Testimony of Sam Katz, born in Tels, Lithuania, regarding his experiences in the Kaunas Ghetto, in Slobodka, in the Slobodka Ghetto, in Augsburg and in Stutthof

Testimony of Sam Katz, born in Tels, Lithuania, regarding his experiences in the Kaunas Ghetto, in Slobodka, in the Slobodka Ghetto, in Augsburg and in Stutthof Death of his mother when he was 8 years old; studies in a "heder" in Tels; family life; treatment by the local population; sympathy for the Communist Party; escape of his brother Chaim to the Soviet Union; detention of his brother Chaim in a camp for several years; emigration of his sister to Rhodesia; move to Slobodka due to his marriage to Masha Mishkovski, 1935; birth of his son, Yakov, 1937; death of his father, February 1939; work as a watchmaker under the Soviet rule; appointment as comnissar; departure of the Soviet Army; Pogrom in Slobodka by the Lithuanians prior to the German occupation; German occupation of Slobodka; establishment of the Slobodka Ghetto; birth of his daughter in the Slobodka Ghetto, 1942; mass murder of the Jews of the ghetto; deportation of the children from the ghetto, July 1944; hiding his son and his daughter in the bunker; collaboration of Jewish policemen during the children's "Aktion"; in hiding in the bunker for six days; discovery of the hiding place; liquidation of the ghetto; burning alive of 945 Jews who were hiding during the liquidation of the ghetto; transfer to a forest in Stutthof together with additional Jews; separation of the men from the women and children; deportation of his wife and children to Auschwitz; forced labor as a watchman; transfer to a labor camp near Augsburg; forced labor in aircraft manufacturing; leaving the camp; wanderings in the forests under German guard until the liberation; liberation by the US Army, 27 April 1945; Arrival in Berlin; life under Soviet occupation; receives information regarding relatives in South Africa; travel to France; life in Marseilles, for three years; sails to Africa, 1948.