Kestenberg Archive - Depositions

Blanka Goldhurst was born on January 10, 1930 in Piotrkow Trybunalski. When the Germans occupied Poland, they destroyed her parent's home and they lost everything. In the summer of 1942, the Germans established a ghetto in her hometown and eventually started deporting Jews to Treblinka. After the Germans severly beat her father, he became very ill and died. Blanka, along with her sister were sent to a camp in Skarzysko Kamienne HASAG, but managed to escape. Later she was taken to Bliznia. While she was there, Blanka helped in the kitchen. After some time the camp was evacuated and they were sent to Auschwitz where she worked in a labor camp. She was constantly physically and mentally abused and under daily threats of being sent to the gas chamber. She magaed to save herself from her own death. She was sent to Oberaltstadt in Sudetenland where she worked in an arms factory until she was liberated by the Red Army. The former female commandant of the camp was caught and was beaten in revenge. They were well treated by the Russians and former Czech partisans. At the time of the deposition, Blanka was living in an orphanage in Czestochowa. Although she is well treated, she is distressed that she is still separated from her mother and sister who survived a concentration camp in Lisko. The deposition was taken in Katowice.