Sara Zyskind / Sara Rachela Plagier (F / Poland, 1927-1995), Holocaust survivor
Sara Zyskind / Sara Rachela Plagier (F / Poland, 1927-1995), Holocaust survivor.
- KEYWORS : <Poland> <Lodz Ghetto> <Auschwitz> <Mittelstein>
- MEMOIRS : Stolen Years (1977).
Biography
Sara Rachela Plagier was born in Lodz on March 26, 1927 to a a well-known Jewish family of industrialists. At the age of 12, she and her family were forced to live in the Lodz ghetto. Her mother died in 1940. She and her father mutually supported each other during the following years, successfully evading arrest and deportation, until he died during the Passover of 1943. Upon the "liquidation" of the Ghetto in August 1944, at the age of 16, Zyskind was deported to Auschwitz, and from there to other labor camps. After liberation she met and married fellow Lodz survivor Eliezer Zyskind. The couple emigrated to Palestine, where they lived ever after.
Book: Stolen Years (1977)
- העטרה שאבדה : בגיטו לודז׳ ובמחנות / ha-ʻAṭarah she-avdah: be-geṭo Lodz' uva-maḥanot <Hebrew> (Tel Aviv: Bet loḥame ha-getaʼot ṿe-hotsaʼat ha-Ḳibuts ha-meʼuḥad, 1977). English trans. Stolen Years (Minneapolis, MN: Lerner Publications Co., 1981).
"Presents a personal account of the author's experiences as a young Jewish girl living in Poland at the beginning of its occupation by Nazi Germany in World War II."--Publisher description.
Profile : USHMM
Sara Rachela Plagier was born on March 26, 1927, in Lodz, the only daughter of Anszel and Mindl Plagier. Sara's father was a partner in a knitwear factory and religious ornament artist. After the German invasion of Poland, Sara's father wanted his small family to flee to the east, but Sara's mother wouldn't hear of parting from her siblings. After a few months of the occupation they decided to move to Warsaw. They moved all their belongings ahead to Warsaw and they themselves were supposed to travel; however, they were trapped when the Lodz ghetto was sealed.
Sara started to attend the ghetto high school (she is signature # 13,049 in the album). Her mother died in the ghetto at the age of 36 and Sara went to live with her maternal aunt Cesia and five children. After the schools were closed, Sara started to work in a corset sewing workshop. She was 14 years old. During the deportations of the winter and spring of 1942 aunt Cesia and her immediate family were deported to Chelmno and Sara moved in with another aunt. Sara's father was gravely ill and was taken to the hospital. Sara was ordered to come to the ghetto prison for deportation and only by chance was she released. During the Gehsperre Aktion in the Lodz ghetto Sara's beloved aunt Hanusia was taken away, but she and her father managed to hide in an abandoned house. During Passover 1943, Sara's father succumbed to hunger and died. In August 1944, Sara was deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau. She was later transferred to Mittelstein forced-labor camp.
She was liberated by the Red Army and after barely avoiding being raped by a drunken Russian soldier, Sara and a few survivor girlfriends managed to return to Lodz. She met and married fellow Lodz survivor Eliezer Zyskind. The couple immigrated to Israel. They had three children. Sara Zyskind described her experiences in a book, Stolen Years. She died in 1995.