Vera Velner

Testimony of Vera (Policer) Wellner, born in Poprad, Czechoslovakia, 1925, regarding her experiences in Kezmarok, Auschwitz-Birkenau, Mengele's clinic, death march to Ravensbrueck and Neustadt Glewe Childhood in Poprad and Kezmarok; high school studies in Kezmarok, membership in Maccabi Hatzair; Aryanization of her family's business, 1939; decrees; yellow badge; termination of studies, 1942; deportation to Auschwitz-Birkenau; living quarters and conditions there; mining coarse sand, transfer to Block 25 together with her mother, and with people who were afterwards sent to the gas chambers; rescue from being sent to the gas chamber by her mother; work in Dr. Mengele's clinic; the screams of the women being operated on; ban on the women to breast-feed; Mengele; the dwarfs and twins that arrived at the clinic; suicides; good treatment by Toni, the Kapo; Jewish physicians in Auschwitz; positive memories of Dr. Mengele's replacement, Dr. Rohde; orchestra conducted by Alma Rosa, Gustav Mahler's niece; death march to Ravensbrueck, and from there to the Neustadt Glewe camp; positive treatment by Wehrmacht personnel; work in a factory that produced Messerschmidt aircraft; liberation. Return to Poprad; ramifications of the Holocaust.