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Chapter Eleven:
Mittenwald
In Mittenwald I started to work in the officer's mess of the U.S. Army. One afternoon the Captain came to me saying "Jacob, I have arrested your girlfriend" I laughing told him that I did not have a girlfriend, the captain got angry and said very seriously "you don't believe me, then hop into my jeep and I will prove it to you." Arriving at the jail, I was shocked to see Bela and her sister Mania, - they were released immediately.
Mittenwald was the last train station before crossing the Austrian border. A lot of black market dealings were going on at the border crossing. As a result, from time to time the U.S. army conducted raids, and those without proper documents or caught with contraband were arrested.
This is the story Bela told me: - Towards the end of April 1945, Bela and Mania were evacuated from the camp in Elsnik, Germany. Bela was sick with pleurisy. The cattle car they traveled in was bombed by Allied planes and Bela, sick with pleurisy, was in a car that caught fire. Through the torn out holes of the wagon, the girls pushed Bela out to be caught by her sister Mania. There was a forest nearby, but much too far for Bela to walk to. A German soldier carried her to the forest and left her there with the other girls. To shield Bela from the rain, the girls built a shelter from tree branches. They were liberated by the Russians and Bela was brought to a hospital in a P.O.W. camp.
After several weeks, Bela recuperated enough so that she could travel, because the Russians demanded that all refugees return to their homeland. After a difficult journey they arrived in Radom. In Radom, they discovered the house they had lived in was occupied by a Polish family, they didn't know where to turn. They were under the impression that with the liberation from the camps, the suffering would cease, but they found that suffering had no limits. They did not find any living members of their family, and resigned themselves to the fact that they did not belong to this world.
The following morning they met a friend Hershel Liverant, who was a member of Hashomer Hatzair, the same Zionist organization Bela and Mania belonged to, and he provided them with a leaky attic as a shelter.
When Bela had to go out to buy food, she wore a cross on a chain for fear that she be recognized as a Jew. At that time a young married Jewish couple were knifed in their home.
One of the people I showed Bela's picture to in Feldafing recognized Bela in Radom. He told her that I was alive and in Germany. Bela found out that there was a group of Jewish boys who planned to smuggle themselves into Germany in search of their family. Bela, along with her sister joined the boys' group and smuggled themselves through the Czechoslovakian border, and later the German border. Arriving by train in Munich they met another friend "Pontchek" (that was his nickname) who advised them that I had moved from Feldafing to Mittenwald.
They arrived in Mittenwald without proper documentation, on a day when the U.S. soldiers conducted a raid, and arrested them.
In the meantime, Muniu was smuggling cigarettes into Italy, where he met his girlfriend Bela, who was already engaged to Henry Rosenbaum. He also met my two brothers in the same kibbutz, and had told them that Bela and her sister were in Mittenwald, and that I planned to marry Bela in the near future. Together with Muniu they returned to Mittenwald to attend our wedding: it was the first Jewish wedding in Mittenwald after the end of the Second World War.
In the meantime, I became the secretary of the Jewish community, and the liaison between the city council and the Jewish community. Working very closely with the Burgermeister, we established a very good personal relationship. Thanks to him we obtained all the food we needed for the wedding which took place in the Hotel Traube, January 29th 1946.
The orchestra that played at our wedding was under the direction of a Kapelmeister who played with the Berlin Symphony Orchestra. He played Mendelsohn's Wedding March for us, which was a first, since it was forbidden to play music by Jewish composers during the Nazi era.
The invited guests at our wedding were all survivors from the camps and none could afford to pay for a hotel, so on our wedding night, Bela with five other girls slept in the only bed we had and I, with five boys, slept on the floor. This was our honeymoon! Nevertheless we had fun.
Many young Jewish survivors wanted to get married but according to existing German law, those below the age of 18 or 20 had to obtain permission from a parent. None of these young people's parents were alive, so I being the secretary from the Mittenwald Jewish community, was appointed by the court to authorize marriages.
My blessing (signed authorization) was given to several marriages and as children were born, I became a grandfather - before I became a father.
One day the captain approached me, with the request that I accept the responsibility of screening the Ukrainian refugees who applied for D.P. (displaced person) status. Many, if not all of the Ukrainian refugees, had cooperated with the Germans and actively participated in killing Jews.
After a week of accepting this responsibility, many were refused D.P. status because they could not hoodwink me. The next morning, I found a letter on my desk threatening that if I did not leave this job voluntarily, they would complete the task that the Germans had failed to do. In other words kill me. I gave this letter to the captain with my resignation. The reason behind my decision was simple; having survived this long and tragic war, I was not prepared at this time to lose my life.
I was transferred to take over the management of a "Children Nutritional Center" instead. I worked in this position until we left for Canada in November 1948.