This section features the true experiences of Holocaust Survivors we see and visit today. This is to fulfill their requests,
“Remember us! Tell others of our experiences so we are not forgotten!”
Auschwitz- heading to the gas chambers
~ Dvora ~
During WWII Dvora was taken from Ukraine to a concentration camp. She remembers vividly all the horrors that happened to her during that time.
When they arrived at the camp her mother was taken to the gas chamber immediately. Besides her mother her brother and all the rest of her family were killed. Dvora was a young teenager at the time.
She was taken to have a number tattooed on her left arm indicating she was chosen for labor. They shaved all her hair off and she was forced into the showers with the others. During her time there she received very little food. Dvora says she worked very hard.
Dvora eventually became sick with typhoid. While she was sick she was called for selection. (Prisoners were occasionally chosen to die in the gas chamber to keep the numbers of prisoners low. This was called “selection”)
Instead of Dvora going, her roommate answered her “call”, going in her place. Dvora lived through the war, interred in the concentration camp, but unfortunately her memories also continue to live.
Though not asked about the past, sometimes she will begin to talk and cry for days and no one can get her to change the subject. She is often depressed and keeps remembering the past.
Now Dvora has Alzheimer’s Disease so the past is now almost all she can remember. Though she lived through a horrendous time, it is now where she lives every day. Her son and daughter see her regularly and she has 24 hour care in her home. She will be 89 years old in June. The comfort for her today is she’s surrounded by those who love her.
