Survived with Mother´s help

Name : Erika Nemschitz

Date of birth : 08.01.1932

Place of birth/Country : Vienna

Profession : Secretary, housewife and mother

Information on her life before, during and after WWII

Erika Nemschitz was born in the Viennese working class district of Simmering on 8 January 1932 as the daughter of Friedrich and Hermine Nemschitz. The father was half Jewish and the mother converted to the Jewish faith before Erika’s birth. However, Erika’s mother successfully hid this fact from the Nazis throughout the entire war. She claimed she was Aryan and managed to save her husband and child from being persecuted and deported.

The six-year-old Erika was suddenly insulted as a Jew by her earlier playmates after Austria was annexed by Germany. She sees how Jews have to wash Christian Socialist slogans from the streets under Federal Chancellor Schuschnigg. The highlights of their everyday lives now are house searches, drives to find food in the Waldviertel area, bugging, the need of relatives in hiding, illicit trading and the constant fear of being arrested.

Erika Nemschitz is expelled from her regular elementary school on 25 September 1941. She is sent to a so-called "half breed school" at which non-Aryan children were allowed and Jews who had been baptised before 1938. Schoolmates vanish time and again. Teachers are pulled directly from the classrooms and taken away. The school is closed only a few months later, on 11 July 1942. Erika temporarily takes lessons from committed sisters of the Order of the Heart of Christ in German, English and Mathematics. She is baptised as a Catholic. The parents hope this will help protect her better. The father becomes a Catholic in Easter of 1943 for the same reason.

Erika Nemschitz experiences the bombing of the Vienna State Opera and has to see how a splinter bomb gravely injures her parents on 4 April 1945.

She attends a nun’s school as of 1945 and finishes her education after completing the 6^th level of high school in 1947. She worked as a secretary from 1951 to 1953 and was employed in other different capacities until 1956.

Erika Nemschitz married on 3 March 1956. She became a housewife and mother. She has two children and four grandchildren.

Survived with Mother´s help

My name, my maiden name was Erika Nemschitz. I was born in Vienna on 8 January 1932. My parents are Friedrich and Hermine Nemschitz. My father was half Jewish and my mother was Aryan. My father was born in 1904, my mother in 1910. My mother assumed the Jewish faith before my birth, so I am actually three quarters Jewish.

I wasn’t any different from the other children until 1938. I come from a working class family and I played with the other children in the courtyard, for example. We played the games children played then, we cooked and so and things continued like this until 12 March 1938. I was suddenly ostracised as of the 13th (March 1938). I was ostracised to the extent that the children called – I don’t know if I should express it this way – the verbatim text was, "Jud, Jud spuck in´n Hut und sag der Mutter das ist gut", Jew, Jew, spit in the hat and tell mother that its good". I didn’t understand it, stones were thrown after me. The children weren’t to blame for the whole thing their parents had somehow initiated. And from that moment on I was somehow excluded, at least in my own house. I still attended a normal elementary school, but seemingly it wasn’t acknowledged in the beginning.

12 March 1938. My father came home; somehow the excitement had been palpable for days. I can still remember, my father came home then, fell into the chair and started crying suddenly, saying everything was over, which is something I had never seen before. My father was a worker and was always there for his colleagues. He was in charge of the savings association, for example and was very popular among the other staff members. Then suddenly, everything just changed.

I can only remember one thing; I went out on to the main street with my father and my mother on the day that Jews had to scrub (clean) the streets. We weren’t noticed. Nobody took notice since we were poor Jews. But seeing that made a lasting impression on me. And the images become clearer the older I get.

A few days after the 13^th of March (1938), the house searches began. They tried to take any valuables they could find with them during these searches. So once one came that we knew (in civilian clothes) and they searched for jewelry. Naturally there wasn’t much in a worker’s family, but the little that we had was put on the table. And the mother of my mother came in by coincidence at that moment and asked what would happen with it. She was told it was confiscated. My grandmother said, "my daughter got this from me." There was a Star of David on the bracelet she meant, hanging from it. Our acquaintance said, "That too?" And my quick-witted grandmother said, "No, that’s from Fritzl." Fritzl was my father. They clipped the star off and my mother, (corrects herself) no, my grandmother swept it all into her apron in one move and disappeared with the jewelry before they could look twice.

My mother was a very forceful woman. My father was a very good-hearted man: my mother had the pants on and my father obeyed her. And at that time mother was the only protection we had. Because it wasn’t known that she had received a Jewish baptism. My mother was very, very smart. She took her birth certificate, her conversion to the Jewish faith was noted on the back, and the first thing she did was put it on the stove (like this) to make it dry and crack slightly and then mixed some starch and stuck it on to a piece of linen. I only tore it off when my mother was already dead, that was in the year 1986, no 1994.

And after the annexation she stated resolutely that she was Aryan. It couldn’t be proven that she wasn’t – the records seemed to have been missing among the Jewish Community records. No one found out she had actually converted to the Jewish faith in any case.

Amongst other things, my mother was summoned and advised to divorce my father and to claim I wasn’t his child. It was preferable for a woman to be considered easy than decent in those days. Naturally, my mother said my father was a decent person and that she wouldn’t leave him even if that meant going to the end of the word and living on bread and water alone. She said she would never leave him and she never did.

Yes we lived in a rented apartment, as I said, in a one room plus kitchen apartment. Block 1 faced the street and you had to cross the courtyard to get to Block 2 and 3. My father would jump out of bead, grab his clothes and run up to the top floor if he heard somebody crossed the courtyard. Then I took my bed sheets, crammed them into the couch and got into my father’s bed. My mother would have said, "Father didn’t come home tonight," if someone had come up. This happened once a night, if we were lucky. It happened more often if we weren’t.

That was the beginning of it, and it just... Father was employed at the Imperial Feigenkaffee (Fig Coffee) factory at first, and he was employed there for years. Carrying sacks of figs under the hardest labour conditions, that isn’t exactly easy. And then he must have made some remark about Hitler at some point, in any case, they reported him, he lost his job and he was summoned to Morzinplatz. Square. Naturally my mother went with him and made sure he had cigarettes and everything else. She said good bye to him with the following words: "You know nothing, never said anything and you’ll stick to that!" My father went inside and he was lucky that he had a Nazi with a crumb of humanity left in him. He let him go with the words, "Be more careful in the future!" after my father insisted that he knew nothing and had said nothing. Father noted afterwards that he had been less afraid of the Nazi than of mother.

Ruth Deutschmann:

You told me that you were also photographed, how was that done?

Erika Nemschitz:

We were summoned to an office and – I still have some of those pictures – we were photographed full-face, from the left and from the right. All of us had to pull our hair behind our ears so our ears were visible. Because you can supposedly tell if someone is Jewish or not by the ears.

People did know certain things. Now people often say, "Well, we didn’t know a thing." I can’t imagine that. They had to know or else people wouldn’t have gone into hiding when they received a summons. A suspicion was certainly there, even if people say they didn’t know different things...

When you ride the Schnellbahn train between Simmering and Rennweg, you ride past the Aspangbahnhof train station. That’s where the Jewish transports were handled. There is still a "Platz der Deportierten" (Square of the Deported) there today. And there are houses lining the route that were built at the turn of the century. So people must have seen something.

What was tragic about it is that the Kapos (supervising prisoners) who supervised the handling of these loads were very often Jews who hoped to help their own lives by helping. Their time was up at the end, just like everybody else’s.

We experienced the events of the war just like everybody else. The only difference was that father wasn’t allowed to come into the basement with us. We were given nothing for our food stamps, nothing is the right word here because the others also received very little, but we got even less than very little. The "normal" children received a quarter litre of full milk per day and I received a quarter litre of skim milk a day. And there was a special butcher we could have gotten meat from occasionally, but naturally, it wasn’t entirely all right, so my mother decided we could do without it...

My father and I, we had Kennkarten (Identity Cards) all of us received one, but the Aryans had the Reichsadler (Eagle) on the cover of theirs whereas we simply had a "J" on ours. That is one of the points in which we were unworthy (it was said). I was also ordered to the BDM , but I was exempted since I wasn’t allowed to use the German salute. Adults also had to put their fingerprints in their identity cards. It said in my identity card: "Not ten years old yet". I still have it.

We were all given a second first name in those days. At home it could naturally happen that my father said, "Sarah, your being smart again" if I was a bit fresh." To which I responded: "I know Israel." So we made a bit of fun of it.

Not only my father had to wear the star, I was given one too. We received our stars, it must have been somewhere in the 2^nd District, because I can still remember I was standing on the Schwedenbrücke Bridge with my mother – the O tram line used to cross the bridge. I was standing there, looking down at the water (in the Danube Channel) through the railing bars and said to my mother – I really remember this very well – "Mutti, it would be better if I jumped in there. You would have so much less to worry about."

Today I know how much that remark must have hurt my mother.

We rode the O train then, and I already had a star. Naturally, they pinned it on me right away. Of course my mother wanted to protect me on the train and held me close. There was a Nazi woman on the train and it seemed that she thought she had to let off some steam, so she said I had to get off the tram. But there were also people who had backbones. I can remember there was a man there and he asked her what she thought she was doing, to treat a child like that. Then the others also took sides against her and she got off at the next station. So I was actually able to get home unharmed then.

My father received it (the star) at the same time, but he went there alone. I couldn’t go alone since I was a child so I went with my mother. Naturally, we had to wear the star. Our neighbours in the building paid very close attention to whether we (my father and I) wore them. It was fastened with a safety pin and my mother always mended it – she was a seamstress. And whenever we went somewhere, she would take it off immediately after we had turned the first corner.

A new teacher appeared suddenly at the beginning of 4^th grade. She was known at school, well, I almost think she was a Blutordensträgerin (member of the Blood Order), because she was an incredible Nazisse, female Nazi. She had already been (underhanded) to me a few times. I looked pretty well, well fed, which wasn’t that common then anymore. And she of course had to find out what we lived from. Somehow I was on guard and I said: "Well, from Knödeln (dumplings), noodles and Nockerln (Soup garnishing noodles)." And that settled that matter…but I was also the best in my class – which was unfortunate for me then.

She came in, in the morning, and when we had all sat down after the greeting, called on me and told me, she probably said it differently, that I should leave the class since I was not worthy of going to the same school as Aryan children. Of course I packed up my things and went out the door. When I was walking down the steps the School Director, who was also a party member was standing there. He waved me over and comforted me. He liked me very much. He comforted me and said that this would also pass. And he said that at a time in which it wasn’t clear that it would ever pass.

I only have a picture of myself, I’m in the hall (note: in the "half-breeds school"), that picture stayed with me. It must have been during a recess, because children were standing in the hallway and I only saw that uniform. Well these "Goldfasane", (Golden Pheasants) that’s what people called them (the men) in those SA uniforms, came up the stairs, took the teacher and didn’t treat her very well. – "Took" is putting it nicely; they pushed her down the hall and took her away. I can still see it in front of me, but these are individual images, it could be that one represses different things as time passes. Indeed, it was demanded of us for decades that we forget, "Well, that’s over, you have to forget that." I also tried that, I didn’t forget it, but I did suppress it. But today one has the feeling that these things are more like an elevator: the memories come up from the depths below, you just have to snap your fingers and suddenly an image is there, a comment, someone says a word, you see something on television and suddenly the pictures are there again. And the older you get, the clearer these pictures become – unless you are going senile.

I can remember one thing very, very well: we went on a Hamsterfahrt, a trip to find food. We drove from the Waldviertel area, to Krems in a so-called "milk wagon" – it was a form of flat bed truck – during the apricot season. We got off the truck once we arrived in Krems and suddenly I saw a Gendarme and said, „Mutti, a Gendarme is coming." With her voice ringing with conviction and loudly so the Gendarme could hear her, my mother said, "Well, then let him come!" The Gendarme approached us and barked, "Do you have apricots?" My mother smiled at him and presented her suitcase and bag and said, "Not a single one." He turned around and left again. Well, if he had opened the bag he would have stopped looking for apricots! We had everything that was illegal in that bag. We had poppy seeds amongst other things. It was an offence punished with the death penalty to own poppy seeds since the oil was used for aeroplanes. And so we got home unscathed.

Recently, at a round table I said, "I am surprised that they never caught my mother." We must have had a few guardian angels, not just one.

I was on my way to the Waldviertel area with my mother again and the trains weren’t running regularly anymore because of the bombing attacks. And it happened that we made it to Krems and we wanted to go on to Weißenkirchen in der Wachau, but Krems was the last stop. So we were standing at the train station and couldn’t travel any further. What to do? There was an NSV (those women’s organisations were also involved) home at the station, like the mission homes they have today. And my mother was standing there with me and said, "Well, let’s inside now." And I said, "Mutti, that isn’t allowed. " "You be quiet, we’re going in." I can still see it in front of me, It seems that there wasn’t any electric lighting, there were a few candles on the table and women doing chores of some kind. I only have shadow-like memories of that. I was put in a bed with rails since I was a child, but it was a little bit too short for me. My feet stuck out at the bottom. And I had to spend the entire night there. We left that hospitable place in the morning the next day and when we were around 10, 20 meters far away, my mother said, "If they knew that a Jewish child slept in their Aryan beds." That’s what my mother had to say.

My father received a summons towards the end of the war. He was then informed that he was to be transported to the province of Burgenland to build "ramps". And there weren’t only Jews at these sites, Czechs were also there and murderers, there were criminals, gypsies, all kinds of people, right across the board. They were all transported down there to dig trenches. Naturally, my mother went to the Waldviertel and brought my father all sorts of supplies. And then my father drove off. My mother swore: "(she would follow my father) to the end of the world," and it was a matter of fact for her to honour that oath. And she looked for my father.

My father was very popular and he was known as "langer Fritz" (tall Fritz) everywhere, because of his height. "Yes, he’s in the mayor’s office, " we were told. So we went there and some of his colleagues who were there early said, "Fritzl, he’s still on his way." Mother and I hid behind the door and when my father came in – I can still see him in front of me, my father was always careful to have his hair combed properly and to be smoothly shaven – he had stubble on his chin. This was because he had sworn that he would not shave until the time when he could return home. When he came in my father saw my mother and me and naturally none of us managed to say a word. We were all crying and his colleagues also joined in, in all the crying.

Then I didn’t understand properly, today I know. We also saw the trains with Hungarian Jews in them who were transported to Vienna (corrects herself) who were transported on to Germany. And I can still remember one thing, the farmers wives took us along and tried to tuck something into their pockets as they marched by and therefore the farmers leader felt compelled to threaten the farmers wives. Well, what they said isn’t fit to print and he disappeared again. I can also remember how an old man was marching at the end of the column and the farmer’s wife we were with called "Vaterl" and he just said, in very good German, "How old do you think I am?" She said she didn’t know. And he said: "27 years old" She gave him a loaf of bread and he marched on, but I almost assume he didn’t get much further. You could always hear shots. The escort companies were composed of HJ members, meaning there were no adults. Later we heard that they simply liquidated those who couldn’t continue marching quickly.

I can only see, I can still see that man in front of me. He really was an old man. And then he said he was 27.

That was at the beginning of April. A few days later, on the night of 3 April, the doorbell rang suddenly and it was my father standing at the door.

Indeed, how did he get back?

At night someone went out (one of the trench-builders) to relieve himself and suddenly saw that the night was light, illuminated and when he looked in the direction of Stein am Anger they could see the so-called "Christmas trees". They were flares that became broader in a Christmas tree-like pattern. Planes dropped them in order to see where they might be able to drop their bombs.

Of course they saw that. He went in, woke up the others and they naturally looked around, but none of the so-called "Gold Pheasants", the SA men, were to be seen anymore. They had already fled, which of course the men building the trenches did as well then. Well, I can only say that the way my father returned to Vienna was adventurous, more than adventurous. I never would have thought him capable of that. It really was courage bred from desperation. He came back to Vienna in a train carrying SS officers, at least for the first part of the trip, that’s the story he told. They picked him up since he claimed he didn’t have any papers because he was on a secret mission. This way nobody could get their hands on the documents. They must have been so confused that they believed him and took him along.

And so my father returned to Vienna in stages and wound up at home.

In the morning, my father suddenly grabbed the laundry basket and all the larger crockery that was there and started packing everything together that was of any value in the apartment.

This was all stowed in the cellar and at ten the area was still "free of enemies", that’s what you heard on the radio all the time. At 11 my father suddenly said, "Run down to the basement, I can hear the bombs dropping!" Nobody could hear a thing, nothing on the radio. Well, anyway, I went out the door and we had a form of spiral staircase, there was a turn for every floor. I was between the 1^st floor and the mezzanine. Now, of course my grandmother thought she had to mop the floor first, but then she ran out too and was in the turn between the 2^nd and 1^st floor. My father was already in the doorway and my mother was a few steps further down when the bomb hit.

It was a splinter bomb; we found the casing in the courtyard later. It looked like it had been cut in centimetres and rolled up. One of the splinters injured the base of my mother’s hand and my father had huge flesh wounds on both legs. He came down to the basement afterwards and I can remember there was a female medic there. When he came down, I didn’t understand what he meant at the time, people weren’t informed about the bird and the bees then, my father said he thought "everything" had been torn away. Fortunately that wasn’t the case; it was just a large flesh wound. The nurse just took the chunks of flesh that were hanging from his leg, pressed them down and bandaged them tightly. My mother dressed the wound then and my father was taken away, we didn’t know where to then.

At what? At the time? At the people? I have already been asked that question. And the answer was: "I come from a working class family", and my father experienced (times of need in) the years from 1934 to 1938 as a worker. He always said, people expected an existence more worthy of them and got a bill that was much higher than they expected, because a lot of them bit the dust. I only get mad if someone today says, "Auschwitz is a lie." But hatred for the patsies?

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Copyright © 2001 by Ruth Deutschmann, Vienna

Vienna, 31 July 2001