dora’s Diary’, by the Danish author, Dea Trier Mørchs. The author writes about Danish Jews escaping arrest by the Nazis and fleeing to Sweden by sea, and had interviewed my sister about her crossing in 1943. There were 10 people in the rowing boat including my father, my sister Fanny and my brother. After about 1 kilometer from Denmark the boat started to take in water and capsized. Broken ribs and a wounded knee prevented by father from swimming. In the attempt by my brother to rescue our father they both perished. In 2007, in Fanny’s apartment in Copenhagen, with the enormous distance from the Holocaust, as far as time and place were concerned, we talked about what happened in 1943 and listened to each other through tears. I had been 15 and she 19 years old. When we opened up to each other we were 79 and 83. It was difficult for her and no less difficult for me. I told her about the journey to Theresienstadt in filthy cattle wagons and only then did she realize what I, my mother and brothers had endured. Theoretically she knew how the Nazis had transported Jews but, she had never heard it from me! My sister opened herself more and more, and to my surprise it was a kind of relief to listen. It was as if the chapter could be closed at last. As we conversed my thoughts were erratic. I urgently realised that Dea Trier Mørchs book must be translated into Hebrew. My grandchildren who live in Israel do not speak Danish, and suddenly it was vital that they know what had happened to their Grandfather when he was 15 years old. I had never heard the details about my father and brother’s death before. We had been silent about it after the war. We had lived as if nothing had happened, but poor Fanny could never forget that terrible event. Perhaps it was easier for her to open up and talk to the author Dea Trier Mørchs, a stranger, than to talk to those of us within the family. The book stirred something inside me. I said to Fanny, “Now you have to tell me exactly what happened and I will try to explain what happened to me”. This feeling was reinforced when my daughter asked if I would help my granddaughter, Ore, with a school project. In Israel it is common for schoolchildren to do projects about their family roots. For me, it meant I had to recall my childhood and my upbringing, and that my grandchild would realize, for the first time, that I had been in a concentration camp. At that time she only knew theoretically and superficially that I had been in Theresienstadt. I didn’t know how to tell these facts to my grandchild in a way that she could understand and in a way that would also protect her 6 | from the horror. She was 15 years old, the same age as I had been when the Germans came banging at our door in Copenhagen. I found it very difficult to talk about it, so I asked her to ask me questions. To my great satisfaction Ore received top marks for her assignment. However, these conversations opened memories which I found that I needed to shut away again. As time passed, however, I realized I actually had to speak out. My experiences were little pieces of the big Holocaust puzzle. As a member of ‘Danes in Israel’, I have often taken part in the annual memorial event remembering how the Danish Jews were rescued as they fled to Sweden in October 1943. Danish fishermen, together with the Resistance, sailed to Sweden in boats, saving the lives of the thousands of Jews crammed inside. But I began to struggle with why the focus should be on the rescue to Sweden. Indeed, the rescue of most of the Danish Jews to Sweden pictures Denmark as a model in dealing with the Jewish community and in many ways it has become Denmark’s ‘Anne Frank History’, so to speak. The history of Anne Frank is the event most people connect with the Jews of Holland during the Second World War, despite the fact that Poland, Holland and Hungary lost such a large percentage of their Jewish community. Similarly, in Denmark most people know of the rescue of the Jews to Sweden. People also remember that some Dutch people cooperated with the Nazis as informers. But what about the account of 472 Danish Jews, 419 of whom survived, who spent one and a half years in Theresienstadt? Our story is a central and important element of Danish Holocaust History. We were never mentioned. Were we forgotten? Some years ago I decided to talk to the chairman of ‘Danes in Israel’ about this. He promised to mention it during their next meeting. Then they asked me join the board and at the same time I was asked to make a short presentation of my experiences during the war. As I had brought up the problem I could hardly refuse. In an unconscious way I had brought myself to a situation where I was forced to talk about my repressed memories.