RelatioNet YI TO 23 ST PO

Yitzhak Tochterman

Holocaust Project
Katzanelson High School
Kfar-Saba ISRAEL

Students: ido1403@gmail.com

                  neta.t9@gmail.com

Teacher: relationet2014@gmail.com

Staszow- Poland

The town was established in 1525.

During WW1, Staszow was the area of heavy fighting between the Russians and the Austro- Hungarians. The town changed hands several times, and in November 1918 it was free.

by 1930, its population was 10,000, half of which was Jewish.

The Germans retreated in January 1945, after the hostilities and aerial bombardment of the town, 80% of it was destroyed.

By 2010 the town's population was 15,108.

Yitzhak's Story

Yitzhak was born on October 10^th, 1923 in Staszow.
They were seven siblings- Leah, Jonathan, Rachal, Tzvi, Jacob, Abraham and Yitzhak.
His parents' names were Binyamin and Esther (her maiden name was Wolman).
They were religious and his father was the head of "The Mizrachi", a religious-Zionist organization.
They had a little department store that had mainly books.

The neighborhood they lived in was Jewish.

His father's plan was to bring all the family members to Israel eventually.
In 32, there was the first Maccabiah, his older brother Jonathan came to Israel as a part of the Mizrachi organization and stayed there.
There was an organization, which sent messengers from Israel to Europe to help Jews make Aliyah using a certificate claiming they were married. This allowed them to immigrate.

In 35 his older sister, Rachel, managed to get the certificate and went to Israel.
His other older sister, Leah, Married to their cousin and they lived in Warszawa.

When Jacob, Yitzhak's brother, was young (around 2-3 years old), the house nanny cleaned the house and she put him outside for the entire day, he got Pneumonia (lungs infection) and passed away.

In January 37, The Nazis sent an order to close all the kiosks that Jews owned. Yitzhak's father, Binyamin took the news very badly, got a heart 

attack and passed away.

In 39, a few months before the war started, his older brother Abraham immigrated to Israel illegally through Romania. Only Yitzhak, his mother, his brother Tzvi and his sister Leah with her husband and their kid were left.

On September 1^st 1939, the war officially started.
At first, the Nazis concentrated all the Jews in Staszow in a place called "The Ghetto".
Most of the Jews had lived in one area in the first place so it was not a major change for them.
Yitzhak's family rented a small shop in the ghetto and they sold items that had remained from the old shop.

The Judenrath instructed to send 300 men to factories in Skarzysko. Yitzhak and his brother were two of them.
When they arrived, the soldiers ordered everyone to take everything they had out of their pockets.

Yitzhak and Tzvi were sent to "Werk C"- a section in the factory where bombs were made, and they worked there for a while.
The camp manager, Mrs. Markovich, had found out somehow that Yitzhak and Tzvi are from the Tochterman's family and she knew they were a very well-known and important family in Staszow.
She tried as best as she could to help them in the camp.
Tzvi spoke many languages, so she took him to teach her daughters English and French.

After a while, the Typhoid fever started to spread and almost everyone got sick.
Yitzhak was sick too, but he was in a much better state than Tzvi- who was very sick, and had to be put in a separated room from the rest of the people.
Tzvi's health worsened each day and he eventually passed away at the age of 27.

Mrs. Markovich took care of Yitzhak and sent him to work in a coffee factory. He worked there until the Russians came into Poland.

They had been told to put bombs in the ground in order to bombard the Nazis. One day before they put the bombs in the ground the Nazis brought in the "SS", who sent people to the pits and killed them. Yitzhak was not taken to the pit, thanks to Mrs. Berkovitch who saved him.

One day, the Nazis came to Staszow and took everyone who was able to work to Lublin, to work on the trains. The next day they dried swamps in Lublin.

The SS moved them by trains to "Buchenwald", where they helped build buildings.

After a short time in Buchenwald, they moved to Schlieben, where there was a small factory, which manufactured anti-tank warfare named Panzerfaust. Yitzhak's job was to press the lever that opened the warhead.

One day the factory's ceiling fell. Fortunately, Yitzhak's machine was high 

enough to save him from the fall. He was hurt but not badly.

The whole camp was in trouble because the Americans bombed the camp and the fence fell off.

Yitzhak and some guy ran away from the camp to Schweinitz but soldiers came immediately and took them back to Schlieben .They brought him to the doctor because he was hurt and the doctor decided to send him back to Buchenwald to the hospital there. After he was treated in the hospital they took him to Judenblock.

Later on, they moved to Berga An die Aeltesta where they worked to help the Germans in the war and to develop their factory.

One morning, the SS gave an order and said that they (the Jews) were leaving the camp. The Jews did not know where they were headed, but they walked for a few days. While they were walking some Russian men told them that the war was ending and that they could run to the forest and hide there until it was safe- and so they did.

Yitzhak and the two other people who ran away were in the forest for 5 days. But on the 5^th day, they understood that they wouldn't be able to survive another day so they pretended to be Polish.
Yitzhak's fake name was Joseph Tomshevski.
They went to a small town and looked for the village leader's building. They said that the Americans bombed their camp so they ran away and that they are looking for a job.
They didn’t get a job, but one farmer let them stay at his house.
One day he came and said to them that he knew they were Jewish and that they couldn’t stay anymore. He took them to another village. While they were walking to the village, an "SS" soldier approached and said "Go now, or I'll kill you both", so they ran away to a tunnel in a city named Schneeberg.

In Schneeberg, a woman asked them what they were doing there. They told her their fake story and she invited them to sleep in her house.

While they were sleeping, the village was bombed.

They ran to the bunker. After the bomb attack, they stayed in the bunker for a long time until May 5^th, 1945.

Then, they went to camps to search for Jews from their old village. They managed to find some and were very happy. They stayed there for a little 

while.

Yitzhak then moved to Landsberg and found a job at an office. A little while later, he signed for Aliyah.

In April 1947, he arrived to Cyprus. They stayed there until January 1949 

and then finally they arrived to Haifa, Israel. 

.Yitzhak met his wife, Rina, in Israel

Rina passed away 17 years ago.

He now has 3 children, 10 grandchildren and 2 great- grandchildren.

Yitzhak Voyageto Is Israel 

Binyamin, Esther, Zvi-Hershel, Leah, Yerahmiel (Leah's son), Abraham, Mordechai (Leah's Husbend), Yitzhak, Jonathan, Rachel.

Left- Tzvi-Hershel
Right- Yitzhak
Middle up- Jonathan
Middle down- Abraham

In the family's store.
left to right:
Leah's friend, Leah, Rachel, Jonathan's friend, Jonathan.