Testimony of Hella (Feuerlicht) Gertner, born in Krosno, Poland, 1926, regarding her experiences in Krosno, the Jaslo Ghetto, the Szebnie camp, Slovakia and Budapest during the Holocaust period, and in Vienna after 1947

Testimony of Hella (Feuerlicht) Gertner, born in Krosno, Poland, 1926, regarding her experiences in Krosno, the Jaslo Ghetto, the Szebnie camp, Slovakia and Budapest during the Holocaust period, and in Vienna after 1947 Interview conducted in Vienna, 11 December 1997: Family life of the witness in Krosno with her parents, Meilach and Hanna (Irom) Feuerlicht, and her sisters, Feige and Manja; displays of antisemitism; memories of the beating of her father by Polish pilots in the mid-1930s; Outbreak of the war, September 1939; escape of her father and his brothers to areas controlled by the Soviet Union; escape of her mother, the witness and her sisters to a small village in an attempt to hide, and their return to Krosno three weeks later; confiscation of the family business by the Germans; expulsion of Jewish children from the schools; difficulties in day to day existence; return of her father after being smuggled back to Krosno in exchange for a bribe arranged by his wife, 1941; going out to work with her sisters, 1941; the witness' work as a cleaner in a hospital on an airfield near Krosno; establishment of the Krosno Ghetto; family life in the ghetto; deportation of ghetto inmates to camps from 1941; her mother's illness, early 1942, and her mother's death, August 1942; preparations for the liquidation of the ghetto, September 1942; order to the Jews to gather in the city square, September 1942; hiding of her father and Manja with help from a family friend; reporting to the city square by the witness and her sister Feige; search for young men and women fit for work by local business people; choice of the witness for cleaning work in a hospital on an airfield near Krosno, and her separation from Feige (who perished); work in the hospital; attempts by the witness to rescue her father (who survived) and her sister Manja (who perished later); transport of the witness as part of a group of 30 people to labor in the Jaslo Ghetto, which had been emptied of Jews; labor of the group cleaning the items [that had belonged] to the Jews who had been murdered in the Jaslo Ghetto, and sorting the items over a few months; transport of the witness to the Szebnie labor camp, early 1943; labor at cleaning the house of the camp commandant, Scheidt, and after his removal a few months later, in the house of the new commandant, Hans Kellerman; efforts by the witness to transfer her father from the Rzeszow Ghetto to Szebnie; arrival of her father at Szebnie, July 1943; liquidation of the Rzeszow Ghetto, where her father's brothers perished; preparation of an escape plan by the witness and another inmate, Volkmann, formerly the Chairman of the Tarnow Judenrat; arrangement of trips to Tarnow by Volkmann by the witness; preparation of a truck containing a hiding place with help from friends of Volkmann from Tarnow; arrangement of the departure of the members of the Volkmann family, her own departure and that of her father from the camp; successful escape by the group, 06 December 1943; arrival at the Slovakian border and meeting members of the Polish underground; being smuggled across the border with help from the underground members; arrival at Presov; a short stay in a hiding place, and continuation to Hungary; arrival in Budapest, 12 December 1943; receipt of [forged] documents with false Polish identities (the witness lived with the name Helene Schwiednicka) with the help of the Polish Committee for Assistance to Refugees in Budapest; living in Budapest; work for the underground searching for hiding places, maintenance of hiding places, arranging for supplies, and so on; meeting her future husband, Mair Meir Gertner within the framework of her work for the underground in Budapest; German occupation of Hungary, March 1944; escape of the witness and her father to Slovakia as part of a group of Jewish refugees, April 1944; remaining in Bratislava for four months, and return to Budapest; capture of Volkmann in Bratislava by the Gestapo and his deportation to a camp in Poland, where he perished; the witness and her father's stay in Budapest; liberation of the city; Marriage of the witness to Meir Gertner, March 1945; remaining in Budapest until February 1947; move of the witness and her husband to Vienna, February 1947; life in Vienna; birth of their children; visits to Israel.