Ruth Minsky Sender

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Ruth Minsky Sender is a Holocaust survivor as well as the author to many powerful novels including The Cage To life and Holocaust Lady. Ruth was born Riva Minska in Lodz Poland. At the time of her birth she had a father, Avromele Minsky, a mother, Nacha Minsky, three older siblings, Chanele, Yankele, and Mala. During her youth her mother gave birth to her three younger brothers Motele was the oldest, then Laibele, then Moshiele. Not long before Moshiele's birth Riva's father passed away due to an illness.

[edit] Biography

In 1939 the Nazis invaded Poland and her older siblings fled to Russia to escape forced labor, her hopes and dreams were shattered. As well as her heart, her neighbors betrayed Riva and her family, and robbed them of all the valuables they owned. Not long after that all the Jews in the city of Lodz were forced to live caged in a ghetto.

In the Ghetto of Lodz disease spread easily, Riva's little brother Laibele contracts tuberculosis. On September 10, 1942 The Nazi's raided the Ghetto and took away the sick, the old, and the children. Out of desperation Nacha Minsky hides Laibele in the cellar because he is sick. Riva and her other brothers try to convince her that she to must hide with Laibele in the cellar because she looks sick. She refuses.

Now malnourished and scared, Riva must find a way to protect her younger brothers from the horrors in the ghetto. Her job becomes much harder when a woman tries to have them adopted. Riva refuses to be separated from her brothers. Seeing the love and devotion they siblings had the woman decided that Riva would adopt her younger brothers at the age of 16. Riva became a homeworker so that she could care for Laibele since he was sick. Motele and Moshiele saved their soup rations until they got home at five and they all shared the soup. Riva develops a condition in her legs,due to malnutrition. Unable to walk and confined to bed her brothers are desperate to help her get well. Even by the means of trading their weeks bread rations for one tangerine. Riva refuses to eat the tangerine alone and insists that they all share it.

Laibele dies of tuberculosis in the ghetto. Riva, Motele, and Moshiele are rounded up with the other remaining Jews in the ghetto including Riva's good friend Karola. They are pushed into cattle cars and taken to the death camp Auschwitz. Riva and her brothers are separated at the gates. That was the last time Riva had ever seen her brothers. After only a week Riva escapes death by be transported to another camp, a labor camp. At the labor camp she keeps up her will to live by the means of poetry and friends. One day Riva cuts her hand at work on a bucket. Soon to her horror she finds out that she has blood poisning! By some miracle she receives permission to be admitted the a German Hospital. The poison stops spreading soon after and operation. Riva is soon deported with Karola and Tola, to a new labor camp. There she is liberated by a group of Russian soldiers who say that they are the first Jews they have found alive after liberating several concentration camps.

After liberation Riva, Karola, Hela, and Bela leave the camp in hope of joining the Russian slave laborers returning home. After a night spent in a barn they are discovered by a group of young Russian Soldiers. The soldiers give them food, shelter, and some compassion. However at the end of the long day they tell the girls to come to bed with them.

The girls leave the house and continue on their way. Along the way they met others who have been freed from the concentration camps. Names and adresses are exchanged as the girls now make their way to Lodz, Poland.

At last Riva and her friends reach their destination. Riva and Karola separate for Hela and Bela and make their way to the street on which they both lived. With hope in her heart Riva knocks at the door of her former home, only to find thst her home like many other Jewish homes have been given to the Poles. Riva is horrified to learn that the woman who now occupies her house has thrown out all of Riva's pictures and writings of and about her family. As well as the secret library cherished by many in ghetto.

Riva and Karola flee Lodz together when they find that the Polish A.K is now killing the Jewish survivors of the camps. They stay in an abandoned apartment with other survivors. That is where Riva first meets Moniek Senderowicz. Five weeks after they meet Moniek and Riva are married. A while later, to their great joy it is discovered that Riva is pregnant.

Riva and Moniek find a smuggler to take them to Germany, where the displaced persons camp is. After a struggle to bid with the smuggler they arrive safely to their destination.

In the displaced persons camp accompanied by a kind and compassionate midwife named Cima, Riva gives birth to a healthy miracle, her first son named Laibele after Moniek's father. A while later Riva is expecting another baby. Also born in a displaced persons camp was Riva's second miracle, another healthy boy names after her father Avromele.

Also while in the displaced persons camp Riva is joyfully reunited with her brother and two sisters (Mala, Chanele, and Yankele). Riva joyfully learns that she has become an aunt to little Abramek, Mala's six year old son. But joy becomes pain when she learns that her uncles and aunts in Russia did not survive and Mala's first husband Laibish has been killed on the Russian front.

After having to pass through many agonizing medical tests Riva, Moniek, Laibele, and Avromele receive permission to emigrate to America. On board the ship Riva is greatly affected by sea sickness and is brought back to her past as Moniek slips and orange into her mouth. She remembers her brothers and the tangerine in the ghetto.

In America Riva must learn many new and alien like customs. But she also has two more children, Chaim, and Nachele.