COMMUNITY
Hidden Children
Share Their Memories
Staff Writer
E
rna Gorman has been
a hidden child for most
of her life.
When the Nazis invaded
France, Mrs. Gorman, her
parents and her sister fled
their home in Metz and
found refuge on a farm near
the Ukranian border. A local
farmer hid her family in his
hayloft. They remained
hidden there for two years.
The farmer and his wife
kept the family's existence a
secret from their own chil-
dren. As a result, Mrs. Gor-
man, who was 7 years old,
was forced to live in com-
plete silence. For two full
years, her family never came
down from that hayloft.
At the end of World War II,
her family journeyed back to
France. Mrs. Gorman's
mother never made it. She
died on the road.
Mrs. Gorman decided that
no one should ever know of
her past. She made a pact
with herself never to speak
to anyone about what she
lived through. Her secret
followed her to Detroit in
1953, where she even kept it
from her husband and chil-
dren — until six years ago.
At the age of 44, Mrs.
Gorman broke her silence.
"I could never deal with
it," Mrs. Gorman said,
"Even when the movie Holo-
caust came out a few years
ago, I refused to watch it.
Consequently, my guilty
feelings continued to grow.
"When my husband told
me about the gathering of
hidden children in New
York I had very mixed emo-
tions, but in my heart, I felt
it was time."
Mrs. Gorman, who lives in
Bloomfield Township with
her husband, Herb, was one
of about 10 Detroiters who
went in May to New York
City for the first interna-
tional gathering of children
hidden in the Holocaust.
Approximately 1,500 child
survivors attended the May
27-28 conference, which was
held at the New York Mar-
riott Marquis Hotel.
Mrs. Gorman was one
of five guest panelists
invited by CHAIM, Children
of Holocaust Survivors
Association in Michigan, to
share their stories and ob-
servations July 7 at the Jew-
ish Community Center in
West Bloomfield.
Charles Silow, president of
CHAIM, said 1.5 million
children perished in the
Holocaust. He thinks 10,000
children were saved.
"Anyone who lived
through it is a miracle," said
Mr. Silow, who is president
of CHAIM. "The gathering
celebrated those who surviv-
ed, but it also honored those
ordinary people who did ex-
traordinary things to save
Jews."
Rene Lichtman, 53, who
joined the panel, was
adopted by a Catholic family
living on the outskirts of
Paris.
"Lots of us have identity
problems," said Mr.
Lichtman, who lives in
Southfield. "For the longest
time, I couldn't figure out if I
was a Catholic or a Jew."
When the Germans invad-
ed France in 1940, Mr.
Lichtman's father joined the
army. He was killed shortly
after.
In 1945, Mr.
Lichtman's mother
returned for him.
"She was a
stranger to me;' he
said. "I'd already
been baptized, and
she wanted me to
be Jewish and
take me to a
Jewish
environment. I
wore a cross with
the Virgin Mary."
But he had made ar-
rangements with a Catholic
family to take care of his son
if anything should happen to
him.
"In retrospect, I had a
happy childhood," Mr.
Lichtman said. "I don't
recall any real negative ex-
periences, except for the fact
that I was essentially
hidden."
Mr. Lichtman lived at the
edge of town, close to a
railroad crossing. He re-
members the location being
militarily significant and
recalled that soldiers were
stationed nearby.
In 1945, Mr. Lichtman's
mother returned for him.
"She was a stranger to
me," he said. "I'd already
been baptized, and she
wanted me to be Jewish and
take me to a Jewish envi-
ronment. I wore a cross with
the Virgin Mary."
Artwork from Newsday by Gary Viskupic. Copyright* 1991, Newsday. Distributed by Los Angeles Tunes Syndicate.
In 1950, Mrs. Lichtman
remarried an Orthodox Jew
and took her son with her to
Williamsburg, N.Y., Mr.
Lichtman was 121/2.
"I had my bar mitzvah in
Williamsburg, a Chasidic
section of Brooklyn," Mr.
Lichtman said. "Several
years later, after I joined the
U.S. Army, an examining
physician discovered I'd
been living with an ulcer
from childhood.
"I never considered myself
to have experienced real
trauma," he said. "I thought
I was well-adjusted and well-
acclimated."
Ina Silbergleit, who as a
child survived the Warsaw
Ghetto, said she has noticed
common psychological and
emotional characteristics
among child survivors.
"They (child survivors)
have a tendency to become
high achievers," Mrs.
Silbergleit said, "but some
never become fully comfor-
table with their success,
almost shying away from no-
toriety when they achieve
it."
Mrs. Silbergleit said many
tend to be more quiet and se-
rious. Their early confine-
ment makes the childhood of
their own children the more
precious.
"We have a need to make
up in some way for our lost
youth," she said. "We have a
definite need for recognition
to cancel out the anxiety and
fear of abandonment."
Mrs. Silbergleit's family
stayed together until the
uprising of the Warsaw
Ghetto. Her father owned a
lace factory in Warsaw
before the war. When the
Germans invaded Poland,
her father's factory was
taken over and forced to
manufacture German
uniforms. Her father was
permitted to stay on and
manage the factory. The rest
of her family hid in the fac-
tory and in homes
throughout the ghetto.
Often, they hid under stacks
of Nazi uniforms.
"Warsaw had a network
for smuggling Jews out of
the ghetto," Mrs. Silbergleit
said. "Even the people who
did it purely for mercenary
reasons still deserve credit
for risking their lives."
Mrs. Silbergleit said there
is such a thing as an anti-
Semitic rescuer.
"Some just couldn't bear to
see a child murdered," she
said, "while the same kinds
of people didn't mind when it
happened to a larger group
as a whole."
When the ghetto was liq-
uidated in 1943, Mrs.
Silbergleit and her mother
were put on a train headed
for a concentration camp.
"My mother never let go of
my hand on the train," she
said. "When she jumped off,
she dragged me with her. We
walked for days, slept in
fields and in barns. Even-
tually, she left me in a con-
vent with sisters to look
after me. I didn't know I was
a Jew until the war was
over.
"When I was reunited with
my mother, she gave me a
mezuzah to wear around my
neck. I didn't want to wear it
because the sisters had
given me a cross to wear. My
mother wouldn't let me wear
both together, so I didn't
wear either one."
Mrs. Silbergleit said many
hidden children had to cope
twice with the pain of
separation. The first was the
separation from their
natural parents. The second
was the separation from the
foster families and institu-
tions that took care of them.
Helen Bennett, who lives
in Southfield, was hidden in
a Swiss convent and then
given shelter by a Swiss
family.
"I remember a church ser-
vice I wanted desperately to
attend," Mrs. Bennett said.
"The priest wouldn't let me.
I was so upset; I sat and cried
in the barnyard outside. My
foster mother came outside
to sit with me and showed
me a strange book with diff-
erent letters and shiny pic-
tures. She said, 'This is
where you come from; this is
where you belong.' "
Members of the July 7
panel said many survivors
tend to discount their expe-
rience, thinking that they
didn't suffer the way concen-
tration camp survivors did.
"I felt I didn't deserve to be
acknowledged because I
wasn't tortured like other
Jews were," Mrs. Silbergleit
said. "One of the things I
learned from the conference
was to be able to say, 'I ex-
isted,' and 'I'm a human be-
ing too.' "
Sidney Bolkosky, a pro-
fessor of history at the Uni-
versity of Michigan - Dear-
born, urged all survivors to
form support groups. He's
spent the last 10 years
interviewing and recording
Holocaust survivors' experi-
ences.
"It's too late for most con-
centration camp survivors to
find comfort in each other's
words," he said, "but it's not
too late for you." ❑
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
45
OM MU NIT
AMY J. MEHLER