The Final Solution
In September 1939, as a 12-year-old, Esther watched German soldiers arrive in her village of Mniszek, strategically located along the east bank of the Vistula River. For the next 3 years, German troops used Jewish slave laborers from Mniszek and the nearby city of Rachów to build roads and bridges for their Eastern campaign. Once the Nazis moved to implement the "Final Solution", however, the Jews of Rachów and Mniszek—those who had not already been murdered—were instructed to leave their homes and report to the train station in Kraśnik, about 20 miles away. No one knew where they were going. Many thought they were going to be taken to a ghetto somewhere. Others whispered darkly of death camps.
Esther was by then 15, the second in a family of 5 children and the oldest girl. Her family had managed to struggle through the German occupation, watching their already-meager livelihood dwindle to nearly nothing. Her father, a horse trader, could no longer travel. Soldiers had taken the last of her mother's geese just as her eggs were about to hatch. The night before their departure, as her family assembled what few belongings remained to them, Esther decided she would not go with them. She turned to her mother for help, insisting that one of the Polish farmers among her father's friends would take her in and give her work. Although at first reluctant to let her go, Esther's mother agreed to give her some provisions and destinations.
As the family said their goodbyes to her, Esther realized she could not carry out her plan by herself and insisted that her 13-year-old sister, Mania, go with her. Mania was reluctant, wanting only to stay with the rest of the family, but Esther was emphatic. On October 15, 1942, her father, Hersh; her mother, Rachel; her older brother, Ruven; and her little sisters, Chana and Leah, set off on the road to Kraśnik. It was the last time Esther saw her family.
Read more about this topic: Esther Nisenthal Krinitz
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