| Jewish Stories --> Stories --> Stories from Holocaust Survivor Cookbook --> Barbara Schechter Cohen |
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Barbara Schechter Cohen Bloomfield, MI Recipe:
Piquant Meat Balls |
 Holocaust Survivor Cookbook Recipes your family will enjoy......Stories they will never forget |
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A Polish farmer hid us for a short time,
but it was getting too dangerous for him and his family, and we were
told to leave. My father was able to get forged papers stating that we were Polish Christians. Philip and Jean Schachter were now Philip and Jean Rogalska and their Barbara, or Basha, as I was called. My parents decided to separate, so that it would be easier to travel and move more freely. My father was able to get work in a Polish labor camp, but my mother was frantic not knowing where to go or what to do, with a little baby. She was planning to go back to her hometown to be with her parents, but that would have probably meant death for us. As luck would have it she stood by the church in the village square where she was told Germans were looking for farm laborers. She had blond hair and blue eyes, and spoke fluent German and when the truck came by with bullhorns screeching that volunteers were needed, we were taken to Germany. My mother was given heavy farm work to do, but she was unable to take care of me properly, as a baby needs constant attention. A German woman offered to take care of me. She was a single woman and wanted a child of her own. I was well taken care of, dressed and fed well. There was even a dog for me to play with. I was taken to church regularly and knew all the psalms in perfect German. Little by little my mother’s visiting privileges were taken away and I was getting used to this new mother...calling her “muti.” My biological mother begged to see me one more time to take me for a little walk and it was then that she simply ran away with me...I was crying for my “muti,” my German mother. Now it was near the end of the war and we were on the road with many other refugees. Again, we survived a very close call. We were nearly killed in the bombing of Dresden, by our very own American planes. We finally ended up in Stuttgart in a DP camp. My father found us by some miracle with the help of the Red Cross. The American Joint Distribution Committee, HIAS, another agency and a distant relative in NY helped us come to the US. We were on the very first ship of refugees after the war, the Marine Flesher in May of 1946. My father’s five sisters survived the camps, but all of my mother’s family was murdered. Living in the US was not easy. We lived in Brooklyn, in the tenements, five-story walk-up, no elevator. My parents worked in the sweatshops, doing piecework. We were very poor, but my parents were very grateful to be in this country, and their faith in G-d was not diminished. They associated with other “greeners” meaning other refugees like themselves and did not mingle with other people. We moved to Detroit with the help of friends when I was eleven. The Holocaust has permeated my whole life. When I was growing up, I wanted to block it out, and just assimilate into my environment, and just live a “Normal” life. Now that I am older and my parents are gone, I feel as if I have a mission to speak of it, to honor my parent’s memory, to honor the Righteous among the Nations. The Jews and non-Jews who risked their lives to save ours gives me hope that there is yet some goodness in the world. I want to pass on the legacy of remembrance to my children and grandchildren so that they should never forget where they came from and their history of the Shoah. That they should value their freedoms, the Bill of Rights, the constitution, and most importantly to vote. To be aware of bigotry and prejudice, to analyze the media, and propaganda, to speak out against intolerance. |
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