Ruth Elias

Mein Weg von Theresienstadt und Auschwitz nach Israel

A better-than-average Holocaust memoir. Ruth Elias spent some time in Theresienstadt, married there, and arrived in Auschwitz pregnant. Most pregnant women are gassed immediately, but they missed her condition, and she became adept at hiding it. When they did find out, she was very close to giving birth. The infamous Mengele decided to keep Ruth around to experiment how long a newborn baby will live without being fed. So he bound Ruth's breasts up so she couldn't nurse the child, and left them together for seven terrible days and nights. Seven days, seven nights that she watched her firstborn disintegrate and die. Wailing loudly the first few days, then its cries became weaker, like those of a kitten, then it became too weak even to cry. On the seventh day, a compassionate Jewish doctor risked her life to steal some morphine. She gave it to Ruth, who injected it into the baby and killed it painlessly. I defy any reader to get through those few pages without getting tears in their eyes.

That Ruth survived all that, and more, is a testimony to just how resilient and adaptable we humans are. It was a good book, very detailed, telling everything matter-of-fact and without self-pity. Ruth was the only survivor in her immediate family. Her husband survived, but she split with him and married another survivor who lost his wife and little daughter in Auschwitz. ( )