CLOSE-UP

Was it an act of God?
Sheer coincidence?
An inexplicable mystery?

r

O w'

Three Detroiters talk about remarkable events in their lives.

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may be discerned through
the ness nistar, the hidden
miracle — seemingly or-
dinary occurrences which,
when considered by a person
of faith, are revealed to be
acts of divine intervention.
For Southfield resident
Martin Adler, that a
sonderKommando would
save the lives of two
strangers is a miraculous
event.
Nathan Roth of Oak Park
also experienced a
remarkable occurrence
when, during a chance trip
to New York, he saw a
photograph of his father's
grave for the first time in
more than 40 years.
And through a curious
series of coincidences, Louis
Golden of Birmingham
managed to discover the
missing pieces of his grand-
father's life — a path that
led to his renewed commit-
ment to Israel.

M

artin Adler was
born Sept. 14,
1929, in Volove
in Czechoslovakia's Car-
pathian Mountains on the
border of Poland. His mother,
Faiga, was the youngest of
five children; his father,
Herschel, had seven
brothers and sisters. The ex-
tended family comprised 70
aunts and uncles and
cousins. Of these 70, six
would survive the Holo-
caust.

In September 1938,
Britain, France and Italy
signed a treaty awarding
major portions of
Czechoslovakia to Nazi
Germany. The next year, the
Nazis turned Volove over to
Hungarian authorities. City
officials implemented the in-
famous Nuremberg Laws.
Jews were obligated to wear
yellow Stars of David; in
schools, Jewish students
were forced to study in
separate rooms from non-
Jews. Herschel Adler and
other Jewish men were
taken away. to Hungarian
labor camps.
"I was 11 when. my father
left, and I became the man of
the house," Martin Adler
says. "I took my brothers to
the synagogue every
Shabbat, just as my father
had taken us."
The family's greatest fear
was of sudden round-ups.
Jews from Volove and sur-
rounding towns would be
taken outside the village
and never heard from again.
In 1941, Martin and his
mother were loaded on one
such transport.
By extraordinary coin-
cidence, Martin and his
mother were among a small
group pulled off the train at
the last minute. On a whim,
officers decided to release all
families with men serving in
the labor battalion. Every-
one else on the truck was
murdered.

In 1943, after two years in
the labor camps, Herschel
returned home. One year
later, he and his family were
told they would be relocated
to Auschwitz.
On the appointed Monday
morning in April 1944, the
Adlers appeared on their
front porch. Faiga began to
weep. "Why don't we tell
them we're not going and
just let them kill us here,"
she cried.
They were taken by train
to the village of Sikernice,
which had been made into a
ghetto. They stayed there for
three weeks.
Then the Germans sudden-
ly issued a call to board the
train.
SS guards stood atop the
100 boxcars as the Jews
were forced inside. "We
thought for sure this would
be where they machine
gunned us all and this would
be the end," Mr. Adler says.
"People were taking out
their prayer books to say
Kaddish."
Three days later, the
trains stopped at Auschwitz.
"We were taken out,
beaten and shoved," Mr.
Adler says. "All the . while
we kept hearing `schnell,
schnell' (faster, faster). I'll
never forget that `schnell,
schnell' all the time. Wo-
men, old people and children
were told to go to the right.
They said the women would
be doing cooking; the chil-

dren would go to school; the
old people would be taken to
a home."
Among those sent to the
right were Martin's mother,
brothers Yossel and Yehuda
Mendel, and sister, Freida
Rivka. Speaking in Yiddish,
Faiga whispered the last
words Martin would ever
hear his mother say. She
told her husband, "I'll go
with the children, and you
take Martin."
After the selection process
— which Martin and his
father survived because of
the sonderKommando's ad-
vice to lie — the two were
forced into a shower that
alternated between burning
hot and freezing cold water.
Their heads were shaved
and they were told to put on
the camp uniform, a striped
shirt and pants.
Martin was constantly
aware of the quiet death

Above: Martin Adler in the
1940s and, below, today.
"What are those chimneys
saying? They're saying
they killed your mother,
brothers and sister."

P hotos by Glen n Triest

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pouring from the
smokestacks. His father
often pointed to the
crematorium and said,
"What are those chimneys
saying? They're saying they
killed your mother, brothers
and sister."
After several weeks at
Auschwitz, Martin and his
father were among
thousands shipped to
Buchenwald. Once again,
Martin believes he survived
because of a remarkable in-
cident.
At 14, Martin was one of
the smallest to be shoved on
the train headed to Buchen-
wald. Inside, the boxcar was
divided into thirds. On both
the left and right side were

60 men each; the center
third was reserved for two
Nazi guards.
Martin was one of the first
aboard, and it wasn't long
before he was surrounded by
men, all packed tightly
together. He couldn't
breathe.
One of the SS guards
chanced to look at Martin.
He told him, "Come up
front" and offered him a bite
of bread and sausage. Mar-
tin thought he was "the
nicest guy in the world."
Martin had been just days
at Buchenwald when he was
among 1,000 men shipped off
to another Nazi camp. This
time their destination was
Dora. When they arrived,
900 men were sent immedi-
ately to their deaths. Martin
and his father were among
the few allowed to live.
Herschel Adler worked the
night shift; his son worked
during the day, building the
crematorium and carrying
rocks. They saw one another
briefly when each was on his
way to or from work. Then
Martin's father disappeared.
"One day, I heard someone .
say, 'Are you from Volove?' I
said, 'Yes.' He said, 'Did you
know a man named Herschel
Adler from there who was
shot today?' "
Moments later another
man, a Volove resident, ap-
proached Martin. He said:
"If you survive, you must
always remember your
father's yahrtzeit: erev rosh
chodesh Tammuz (the eve of
the first of the month of
Tammuz)."
Martin doubts he would
have survived had he not
been given — for unknown
reasons — the best job at
Dora: working in the
clothing depot. Here, he was
able to stay inside, avoiding
both the freezing cold and
terrible heat, and could oc-
casionally steal clothes to
trade for food.
Toward the end of the war,
Martin was again forced
onto a boxcar. He and hun-
dreds of other prisoners were
taken to Bergen-Belsen.
They never arrived. The
British army intercepted the
train and liberated the men
on board. Many already had
suffocated.
After the war, Martin
Adler settled in the United
States. Today, he works at a
furniture store in Hamtram-
ck. He reads a lot of books
about the Holocaust. By

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

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