Dalton Anderson Holocaust Testimony Ester Fiszgop

Dalton Anderson
Mr. Neuburger
Eng. 102
12 October 2011
Holocaust Survivor Testimony
Ester Fiszgop
Ester Fiszgop was born in Brest, Poland on January 14, 1929. Her father’s name was Abraham Fiszgop and her mother’s name was Rachael Fiszgop. Her father was co-owner of a lumberyard and also a contractor. Her mother was an artistic, beautiful, and loving housewife. I noticed that when she spoke about her family (especially her brother) she became very upset and began to cry, which is quite understandable. Ester said she had a very loving, traditional Jewish family. They were middle class and she and her brother attended a seemingly prestigious school. In the time just before the war broke out, Ester says that she even knew about Hitler and what was happening over in Europe. However, she says that she didn’t sense any danger at that point in time. After a year or so, the German army bombed her town and a little while later they invaded and began to take control of the town. Ester told about how the Russians came in and saved their town from the Germans. The citizens of the town rejoiced and made an arch de triumph decorated with flowers to show their gratitude. Two years later however, the Germans came back and as punishment for the way they acted. They took 5,000 to 7,000 men and shot them on a bridge over a river until it ran red with blood, Ester’s father was one of the men shot. In 1941 Ester went to the train station with her mother and brother to be transported to a Ghetto. Ester got on a bus, looked out the window at her mother. When the bus turned the corner, she never saw them again. While in the Ghetto, Ester lived with her grandmother and great uncle. There was scarcely any food and almost no new clothing. Ester stayed sane only through her own drive for survival. One night, she, her grandmother, and her mother’s friend and children dug out of the walls of the Ghetto and crawled to the outer area around the barbed wire. They fled to Kainoffski and hid in the forest. Ester moved from house to wilderness quite a lot, even pausing to live in a hole beneath a pig sty for six months. By the time she got out, she could not sit or stand on her own. She eventually was liberated by the Russian army and moved to the United States where she lives to this day.
“It’s a heavy burden” (in regards to the pain she feels)
“I am very much afraid that whether it will take 100, 200, 300 years, history repeats itself. Be on guard.”