RelatioNet KA VE 27 KU HU

VERA KANENGISSER

2006-05-23T23:03:00.000-07:00

RelatioNet KA VE 27 KO HU
Full Name VERA KANENGISSER

Interviewer: Danit Norani, Mor Hani.

Full Name/s
Email: mjc9@walla.co.il
Messenger: danitush@hotmail.com
Address: ISRAEL

Survivor:

Code: RelatioNet KA VE 27 KO HU
Family Name: KANENGISSER First Name: VERA
Birth Date: 1927
Town In Holocaust: Kosice Country In Holocaust: HUNGARY-CHEKOSLOVAKIA Profession (Main) In Holocaust: Profession
Status (Today): Alive
Address Today: KEFAR SAVA,ISREAL.
Email: MJC9@WALLA.CO.IL

Relatives:

Code: RelatioNet AA BB 11 CC DD
Family Name: Kanengisser First Name: Binyamin
Relationship (to survivor): father
Town In Holocaust: Kosice Country In Holocaust: Hungary-Chekoslovakia
Profession (Main) In Holocaust: lawyer
Status (Today):Dead
If Dead - Death Place: Auschwitz

Code: RelatioNet AA BB 11 CC DD
Family Name: Grinvald First Name: Ella
Relationship (to Survivor): mother
Town In Holocaust: Kosice Country In Holocaust: Hungary-Chekoslovakia
Status (Today): Alive/Dead
If Dead - Death Place: Town Country Death Reason: Death Reason Year Of Death: Year
If Alive - Address Today: Town Country

Family Name: Kanengisser (during the war) First Name : Anna (Ritter)
Relationship (to survivor) : aunt

Kosice

2006-04-26T23:32:00.000-07:00

During Second World War Kosice was a part of Hungary. On November 2nd 1938 the Hungarian army occupied the city. There were 11,420 Jews inhabitants. It was the largest population of Jews in occupied south Slovakia. On March 19th 1944 the Germans took over Hungary. Prime Minister Demeter Stojay of the Hungarian government had already decided on the final liquidation of Jews on March 29th 1944. On April 5, 1944 Jews were obligated to wear a yellow Star of David on their clothing. They weren’t allowed to use public transportation, visit theaters, movies or coffee houses. They had to record all their property with city authorities. There was a curfew for Jews from 7pm to 6am.
The number of the Jews on April 20th 1944 was 13,250. On April 24th 1944 the Jews were taken into a concentration camp in a brick factory. They crowded 10,590 Jews in two camps. The other Jews were in other places: in the ghetto and city prison. In the south east of the city, the ghetto was isolated from the city. Fences closed the ghetto streets and the Jews couldn’t loiter or assemble on the streets. The Jews in the ghetto believed that they would survive because they had relatively, more freedom and generally better hygienic conditions for life.
Deportation of the Jews started on May 16th 1944. They were transported by the railway freight cars. Four tray loads of Jews were sent to Auschwitz in Poland. The last tray load was on June 4th 1944. 12,000 Jews were killed in the Gas Chambers of Auschwitz. After the war, only a fragment of the Jewish community returned to Kosice.

The interview

2006-01-20T06:01:00.000-08:00

Vera Kannengiesser was born in 1927 in Kosice, Slovakia to a wealthy family. Her father, Binyamin was a lawyer. She had no siblings and she lived a normal life.
She learned at the elementary school until age of 10, and then she went to high school where Christians and Jews learned together. In 1938 after a decision between Germany and England the city of Kosice was separated from Czechoslovakia and became a part of Hungary again. In 1939 the war started and the Germans conquered Poland. Hungary entered the war in 1941. Vera's father was fired from his job as a lawyer and couldn’t work. In that year Kosice was bombed 3 or 4 times at least.
In March 1944 the Germans conquered Hungary. The schools turned to hospitals for the wounded soldiers. In April, the Jews of Hungary were forced to wear the yellow Star of David. In addition, there was a law that said they must leave the house with 50 kg of cloths and that they are about to leave.
The men were taken to a factory house. The Hungarians soldiers watched them. The Germans put 100 Jews in one wagon. Vera stayed with her mother, Ella, her aunt, Anna (a sister of her father) and her 3 children.

Kosice population was 90,000 people of which 10,000 of them were Jews. Those and more other Jews from the near villages of Kosice were taken in four transports to Auschwitz. Vera was on the second transport with her mother and aunt in unbearable conditions, with no food or water for three days under the power of the S.S soldiers. They arrived to Birkenau in the early morning. They were forced to stand in two lines-men only and women only. At the background she could hear the soldiers yelling "hurry up!" .At the separation between men and women Vera was separated from her father and from that point she never saw him again. Later on the lines were asked to come forward and a Nazi soldier who in time became known as the cruel Dr.Mengele told them where to turn- left or right. Vera and her mother turned right while her aunt turned left to the gas chambers since she was older then 39 years old and couldn’t work. The people, who were left, about 200, were taken to washing houses. They needed to get undressed, but were allowed to keep their shoes. They were shaved all over body and entered the showers in cold and hot water. Afterwards, they all got clothes that weren’t theirs and they were taken to an old shed where other women were already located. A female soldier came twice a day to check and count. The conditions over there were very bad. Once a day they got some soupy water with potato peelings.
One day, for no reason Vera, her mother and more other women were taken out to sit outside of the camp. Vera was so exited of the new feeling of smelling the flowers and hears the birds sing. It was a lightening moment for her after a long time in the dark. After that day they were taken to Auschwitz's train station and went to a new camp where the conditions were a little bit more comfortable. They worked in a factory house, weaving for 12 hours a day with only one break in the afternoon. 100-200 new women that arrived to the camp told the other women that Auschwitz was being freed by the Russians after a mutiny by the Jews. Vera stayed in that camp till February 1945, then they got told they are about to leave soon. They left to a factory house and lived there for about a month. Then they drove in trains to a village in Germany and stayed in its culture house. When they asked to work by the soldiers, Vera volunteered. She went with another 20-30 women and with her mother because they didn’t want to be separated from each other. They went to work in a factory house of war products. After two days they heard bombing over the village. The Germans soldiers decided to take the Jews out of the village and put them in trains that are made for animals and not for human beings. On their way, not knowing where, they passed Germany that was bombed all over place, the Czech Republic, and Austria there they stayed in a camp for two weeks without doing anything. It was about the end of April 1945 when they were taken on a transport to the middle of a forest to another camp. Over there they have got some delivers from the Red Cross with chocolate and sardines and set upon it because of the hunger they suffered from. By chance, Vera and her mother met the latter's cousin and ate together. They stayed in that forest for a week and there were some rumors they were about to go free soon and that the war was close to its end. On May 2, 1945, Hitler committed suicide in his bunker. A day later they were free. The Americans arrived and gave the Jews some food, water and chocolate. On May 8, 1945 the war ended.
After some trouble and hard times Vera went back to her home in Kosice with another 400-500 other Jews. When she got there she went to her old house and found out other people were living there and had some harsh opinion on Jews. In November she entered her house with her mother. She came to Israel in 1949 since the Communists rise to power and she didn’t want new terror. Her mother stayed in Kosice. Today Vera lives in Kefar-Sava, Israel with her husband, children and grandsons.

2005-04-26T23:39:00.000-07:00