When Children Holocaust survivors lost the last links to their past.

Children were especially vulnerable to Nazi persecution. When World War II ended in 1945, six million European Jews were dead, murdered in the Holocaust. About 1.5 million of the Holocaust victims were children. The child survivors survived due to many different reasons. Many of them were full orphans.

Most of the children from Piotrków Trybunalski Ghetto were murdered in the death camp Treblinka in October 1942. At that Jewish families were rather large and in several, there were 8-9 siblings. 

Prior to and during the Action in the Piotrków ghetto Jews were trying to save the children by hiding them, both within and outside the ghetto borders.

However, after the Action, several children became half or full orphans. In several cases, relatives of the parents that were sent to death during the Action took care of the abundant children.

In the DP-2 cards of three persons of Rubinlicht's family that survived the Holocaust and were brought from Bergen-Belsen to Sweden by the UNRRA White Boat Mission and numerous other cards of the Bergen-Belsen survivors from Piotrków, we can follow the entire story of the family. Sisters of the mother Anna, Ruchla 19 year old end Estera, 24, were sent to the death camp Treblinka in 1942, Anna herself and her two daughters that were sent from Piotrków Ghetto to Ravnsbrück concentration camp in late 1944 and thereafter transported to Bergen-Belsen. Annas husband Pinkus Lajb Rubinlicht was transported first to Buchenwald and later transferred to Mittelblau Dora where he died just before liberation This was not mentioned in Anna Rubinlichts DP-2 card).

In December 19444, with mothers or with relatives children were transportet from Piotrków to the concentration camps Ravensbrück and Buchenwald and thereafter to Bergen-Belsen. When the Americans liberated Buchenwald concentration camp in April 1945, they found that about 900 children had survived thanks to the protection afforded to them by adult prisoners. Some of the children there were from the December 1944 transport from Piotrków. Some of the boys that came to Buchenwald with their father were separated from them and sent after 1 month to Bergen-Belsen.

Just before and some weeks before the liberation, numerous mothers or relatives died in the camp. 14 000 died after liberation between April 15 and the end of June 1945, This results that child survivors in many cases were losing their only links to the past. The youngest one had no idea about who their parents were and their surnames.

During the last deportation in December 1944, only 1-2 were following their parent or the caretaker.

On numerous DP-2 cards that were issued direcly after the war, the information about the child comes form the third person. It might be women that childs mother that shared a bunk at the concentration camp with childs mother that died shortly before och after the liberation of the camp. Often the information that comes from the child only at it contains just the nick names of mother and father.

It is likely that Icek become Ajsik after that letter I was prounced Aj and z as c. From Ajsik wich was a jewish name. 

On the photo below is Arie Fuchs. It is most likely that Leon change his name when arriving to Israel to Arie.  

Fuchs Arie