Object numberM1996/010:009
DescriptionLetter written by 18-year-old Hana Lipova from the hospital in Bergen-Belsen to her uncle and cousins at home (Uncle and Edita Daskova and Ida) in Jaromer, Czechoslovakia, 7 July 1945. Hana came to Australia in 1948, bringing the letter with her.
The letter is like a testimonial account. She explains the ordeal she went through: "On 18 May 1944, I was transported from Theresienstadt Ghetto to Arbeitslager (Labour Camp) Birkenau. Instead it was Auschwitz and all what goes with that. Nobody came alive from there till our transport arrival. The main reason for that was the ‘modern well equipped gas chamber’. I think that almost all our relatives died this way." She writes about the selection, about heavy labour, ill treatment by the SS guards, beatings. She was taken to Bergen-Belsen: "The horror of it I cannot quite describe, so better to leave it till we are together. Here in Belsen most everybody got sick with typhus or typhoid fever." Hana writes that she has been bedridden for 9 weeks. She asks them to write to her with news of her father and says, "Though I am prepared for the worst, a very small hope is always present."
Part of a collection of photographs, medical records, identity documents, postcards, letters, 1943 pocket book, hand-made leather book mark, deportation slips and yellow cloth Star of David donated by Hana Novotny (nee Lipa).
The letter is like a testimonial account. She explains the ordeal she went through: "On 18 May 1944, I was transported from Theresienstadt Ghetto to Arbeitslager (Labour Camp) Birkenau. Instead it was Auschwitz and all what goes with that. Nobody came alive from there till our transport arrival. The main reason for that was the ‘modern well equipped gas chamber’. I think that almost all our relatives died this way." She writes about the selection, about heavy labour, ill treatment by the SS guards, beatings. She was taken to Bergen-Belsen: "The horror of it I cannot quite describe, so better to leave it till we are together. Here in Belsen most everybody got sick with typhus or typhoid fever." Hana writes that she has been bedridden for 9 weeks. She asks them to write to her with news of her father and says, "Though I am prepared for the worst, a very small hope is always present."
Part of a collection of photographs, medical records, identity documents, postcards, letters, 1943 pocket book, hand-made leather book mark, deportation slips and yellow cloth Star of David donated by Hana Novotny (nee Lipa).
Production placeBergen-Belsen concentration camp
Production date 1945-07-07
Subjectliberation, health, hospitals
Object nameletters
Materialpaper
Dimensions
- width: 210.00 mm
height: 148.00 mm
Language
- Czech Dear Uncle and Edita and Ida (cousins)
I have an opportunity to send you this letter via a repatriation transport returning to Czechoslovakia. Unfortunately we here in the hospital won’t probably travel just as yet. But we are of good cheer, we know they won’t leave us here and if we don’t leave today, we will travel in a few days time. I don’t know whether you have received my previous 3 letters and therefore I’ll briefly “from Adam onwards” (a Czech saying) describe my Odyssey. The details will have to wait till we are able to speak and talk in person.
last year, on 18th May 1944, I was transported from Theresienstadt Ghetto to Arbeitslager (Labour Camp) Birkenau. Instead it was Auschwitz and all what goes with that. Nobody came alive from there till our transport arrival. The main reason for that was the ‘modern well equipped gas chamber’. I think that almost all our relatives died this way. Auschwitz was a compete big city of many camps and perhaps even the SS themselves did not know the full size of it. To circumnaviage it all would take by car several hours. There I remained for about 7 weeks. Then there was ‘The Selection’, that is, one had to walk, naked, past the SS men, who decided which way one is to proceed. Straight on was good, to the side meant death. We the young ones, in reasonably good condition, men as well as women, passed, luckily, through and after some more terrible days (in another camp, some distance from the Familien Lager), we were transported by train, several days, to various German and Upper Silesian towns to work there. As you know, I was in Hamburg, Germany, and we suffered a lot there. Hunger, heavy, very heavy work, normally done by men, clearing out rubble, carrying rails for industrial railway and altogether very heavy stuff etc, air raids day and night, and we unprotected outside, all the time outside, , in all weather, ill treatment – women SS guards, beatings, well nice it was not!
shortly before the British came to Hamburg we were quickly taken by rail to Bergen Belsen, about which you have no doubt read in the newspapers. The horror of it I cannot quite describe, so better to leave it till we are together. Here in Belsen most everybody got sick with typhus or typhoid fever. But by then we were liberated (14.4.45) by the British and taken to more healthy surroundings, that is modern military barracks. After that the barracks became also a hospital, row of hospitals, because perhaps everybody was sick with typhus. I was extremely sick, not expected to live. After a few weeks of high temperature unconsciousness and horrible diarrhoea, I got bed sores and an abscess on the back. But now, thank be to God, I am slowing coming to. I have been bedridden some 9 weeks and I can’t yet walk too well, but that should improve. Only not to despair I am now in a very nice (former) SS Lazaret Hospital and am reasonably all right. But I want to go home. Home is home and I am home sick. I hope that we too shall soon be repatriated home and then I will have so much to tell you. A letter could not carry it all.
But now something about you. Please, please do write to me all the news you have, mainly about my beloved daddy. Though I am prepared for the worst, a very small hope is always present. What about uncle Ernest? And the others? Our friends …, what is happening elsewhere around … altogether all the news you have. I would even like the littlest news. The last news from you, that is to Hamburg, 2 postcards and one letter. I was not given though the parcels nor money or bread coupons you have sent, but my joy was nevertheless great! That gave me mental strength and that was so needed.
My address is Hana Lipova, Hospital Camp IV, Block B 2/1, Room 25, Bergen, Germany.
Please write to me soon and lots and lots. My girls friend who is leaving soon also taking this letter for you with her, will if possible, explain and tell you what is perhaps not quite clear to you. I am thinking of you, you are all my nearest and dearest. I am looking forward to my return home. I believe that at home, with you, I’ll at last be completely well. Oh well, I have to be patient. I know nothing about my father since he was taken away from Theresienstadt on 20 August 1943, no news at all, but I can imagine…! And therefore, please don’t keep anything from me; after what I have lived through, experienced and saw myself, nothing can surprise me. I became hardened. There will be pain at a sad news, for sure, but I want to know the truth. I know nothing about Uncle Ernest since I left Theresienstadt. He was that, then, what was called ‘protected’ (by his high military medal awarded to him in WWI by the then Austrian Imperial Army), but I don’t know for how long.
Do remain in good health, don’t forget me and write. Million of kisses from yours, Hana
Credit lineSydney Jewish Museum Collection, Donated by Ms. Hana Novotny