and after fifty years of marriage to see them both cuddling, holding hands and kissing – I believe this has allowed me to be a very outwardly loving and caring husband and father.
Both my parents were determined that I should know what they went through. When the TV series The World at War started, I was 13, and they made me watch it by myself every week. They were unable to watch it with me. I remember when they were showing live footage of the camps I looked to see if I could spot my parents. That footage is stuck in my mind even now
My father was comfortable to talk about his adventures in the camp, but only on the Jewish festivals when he and the men would sit around the table and chat about their experiences – all of which were fascinating. Mum, however, said nothing of the details except on one occasion where she told me that in the camp when she was very sick her mother had come to her in a vision and told her, ‘You will get better. Move to a faraway land and have a son.’
I’ll try to give you some insight into how those years affected them both. When my father was forced to close his business when I was 16, I came home from school just as our car was being towed away and an auction sign going up outside our home. Inside, my mum was packing up all our belongings. She was singing. Wow, I thought to myself, they have just lost everything and Mum is singing? She sat me down to tell me what was going on and I asked her, ‘How can you just pack and sing?’ With a big smile on her face she said that when you spend years not knowing if in five minutes’ time you will be dead, there is not much that you can’t deal with. She said, ‘As long as we are alive and healthy, everything will work out for the best.’
Certain things stuck with them. We would be walking along the street and Mum would bend down and pluck a four- or five-leaf clover from the ground, because when she was in the camp if you found one and gave it to the German soldiers, who believed they were lucky, you received an extra portion of soup and bread. With Dad, it was the lack of emotion and heightened survival instinct that remained with him, to the point where even when his sister passed away he did not shed a tear. When I asked him about this, he said that after seeing death on such a grand scale for so many years, and after losing his parents and brother, he found he was unable to weep – that is, until Mum passed away. It was the first time I had ever seen him cry.
Most of all, I remember the warmth at home, always filled with love, smiles, affection, food and my father’s sharp dry wit. It was truly an amazing environment to grow up in and I will always be grateful to my parents for showing me this way of life.
Additional information
Lale was born Ludwig Eisenberg on 28 October 1916 in Krompachy, Slovakia. He was transported to Auschwitz on 23 April 1942 and tattooed with the number 32407.
Gita was born Gisela Fuhrmannova (Furman) on 11 March 1925 in Vranov nad Topl’ou, Slovakia. She was transported to Auschwitz on 13 April 1942 and tattooed with the number 34902, and she was re-tattoed by Lale in July when she moved from Auschwitz to Birkenau.
Lale’s parents, Jozef and Serena Eisenberg, were transported to Auschwitz on 26 March 1942 (while Lale was still in Prague). Research has uncovered that they were killed immediately upon arrival at Auschwitz. Lale never knew this. It was discovered after his death.
Lale was imprisoned in the Strafkompanie (penal unit) from 16 June to 10 July 1944, where he was tortured by Jakub. No one was expected to survive or be released from that unit.
Gita’s neighbour Mrs Goldstein survived and made her way home to Vranov nad Topl’ou.
Cilka was charged as a Nazi conspirator and sentenced to fifteen years’ hard labour, which she served in Siberia. Afterwards she returned to Bratislava. She and Gita met only once, in the mid-1970s, when Gita went to visit her two brothers.
In 1961 Stefan Baretski was tried in Frankfurt and sentenced to life imprisonment for war crimes. On 21 June 1988 he committed suicide in