KARTUZ BEREZA 1993 YZKOR

Chapter VIII - K

I LIVED AND SURVIVED HITLER

By Yosef Frydman

During the year 1942, several months before the liquidation of Ghetto B, I escaped with two friends and with Leyzer KOLODNER, to the forests to join the partisans. I worked in the barracks in which they had supplies of weapons that were abandoned by the red army. We smuggled rifles, bullets and bombs to Ghetto A.

I remember that before escaping, I went to my mother’s house, in the same place in which my parents, siblings and sisters lived. My dear mother asked me to come into the house because it was late. I could not do so since we were already planning to escape, but I did not tell her anything about it. At that time, I wondered if I would ever see her face again and, from then on, I did not see my dear mother again.

Together with my friends, when the guards of the Ghetto were occupied in washing themselves, we crawled under the fence of spikes to the other side of the field. We went through different fields until we came to the Yasolda River. We crossed the river swimming with weapons in hand. German guards constantly illuminated the area with reflectors and when they heard a murmur they answered with lot of bullets. We swam below the water, and we left the river when the shots ceased.

On a road that was not much of a road, we crawled among swamps and, at dawn, we reached the Marmazova village, about 7 kilometers from Kartuz Bereza. We went to the home of a stranger whose name, according to what I remember, was Alek. He worked for Germans but he had contacts with partisans. After many difficulties we were admitted in the groups of partisans in the Marmazova forests, and we fought against Germans with them.

I fought in the group of partisans until April of 1944. That month, the group of approximately a hundred men penetrated towns and we fought in front of the Pryft River near Pinsk. There I joined the red army. During combat, we lost a third of our group.

Then I joined the group called "The 38 guard" under the orders of Marshal Rakasovsky who fought against Germans in White Russia, and I participated in the conquest of a part of Germany, near the Baltic Sea.

During June 1945 I finished the Sub-Officials course in the red army, and was sent to the School of Officials in Siberia until the year 1947. That year I was liberated due my delicate health. For the services lent in the partisans group and in the red army I received many medals.