Olga Horak
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Olga Horak (born 1926, Bratislava) is a survivor of the Holocaust and an author.
Born in 1926 to Piroska Weiss (1905-1945) and Hugo Rosenberger (1894-1944), she was transported by the Nazis to Auschwitz in 1944 and later, in 1945, to Bergen-Belsen. She was the sole survivor of her family. Her sister, Judith (1925-1942) died in Auschwitz in 1942 after being one of the first Jews transported from Bratislava. Her father was transported to Auschwitz in 1944 and her mother died the day after Belsen was liberated by the British on 15 April 1945.
She and her husband John Horak emigrated to Australia in 1949 and established the Hibodress garment factory. In 2000, she wrote her memoirs Auschwitz to Australia.
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[edit] 1939-42
Olga Horak was born in Czechoslovakia and lived peacefully in Bratislava for her first thirteen years. She lived with her father, Hugo Rosenberger, her mother Piroska Rosenberger, her sister Judith as well as her Omama, her father’s mother. In 1939, everything changed for Olga. The Nuremberg Laws were passed in Slovakia and the Second World War started. She and her older sister, Judith, were unable to continue their schooling at Zivnodom, a German high school. She was forced to wear the Star of David on her chest and she says (in her book Auschwitz to Australia, p.3) "I was not ashamed to wear the star... I was endangered on the street where some people abused me with foul language and bodily harm."
On 21 March 1942, the Germans ordered all Bratislava's single Jews born before 1925 to report to the local train station to 'finally do some work'. Olga missed this by just one year. Her sister Judith, however was not so lucky and, on the morning of March 25, boarded a train with 994 other Jewish teenagers, headed to Auschwitz. She was murdered two weeks before her 17th birthday.
After living under increasing hardship and with the constant fear of being deported, Olga's parents made the decision to escape Slovakia and go to Hungary.
[edit] Hungary
Olga and her family left Bratislava with Aunt Aranka, Uncle Jacob and their only remaining son, Thomas. Left with an overnight bag and no documents, Olga, 16 at the time, was worried about looking fat in the numerous layers in which her mother had clothed her. Little would she know they were the only clothes she would have for the next year and a half. They boarded the train in two groups and travelled to Hegyeshalom, a remote village on the Hungarian border. There, they met a guide who took them across the border. They would walk all night before finally reaching a small Hungarian village at dawn.
They sought rest at a small cottage before catching a train to Budapest. They found a small room to rent under the supervision of another Jewish family, the König's. They were never to find out about Olga's true heritage, as the family always used the excuse that Olga's father needed medical treatment in Budapest. Olga slept on a stretcher bed on the floor. By the war's end, she would have slept on much worse.
[edit] Return to Bratislava
As the situation in Hungary worsened, Olga’s father started making arrangements to return to Bratislava. They had the same guide as in 1942 and took, roughly, the same route. They took the train and stopped at the same little Hungarian border village. On the way out of the station, Hungarian gendarmes were positioned to verify papers and travel documents. Olga and her parents got through safely. Aunt Aranka and Uncle Jacob did not; they were deported to Auschwitz while their 15-year-old son, Thomas, kept walking. He was never to see his parents again and would never again speak of them. Olga says, "he buried his sadness deep within".
In late August 1944, the Germans invaded Slovakia. Eugene, a cousin of Olga and a young solicitor who worked with the underground, was pushed from the 3rd story of a building in broad daylight — an open murder of one of Olga’s family. With the invasion of the Germans came more deportations to death camps. In early August 1944, after spending a few months in an apartment owned by Mr and Mrs Chmelar, Olga and her family were told to go to Marianka, another area outside of Bratislava. After 2 weeks, a groups of SS guards and Hlinka forces surrounded the building. Olga’s fate was no longer in her own hands.
[edit] Auschwitz
Olga was transported to Sered, a collection point for Slovakian Jews located 55 km north of Bratislava. There the Kommandant, Brunner, would entertain himself by shooting prisoners at random.
Olga, her parents, her grandmother and about 120 other people, were shoved into a cattle truck that normally would have held 8 horses. Olga does not know how long she was in the train to Auschwitz but says:
"After a long and seemingly unending journey, the train slowed and came to a halt. We had arrived. I could hear dogs barking and voices shouting in German. All of a sudden, the bolts on our doors were slammed back and the door rolled open. Daylight flooded into our dark car and the light hit our eyes and blinded us. Strangely, amidst all the yelling and screaming, I could hear music. An orchestra was playing light operatic tunes to ‘welcome’ us. It hit me that the music belonged not to the world of the living but of the dead. The merry tunes were really the songs of unbelievable heartache and immeasurable sorrow. The bizarre nature of everything I saw and heard stunned me. All around, people were being pulled out of the cars. Guards shouted at them: Raus raus! — "Get out, get out!" Strange figures in blue and grey striped garb with caps ran around telling us to leave our baggage on the ramp. And, all the time, everything had to be done in a hurry: Schnell schnell! — "Quickly, quickly!" I looked up and saw an iron gate over which there was an inscription: Arbeit macht Frei — "Freedom through Work."" Olga had arrived at Auschwitz.
It was at Auschwitz that Olga was to undergo her first Selektion. Olga was separated form her father just after they came off the train. She never had time to say 'goodbye'; she was never to see him again. Olga, her mother and the remaining female members of her family who were at Sered, were forced to strip and to pass an inspection done by the 'Angel of Death', Doktor Josef Mengele. Olga and her mother were sent to the right, the ones sent to the left never saw another morning.
Olga was at Auschwitz until October of 1944. There she was shaved and was forced to eat, to sleep and to live in inhumane conditions amid mind-numbing fear and constant danger. Amazingly, after all she had been through at Auschwitz, her spirit was not completely broken. One morning, after Appell (roll call), Olga and some 1000 other female prisoners were told not to return to the barracks. Olga feared the worst but as she puts it "At this point, I didn’t care anymore. They could have done what they liked."
[edit] Kurzbach
Olga and her mother were sentenced to hard labour and sent to Kurzbach, a small German village with only a few, small, low-built houses and a newly-built straw barn. This was Olga’s house for the next period of their tormented lives. Kurzbach was incredibly cold, and Olga was given only a paper bag and a grey blanket to keep warm during the cold of winter.
The prisoners in Kurzbach, all women, composed songs to get through the cold nights and long hours of arduous work. One song that particularly stands out in Olga’s mind was the Kurzbach Lied that they sang every morning on their march to the forest for hard labour. It went like this:
When the day awakes and the sun is smiling
To the forests the column is marching.
In our hearts carrying the sorrow
The forest is dark and the sky is red.
In our pouch we only have a tiny little bread
But in out hearts, in our hearts the sorrow.
Oh Kurzbach! I can’t ever forget you
Whatever our fate may be.
Whoever leaves you can only measure
How wonderful freedom is.
Oh Kurzbach! I can never forget you
Whatever our fate may be.
We say ‘Yes’ to life which we treasure
Because the day will come
And we will be free forever
Olga doesn’t know how she survived Kurzbach. She says, "Everyday I prayed that help would come, either from heaven or from the Allies". During one roll call, just after Christmas 1944, the prisoners were ordered to form columns, five abreast, and to start marching. It would be a long time before they stopped.
[edit] Death March
Olga was still with her mother. They walked the same route they took every morning to the forest but, instead of turning right at the end of the village, they kept going. They could hear gunfire and could see an airplane above them — the Russians were near. The SS guards pushed them like soldiers, even though they were visibly weak. The soldiers said, "Anyone who stops will be shot". So everyone marched. The road was icy and cold, not helping their situation at all. Olga’s cousins, Lilly and Trude, were at the end of their strength. Lilly was suffering from a severe cold, high temperature and a bad earache. They fell out of the column and sat by the road. Olga and her mother tried, in vain, to get them up but they would not move. Olga says, “They had taken enough and were beyond caring what happened to them.” (p. 63) So the kept walking, fearing the worst, waiting for the sound of a machine gun. They heard nothing. After only an hour, Russian forces found them by the side of the road.
Olga and her mother had marched for nearly 375 Kilometres before arriving in Dresden. There they were shoved, once again, into cattle cars. Before the train left, they were caught up in one of the three ‘monster’ raids by the British Royal Air Force over Dresden, which claimed 60 000 lives and which rained terror on a city crammed full of freightened Germans. Olga and the prisoners had another opinion. "During the raid, we watched as the bombs fell like manna from heaven. We were not scared, even as shrapnel flew around us..." Within a few minutes of the raid's end, the train was moving again. They were on their way to Bergen-Belsen, with no food or water for the 500 km journey.
[edit] Bergen-Belsen
The conditions in Bergen-Belsen were roughly the same as at Auschwitz, if not worse. Rows and rows of wooden, disease-riddled huts were used as sleeping quarters. The ‘rations’ received were hardly that at all: black water, a small slice of black bread and, if they were lucky, a watery soup. The roll call continued even though the remaining prisoners had been left for dead. In the final weeks before liberation, conditions worsened. They had less than a slice of bread per day, and for the last week, 60000 people were left without water.
On 15 April 1945, Olga, her mother and the rest of Bergen-Belsen’s downtrodden residents lined up for roll call. They were kept waiting but nobody came. Suddenly, they became aware of the situation around them, hearing the noise of tanks. There were no SS guards in sight. As the hum got closer they realised that the noise was of British tanks. They were free!
The British acted swiftly to undo the injustice done by the Germans. Within hours of securing the camp, they brought DDT in by the truckload, to delouse the survivors. They also brought in food and left it outside the barracks. But after years of enforced starvation by the Germans, Olga and her mother were physically incapable of eating even the most basic foodstuffs without repercussions.
After the food was distributed, the British started up a registry to take an accounting of the survivors. Olga went with her mother. They told the officers their names and were issued with 'Displaced Persons' cards. Shortly after exiting the tent, Olga’s mother collapsed. "My mother had survived Auschwitz, a death march from Kurzbach to Dresden, the journey to Belsen and four months in that cesspool, only to die moments after being registered as a survivor".
[edit] Post War
Olga survived the holocaust but lost her family in the process. Her mother, father, sister and grandmother had all become victims of the greatest tragedy in modern history. After her mother died, Olga climbed into a bunk, covered herself with a greyish-black blanket and cried for her mother; slipping in and out of consciousness. She was removed by a group of doctors and former prisoners who took her to the camp's sickbay. From there, she was transferred to the local town hospital, but transferred back because the German nurses paid no attention to her as she was a 'sick Jew.' She stayed at the Bergen-Belsen sickbay until the camp was burnt to the ground, when she was transferred to the State hospital in Pilzen. It was at the State Hospital that she met Bozena who, once Olga had regained some strength, offered her an apartment and some level of care.
Olga stayed with Bozena in Pilzen until she was healthy enough to return to Bratislava — a journey she would make with Bozena. In Bratislava, she met Thomas, who, like Olga, was an orphan. Olga stayed with one of his aunts, the Bardos family, while in Bratislava. Zsuzsi, her cousin, offered to set Olga up with her friend's brother. Olga was not keen on the idea, but Edith’s brother, John Horak, was a persistent man and they got married on 9 February 1947. John and Olga were determined to start a life outside Europe and away from the horrors they had suffered. John’s sister had made travel arrangements for her family and, using the same connections as had Olga and John, they were able to gain passage to ‘far away Australia’. Travelling on the Greek ship Cyrenia, they left in August 1949, arriving in Melbourne on 16 September 1949. There, Olga was employed as a dress maker and, after moving to Sydney, she established the Hibodress garment factory.
Olga still lives in Sydney today and is a volunteer guide at the Sydney Jewish Museum. She has donated several of her artifacts to the museum. While she says that she still hurts for the injustice inflicted upon her, she does not hate. Olga believes that it is hate that caused the Holocaust.
[edit] References
- Auschwitz to Australia - A Holocaust Survivor's Memoir, Simon & Schuster (Sydney), 2000 ISBN 0-7318-0958-0
- all quotes used taken from this book
