DEKEL, LUCETTE MATALON LAGNADO SHEILA COHN Read Online Free PDF

considered twins a double blessing. We were spoiled and given everything children could want.
    Of course, this lifestyle came to an and when the Germans invaded Czechoslovakia. Jews could no longer live openly. Even though my father was very rich, and had connections with the government we still had to go into hiding. We had to abandon everything.
    First, my father bribed a Christian family to let us live in their attic. It was a terrifying period. I was only four years old, but I remember how we were constantly admonished not to make any noise. Even to cry was forbidden, because it would endanger the family.
    And to this day, I am haunted by this feeling-that if I do something wrong, my whole family will die.
    Eventually, it became so dangerous to hide Jews in Czechoslovakia that no one wanted to shelter us-no matter what my father was willing to pay. We lived like animals, lying low during the day, foraging for food at night. I can recall eating raw potatoes, when that was all my parents could find.
    But eventually the Germans found us there. We were sent to a series of concentration camps, until we arrived finally at Auschwitz, in the spring of 1944.
    To outsiders, the Mengeles seemed a close, devoted family. A devout Catholic, Walburga raised her sons to be regular churchgoers.
    Old family albums show Josef dressed as an altar boy, the picture of innocence and piety. Dressed in their Sunday best, father, mother, and the three children went each week to the beautiful eighteenthcentury church near the old marketplace. They were a handsome family and, as their wealth increased, the cause of some fascination in the town.
    Neighbors recall how Josef, Karl Heinz, and Lolo shared friends, romped about the fields, and went on frequent outings with their parents. A few older residents can still remember the skating parties Karl and Walburga held for the children on a small pond near their house. They served delicious candied apples, while music from a wind-up gramophone played in the frosty air.
    The Mengele boys were always the object of much fawning, especially Josef. He was a docile child, and eager to please; Walburga had made sure of that. But though he acted like an angel, he looked more like a young Gypsy. In fact, some who knew him then had the distinct feeling that at any moment this obedient little boy would make a run for it, defying his parents as other normal children did.
    Mengele never broke loose, however. His early school records show he was a model child, who impressed his teachers with his exceptionally good behavior. Though a mediocre student, he still managed to receive A’s in conduct and diligence throughout his elementary and high school years. Even in the strict Prussian atmosphere of a prewar Gymnasium, teachers went out of their way to praise the perfect conduct of Beppo Mengele.
    ALEX DEKEL: I could hear the blaring music of Lohengrin being piped through loudspeakers as I walked through the gates of Auschwitz It was like entering the inferno.
    I was thirteen years old when my mother and I were deported to the death camp from our hometown of Cluj, in Transylvania.
    In early March 1944, my mother had received word that we were being sent to a work camp in central Hungary, supposedly to help with the war effort.
    We were afraid, but the hope of living, of going only to a labor camp, kept us going.
    The deportations were organized alphabetically, and since our last initial was D we were the first to be called to board the train.
    After two horrible days aboard this train, I knew we had gone far beyond the borders of Hungary, and were destined either for Germany or Poland. Panic reigned in the cars. Two people committed suicide.
    My mother clutched me to her and covered my ears with her hands.
    When the train finally stopped, the Germans ordered everyone to get out. I smelled a faint burning odor. A sign along the tracks read
    BIRKENAU.
    Dr. Mengele was standing at the head of the selection line. He noticed