With Pesach approaching, the pace quickens. I always lose five pounds in the two weeks before Yom Tov, just from the nervous energy expended in getting out the chometz and bringing in the Pesach.
My mother-in-law, the Bluzever Rebbetzin, z”l, used to just wave away the tension. “My hardest Pesach was in Bergen-Belsen,” she used to say. “There it was hard to get rid of the chometz. After all, that’s all we had to eat…”
What was it like to make Pesach in Bergen-Belsen, not just one year, but two years – two years of a progressively worsening situation? This is the tale we retell every Pesach.
* * *
Bronia Kozicki arrived in Bergen-Belsen on July 11, 1943, after a harrowing journey which included a three-week stay in Monte Lupe Prison, where she was accused of being a spy. Her deep blue eyes, straight nose, and blond curly hair, with almost white-blond eyebrows, made her suspect in the eyes of the Nazis. Couple that with her perfect Berlin-accented German, and she was suspected of being a spy for the Allies, not a Jewess. Daily, she and her children had been put up against a wall to be shot. She used to say, with tears in her eyes, that Avraham brought his son to the akeidah once, while she brought her children to the akeidah every day of those three weeks.
When she came to Bergen-Belsen, Frau Kozicki was accompanied by her own children, Hirsh Lieb (age seven) and Yitzchak Luzer (three-and-a-half), and her twin teenage nieces. Her husband had been sent to Tarnow with his mother and siblings and was likely murdered either there or in Belzec.
The arrivals on this transport were placed in a special section of Bergen-Belsen known as the “Austoush Lager,” the prisoner exchange camp. The 5,000 people in this select group were the holders of foreign passports and were to be detained for a possible exchange of German prisoners of war.
Bronia and the entire group spent over a year in this backwater hole, waiting for a supposed “prisoner exchange” that never happened. The Germans used to mock the prisoners, saying, “Your friends, the Allies, don’t seem to want you back.”
Now, as Pesach approached, Bronia got into full gear to prepare for the Yom Tov. With her excellent German, she had made several contacts in Bergen-Belsen. One was the kindly German who managed the showers. From him, she was able to purchase several beets and potatoes so that she and the children wouldn’t starve on Pesach.
The second was a Volksdeutch Czech woman who had refused to divorce her Jewish husband, and had therefore been incarcerated together with him in Bergen-Belsen. Bronia arranged to sell all her chometz to this lady for the duration of Pesach. She even wrote out a shtar mechira! Her exultation at this feat was obvious, even 51 years later, when she recounted the story to her children and grandchildren at the Seder table.
Yet, at the time, she was only derided for her efforts. People scoffed that she was derelict in her duty to her children, who would not get enough food. She insisted that the customs and traditions she had seen in her father’s home would continue in her home. Some home, people sneered – a concentration camp! Although stung by the comments, she forged ahead.
Everything was in place – almost. Word got around that some rabbanim in the men’s lager had arranged to bake matzos for Pesach in a kosher kitchen with the Nazis’ permission. Bronia immediately inquired as to how to join the group.
She herself had always been careful with the food she ate, and on the rare occasion that soup was given, she always inspected it carefully; if it had any “swanina” floating on top, she would give the food to others. Her twin nieces confessed later on that when their Tanta went to work, they would take out the swanina and tell her that the soup was kosher, because they worried about her health.
Bronia was very upset to find out that, due to the limited amount of matzos available, children would not be included in the count of people allowed to obtain matzos. Immediately, she swung into action, challenging the ruling.
“Forbidden foods are metamtemim es halev, they make the heart impure,” she insisted. “Many of the people who are enrolled in the kosher kitchen are not really religious; they just think that the food will be better there. Meanwhile, innocent young children, who have never sinned, are not given the opportunity to be mechunach bemitzvos (educated in mitzvos)!”
When the head of the kosher kitchen, the Prochniker Rav, Harav Yisrael Spira (later known as the Bluzever Rebbe), heard about the woman’s revolt, he wisely decided to resign from the position, rather than become involved in a machlokes (dispute). Frau Kozicki won, and she and the children were duly enrolled in the Kosher Koch.
* * *
The first night of Pesach arrived. The children and several women were allowed into the men’s barracks and came to the prearranged place for the Seder.
What a Seder! Everything – the zeroa (shank bone), the charoses, the beitza (egg) – was fashioned out of a single beet. The lechem oni (“bread of affliction”) sat in the middle, but tears formed the salt water, as the people in attendance needed no reminder of their bitterness.
The Rebbe began the age-old Haggadah. When he reached the Four Questions, he gave a new interpretation: “Ma nishtanah halaylah hazeh (How is this night different)…” he recited. “Night represents galus (exile). Day represents geulah (redemption). Today we are in galus; what is the difference between this galus here in Bergen-Belsen and all the other galuyos which we have suffered?
“In all other galuyos we are sometimes puffed up and prosperous, like chometz which rises, and sometimes we are flat and poor like matza. In this galus, here in Bergen-Belsen, we cannot even lift ourselves up. We are always flat and downtrodden like the matza.
“In all other galuyos, we have all kinds of greens: sometimes things are sweeter, and sometimes things are bitter. But in this galus, everything is bitter. Kulo maror!
“In all other galuyos, we didn’t have to dip even once, because the situation was not so bitter that we would have to disguise it, as dips do to the taste of food. In this bitter place, we have to dip constantly.
“In all other galuyos, we are sometimes able to sit up straight and proud, and sometimes we lie prostrated on the ground. In this galus, we are constantly prostrated; we can never lift ourselves to a sitting position.
”But know, my children, that before the break of dawn comes the darkest hour. Do not despair, for this is a sign that the Geulah is sure to come soon. As we say in the Haggadah: ‘Avadim hayinu…’ Avadim is the rashei teivos (acronym) for Dovid Ben Yishai Avdechah Meshichecha.”
At this point, little Hirsh Lieb interrupted, “Ich can nisht herren. Ich been azoy hungarig. I can’t listen, I am too hungry.”
The Rebbe bent down and gave a small piece of beet to each child, along with a kiss on the forehead.
* * *
The Yom Tov passed. By the last day, the children were looking forward to buying back their precious bread. Anxiously, they awaited the three stars.
Suddenly, Mina Heller came running to Frau Kozicki. “The Prochniker Rav is dying,” she proclaimed. “He has not eaten anything for the last few days other than two cubes of sugar. Please have rachmanus, and as soon as the stars appear, buy back your bread and give him some. He won’t eat any other bread for fear that the sale wasn’t made properly.”
When telling the story years later, Bronia always said, “Do you know how much that bread was worth? The Empire State Building is not worth what a loaf of bread was worth in Bergen-Belsen.” And yet, upon receiving the request, she immediately sent a loaf of bread to the Rebbe. Again, people remonstrated with her: “What kind of mother are you? Your children need the bread more.”
Undeterred, she insisted that she had learned the midda of chesed in her father’s home. “I cannot choose the home, but I can teach my children even here.”
A week later, the Rebbe sent for the woman who had saved his life. He presented her with some pieces of bread which he had painstakingly gathered during the week so as to pay her back. She refused vehemently. “I did not do it for payment,” she insisted. He tearfully pleaded with her that her children needed the bread more than he did. Again, she demurred. “The Rebbe will repay me in better times.”
Years later, when they were married, the Rebbe used to say, “And I pay and I pay, and I will never repay the value of this debt.”
* * *
This was the first year in Bergen-Belsen. Time went by, and still there was no prisoner exchange. The Germans made “selections,” nerves were on edge, and the situation deteriorated from bad to worse. As the months rolled around to spring again, there was no more hope of obtaining matzos. Food was becoming scarcer all the time, and even the meager beets and potatoes of the year before were just a dream.
The Seder that second year was held clandestinely under a pritch, a three-tiered bunk. Fewer people attended, and the Haggadah was recited furtively and hurriedly, without any tangible simanim.
It was 1945, and with typhus now rampant in the camp, people were dying right and left. More and more people were crowded into the camp as a result of the death marches occurring all across Europe. The Nazis were almost vanquished, but what good would that do the inmates if they themselves would not live to see the day of liberation?
Many people despaired. Not Frau Kozicki. She would tell the children of all the good foods that she would give them after liberation, and how good it would be when they got to Eretz Yisrael. Hoots of anger were poured down upon her from women in the neighboring barracks. “You’re just making us hungry! We’ll never make it!” they cried. Bronia was mocked as the “Meshuganer Kozicki.”
One night after Pesach, she had a dream. In the dream, her father, Reb Moshe Menachem Melchior, came to her and told her to prepare for a journey. He said that they would be put on a train on the sixth or seventh of April. He brought her food and told her not to worry, for all would end well. “Be ready and do not lose faith,” were his parting words.
The next day it rained heavily, and without warning, the inmates were suddenly transferred to another section of the camp. This section was knee-deep in mud. People were sure that this transfer meant doom. From behind the wall in this new barracks, Bronia heard a rav tell the people to get ready for their last walk, since all hope was lost. When she heard these words, she banged on the wall and shouted, “Is this what we need to hear from a rabbi? We need faith and comfort, not despair!”
“And from where do we find bitachon (faith) in these dark days?” came the reply.
“From Heaven and its messenger,” she replied. “If my father told me that all will end well, it will be so.”
Someone laughed. “Crazy woman,” someone else said. “Even the heavens are crying with us with buckets of tears.”
Just then, six men were selected to bring the usual ersatz coffee to the barracks. Everyone turned to watch the men carrying the heavy cans into the slippery, muddy courtyard. One of the men bent down to pick up some potato peels from the ground. Suddenly, shots rang out, and two men fell into the puddles. A group of inmates were marched from another direction and trampled them to death.
“Bitachon, bitachon, bitachon!” someone screamed at Bronia, shaking an angry fist in her face.
* * *
As foretold in her dream, on April 7, which was a Shabbos, the Nazis announced that whoever wished could leave Bergen-Belsen on a train. Rumor had it that the train was bound for Thereisenstadt.
A shaila was presented to the rabbanim: “Should we stay, or is it permitted to leave on Shabbos?” Rav Spira pronounced the situation as piku’ach nefesh. “Here, we will surely die,” he said. “Perhaps, if we leave, we will have a chance of survival.”
Two-and-a-half-thousand Jews were marched to the train station, a distance of about five miles. Exhausted from the march, they awaited the train. Frau Kozicki had an additional ward, her niece Helle, whose mother had been presumed dead and left behind in the camps. (Some time after the group left, someone noticed the woman’s movements from a pile of dead bodies and it became clear she had not died. She was later reunited with her husband and daughter.)
Accompanied by the five children, Bronia climbed on the train, which was a patchwork of different types of cars. Some were passenger cars, while others were freight wagons. She and the children were fortunate to be in a regular car. But still, they were frightened; food was nonexistent; on the top of the train were 270 Nazi anti-aircraft guns, and there were SS troops all around.
The train made very little progress, due to Allied bombing of the railroad tracks. Every few minutes, the train was forced to stop and wait; sometimes, it reversed. All the while, the people inside suffered from hunger and fear.
Days passed. In the fields, vegetables were already growing. In desperation, little Yitzchak jumped off the train and ran to pick some of the raw beets. Miraculously, he jumped back on without being shot. This scenario repeated itself several times in the week that they traversed the German railroad system. At night the sky was lit up with the aerial bombs of the Allies. If not for the danger, one could have appreciated the strange beauty of the night.
Suddenly, two motorcycles, marked with the infamous skull and crossbones of the Nazi death-head corps, roared up to the engine of the train. After a whispered conversation between the soldiers and the engineer, a second engine was connected to the train so that it would move faster. The train did not go far, however. Finally, the order was given for the passengers to leave the train, as it was no longer possible to reach their destination. The Allied armies were closing in on all sides.
* * *
Unbeknownst to most of the passengers, who were mainly weak and emaciated women and children, the engineer had earlier called for the Rabbiner – Rav Spira – to come to the front of the train. The Rebbe was frightened at this summons. What could it mean but bad news? He therefore asked that those around him should mark his yahrtzeit if he did not return. With great trepidation, he made his way forward on swollen legs. Upon reaching the engineer, he was greeted with courtesy! “Zitzen zee – please sit!” he was told. When did a German officer ever speak like that to a Jew? The Rebbe prudently remained standing. The engineer continued, speaking about how good he always was to the Jews. “Ya, ya,” the Rebbe agreed. “Now I’m being told to take you to the Elbe River,” continued the Nazi, “and then you will be shot and thrown into the river. But I’m purposely delaying the trip so that the Allies will free you before we get there.”
At that point, the motorcycles had arrived with the death-head officers. They jumped up to the cabin. Upon seeing a Jew, they screamed, “Vos mache heir Yuda, what’s a Jew doing here?”
The engineer turned white. He didn’t know what to say.
The quick-witted Rebbe answered that the children were screaming for bread, and if they didn’t quiet down the Allied pilots would hear them and spot the train.
“Ya, gebben zei brodt,” the Nazis sneered. “Give them bread. Tomorrow they won’t need anymore. Now get out of here!”
The Rebbe jumped off the train car and ran back to his car faster than he’d ever run before, despite his swollen, pained legs.
A short while later, he was again summoned to the front of the train. The engineer reported that plans had been changed. They were to stop at the nearest town and shoot the passengers, since the Elbe was no longer attainable.
The Rebbe returned to his car, stricken and at a loss. Should he alert the passengers? What good would that do? They were too weak to escape. The responsibility lay heavily upon his emaciated shoulders.
Spying two young men who seemed to be in relatively good condition (Arnold Landis and David Igra), the Rebbe whispered the news and advised them to jump off the train and try to escape. The young men gratefully followed the Rebbe’s advice, jumping off at the next bend in the road and running into the forest.
As they ran, the men heard a vehicle approaching. They hid in fear, terrified that it might be Germans. Lo and behold, an American tank appeared! The two men waved their hands in the air and screamed, “Yuda!” The Americans had been ready to shoot, but upon hearing the cry and seeing the striped camp costume, they waited and let the men approach. The two told the Americans about the train and begged them to detour so as to save it.
The two GIs in the tank argued about what to do. One said, “Our orders are to get to the Elbe River as soon as possible.” The other was a Jew and insisted on delaying in order to save the train. And that was what they finally agreed to do.
* * *
In the meantime, the train had come to a stop and the passengers had been ordered to disembark. As they slowly and fearfully stepped off the train, they suddenly heard cries coming from the direction of the forest. They turned and saw these two young men running out of the forest screaming, “The Americans are here!”
Before their eyes, one lone American tank emerged behind the two men, driven by the two GIs. When the Nazi soldiers saw this, they dropped their guns and lifted their hands above their heads. The engineer jumped from his car and made a dash for freedom – but he was shot on the spot.
As Frau Kozicki took her children by the hand and left the train, she told them that it was Rosh Chodesh Iyar, and that they should always remember this day. A hill was directly in front of them, and the men went up and said Hallel.* Bronia and her children repeated the words: “Hodu Lashem ki tov, ki le’olam chasdo…”
* * *
Today, as I prepare for the great Yom Tov of Pesach, my mother-in-law’s refrain lingers in my mind. “While everyone else is cleaning, there will still be food for people in my house.” She had her priorities straight. She knew what was ikar (essential) and what was tafel (less important).
Even more than the hot fresh potato kugel she used to send us on erev Pesach, we miss her calming, empowering presence. May her memory be a blessing, along with all the other nashim tzidkanios (righteous women) of her generation.
Reprinted with permission of Binah magazine.
*Pictures taken by one of the soldiers who liberated the train, Dr. George C. Gross, a”h, have recently come to light. When shown the pictures, my husband, Yitzchak Luzer, who was a child on the train, immediately recognized the train and the hill nearby.
