Sonia Bajcz Diamond: Hiding in Plain Sight (Part 6: 1943-1944)

This is the sixth in a series that summarize an interview of my grandmother, Sonia Bajcz/Beitch Diamond (then Sara Bajcz), from about 20 years ago.  This continues her story of survival after the Senkevychivka Ghetto's destruction until the Germans were retreating from the area.  Previous posts in this series are here, here, here, here, and here.  

But then we were requested to go somewhere else nearby--to Ostrov.  It was surrounded by water, and there were Ukrainian people there who were Seventh Day Adventist.  But we were on the outskirts in one room, with a bit of storage.  These people were nice to us; they thought we were Ukrainian like them.  We worked, but they fed us and treated us well.  One day my husband was working, and a horse kicked him in the stomach.  The Ukrainian workers came in with a wagon and wanted to take him to a hospital.  I knew he could get caught, so I told them he needed to stay still, and I'd take care of him until tomorrow, and then we'd see.  Since in Europe only Jews were circumsized, we needed to keep him out of the hospital.

Sonia Bajcz Diamond: After the Senkevychivka Ghetto Destruction (Part 5: 1942-1943)

This is the fifth in a series that summarize an interview of my grandmother, Sonia Bajcz/Beitch Diamond (then Sara Bajcz), from about 20 years ago.  This talks about how she survived after the Senkevychivka Ghetto's destruction.  Previous posts in this series are here, here, here, and here.

I took my mother, and I took her to a family that I knew--the son was communist, and the whole family was against the Nazi regime.  The son told me that since I spoke fluent Ukrainian and Russian, he could get me a passport so that I could live on "Irish Papers" which is what they called false papers.  You had to become an actor and lead someone else's life.  I told him I had a friend, and I needed a passport for him as well.  He said he could steal a set of papers for my friend (my future husband), and he would be able to get a blank set of papers for me.  I would have to use my thumbprint on the papers, and we picked a name--Marina Karamenko, from Zhitomir, Russia.  I had to only speak Russian and forget that I spoke Polish or Yiddish.  I tried to give him some of my fabric as payment.  He didn't want to take it, but I insisted.

Meanwhile, my mother told me about a Polish man who lived by himself in the forest.  She asked me to go and ask if we could hide there.  He was so isolated, it would be a good way to stay unnoticed.  He told me he had relatives in Poleshe, near Pinsk, which was far away.  He told me that we could go together and become his mistress, and I should let my mother get killed by the Germans because she was too old.  I told him I didn't come here for that, but I came to get him to help myself and my mother survive.