Marianne Strauss - Life in Upheaval

Life in Upheaval

When the Nazis started deporting Jews, Marianne’s family was able to gain exemption from this, because they were respected in the Jewish community and were asked to inform other families of deportation. This did not mean they wanted to support the Nazis though, and the family members were extremely lucky to avoid deportation. While this was occurring, the Strauss family was attempting to immigrate to Sweden, America or a South American country. Unfortunately, all their attempts to do this failed. The Nazi authorities wouldn't allow them to leave even with modified papers, and the countries to which they wanted to flee also didn’t cooperate.

During this period of uncertainty, Marianne spent her time helping the Jewish community around her. She sent many packages of food off to people she knew in the Jewish Ghettos, and she helped people cope with what was going on around them. It was at this time, that she discovered a left wing organization of German and Jewish people called, "the Bund". The Bund was basically a group of people who were against the Nazis, but their aim was not to protest but rather to secretly help people get out of the country and use each other for moral support. It was really more of a large group of friends than an organization, but it was still effective at what it strove to do. Little did Marianne know, the bund would be the main reason she survived the Holocaust.

Soon, the Strauss’ were probably the only Jewish family in the region who had not been deported. One morning in August 1943, just two days before the family was set to immigrate to Sweden, Gestapo and SS officers appeared at their door. They said that the family had two hours to prepare their luggage for the next transport to the East.

At this time, Marianne was faced with a difficult decision, should she run, and risk an almost certain death or should she cooperate and hope for survival? Here is an excerpt from her account:

“The Gestapo officials did not let us out of their sight. The allotted two hours were filled with feverish packing of the few things that we were able to take with us–clothing which, in the unknown destination of a ‘work camp’, should be practical warm and with luck keep us alive. Then came my moment. The two officials disappeared into the basement, probably to find some loot. Unable to say goodbye to my parents, brother and my relatives, I followed the impulse of the moment, ran out of the house just as I was, with some hundred-mark notes which my father had stuffed into my pocket just a few moments before. I ran for my life, expecting a pistol shot behind me any minute. To go in that way seemed to me a much better fate than the unimaginable one that might await me in Auschwitz or Łódź, in Treblinka or Izbica. But there was no shot, no one running after me, no shouting!”

Marianne ran to the Bund, and immediately bleached and cut her hair, changing her appearance completely. The Bund decided that she could stay with various members, all around the country. Here is another excerpt from her account:

“It was decided that I should never stay for more than three weeks with any one person. We had to prevent the relatives or neighbours from getting suspicious. In any case, I had no food coupons, so my friends (from the bund), carried the great burden of having to feed me from their rations. But I had some money and access to suitcases containing clothes and linen that my parents had hidden some weeks before their deportation, so I was able to barter their contents with farmers in the country in exchange for food or clothing coupons. This was an essential but very dangerous operation.”