"I
passed through the gas chamber at least a half a dozen
times, through this vapor-filled "shower" room which, at
Bergen-Belsen, was used as a torture chamber for both
physical and mental torture, and in which women and
children died."
"During
my stay at Bergen-Belsen, I went to the showers six or
seven times. I will describe things just as they
happened, and remember that this is no fiction. These
showers were, in reality, gas chambers. Chambers to be
filled with poisoned vapors, chambers of death."
— Moïse-Israël Przemyslawski (a.k.a. Maurice Prémilat
a.k.a. Moshe [Moshi] Peer a.k.a. Mo Is)
Holocaust survivor
"Moshe Peer" is fairly notorious because of an article about
him that appeared in the Montreal Gazette in 1993, which claimed that as
a boy of 12, he'd survived six separate gassings at Bergen-Belsen, a
camp in which homicidal gassing are not claimed by historians to have
occured.
As you can see above,
"Moshe Peer" was a man of many names. I recently got hold of a copy of
the 1993 English translation of his memoirs U.B.B.
Unforgettable Bergen-Belsen which were originally
written in French and first published also in 1993 as I.B.B.
Inoubliable Bergen-Belsen. Nowhere in, or on the book does the name
"Moshe (or Moshi) Peer" feature. The author of the memoirs is stated on
the cover etc. as "Mo Is," which he states is a pen name "short for
Moïse-Israël my given name a birth." He also writes: his surname
is Przemyslawski; "at a certain time, my family name was Prémilat"; that
Maurice is the French version of his name, and that the English
translation of his memoirs was by "A. Emeth, the editor (myself), simply
means the truth in Hebrew"! In fact, the only indication from the
pre-owned copy of the book that I now possess that its author used the
name "Moshi Peer," is in a signed message that he presumably wrote to
the original owner of my book, probably at a book signing.
The showering and delousing building at Bergen-Belsen (pictured in 1945
and 2012
more
details) which contained a shower cum gas chamber according
to Przemyslawski
"Everything was
recorded in my child's memory and can never be erased. Another
facility available at the camp were the showers. Yes, there were
showers at B.B. During the year I spent there, I went to the showers
once a month, and then sometimes not at all for two or three months.
Because in our block
there were men, women and children of both sexes, on shower days the
children went with the women. We lined up together, women, boys and
girls, and we left our block and walked to another building where
the showers were.
It looked more like
a morgue, with blood stains on the walls. The same truck with the
platform always waited outside the building. The huge shower room
could certainly serve as a gas chamber, and I am sure that it was
meant to be one.
Hidden behind the
walls, the Germans decided what they would do with us, the political
prisoners, women and children. [...]
I speak of the
showers as if our cleanliness was important to the "schleus",
while in fact we died in filth and shit every day. The good
"schleus" took us to the showers in order to carry out another one
of their insane experiments. They alone know the exact reasons for
what they were doing.
During my stay at B.B.,
I went to the showers six or seven times. I will describe things
just as they happened, and remember that this is no fiction. These
showers were, in reality, gas chambers. Chambers to be filled with
poisoned vapors, chambers of death. What happened to us contradicts
the accounts of those who say that once you passed the threshold of
these chambers, it was the end, that no one ever came back. My
testimony proves that this was not always true. I myself went in and
came out of the gas chamber several times. My memories of the
poisoned gas showers are very clear.
B.B. was, in fact, a
giant laboratory. Why do I say this? Because it was not a camp
designed to quickly exterminate prisoners and new arrivals. Things
were different at B.B. than they were at Auschwitz and at other
camps where Jewish men, women and children were killed in successive
batches as soon as they arrived. At B.B., the "schleus" had time and
they had all the personnel they needed to process the raw material
which arrived continuously. At B.B., they didn't have the adequate
means for rapid mass extermination because that's not what they
wanted to do there. What they wanted was to learn, to get training,
to explore the limits of human suffering. They wanted to define the
limits of our physical and mental endurance, over which we no longer
had any control because of hunger, sickness, deathly fevers,
tortures, beatings, madness and cannibalism.
But why were they
going to all this trouble? Were they lacking know-how? Did they need
us to sharpen their professional skills? Was this the real role of
Bergen-Belsen? Was it a training camp for the "schleus", a place
where they learned to be killers? The more I think about it, the
more I believe it, and what I saw and heard there serves to convince
me all the more. I will recount the events as they took place,
without leaving out or adding anything. These are simply the facts,
the real events that took place at B.B.
B.B. was a test camp
for the application of the final solution. Why not tell the story as
it really was? Some people might say that at B.B. there were no gas
chambers and that only dead bodies were burnt. But that would be
false. I can attest that at B.B. there was indeed a gas chamber. I
was in it more than once. Read and you will understand.
There was no
specific day to go to the "showers". Without warning, the Polish
kapos would tell us, during the morning count, that after we ate the
women and children of certain designated barracks had to gather
outside the door of the barracks to be taken to the showers. People
left in groups of 100 to 120. The men were also taken to the showers
separately. That part was not so bad.
When we, the
children, left for the showers with the women, the scenario was
always the same, and planned in advance. We would press tight
against each other, especially when it was cold out, but also
because of the terrible fear which made some of the women cry and
scream hysterically. We pushed each other, not to avoid going into
the shower room but, on the contrary, to go in as fast as possible.
There were no Polish kapos in there. What were the women afraid of?
They knew they were going to their death and they didn't want to
suffer. What was the use of prolonging the panic? In any case, there
was no way out. The women knew that some groups of men who had been
taken to the showers had never come back.
During the pushing
and shoving at the entrance of the shower room, these women would
cry and say, "My God, it's over, save us, God, God of this, God of
that, what have we done to deserve this?" and all kinds of imploring
phrases addressed to Moses, the rabbi and to the God of
Israel...These prayers would be answered eventually, but first we
all had to go into the shower room. It didn't take long and once we
were all inside the door would close and bolted from the outside by
an invisible hand.
The cries and
screams got louder and we pressed more closely against each other.
The women put their arms around the children and kissed them.
Minutes went by with nothing There were soldiers outside and behind
an happening. adjoining wall. At
a certain moment an invisible "schleus" would turn on a stinking
vapor and would shout all kinds of vulgar things at us. The vapor
came out through the holes of pipes suspended on the ceiling, and
filled the room with a thick mist.
Once the room was
filled with this terrible stuff, it was as if we were in a tunnel
because everything became dark. We could hear the "schleus"
laughing, then a voice would give us orders: "Everyone under the
showers!"And
water would come out of the pipes instead of the vapor which made us
choke. The
water was cold, then hot, then stopped altogether. The "schleus"
yelled, "Get the soap! Lather up!" We could hardly see, we were
blinded by the mist, we only saw by the light filtering through a
few small windows near the ceiling. We touched each other so we
would not stumble and so we would not step on each other.
The "schleus", who
could see everything, didn't stop yelling, "Come on, come on, fast,
fast, lather up, dirty Jews!" And he would laugh and joke with other
soldiers. Once we were soaped up, we just waited, standing
there, naked women and children covered with greasy soap, surrounded
by acrid vapor which filled all the pores of our bodies. We
waited, like that.
The "schleus" took
their time. Why not? They had the permission of the whole world to
experiment on Jews, and they never missed an opportunity to do it.
It was while we were waiting like that that the women whispered,
crying, "That's
it, now they'll turn on stronger gas and they'll kill us. What have
we done to offend you, God?".
There were screams, cries, moans. Some women fainted or threw up.
People pissed and shit on the floor. Children cried and ran about
wildly.
At those times,
nothing and no one could help us. As I said, we could hardly see but
we pressed against each other. Why? It's not easy to say. We were
covered with soap, stinking of piss and shit, standing in it. For a
few minutes, the shower room became a slippery mess. We would slide
around and the "schleus" found the spectacle very amusing. We could
hear them laughing.
And yet, these same
"schleus" were the ones who had the power to decide to let us live.
It's strange to say that the people who were killing us were also
the ones who could save our lives. They could decide our fate by
turning a lever or by pushing a button.
The brute who
controlled the lethal gas and the water could decide to asphyxiate
us by mixing more gas with the vapor and it would be all over. But
after a few minutes he would yell, "Here comes the water, rinse
off!" And the water would start to flow, first cold, then hot. We
were rinsed and the water would stop. The "schleus" would laugh and
there would be no more hiss of vapor. Long minutes went by, then we
would hear, "That's all, move toward the door!"
There was a great
scurry toward the door. We became a human mass whose only goal was
to get out of that room. We were exhausted, drained, some clean,
others covered in shit because they had slipped in it. We stunk of
sweat and of the vapor that clung to our skin. Finally, the door
would open and we rushed toward another room, passing through an
outside alley first, under the eyes of the guards, even in the cold
or rain. What did it matter? We were alive. The women who did not
come out, who had fainted and not regained consciousness were loaded
onto the platform of the waiting truck, to be taken to the ovens.
During these trips
to the "showers", the prayers to God and other divinities must have
done some good, since I am still here to tell you what happened. Did
the "schleus" hear the women pray to God and implore His mercy? It's
possible, but it didn't change anything. The savages knew what they
had to do. They wanted to put us through all kinds of extreme
torments to see just how much Jewish women and children could take.
They were
experimenting to refine their skills and there was no better
material for their tests than Jews. The
worst was not that they sprayed gas and acrid vapor on us, but that
they left us waiting, in suspense, not knowing what would happen
next, to break our nerve and make us go mad. These so-called
"showers" were really a sinister laboratory. I
have more to say on this subject.
When I went there
with the women, I always noticed the blood stains in the room where
we undressed and in the shower room. The walls and the floor were
covered in blood, especially near the door. That was the direction
in which the women and children rushed, pushing and shoving, to get
out as fast as possible. We did not crush each other, the women took
care not to hurt the fragile children. But we knew that when the men
went to the showers many of them did not come out alive.
Between the two
rooms there was an exterior passageway about 20 yards long where we
waited, naked, before going into the shower room. Armed German
soldiers watched us, joking among themselves. We waited first to
undress, then naked, then outside between the two rooms.
Once we were in the
shower room we were still kept waiting. Then vapor would start to
fill the room, and suddenly stop. We waited again. The water would
start, would stop, first hot, then cold... We smeared ourselves with
soap and waited, pressed against each other like sardines, for a
little comfort. The water would start, we would try to see through
the stinking vapor which surrounded us. Then, suddenly, there was no
more water, no more hiss of vapor, no voice shouting orders.
Silence.
At that moment we
didn't dare speak. To say what? We were crying, overwhelmed with
fear. Some of the women hugged each other and put their arms around
the children. We all looked toward the door and waited. We waited
for the door to open. At the height of the torture what else could
we do but wait? What we really waited for was death; we were
preparing to greet death as best we could. We humbly awaited the
decision that would be made about us. And then the door would open,
after the "schleus" in charge had given the order. We rushed out,
there was some shoving, then the dash through the outside passage to
the room where we had left our clothes. There, we dried our bodies
and our tears.
For the children,
these trips to the showers, the vapor and the gas, were a
nightmarish hell. We cried because the women cried, but the women
cried because they knew things we didn't know. The Jewish women of
block 23 at Bergen-Belen endured these tortures fully aware of their
meaning. Many of them were the mothers of children who were
somewhere else, not at B.B., and had husbands who were fighting for
freedom, dying for the right cause. These women of different
nationalities were sent to B.B. on the orders of some brute who
happened to be where there were Jewish women and children. [...]
Some of these women
were "lucky" enough to wait several times in this alley which led to
the accursed showers. Very few of the women of block 23 survived.
Where are they? Would they dare to speak of it? I don't think so,
especially after having met some of them. I am sure that they are
still suffering the trauma of what happened and that they always
will. [...]
People say that
Bergen-Belsen was a camp where Jews and other war prisoners died in
great numbers but not like at Auschwitz or the other famous
concentration camps. This is only partly true. Given
everything I have heard about Auschwitz, I can say that
Bergen-Belsen was different. It was even worse. For
example, at Auschwitz no one who went into the gas chamber ever came
out alive. There, the Jews were taken to the gas chamber as soon as
they arrived, and then the ovens disposed of them.
They waited a few
hours or perhaps a few days, depending on the numbers that arrived
at one time and on the speed of the extermination process.
Most of the Jews
killed there died without fully realizing what was happening to
them, or not realizing it until the last moment. At Auschwitz things
had to be done fast. The camp was not designed to house large
numbers of prisoners for a long time. Only those who were strong
enough to work Were housed in the camp.
It was a
slaughterhouse whose main function was to execute quickly, by
asphyxiation, as many Jews as possible, and to burn them in the
ovens. Those
who were at Auschwitz certainly suffered, but the torture was more
prolonged at B.B. For
most of the Jews killed at Auschwitz, the period before they were
taken to the gas chamber, after their arrival at the camp, was
short. Some of them no doubt guessed, on the way to the camp, that
they were being taken to their death. All of them no doubt felt the
end coming and were overtaken by panic and madness at the last
moment.
I don't want to
minimize their hell in any way, but B.B. was something else. At B.B.
the Germans killed us little by little. Anyone who says otherwise
does not dare to speak the truth or does not know how it really was
at Bergen-Belsen. Only those who were there can truly bear witness
to what happened.
Of course, if I had
been sent to Auschwitz no one would ever have known my story: the
story of a French political prisoner. I would have passed through
the gas chamber and then been thrown in the ovens. When I was
nothing but smoke, the beasts would have inhaled me in big breaths. Is
there a single survivor of the other concentration camps who can say
that he or she has been in the gas chamber and has come out alive? I
am someone who can say this. I passed through the gas chamber at
least a half a dozen times,
through this vapor-filled "shower" room which, at B.B., was used as
a torture chamber for both physical and mental torture, and in which
women and children died.
The men in our block
would come back from the "showers" in terrible shape: exhausted,
stinking of shit, covered with wounds and blood stains. The look in
their eyes was frightening and there were fewer of them than when
they had left. I can't really say what happened during their
"shower", but it must have been horrifying. What I can say is that
every time the "schleus" decided that the men of block 23 would go
to the showers, many of them did everything they could not to go.
The Polish kapos in charge of assembling groups and taking them out
of the section ran after the prisoners and struck them with clubs.
The men seemed to prefer this to going to the showers, even if it
killed them. [...]
We, the children,
waited with the women of block 23 who, when they were out of the
"showers", knew that they owed their lives to the decision of a
single "schleus" who, on the other side of the wall, was
manipulating the levers according to the orders he had received.
This idiot was playing dice with our lives by asphyxiating us to the
limits of our endurance, until there was only one breath of oxygen
left, checking our reaction the whole time, checking to see how we
reacted to his gruesome game. Orders or not, the only maniac who
saved some of the women and children in my group was the "schleus"
who operated the gas valves. Who told him to stop in time? I have no
idea. I can only say that the power of God is truly great!
This is what the
"showers" were like at B.B. Once we were dressed, we gathered
outside in rows and waited, standing, exhausted, hungry, pressed
against each other like a frightened herd. We waited for the
"schleus" to check the shower room to see if there were any women or
children lying on the floor, unconscious, dying or already dead.
After one last period of waiting, the soldiers led us out of the
"showers" section and we walked to our block which was a few hundred
yards away, on the other side of the central alley. While we walked,
we could see, as usual, the platform truck driving to the showers
and then going toward the ovens with its load. Those who had not
left the shower room were never brought back to the barracks. They
were reduced to ashes. The rest of us were going back to the Polish
kapos to wait for the next vapor "shower", the next suspenseful gas
chamber episode carried out according to B.B.'s sophisticated
standards, which were set by Kramer, the camp's commander."
Mo Is, A Emeth (ed.), U.B.B.
The Unforgettable Bergen-Belsen, Self-published in Montreal,
1993, ISBN 2-9803497-1-2, pp.49-71.
