Peter & Thomas Somogyi (MM / Hungary, 1933), Holocaust survivors
Peter & Thomas Somogyi (MM / Hungary, 1933), Holocaust survivors
- KEYWORDS : <Hungary> <Auschwitz> <Mengele Twins> <Liberation of Auschwitz>
Biography
NOTES : The twins were born in Pecs, Hungary on Apr 14, 1933. They spoke Hungarian and also learned German from their nanny. Deported at Auschwitz in July 1944, they were selected among the Mengele Twins for medical experiments. They were liberated at Auschwitz by the Red Army on Jan 27, 1945. They returned by themselves to Pecs, where they reunited with their father (who survived Dachau]]. Their mother never came back. The family emigrated to Israel in mid-1949. In 1956 they moved to England for a couple years and then onto Canada in 1958.
USHMM's ID Card
Peter and his twin brother, Thomas, were the youngest of three children born to an observant Jewish family. They lived in Pecs, an industrial center where goods such as bricks and ceramics were produced. Peter's father owned a prosperous business selling accessories and parts for cars, motorcycles and bicycles. He was also a regional sales representative for Ford automobiles.
1933-39: A German nanny took care of Peter, Thomas, and their older sister. She taught them German and they became quite fluent. When my Peter and Thomas turned 5, they began piano lessons at home. The next year they joined a boy scout troop. On September 1, 1939, they began school. That day they heard on the radio that Germany had invaded Poland. Five years later, they were deported to Auschwitz with their mother and sister.
1940-44: Male twins and some dwarfs lived in Peter's half of the barracks. Right outside was a crematorium, where bodies, stacked like logs, waited to be burned. An older twin was assigned to watch over them; he taught them math and geography. Sometimes the guards took all the twins to a soccer field to kick around a rag ball. Then there were all their visits to the infamous Dr. Mengele. Peter and Thomas were examined together. He measured their heads and compared their eyes. An assistant took blood. Dr. Mengele liked them because they spoke German.
Peter and his brother were liberated from Auschwitz by the Soviet army on January 27, 1945. They returned to Pecs before immigrating to Israel in mid-1949.
ABS News (27 January 2020)
Peter Somogyi and his twin brother were 11 years old when they arrived in Auschwitz-Birkenau in July 1944.
The two were living in Pecs, Hungary, with his father, mother and sister when the Germans took control in March 1944. He said immediately the Jewish people were forced to wear yellow stars and his father was taken away. He and his family lived in a ghetto for about two months before being sent to Auschwitz.
"They loaded us 70 to 80 in the same cattle car. … Every family got only one bread for the duration. … We had no idea where we are going," he said. "We had no idea what’s happening."
For three days and nights, he and his family traveled with others in the cattle car. When they were released, he said, his mother told him to say he was 9 in hopes they would keep the family together. It didn’t work.
"While we were waiting there to move somewhere, (Nazi doctor) Josef Mengele came around ... asking for twins," he said. "Two German soldiers grabbed us. I didn’t have a chance to say goodbye to my mother. That’s the last time I ever saw her and my sister and my family."
He was also given a number: A17-454. When he asked a man when he'd be able to see his mother, he said the man "pointed to the flames and said, ‘That’s where your mother is.’"
"And that’s when I found out what’s really happening," Somogyi said.
He and his brother endured Mengele’s experiments that included blood draws and repeated measurements of their bodies. He said being a part of Mengele's experiments kept him and his brother alive.
"Otherwise, I would have been in the gas chamber the first moment when we arrived over there," he said.
On Jan. 27, 1945, the day Auschwitz was liberated, he and his brother had been lined up with others to begin the death march from Birkenau to Auschwitz. The Germans were shooting anyone who was not able to walk.
All of a sudden, he said, the Germans vanished. The Russians had been traveling so fast that the German soldiers just left the prisoners.
"I said to myself, ‘Finally, we are free,’" he said. "You have no idea what kind of feeling (that) is for an 11-year-old kid … Both of us (were) elated that we are free. That’s all that I can tell you."
It took him and his brother two and a half months to reach their hometown after the camp’s liberation. They were later reunited with their father, who had survived the camps as well.
Somogyi, 86, said as he grew up, he learned to put the Holocaust behind him and not dwell on it.
"From the day we liberated and we got home, I never, ever, discussed anything with my brother about it," he said. "We just stopped thinking about it, stopped talking about it. … That was the idea. … Then I came to the realization that, within 10 to 15 years, there will be no eyewitness survivors to tell the story … That’s why I’m telling my story."
"Auschwitz represents the worst of humanity," he said.