The Letter

by Rabbi Leib Geliebter, Z”L

To my dear brothers-in-law Mr. Arie, Mr, Mottel, and Mr. Nachum Menashe, may they live long!

I am writing you a letter in the form of a report, not knowing if it will ever reach you, because we have no contact with the outside world. We are fenced in with (barbed) wires in a work camp in a corner of the city. My only wish is to let you know what happened to our family, their fate and how they perished, pathetically, sanctifying God’s name, just because they carried the name Jew.

I am writing this to make myself feel better, so that the world will know, and to relieve the burden from my heart a little.

You know me as a faithful, devoted husband of your sister Hannah Rivka. Your parents were my parents; your whole family was dear to me. As of today, Hersh and I are living, thank God, in one apartment. I hope that we will live to the moment of salvation, but this is hard to believe, because we are completely powerless; we are being shot daily, without law or trial, like dogs. God have mercy on us! Every moment is a frightening experience. Even writing this letter is dangerous, since we work for the Germans all day, one is not allowed to stay in the apartment.

But I want to make clear to you where the bones of your dear perished ones lay, so that you can take revenge for our young, innocent human blood, spilled just because we carry the name Jew, a true sanctification of God’s name.

The sad misfortune of deportation and murdering happened in Poland on the day before Tisha B’Av, [July 22, 1942]. It started in Warsaw. They said that people were being sent East for work. Jews believed this and went like sheep, without resistance. But later we learned their fate because several men were able to escape and revealed the pure truth, the whole secret. Our hair stands up from sorrow. We were cruelly tricked. They were sent to Treblinka, near the city of Malkinia, a station in a forest. There the Jews were let out of the trains and undressed. Completely naked, they were driven with sticks into giant halls marked with signs “Zur Judenstadt” (to the Jews’ City). This is how the Nazis cynically decorated the building, suggesting that Jews were going to be bathed. Women’s hair was cut so it could be used for their purposes. Everyone’s clothes and packages were left in the first hall; Jews were driven into a second hall.

After entering the second hall the air was exhausted from the room, gas was let in, the floor was electrified with electric current, and everything was burnt to ashes. Then the floor opened up and automatically disposed of the ashes, which were then buried. People died with Shema Yisrael (the prayer said when death approaches) on their lips like true heroes. Within fifteen minutes there was no sign of life.

About one percent of the deportees were left alive to clean up, to sort and straighten out the clothing and to collect the monies – 2,000 pounds of gold and sacks of diamonds. Everyone took their valuables on the [deportation] trains because they believed they were going to work. Every garment was screened and examined and all the valuables fell into Nazi hands. All this we learned after the Aktions took place.

If the Jews had known that they were being sent to a certain death, no one would have budged from his place. They would have preferred to be shot on the spot instead of being carried away to be burned at the stake in prepared hells.

In Poland there were three such hells: Treblinka,. Belzec, and Auschwitz. Jews from all over Europe were brought there-doctors, engineers, lawyers and 0ther educated intellectuals-and killed. They also killed Gypsies in these places. Jews from foreign countries came with full suitcases. Only when they arrived, after a few days of traveling, did they see the disaster. If they had known, they would not have come so well-dressed, like lords. No one wanted to believe that Germans, who came from the nation of culture and civilization, would do such a thing. As long as the world existed such barbarism had not been practiced.

Now I will devote myself to the happenings of our own family. We were in Czestochowa two years. Starting on September, 28, l942, the first day of Chol Hamo’ed Sukkot 5703, about 5,000 men were packed together daily like animals into cattle cars. With tears in their eyes and hearts full of pain, they said good-bye to their families, doubting if they would ever see each other again. Putting their bags on their shoulders, they were ordered into the streets by the police. There was a great deal of crying and painful sighing. How bitter were our hearts as we were separated from our beloved women, including my dear, devoted and beloved wife, Hannah Rivka, that good soul. She would have sacrificed herself for me, and I for her. How tragic was the parting from one another and from my dear sister, Renia Rachel. Her two-year old son, Yitzhak’l Israelek, was a phenome-non. He would have been a great person in Israel; he had signs of wisdom, talking like a grown up, with an extraordinary vocabulary; he was a gifted child who already knew the aleph-bet (Hebrew alphabet). I regret all our losses very much, but this child was as dear to me as my own. The world would have benefited from such a child; he was one in a thou-sand. All our dear ones were tom away in the bloom of their lives. Our fathers and mothers, dear sisters and brothers were taken away and robbed from us.

And why? What did we transgress to deserve such an end, may God have mercy on us! The Nazis have abandoned all laws of civilization. Everyone points the gun at us and shoots without mercy.

Now I will tell you what happened to the rest of the family. Our dear mother-in-law and your sister Rose and her young daughter were in Warsaw at the same time, and were sent away from there. Shmuel Simcha, our mechutan (in-law) was also sent away. Sala escaped and is now in Krakow. My beloved father, Reh Moshe Mordechai, and mother [Yiska Chaya Rudover] as well as my brother Pinchas, his wife [Leah, nee Hershkowitz] and son Abraham Michal, his sister Esther and her hus-band Hersh Lichtman, and my youngest beloved sister Hannah Anjia were in Przysucha [Poland] until the Aktion. They must have suffered the same fate as we did.

Your brother Fishel is in Russia and your sister Blima, her husband Moshe Yitzchak Braun, and your brother-in-law Leib Lichtenstein are in Siberia. Their father-in-law passed away in Skiemiewice [Poland] with great honor on 20 Kislev 5701 [December 20, 1940, prior to deportations]. Today this is called dying luxuriously. The ones who are in Russia will surely survive the war.

Therefore, I am turning to you in the name of all who died. In your lifetime, take revenge for our young Jewish blood, young souls that call out to you. Remember and say Kaddish (mourner’s prayer). See to it that Mishnayot are learned, and erect monuments for your parents, sister, brother, and children. Nachum Menashe, you are a hero, you are a determined person. The souls [of the deceased] are crying out: “God take revenge for the spilled blood of your servant” [Psalms 79:10].

It is even a greater heartache since no sign of a grave remains. God have mercy. The dear souls should not be forgotten. The Yahrzeit (memorial day) should be every Hoshana Rabba, every year. I write just like Moses, our teacher, of blessed memory, when he finished the writing of the Sefer Torah (Torah scroll). He wrote with tears when he had to write about himself, in the eyes of all Israel.

Remember us all your lives. To immortalize, say “Yitgadal v’yitkadash sh’may rabba” (the Kaddish, mourner’s prayer).

This is the wish of your brother-in-law, Leibish ben Moshe Mordechai.