When a Light in a Potato Pierced the Darkness

Reichenbach was a small town in Silesia not far from Breslau. In October 1944, 32 girls were brought there from Auschwitz-Birkenau on the eve of Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles.

In the lovely old town, there were several factories that employed slave labor, and we were put to work at the Telefunken factory for the German war effort. Some of us joined the prisoners from Holland in making small electric bulbs, which were used in airplanes. The other girls were put into other departments at the factory.

Women and men prisoners lived outside town in separate camps. The distance from factory to camp was two or three miles, but it is difficult to tell the exact distance, for in our debilitated condition, each step cost us a lot of effort. Our condition in the camp and factory were far better than in Birkenau, and we also had better food. We worked 12-hour shifts. Dragging ourselves through the woods to work at dawn on empty stomachs in rain, snow and howling wind was no small feat. We walked five in a row, helping and dragging one another when needed, leaning forward against the wind.

We passed through the outskirts of town near a bakery with the agonizingly tantalizing smell of fresh bread. Our impossible hope of ever eating our fill of freshly baked bread seemed to make our hunger even worse. On these journeys, I said my prayers, what I could remember by heart, and the girls near me asked me to recite the prayers aloud so they could hear them as well.

As Hanukkah approached and the journeys got harder and harder, I spoke to the girls about planning the lighting of Hanukkah lights. It was something to look forward to, to relive the Hanukkahs at home, to make us realize that we had other worries besides our hunger, cold and weakness.

We divided up among ourselves who would have to pilfer what. Girls who were working near machinery could steal a few drops of oil each day. The most difficult task was finding a container for a small amount of oil.

One girl stole a potato. We all looked at that potato for a whole week, time and time again, kept it safe and no one ate it. What a miracle! How can I explain what a delicious meal a raw potato would make when one is so very hungry?

We had almost everything except matches. One of our girls had to fetch food from the kitchen and managed to lift a box of matches with just a few sticks in it. There were girls who had never seen Hanukkah lights and yet they wanted to take part in the lighting up, in spite of the danger of being found out.

We came back from work that first Hanukkah night in 1944 and after we ate our supper of soup, we started preparing. We made a cavity in the potato, put in those few drops of precious oil, took some threads from our clothes, twisted them and made a wick and put it into the potato with the oil.

We propped up the potato in the window, as tradition demands, for all to see, and made the blessings: “Blessed art thou, O Lord King of the Universe who has sanctified us with his commandment and commanded us to light the Hanukkah lights. Blessed art thou . . . who performed miracles for our forefathers in those days.”

We sang Maoz Tzur Yeshuathi (Rock Fortress of My Salvation). Here we had the second miracle: No one came to beat us up or to demand where we got all those things.

Some 40 of us took part in the lighting and singing, and I told the girls that this light represented freedom of spirit and Nezach Yisrael, the eternity of Israel.

Four days later, I celebrated my 21st birthday. From one girl, I got a small comb made of wood. It was something to be cherished although we had no hair yet to use it on. I also got an extra spoonful of thicker soup and the most fantastic present of all from a 16-year-old girl with large, green-gray eyes. My present was a red checked handkerchief. I wouldn’t have given it up for the world and went on using it even after the war.

Thank you, Hedi. You are not with us any longer. I shall remember you for your starving, beautiful eyes and for your wonderful present, that lovely red handkerchief.