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  As I am wrapping up the final edits on this book, my email pings at me:

  My grandmother was on the first transport. I remember the stories she told us. She wrote a book about the deportation, but she later threw it away, saying no one would believe her. The first page of her written testimony survived, and I have it with me. Her name was Kornelia (Nicha) Gelbova, of the Slovakian town “Humenné.” She was born in 1918.

  Seconds later, I have opened an Excel file I created that has every girl’s name, hometown and age in it, and Kornelia Gelbova’s name is in front of me. She is number 232 on the original list archived at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. Even more extraordinary is that her sister is mentioned in Ruzena Gräber Knieža’s testimony. They were in Ravensbrück together. Both girls are on the same page of the list as three girls you are about to get to know very well: Edith and Lea Friedman, and their friend Adela Gross. And on that very same page are two girls some of you already know, Rena Kornreich and Erna Dranger.

  One of my biggest concerns in writing this book is accuracy. I worry constantly about getting the dates and chronology correct, and making sure the narratives have been accurately chronicled. Edith assures me that I am “never going to get it all right. No one can get it all correct. It is too big. So you don’t have the date, so what? It happened. That is enough.”

  I can only hope it is.

  This story has multiple narratives. The core of this narrative comes from my interviews with witnesses, survivors, and families, and USC Shoah Archive testimonies. Memoirs, Holocaust literature and historical documents have been used to further elaborate on those personal stories, the atmosphere and politics of the time. My goal is to build as complete a picture as I can of the girls and young women of the first “official” Jewish transport to Auschwitz. One of the devices I have used to accomplish this is dramatic license. Where you find dialogue in quotes, you can be sure that those are direct quotes from interviews with survivors or witnesses who are reporting conversations they had or overheard. In other cases, to more fully illustrate or complete some scenes, I have used em-dashes to indicate dialogue I created; I only do this when conversations or arguments were mentioned in a testimony but not elaborated upon.

  I am deeply grateful to Edith Grosman and her family, as well as the Gross, Gelissen, and Brandel families, who accepted me into their nucleus and have treated me as an honorary member. “You are like a cousin of ours,” Edith told me at her ninety-fourth birthday party. Around her were her son, daughter-in-law, granddaughters, a great-grandchild, and another great-grandchild on the way. It is a great honor and privilege to be part of these women’s histories, their champion and their chronicler. They were teenagers when they were sent to Auschwitz. Only a few ever came home. How they survived is a tribute to women and girls all over the world. This is their story.

  Principal Characters on First Transport

  The number of Ediths and Magdas, Friedmans and Neumanns on the first transport necessitated that I create names to identify our young women in a unique fashion. That often meant using a version of their given names. Our primary characters are referred to by their real names or the name they reported on the transport list. (For some reason, girls often gave nicknames rather than the names they normally went by—my first choice in naming is therefore the name given on the list.) For the many duplicate names, another version of that name may be used (e.g., Margaret becomes Peggy). If a name is repeated more than twice, the last name or some alternative is used. That is the case with the many Magdas and Ediths I had to contend with. I hope families understand this need for clarity in the narrative. It is not out of disrespect that names were changed, but out of the hope that readers can identify—and identify with—these girls and women clearly.

  Please also note: In the Slovak language ova is the equivalent of Miss or Mrs. I chose not to use ova with the names of the deportees because some of them were Polish and would not have used that syntax, and the USC Shoah Foundation does not use ova in its archives.

  WOMEN ON FIRST TRANSPORT FROM SLOVAKIA, BY REGION OR TOWN OF ORIGIN

  Humenné

  Edith Friedman, #1970

  Lea Friedman, Edith’s sister, #1969

  Helena Citron, #1971

  Irena Fein, #1564

  Margie (Margita) Becker, #1955

  Rena Kornreich (originally from Tylicz, Poland), #1716

  Erna Dranger (originally from Tylicz, Poland), #1718

  Dina Dranger (originally from Tylicz, Poland), #1528

  Sara Bleich (originally from Krynica, Poland), #1966

  Ria Hans, #1980

  Maya (Magda) Hans, # unknown

  Adela Gross, # unknown

  Zena Haber, # unknown

  Debora Gross, not deported

  Zuzana Sermer, not deported

  Ruzinka Citron Grauber, # unknown

  Michalovce

  Regina Schwartz (with her sisters Celia, Mimi, and Helena), #1064

  Alice Icovic, #1221

  Poprad Region

  Martha Mangel, #1741

  Eta Zimmerspitz, #1756

  Fanny Zimmerspitz, #1755

  Piri Rand-Slonovic, #1342

  Rose (Edith) Grauber, #1371

  Prešov

  Magda Amster, #unknown

  Magduska (Magda) Hartmann, #unknown

  Nusi (Olga or Olinka) Hartmann, #unknown

  Ida Eigerman (originally from Nowy Scz, Poland), #1930

  Edie (Edith) Friedman, #19491

  Ella Friedman, #19501

  Elena Zuckermenn, #1735

  Kato (Katarina) Danzinger (mentioned in Hertzka letters), #1843

  Linda (Libusha) Reich, #1173

  Joan Rosner, #1188

  Matilda Friedman, #18901

  Marta F. Friedman, #17961

  Stropkov Region

  Peggy (Margaret) Friedman, #10191

  Bertha Berkowitz, #1048

  Ruzena Gräber Knieža, #1649

  WOMEN ON SECOND TRANSPORT FROM SLOVAKIA

  Dr. Manci (Manca) Schwalbova, #2675

  Madge (Magda) Hellinger, #2318

  Danka Kornreich, #2775

  Part One

  Map of Slovakia, 1942, Showing the wartime borders and Some of the towns from which the first Jewish women were deported to Auschwitz. The town of Ružomberok is identified because it was bombed by the Germans in 1944. Many Humenné families died in the explosion.

  © HEATHER DUNE MACADAM; DRAWN BY VARVARA VEDUKHINA.

  Chapter One

  It’s a Sad business, even worse perhaps than the stars

  they have branded us with . . .

  because it’s going to hit our children this time.

  —LADISLAV GROSMAN, The Bride

  FEBRUARY 28, 1942

  THE RUMOR STARTED as rumors do. There was just a hunch. A sick feeling in the stomach. But it was still just a rumor. What more could they do to Jews? Even the weather seemed against them. It was the worst winter on record. Drifts higher than people’s heads. If the government had had any practical sense, it would have made a proclamation that forced short folks to stay inside for fear of disappearing in all that snow. All the shoveling was taking its toll on backsides. Sidewalks had become instant playgrounds for children who didn’t have sleds but could slide down drifts on their rear ends. Sledding was the new national pastime—that, and slipping on the ice.

  Every blizzard was followed by subzero temperatures and gusts of wind from the Tatra Mountains. Slicing through thin coats and thick, it was impartial and pitiless to rich and poor alike. The wind could find its way between the seams of even the best-sewn garments and nick flesh with biting cruelness. Lips and hands were cracked and chapped. Leftover goose fat was smeared inside nostrils to prevent nosebleeds. As cold drafts sneaked through the cracks of windows and under doors, tired parents welcomed tired neighbors to sit on stools and fret together about the rumor in front of a fire, though many worried in front of cold hearths—even firewood was hard to come by. Some Jewish families bare
ly had food. It was bad for everyone, worse for some.

  Flames of doubt and uncertainty were quenched by reason. If the rumor was true, the most reasonable said, and the government did take girls, they wouldn’t take them far away. And if they did, it would only be for a little while. Only for the spring—when and if spring ever arrived. If, that is, the rumor was true.

  The if was so big no one dared to say it, just in case the very word would curse them with its reality. It simply had to be a rumor. Why would anyone want to take teenage girls?

  THE SNOW BEGAN FALLING as Jewish mothers all over Eastern Europe prepared the Sabbath candles. In the Friedman home, Emmanuel Friedman came in through the front door clapping and singing, “Shabbat Shalom! Shabbat Shalom! Shalom! Shalom! Shalom!” Clapping and singing, the children joined their father. Then the family gathered around the Sabbath table to watch as their mother lit the Sabbath candles. After circling her hands over the flames three times, she brought the light toward her heart—for it is a woman’s place to bring light into the home—placed her hands over her eyes and murmured the Sabbath blessing:

  Barukh ata Adonai Eloheinu Melekh ha-olam, asher kid’Shanu b’mitzvotav v’tzivanu l’hadlik ner, l’hadlik ner Shel Shabbat. Blessed are You, Lord, our God, King of the universe, who has sanctified us with His commandments and commanded us to light Shabbat candle[s].

  Edith and her sister Lea watched in reverent adoration as their mother prayed silently, blinked three times, and then opened her eyes. “Good Shabbes!” Her daughters hugged her, and she blessed them each with a kiss in order of age, eldest to youngest, but she bestowed a little longer kiss on the brows of her teenagers Lea and Edith. There had been other rumors that never came to fruition, she told herself, hugging her girls close to her heart. Her secret prayer to God that night was that this rumor, too, would be false.

  Outside, thunder rolled like a great drum through the sky. Lightning flashed. Snow fell in sheets. No one could remember how many years it had been since there was a storm like this.

  By Shabbat morning, the blizzard had dumped over a foot of snow, and by midday, it was thigh high. As usual, a few stalwart individuals started shoveling, figuring it was better to get the work half done and do it twice than to wait and have to shovel once but twice as hard. The tobacco shop was not only partially cleared, it was open. Weather never stopped a serious smoker.

  It was unusual for the town crier to make announcements on Saturdays, even rarer than thunder in a snowstorm. Normally, proclamations were made during Friday or Monday market. But in the afternoon, out in front of town halls all over eastern Slovakia, drums started beating and, despite the blizzard, a few gentiles out on the street stopped to listen. The wind was up and the snow was deep, muffling the drum’s call to attention. No one in the Jewish neighborhood, across the low banks of a small river meandering along the south edge of town, heard it. The weather—for while there was always weather somewhere, today there was just more than usual—wasn’t helping.

  Among the smattering of people gathered round the town crier stood twenty-one-year-old Ladislav Grosman, who for reasons known only to himself was in the square instead of at the synagogue or home with his family. Dark-eyed, open-faced, Ladislav was more likely to generate a smile than a frown, and laughter than tears. A poet at heart, he may have been taking a stroll after the family repast, appreciating the trackless white carpet across the square, wincing at the cold sting of snow pelting his face. Perhaps he just needed a smoke. Whatever the reason, when the town crier began banging his drum, Ladislav hurried with the few others who were out traipsing through the snow to hear the latest news.

  Normally, the town crier would wait for a crowd to arrive before he began his announcement. Not today. He began at once so he could get out of the damn weather that was wetting his collar and freezing his neck. The flakes falling upon the heads of gentiles and Jews alike were large and wet now, a sure sign the storm was ending.

  For some, it was about to begin.

  Over the din of the storm, the town crier cried, “All Jewish girls of sixteen years and over. Unmarried girls [are] ordered to come to the appointed registration office; details of the medical inspection and the purpose of the whole business [to] be officially notified in due course.” There was almost no one about to hear. It was a blizzard after all. Just a few ardent smokers, but the men who did hear it turned to their neighbors to say, I told you so.

  Not having any more information about dates or times or places to add, the town crier appended the announcement with his own verbal signature, a kind of Bugs Bunny sign-off, and one last roll of his drum: “And that’s the lot, the whole caboose, the dope the public is required to take notice of, full stop, ende, finish, fin, off home with the lot of you in this ruddy weather you wouldn’t put a dog out in . . .”

  There were no more ifs, ands, or buts—the rumor was true. And by the next morning, even with the snow piled high against their doors, everyone knew it. The latest proclamation fell on the heads of the Jewish community as heavily as icicles falling from the rooftops but far more dangerous.

  WHEN IT CAME TO DRACONIAN MEASURES against its Jews, the Slovak government seemed to be trying to surpass the Germans. Young thugs, who had joined Slovakia’s fascist, right-wing Hlinka Guard, bullied and beat up Jewish boys and men wearing the mandatory armbands, which had now become yellow stars. Gravestones were toppled or smashed, shops were defaced with anti-Jewish slogans. In the larger cities, there were bloodcurdling, nationalistic songs, punctuated by a rhythm section of stone throwing, a cymbal section of glass shattering. Newspaper kiosks served up Stuermer (Striker), the propagandist newspaper that fed ignorance and racist ideologies while publishing defamatory caricatures of hook-nosed Jews raping Slovak virgins, cutting children’s throats and collecting their blood for the baking of matzo, straddling the Earth as if the globe were a horse to ride and conquer, while heroic German soldiers fought the devilish Jew—humanity’s evil fiend.

  One woman in the market even asked Edith, “Where are your horns?” When Edith showed her she didn’t have any, the woman was shocked. How could anyone be so stupid as to think Jews had horns, made matzos with children’s blood, or killed God? Jews invented God, for God’s sake!

  How could anyone actually believe what the propagandist newspapers said?

  In September 1941, the Slovak government devised a Jewish Codex, laws and regulations that began to be implemented with increasing frequency throughout the fall, until it had seemed like every day the town crier was making another pronouncement against Slovak Jewry. One day it was:

  We hereby make it common knowledge that the Jews: must register themselves and every member of their family at the mayor’s office in the next twenty-four hours, with a list of all their real estate possessions.

  The next day:

  Jews must present their bankbooks from local as well as from foreign banks and are henceforth forbidden to reside on any main street and must vacate main street abodes within seven days.

  A week later:

  Jews must wear a yellow star on all their clothing 24 x 24 cm.

  Jews may not travel interstate and for local travel must have a written permit by the Hlinka Guard, costing one hundred crowns. They may obtain it only if the Hlinka Guard accepts their request as being a valid one.

  But what Jew had one hundred crowns, and what Jew knew a Hlinka Guard who would validate their request?

  Jews must deposit all their jewelry within twenty-four hours at the head office of the Hlinka Guard.

  Jews cannot have pets—not even a cat!—cannot have radios and cameras, so as not to become spreaders of lies from the BBC.

  Jews must deposit their fur coats at the Hlinka Guard headquarters

  Jews must turn in their motorcycles, cars, and trucks.

  Jews will not be admitted to any hospital and will not be eligible to receive operations.

  Jews may no longer enter any high school, nor demand any reports from the various state a
uthorities.

  Edith still shakes her head at the laws that stunted her education. “My siblings had school still, to grade five. When they finished, the law said they had to go to school till age fourteen.” So they had to repeat the fifth grade, three times! Meanwhile, Edith and Lea fell in the difficult spot of already being over fourteen, and despite their yearning for knowledge and their quick minds, Jews were not allowed to finish high school.