Thread by @ABMFusa

The world lost another #Auschwitz survivor. With great sadness, we share that Michael Silberstein passed away Saturday evening, April 9.

May his memory be a blessing.

We took this photo of Michael in January 2020 at the 75th Anniversary of the Liberation at
@AuschwitzMuseum

On February 10, 1930, Michael was born in Grudziadz, a small Polish town. He was the youngest of 4 children, with 2 sisters & an older brother. Although the family was from Łódź, they moved to Grudziadz for better financial opportunities before Michael was born.

Michael’s father owned a successful dry goods store, allowing the family to live in comfort. Grudziadz had a small Jewish population. Many of the town’s residents were Germans due to its proximity to the German border. The city had an orthodox synagogue Michael's family attended.

Antisemitism was rampant at the time. With the Jewish community being a minority, Michael was aware that he was “different.” He remembers occasional anti-Semitic incidents while attending school, such as being called a dirty Jew but accepted this as daily life.

Even before the German invasion of Poland, Michael's parents spoke in hushed tones of Hitler. Seeing this as a distant threat, the family did not want to leave their comfortable life and uproot to the U.S., where they had a family. His parents didn't imagine what would soon ensue

In September 1939, when Michael was only nine years old, Hitler invaded Poland and marched almost immediately into his town. Noticing his parent’s fear, he too became scared. His family’s opportunity to leave Poland was no longer an option.

Still having family in Łódź, the decision was made to move there. Michael’s father put the family onto a train to Łódź within days. His father & brother remained in Grudziadz to take care of the business. Understanding there was nothing they could do, they too returned to Łódź.

When they arrived in Łódź, the family remained with Michael’s aunt & uncle. His uncle was a tailor with a meager living but welcomed them with open arms. They lived together in tight quarters, a very different way of life from what they had known. Life immediately became harsh.

Within two weeks, the Nazis had entered Łódź. Shortly after, the Jews were instructed to wear a yellow band and, ultimately, a yellow star sewn onto their clothes. Jews had to line up to receive food rations, and Germans introduced travel restrictions.

Many Jewish men were ordered to report to work. Although his father was among those men, Michael’s brother went in his place. When his brother returned from the day’s work, his parents arranged for him to leave east to the Soviet Union.

Eventually, the family lost contact with his brother. He was arrested by the Russians & accused of being a spy. He was sent to Siberia & later became a part of a Polish division of the British army fighting during WW2. His mother never recovered from his brother’s departure.

The family remained in the cramped apartment until they were ordered to move into the Łódź Ghetto. It was very crowded, surrounded by barbed wire & guarded by soldiers. Their new living quarters consisted of two rooms for the five of them and an outhouse. Life became challenging.

Besides not having enough food, medical care was very primitive. It was easy for a minor ailment to turn deadly. The winters were brutal because of the lack of heat, burning whatever they could to keep warm. Michael’s sisters were assigned to work in a carpet factory.

His sisters were weaving carpets out of rags with their hands. Having a job was essential in the ghetto. Michael worked in an electric shop, sweeping the floors and running errands. The job kept him from the cold and allowed him to receive a bowl of soup.

In 1942, the Nazis rounded up Jews from the ghetto, and a selection took place. They loaded Michael and his mother onto a truck and took them to an assembly point. Clinging to his mother, Michael sensed his mother’s fear; it terrified him.

His father and sisters desperately tried to get them out but to no avail. He & his mother remained overnight and were lined up the following day. A Jewish nurse grabbed Michael, instructing his mother to let go of the boy. The nurse told him to run as fast as possible to save him

He did just that, leaving his mother behind. Michael’s mother was put on a truck and sent to Chełmno (Kulmhof) extermination camp; it was the last time he saw her. He returned to his family in the ghetto, where he remained for another two years.

There were no newspapers, radios, or communication with the world outside the ghetto. As the war continued, food rations became less and less, and they became hungrier. Michael’s father developed problems with his back. The lack of medical care had caused him to be bedridden.

In June 1944, the Nazis decided to liquidate the Łódź ghetto. Michael and his family were told to report for deportation. His father could not walk due to his back pain and had to be carried to the train station. They were packed into cattle cars.

They were told that they were being resettled to another labor camp. The doors were shut, and the train left for an unknown destination. Michael was separated from his father, who was in a different car with the sick others.

Michael was devastated by the separation from his father but was reassured that he would be taken care of. The train was brutally hot and overcrowded. They arrived at their destination in the early morning, #Auschwitz-Birkenau.

The train stopped, the doors flung open, and they were ordered to exit quickly. Michael saw soldiers with dogs and prisoners with striped shirts. The men and women were separated, and his sisters were gone with a quick goodbye wave.

For the first time in his life, he found himself completely alone. He instinctively realized that no one cared what would happen to him. He was fourteen, and he now had to fend for himself. Michael allowed himself to cry for the first time since his mother was taken.

Michael lined up with the others for a selection. Someone instructed him that if asked, he should say he was 16 y.o. Michael presented himself as 16 & was ordered to one side. He had yet to see his father, who was immediately sent to the gas chambers amongst the young, old & sick

It took a few days for Michael to understand that the smoke and putrid smell were evidence of his father’s gruesome fate. Michael’s head was shaved. Although losing his hair was not very important to Michael, he knew how heartbreaking this would have been for his sisters.

Nazis needed a group of young men for labor, and Michael was selected along with 250 other men. The men were marched to another barracks where he got his tattoo. They were told that receiving a tattoo meant that they were marked for work and saved from death for now.

Michael was now number B8093. The men were again marched to the main camp in Auschwitz. They were put in the barracks and forced to work hard labor outside the camp. From one day to the next, the uncertainty of life was Michael’s most brutal struggle in #Auschwitz.

During this time, Michael became sick. Every morning during Appel (roll call), prisoners were asked if anyone felt ill. Michael knew that no good outcome would come from admitting you were sick, but the sickness was overwhelming one morning.

He knew he would die anyway if untreated, so he confessed. To his surprise, he and a few others were marched to a hospital. He was taken to an office with a young non-Jewish doctor. Michael received medicine and felt better in a few days.

The war was nearing its end, and the Soviet army was advancing. In January 1945, Michael was marched out of #Auschwitz on a death march. It was brutally cold, and many people fell by the wayside. If one could not keep up, they were left behind or shot.

The prisoners arrived at a railroad station and put on open cattle cars, allowing them to scoop up snow to quench their thirst. Many died on the train. Their bodies were thrown off and disposed of. When the train stopped, Michael arrived in Mauthausen.

He was marched to the main camp and into the tightly packed barrack. Michael was cold and dirty, using the little coffee they received to wash his hands. Michael was also covered with lice. After a short time, the prisoners were moved to a satellite camp of #Mauthausen.

They were packed into temporary tents. Michael was beginning to feel weaker and weaker and began to fear he would not make it. One day rumors were circulating that the guards had disappeared. This was, in fact, true, and On May 5, Michael was liberated by the American army.

Right after liberation, Michael was unsure of where to go next. He refused to return to Poland and did not want to be closed at a D.P. Camp. He and two other men found a shack in a field where they stayed. Unbeknownst to him, his sisters were in a nearby women’s camp.

His sisters were desperately searching for their brother and went to a nearby assembly point for survivors to inquire about his whereabouts. Someone alerted them that a few people were staying in a field nearby.

His sisters, hoping that they would find Michael, made their way to the area, where they miraculously reunited with their brother. They persuaded everyone in the Women’s camp to allow Michael to stay because he was just a child. They remained in the camp until Michael recovered.

The British army had a unit that consisted of Israeli soldiers. They were recruiting Jews, putting them in trucks, and bringing them to a D.P. Camp in Southern Italy to get them to Palestine. Michael encountered a soldier who was familiar with the Polish unit of the British army.

They sent a telegram hoping to reach his brother, who came to Italy to meet them. His brother could get Michael into a school run by the military. All those who were part of the Polish division could go to England.

Michael was able to go to England with the school since he was considered a “dependent” of his brother. Michael went to school to be an electrician and then to night school to become an electrical engineer.

Michael immigrated to the U.S. and was eventually drafted into the army and fought in the Korean War. When he was liberated at fifteen, Michael was very angry and did not want anything to do with religion.

What he saw happened to religious Jews who strictly followed the religious laws made him lose faith. He did not open himself to religion until he married and had children. Michael did not talk about his experience for many years.

He eventually resettled in the United States in 1952, serving in the U.S. Army during the Korean War. Shortly after, he met and married his wife of 66 years, Lillian, moving to Poughkeepsie in 1959, raising two sons, and working for IBM in Poughkeepsie for 32 years.

As one of the few surviving witnesses of the Holocaust, Michael widely shared his experiences with high school and college students around the area and in the communities of both his sons. He passed away on Saturday evening, April 9. May his memory be a blessing.