Summary

Mathilda Stroli (née Mandel), my grandmother, was interviewed by the USC Shoah Foundation on April 18, 1999, in Toronto, Canada, regarding her experiences as a Holocaust survivor. Born in Cluj, Romania, on January 22, 1922, Stroli grew up in a very close, strictly Orthodox family; her father, Adolf Mandel, was a serious man and bookkeeper, and she was the oldest of seven children. The family’s life changed drastically with the Hungarian occupation (1940-1944), leading to the family being moved to the Cluj ghetto in 1944. She was deported to Auschwitz, where she was separated from her parents and younger siblings, all of whom were killed. Stroli survived three months in Auschwitz before being transported to the Zolz Vader/Salzfeld working camp. She was liberated by the American Army on April 14, 1945. Following liberation, she traveled to Budapest, reunited with her brother, and later married Valentin Stroli in April 1946. The couple eventually moved to Israel (where their daughter was born) and then settled in Canada, where Stroli raised five children. Her reflections center on the importance of family, maintaining her religious heritage, and the hope that her descendants never have to endure similar suffering. 

Video link: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPePMyqynXejP5ac2h-JzAqpmZLh6cRG5

Interview Introduction and Biographical Details

A: Foreign date is April the 18th, 1999. My name is Linda Davidson, D-A-V-I-D-S-O-N. We are interviewing the survivor Matilda Stroli, née Mandel, M-A-T-H-I-L-D-A S-T-R-O-L-I, name at birth M-A-N-D-L. The interview is being conducted in English in Toronto, Canada.

A: Today’s date is April the 18th, 1999. My name is Linda Davidson and I’m interviewing the survivor Matilda Stroli, née Mandel, M-A-T-H-I-L-D-A S-T-R-O-L-I, born M-A-N-D-L. The interview is being conducted in English in Toronto, Canada.

Q: Mrs. Stroli, first of all I want to thank you very much for coming to give this interview today. Could you please give us your full name and spell it for us?

A: My name is Matilda Stroli, M-A-T-H-I-L-D-A S-T-R-O-L-I, M-A-N-D-L.

Q: Is there any other name that people use when they talk with you?

Personal Details and Birthplace

A: January 22, 1922.

Q: So how old are you today?

A: I’m 72 years old, I think so.

Q: And where were you born?

A: Mati.

Q: And what is your date of birth?

A: I was born in Cluj, then Romania. And what country is that? Romania then, Romania, and now it’s also Romania.

Pre-War Family History

Q: Tell me, I want to know a little bit about your family before the war. Your mother’s parents, where were they from?

A: My mother’s parents were also from Cluj, Romania. It was at that time on the Hungarian side sometimes, and sometimes it was on the Romanian side. My mother was born, I think it was in 1899. My father was born in 1893 in Sibiu, Hermanstadt, Romania.

Q: About your mother’s parents, do you remember their names?

Maternal Grandparents (The Frieds)

A: Yes, my mother’s parents were Isaac Fried and Tila Fried. They were from the city where I was born.

Q: Have you any idea how many years the family had lived in Cluj?

A: I don’t have any idea because I know my mother was born there and my grandparents lived there, so I have no idea.

Q: Would you know if your grandfather served in the army at all? Your mother’s father?

A: I don’t know. I don’t remember. I know that he was a businessman, textile. When I already grew up, my father was in the business and my uncle. They were two people. The two daughters, they had two daughters and a son. The son was a doctor. His name was Dr. Emmanuel Fried.

Q: And your mother’s name?

A: Margareta Fried. And her sister’s name was Bella. Bella was the oldest and there was Emmanuel and then my mother Margareta.

Q: Were they a close family?

A: Yes, they were a very close family. From my aunt’s family there’s just one man left, a cousin who lives in Israel, and his name is Yangu Lazar.

Q: What do you remember about your mother’s parents?

A: They were very strictly Orthodox, maybe Hasidic, I don’t remember exactly. He was a very smart man. My uncle wanted to be a doctor, he was a doctor. My grandfather asked him to go into business because he wanted to help people. When I remember him in Cluj, he was a very strictly Orthodox man. He took out the doctor’s bag with him, went to visit the patients, and then went to the drugstore and himself ordered the medication. He took her because he wasn’t arriving on Shabbos.

Q: What language did they speak with one another in the family?

Q: Now, your father’s parents?

Paternal Grandparents (The Mandls)

A: My father’s parents lived in Sibiu, Hermanstadt, Romania. They had a business, transporting grain in big wagons. My father had nine children. His parents’ names were Marcus Mandel and Rahel Mandel.

Q: What kind of people were your father’s parents?

A: They were Orthodox. They brought up the children very strictly Orthodox. Some people were still alive because Romania didn’t deport the Jews, and they were in some camp or something but they weren’t killed.

Q: You mentioned that your father’s family were Hasidic. Did they belong to any particular rabbi or sect?

A: My father followed Satmar and Sighet, Satmar and Sighet. But we lived in Cluj and there was the Cluj rabbi, the closest one too.

Q: What was your father’s name?

Q: You mentioned that he worked for your mother’s family.

A: Yes, he worked for himself, but when my grandfather retired then the two son-in-laws got in.

Q: Did your father ever serve in the military?

A: No, my father had a bad foot. It was a little bit bigger. He bought a special shoe.

Q: Did any of his brothers serve in the army?

A: I don’t remember them as soldiers.

Q: What language did your father’s family speak with one another?

A: German and Yiddish, because it was a German city. I myself went to the German school because my father wanted me to be intelligent.

Parents’ Story and Courtship

Q: How did your parents meet?

Courtship and Engagement

A: This is an interesting story. My mother was living in Cluj. In this time it was old-fashioned to go and see the girl. So he went to see my mother. He went through a garden there where they lived. My mother had beautiful long hair and he said, “Oh, that’s beautiful hair.” Then he remembered that she was going to cut her hair, so it’s not interesting, but still it interested him. So he went in and they talked. At this time my father was a smoker and he made his own cigarettes. Then my uncle, who was a doctor, came in and found him very childish. He was older than my mother but he looked maybe childish. He said, “You know my child, you better go back to your mother’s to get some more modern milk.” Everybody was upset. A couple of years later my father went on a train and he met another young man and they started to talk. He said he’s going to see this girl. My father remembered how nice she was. It doesn’t matter what the brother said, she was a nice girl. Then he came again to my mother and then they got engaged.

Q: Where were they married?

A: They were married in Cluj. My father was what in Hungarian is called like that, because of exactly that. It means that is a school where you learn your Jewish, you learn Hungarian, Romanian, I don’t know, German. And then he finished like a rabbi but he wasn’t a rabbi. He finished his learning so high. For many years I kept the piece of paper that was written on it that my mother Margaret Fried and Adolf Mandel got engaged. Then they took me to Auschwitz. We had to leave everything behind. I wasn’t sorry for the pictures but I was sorry for this piece of paper because I was holding my father in very high opinion.

Q: Was your father active in the community?

Father’s Community Role and Work

A: I think he was in the Cluj rabbi’s soul or something. I know he collected money for the Talmud Torah because people weren’t too well off. They had to pay for the rabbis who taught in the heder. He went around with two pushkas. He was a very serious man, my father.

Q: Your family, what was their financial situation like?

A: My father was a bookkeeper in the business. I think he had the accountancy and I had my uncle who was serving the customers. It was a textile business. Later when I was bigger my father took me in. I should help him. They taught me how to cut a piece of material.

Q: Do you know what kind of education your mother had?

A: Yes, my mother had finished high school in a Catholic school because in this time there was no Jewish school. My grandfather wanted his daughter to have a high school diploma. Because she was religious she couldn’t go to university.

Q: Who were you closer to, your mother or your father?

Personal Relationships and Family Closeness

A: To my father, because I was the oldest at home. My father Friday night after the meal used to go in the street walking. My mother was tired, she laid down. I held my father’s arm. We went walking in the street and he was telling me stories and I told him stories. We were very close. Later when we got older my mother also said, “You’re gonna know who I am then I’m not going to be here.” I had no idea what she said because I was a child.

Siblings, Education, and Community Life in Cluj

Q: How many brothers and sisters did you have?

Siblings and Childhood Roles

A: I have two brothers. We had seven children. I was the oldest. The youngest son, six or seven.

Q: Tell me more about your schooling?

Secular and Religious Education

A: I went to German school. There were seven classes. I wanted to go to high school but because it was German school I had to go shopping too. We had a maid in the house. She brought my books and they allowed me not to write on Shabbos. Then I went throughout the school from eight o’clock to one o’clock and then I went home. Everybody was already eaten and I had to eat with my sister alone.

Q: What kind of schooling did your brothers have?

A: My brother went to a heder and then to yeshiva. It’s called the Tashnad yeshiva. Later when it was Hungary there they went to a yeshiva in Hungary. Till the deportation came along and he was taken into the working army.

Q: What were your favorite subjects at school?

A: I was good in mathematics and I liked history too. But in this time because it was a German school I didn’t learn about the Jewish people. Every Sunday we went to Hebrew classes.

A: When I was a little girl around five they put the boys in a heder. Because I was a girl it was the kindergarten for girls. They put me also in the heder. We had a man who would have a taxi in Toronto and his grandfather was my rebbe. His name was Samuel. I still remember him. Sometimes we talked with this driver when he takes her someplace about his grandfather and he’s very happy to hear about him.

Q: As children growing up in Cluj, what kind of games did you play when you had free time?

Childhood Activities and Relationships

A: We played dominoes and we played Ring Around the Rosie. I don’t remember so much.

Q: Which of your brothers and sisters were you closest to?

A: We were seven children. I was the first. My brother in New York was the second. The third was my sister Pearl. There was after this my brother in Toronto and then Vicky, my sister, and after this was Moishe.

A: I was very close to my sister because when my mother had the children the girls had to look after the younger ones. I was looking after them and my sister Pearl was looking after the younger ones. Because I went to a German school I tried to teach her German.

Q: Do you remember the address where you lived?

Community and Neighborhood

A: Yes, that is David Street 7, Cluj, Romania.

Q: Was this a Jewish area?

A: No, it wasn’t exactly a Jewish area. A lot of Jews were living there but it wasn’t exactly Jewish. My next door neighbor was a gentile and after this was a Jew and opposite us some Jews and some gentiles. Some religious and they’re not religious.

Q: Did you play with the non-Jewish children?

A: I don’t remember because I had sisters and brothers. I had a friend who was with me in German school but she lived far away and we got together in school.

A: I don’t remember because I had sisters and brothers. I had a friend who was with me in German school but she lived far away and we got together in school.

Early Anti-Semitism

A: I remember I was in school in the same schoolyard. There was a boy and he threw out some pieces from the fur. Because I was another Jewish in this class. Most of them were Germans and some Hungarians too. My friend went home one day and one boy put a piece of fur on her back. It looked like she had something hanging. She had no idea. She went home and then her parents told her. She came next day to school, she cried very much. This boy who did it to her was the principal’s son. The father who was the principal for the school before us hit his son so hard that he should never do this again. During the war I heard later he was a big fascist because he started already when he was a young boy.

Q: Apart from that, did you hear any anti-Jewish comments?

A: Yes, during the war it was Romania. They wanted money. He was a big fascist, you know, and he was against the Jews. Then a neighbor came one time and made like that to my father on his face. My father was very upset but he could not do anything.

The Family Home and Mother’s Role

A: Yes. It was a house. My grandfather from Cluj bought it for his two daughters. It was like an inside yard and on all sides was living my aunt and uncle and the children and the other side we were living there.

Q: How many rooms did your home have?

A: It had a living room and dining room and kitchen and one bedroom. But in this we had another bedroom for my parents. Obviously I, because I was the oldest slept in the dining room and the other children lived in the living room. They had such beds that you throw to put to the wall. It had an inner yard.

Q: Are there any strong memories of your mother that you can tell us about from your childhood?

A: She was a wonderful mother. She looked after us. She was never in business but she was a wonderful mother and I think she was a wonderful wife for my father.

Home Life: Shabbat and Holidays

Q: What was Shabbat like in your home?

The Shabbat Experience

A: Shabbat was a beautiful experience. Friday night it starts before the cooking and everything. My mother taught me to cook when I was still very young. Then Friday night the table was set beautiful with colors and the candles. My mother lit the candles and then we go and kiss her hands to have respect for the mother. Then my father came home from shul with the boys. Then they sing. By asking how it wasn’t allowed the girls should sing by the table, just the boys. Later when I was married I myself sang because I like to sing. But my father was against it. He didn’t believe the girls should mix with the boys. We were very, very religious.

Q: What kind of food would your mother serve on a Friday night?

Shabbat Meals

A: Friday night was fish and chicken soup and chicken and fruit and cakes. At lunchtime we had almost the same thing. We had fish, we had chulent. Chulent is beans with barley. Some people put in potatoes too but we had it without potatoes. This was hot on the oven. They should have something warm on Shabbos. After this we had again a cake and fruit.

Q: Which was your favorite holiday?

Pre-War Dreams and Changing Relations

Reflections on Holidays

A: Matilda Strolley (née Mandel)

A: We were talking at the end of the last tape about which were your favorite holidays. Yes, and you said that I’m going to tell you why it was my favorite holiday. Because of what happened today, it only hurt me very much that my father, a Chassid, always went to his parents for Simchat Torah and Shavuot. Because we were seven children, it was very hard for my mother to go with all seven children. Sometimes my father took my brother who lives in Toronto with him because he was a small boy and his ticket on the train was a half ticket — it was cheaper. But it hurt me very much why my father left my mother alone with us for this nice holiday.

Religious Life and Community Leaders

A: My father said, “As long as my parents are alive, I always go to them.” Later when they were killed by the fascists — this I’m going to tell later — then he wanted very much to go to the theater for the same reason. So he wasn’t home because he was a very religious man and he wanted to go. My mother understood him. I didn’t like it so much, but she understood that this was important.

Q: Did your father seek advice from the rabbi from time to time?

A: Could be. I don’t remember this.

Q: Do you remember whether the rabbi came to your home ever?

A: Yes. When I was, I don’t know, eight years old, nine years old. You know, in our place in the house something happened — something got broken in the hall and it fell into the basement. After this my father invited the rabbi to come to our home after they fixed it. He came to the house and my husband said that he remembered — he was a young boy then — he was learning in cheder and he wasn’t in our house. But my father’s son was very happy that the rabbi came to our house to eat a meal. Lots of people came with him because when the rabbi comes, lots of people come with him to give him honors. So that’s the way I know that he was close to the rabbi.

Q: What kind of books did your family have at home?

Q: Did your family read newspapers?

Q: Did you have any training in bookkeeping?

Q: I know you were a young girl at the time in Cluj, but we’d like to learn a little bit about the community. What kind of Jewish community was it?

Q: Were there Jewish schools in Cluj?

The Cluj Jewish Community

A: It was in Hungarian. I don’t remember exactly. It was the same school where I learned every Sunday, and my best friend who is in New York — she’s alive — she went to school there. I went to Hebrew classes with her. Her name is Wild Friedman.

A: We still keep in touch. Her husband died recently, but she has three nice children: one girl who was born not completely normal — cerebral palsy — and two boys who are very wealthy men now. The girl married; I was at the wedding because she was very smart. She finished university and she has two children now.

Q: Was that the only Jewish school in Cluj?

Q: Do you know how large the Jewish community was in Cluj?

Q: How about institutions — Jewish court, Jewish police?

A: I don’t remember because these things always the men spoke about. We never spoke about them.

Q: Was your mother active in the community, with women’s organizations?

Q: From what you were telling me, you were leading a very happy Jewish life.

A: Yes, it was a very nice life.

Q: What were your dreams towards the future as a young teenager?

Personal Ambitions and Changing Tensions

A: I wanted to learn, to be somebody. I didn’t give up, but I couldn’t do it because I wouldn’t do anything against my father’s will. I respected my father and my mother. It was different times like today — the times are changing. So my dream as a young woman was to be somebody. I felt myself intelligent enough to speak to anybody and I had nice friends. But it was different times. You did nothing against your parents. Some girls did, but they got called bad girls.

Q: From what you knew, relations between the Jewish community and the non-Jewish community — what were they like?

Q: So that was when there was some change towards the Jews, when the Hungarians came?

The Hungarian Occupation (1940-1944)

A: Yes. The Hungarian Hungarians came in. With my girlfriends (I had two girlfriends, even the lawyer’s daughters), we saw the Hungarians come in with a white horse in the front. We talked with my friends about that: “Then it’s gonna come the time that the Jewish people are gonna come with five horses to liberate us.” That’s what we talked about. That was in 1940, I think spring. In ’44 we were deported. The Hungarian Hungarians came in — they were puppets to the Germans.

Q: Did your family discuss this?

Q: During Easter and Passover all the time?

Q: How did that affect your father’s family?

Q: What happened to your father’s store when the Hungarians came?

Q: How did the family survive when the store was closed down? How did your father make a living?

Q: Did your family remain in the home when the Hungarians were in Cluj?

Q: What was life for the family like under the Hungarians?

Impending Separation and Ghetto Announcement

A: Later when I had my son there was a Jewish nurse with me. She told me she was there with my grandmother when she died. There was another Jewish old lady who made the taharah. She didn’t remember where she was buried but she was there when she died. My grandmother said, “Don’t leave me here. Don’t take me here. I’m never going to see you again.” I said, “Bobby, I’m going to come back.” She said, “I feel you’re not going to come back.” That was the reason she said goodbye to me.

Q: Was there a change among the non-Jewish people towards the Jews?

Q: When did you first hear about the ghetto?

The Ghetto Experience

Entry and Initial Conditions

A: Two days before. They wrote it in the paper and they said on the radio that we had to go away because they take us to work. The factory where we were taken was a block factory. It was nothing — just blocks on the floor. So everybody brought things with linen. We put under that so it should feel like a separate place. My mother was doing lots of beans because you couldn’t take nothing much. Every day we had shown that was the beans — you put in water, the next day you cook it. That’s what we ate all the time for three weeks.

Q: Who was with you the day you were taken to the ghetto?

Q: Did you know before you went into the ghetto whether there were any organizations who tried to rescue the Jews?

Failed Rescue Efforts (Kastner)

A: This Mr. Kastner — he was working with the Germans together. He wanted to take some Jews who paid money to take them out to Switzerland. So he felt himself he’s somebody. He appointed himself because he went to talk with the Germans. After the liberation he was in our city and I told my husband I’m going to go to the police. My husband didn’t let me. He said they’re going to find out who he was. He got married. That’s the way in Israel he lived later. But I wanted to say when we arrived in the ghetto they took all the young girls to the babies’ father specialist place because lots of people had babies and they had to look after the babies. So they took the young girls to diaper them, to feed them. I was among them. A couple weeks after, my shift was finished at seven o’clock and I wanted to go back where my parents are. I tried to go in and I couldn’t go in because everything was closed. I was really scared. Everybody said you stay here with us, nothing gonna happen to you. I said are you kidding? I got my parents, my sisters and brother to be there alone. So I went around and found a place where I could enter. When I arrived my father and my mother kissed me and hugged me and they said they were afraid they lost me forever. So we wanted to be with them no matter what happens.

Q: Where did you stay? Tell me about the ghetto.

Work and Family Reunion

Attempted Escape and Consequences

A: There were lots of people. I don’t remember how many. My uncle the doctor came to take out his family from the ghetto. That was a big thing. Nobody could take out because he had an officer in the Hungarian Army and he was a doctor. He took them out. On the way they came into things. They said it’s all right, we did his Jewish and he has his family. He said, “What? You took out your family from the ghetto?” They took the paper and cut it in pieces. Later we heard that my uncle was there like a cleaner from the toilet. He looked for his wife and children. His wife and daughter were alive. He and his son were in charge of the deportation — the Hungarians cooperated with the Germans.

Holocaust Awareness and Deportation

Q: I wanted to just go back a little bit in time and ask you if you had heard of Hitler and the Nazi party before the Hungarians occupied Cluj.

Growing Awareness of Nazi Threat

A: You see, my father took me and my sister from the German school and put us in the Jewish school because when Hitler got into power, then every Jew felt that we have nothing to do with the Germans. We don’t know anything about the Hitler party or whatever, but the man, they were against the Jews. So all the school, all of us and my friends got out from school and we finished the school. Hitler was already in power when we finished, but it was important for my father that I had my degree. My sister and my younger sisters went to the Jewish school. It was still a Jewish school, but we had no idea about Hitler and what was going on.

Auschwitz: Early Knowledge and Loss

A: During the war we already knew in Auschwitz what was going on because we saw Himmler by the door there. In Auschwitz was my aunt, who was my father’s youngest sister. She had a son and my great-aunt took the son with her. She was a beautiful woman. This was the woman who helped my uncle to go to Vienna. Her name was Esther Mandel. She wanted to leave because she had already lost a child and this child was her life. She didn’t like her husband, but this time you listen to your father. They took her away and she wanted to go with them. Himmler threw her back three times because she was a beautiful young woman. So she was in Auschwitz not far away from us. We were in 16, 18 and they were in 16.

A: How do I know about that? I had a sister-in-law who is not alive anymore and she told me after four years when she married my brother-in-law that she was there when my aunt got killed. She killed herself. I had no idea. The minute she heard an anti-Jewish woman told her they went in the door and went out by the chimney, she believed it because she never saw her son and her aunt again. So she didn’t feel her life was worth anything anymore. She threw herself onto the electric guard.

A: We were standing in what we called a Sa Appel. You know what a Sa Appel is? People have to stay outside for hours to count and count. Then we heard, we saw a flame someplace and somebody cried, and then we heard everybody stay still. That was my aunt.

Q: We’re going to come back to your experiences in Auschwitz. I just want to go back and ask about Hitler. When Germany declared war against Poland, did you know what was happening in Poland against the Jews?

Disbelief and Resistance in the Ghetto

A: One thing, there were some young people going over to Hungary and they went to shul and they said they had no place to eat and nowhere to stay because it was Shabbos. So we had somebody by us for Shabbos and some people put them up. They were running away from the Germans, so they told us. But we said to ourselves, the Jews must have done something. I mean, you don’t take those people and kill them. We didn’t believe such a thing could happen. But when we were in Auschwitz we already knew what happened.

Q: In the ghetto, were you aware of any resistance among the Jews? People trying to escape?

A: Yes, young people tried to escape and they caught them and brought them back. Nobody could escape from there. There was a young man with a girl. I remember they ran away and they caught them. One of the boys was called Koppel. I don’t remember the girl’s name. They didn’t come back from the concentration camp.

Q: When you were in the ghetto, was it possible to observe Shabbat?

Final Days in the Ghetto

A: No. We had to go out. In the ghetto nothing happened. They let you be there till they took us away. Some people when they came together they prayed together. That’s what I think. I’m not sure exactly. When you were a young girl you didn’t think about those things.

Q: What were people talking about at nighttime in the ghetto? Do you remember?

A: My father was a man who didn’t speak too much. He spoke but his family was the most important thing. He said God is going to help us and everything is going to be okay. We thought we were going to work. We saw how they treated us before they took us away. We had to stay in line and the Germans were there. Some people were hit with bayonets. They threw some people on the floor. We saw already how they treated us. Then we had to walk to the railway because the wagons were waiting.

The Deportation Train

A: My mother’s sister and her husband and the children went earlier because my father couldn’t walk so fast because of his bad leg. So we were separated. I remember we were 80 people in a wagon. When we were in the wagon we already knew what was going to happen to us, the same thing like for the Polish Jewish people.

Journey and Arrival at Auschwitz

Journey by Rail

A: We arrived in a Polish place. I don’t remember the name. It was a big city. The German stopped there and a couple of German soldiers walked up and down. From far away I saw a peasant woman, a very heavy woman. When the Germans went away she ran to me. I threw out my mother’s fur coat and she took it and ran away. The whole wagon told me they are going to kill us all. They saw us. I said it couldn’t be.

A: There was a woman who nursed her baby. She didn’t have anything to nurse anymore and the child was crying. I couldn’t look at it anymore. Later the woman came back and threw in a big half of fresh bread. The minute the bread was in, the whole wagon said we are going to put it between us. Everybody is going to have a piece. I said no, my father is going to give for everybody. He said he’s not going to eat, just the young people. I said no, I got it and everybody is going to have a small piece. We had sugar cubes in our pockets because my mother put them for everybody. We ate the sugar cubes first because the bread we were going to eat later.

Arrival and Initial Selection

A: When we arrived to Auschwitz we saw holes and everything. It looked like a settlement. Some people came on the wagon. They were in striped clothes. One said to me and another young man, “You two are going to be alive after this.” I said, “Are you crazy?” He said, “You’re coming to work here. You’re not going to work here with black coffee. Nobody is going to be alive but you’re young and he’s young.”

A: I tried to remember how I saw my father the last time. They took us separately. My mother with my little sister and brother, and I was with my two sisters Pearl and Vicki. We had no idea, but in the ghetto they did the same thing so we thought we would see each other again.

A: We were put five in a row. There was a girl between them who was my sister’s friend. She was very sick. I told her whatever is going to happen to us is going to happen to you. You’re going to be with us.

Processing and Humiliation

A: Then they took us and cut our hair. They sprayed us all naked. The men and women who did this to us. We were shivering. They said later you’re going to get clothes. We looked at each other. They couldn’t believe it was happening to us.

Q: Do you remember any German prominent people at the selection?

A: Not when we came in, but later I was taken to a working camp.

A: I didn’t believe that they killed my mother. In the ghetto I was standing in the row. A group of mothers with children went through and I heard my mother say “Matilda.” It was my mother with my sister and brother. She recognized us even with our hair cut. A mother recognizes her children.

A: Later when I heard what happened to my mother and the children and my father, I told myself in my mother’s mind she saw us there.

Q: How did you learn of what happened to your mother and the younger children and your father?

Confirming Family Fate

A: We had a woman in the block. She was Jewish but born in Slovakia. She told us one time, “You go in by the door and go out by the chimney.” That was it. We heard about the crematorium but we didn’t believe it. My aunt believed it and that’s why she killed herself.

Q: After the selection, where were you taken?

Barrack Life and Subsequent Selections

A: I had my sister Pearl. She was taller than I am but very thin. She got diarrhea and got very sick. They put her in the ambulance. Every morning I helped bring the coffee so I could run to her and give her a little to drink. She told me there is going to be a selection. Be careful you shouldn’t be taken because when you are taken we won’t have anybody here.

A: This time we were together with my cousins who were alive in Auschwitz. They selected and I was selected. They threw me into the door and locked it. My sister Vicki was crying bitterly.

A: Later they took us in the middle of the night. We were naked in an empty place. A woman came around. She was my father’s cousin’s wife. Her husband was a doctor. She brought me a coat and food.

A: I found my girlfriend who is now in New York. She was with her mother. I asked if I could stay with her but nobody wanted to leave their mother.

Q: Where were you taken in Auschwitz? 

A: I was in Barrack 16. My aunt was at 12.

A: I was in Auschwitz three months. They took us in wagons. Every wagon had 50 girls or women. There was a German soldier who told us we were going to a working camp and we shouldn’t worry. He spoke perfect German.

A: A day in Auschwitz: They woke us up at 5 or 6 in the morning. We got a little black coffee. Everybody had one plate. At lunchtime you got a piece of bread. We put away the piece of bread because maybe at night we would only have soup. That was all the food.

A: I wasn’t working. We sat in the barrack. We talked about food, what we used to eat, our parents, sisters and brothers. There was a girl who stood on the oven and sang beautiful songs. Her name was Blanche.

Q: How many people were in the barrack? 

A: Thousands. Most were Hungarian. We were from Romania but it was already Hungary.

A: There were guards outside with vicious dogs. Sometimes a woman officer with a big dog who was very vicious. She would pull out a woman and kill her.

A: There was no contact between men and women in Auschwitz.

A: When we arrived they said throw out everything because everything is going to be taken. Some people believed them.

A: When we arrived in Auschwitz the first day I had my period. I had nothing. The woman who was taking care of us told us they put something in the food to take away the period. I was upset but then I was optimistic. When I arrived in the working camp they gave us regular food and I got my period back the same day.

Q: Did you smell something in the air? 

A: I can’t remember because it was far away from us. We saw the fumes but had no idea.

A: My block leader was Slovak. She was Jewish but more anti-Jewish than anybody else.

Transcript (cleaned and formatted as paragraphs):

Life in Auschwitz and Transfer

A: Thank you. This is tape four with Matilda Strolli née Mandel.

Q: I wanted to ask you: when you arrived at Auschwitz during the selection process, were you tattooed with a number?

Auschwitz: Camp Procedures and Liberation Timeline

A: No, they took us out of Auschwitz and we were taken to an empty field because the place where they were going to take us was bombed, so they had to think of another place. Then we got to that place later, you know. That’s why I wasn’t given a number, but by number of us 1478 I think. For many years I kept this in mind. It was very important to me, but I hope it’s the right number.

Q: When you were at Auschwitz, were there any things that you witnessed that you would like to tell us about, apart from what you’ve already told us?

A: I tell you something that was the definition of the camp. They killed people, they thought, so they didn’t do it in front of us. They selected the people. We never knew when somebody was selected — whether you’re going to die or you’re going to go to work. Nobody knows that. That’s why most of the people didn’t want to go away from there until the last time. In January, Auschwitz was liberated by the Russians, but many people were already not alive then.

Q: What year are we talking about now?

A: 1945.

Q: While you were in Auschwitz, you had been a very religious girl before the war. Was it possible to observe any Jewish customs in Auschwitz?

Maintaining Faith and Observance

A: Nobody. Before we arrived, my father, God bless him, he was a very smart man. The first night he blessed us and told us, “Wherever you go, you can eat everything and you do whatever you have to do.” He was smarter. He said, “Take the children and run away where your eyes can see you. We don’t know what they’re going to wait for us, and you do everything that has to be done and you can eat everything.” That was important for him — that we shouldn’t die from hunger. It doesn’t matter, we’re going to be alive. In his mind he understood that young people may be going to be alive. He said, “Your mother and me, we lived already. You didn’t live nothing yet, so you take care of your sisters and brother.” That’s what he told me before we arrived to Auschwitz.

Q: In Auschwitz, did you know the calendar? When it was Shabbat or if it was a holiday, did you know any of that?

A: We knew it was Shabbat, but we could not do anything because we were sitting there doing nothing. After we were in the concentration camp, we had to work on Shabbat. We decided before we go home, when we’re going to be liberated, we’re going to keep Shabbat again.

A: There is a woman who was fasting. There is a woman who read the Megillah. She had it in her heart and half. She got it somehow. She must have been a very religious woman. Somebody must have thrown it in, you know. This is something bad happened there, but we never knew. When we were in the locker room, some people stole carrots in the garden because we brought them outside, and then they caught them, brought them back, cut their hair, and put them by the door so everybody could see.

A: The Polish people who were suffering for such a long time — when they caught the Germans after the liberation, they did the same thing with them: cut their hair and put them to stay there. They wanted to give something back. It didn’t help too much, you know.

Q: We’re going to get to the working camp in a while. Back in Auschwitz, did you have any contact with people who underwent any medical experiments? Did you know about it?

Witnessed Atrocities and Fellow Prisoners

A: After the war. My best friend, she has an ear to her twins. The twins always are healthy — one and one was sick. The sick girl they made healthy and the healthy girl got sick. They experimented on her. There was a movie that they made from them and she went, the mother, after she was liberated with her daughter. She went to see this movie 100 times to see their daughter, how she was treated. She told my girlfriend, told me, because I saw the other girl. I’ve never been to the twins. Small children. She lives in Israel and we met one time when we were in Israel.

Q: Did you have any contact with gypsies at Auschwitz? Were they in adjacent Auschwitz?

A: You know when they cut our hair, then there were lots of girls — meant to — and the girls told me she’s from Bristol, she’s from here, she’s from there, all from Europe. Intelligent girls who were university educated. They had to do this work. They should treat them like dogs, you know.

Q: When you were at Auschwitz, did you witness people trying to escape?

Daily Life and Camp Security

A: No, we never saw this. I tried to tell you about the woman who was in Auschwitz. My father’s cousin, a doctor, his wife. Her father — I don’t remember her maiden name. When she married, her name was as mother. She spoke to an officer because she was very highly intelligent. She spoke to a German officer and told him her father is a very wealthy man, and when they can run away to tourists, maybe he could take her. She was ready to go. Somehow somebody got a whim of this and the dog thrown after. They will kill them on the spot. That I know about her because her husband found out. Somebody we didn’t know about that. I also didn’t know. I know she helped me then because even you have somebody from family, you try to help whatever they could.

Q: While you were at Auschwitz, were you in Appell at all?

A: Yes, everybody had to go and stand up in the morning at six o’clock or five o’clock. They go and bring the coffee. Like I said, it was that coffee, and if you have a drink that was your breakfast. You have to go out, you have to stay in the line for hours. It was raining, it was snowing, it was windy. It was cold because Auschwitz is a very cold place. You have to stay. Some people couldn’t stay any longer, they sat down on the floor. So the Germans come and hit them. They even got sicker then. I don’t know what happened to them, but they got sick. Many people got sick.

Q: Who was in charge of the Appell? The Oberscharführer. Do you remember his name?

A: I think his name was Hans, but I don’t know the other name. He was a blonde tall man.

Encounters with Guards

A: I wanted to fast. Did I tell you the story? He said, “Better give a piece of bread.” The bread they could put away to eat later. So then there were five months of Jewish people who weren’t religious. They called for Maramureș. You heard that was, and they say we want to eat and we will work. So the next day I told the German woman I want to take the food to the working place. Then the German men saw me by the door because he was standing all of us by the door. He said, “Child, you’re working tonight. How come you here?” I said, “I want to take it.” And I told him before, “You should give a piece of bread. It’s less and the people can have more.” “Ah, you talk like that.” It took it there. The German woman, she was a little bit understanding for us. She was looking at the halflings, that’s what we call.

Zolz Vader/Salzfeld Working Camp

Arrival and Initial Work

A: When I arrived there and the people saw me, they know about me already. One girl who was a sickless girl come down and said she is hungry, she have to eat. The judgments of same people said, “No, no, they’re gonna eat. You’re gonna send back the food.” The food, he said, “What food? Didn’t they are hungry?” Said, “No, it’s a big holiday.” I told you so. He said, “What, you’re a priest? I’m going to give you a teller like I could and every Sunday you’re gonna pray with the people.” He forgot it later, but that’s what he told me.

The Machine Shop and Acts of Kindness

A: At night it was working night shift and everybody put away the bread on the day. I was an overseer. Every girl had to be by three machines making the holes. Something to make a hole in. 

Q: Where are we talking about now? Are you talking about the working camp?

A: This is working camp. The river is working. So the minute they arrived there the first time, they taught us what to do. They put in something like that and you put in a hole in, but everybody has to work on three machines. I understood that right of it. I never did it before because the German was a big anticipate, but he thought he said, “You’re going to be the people teach all of them how to do it and you won’t do it.” No, I did this always and it was teachable. I told the girls, “I gotta take over your machines. You go and eat, have something in your mouth,” because we wasn’t eating 24 hours, more than 24 hours. Then I eat my bread, but everybody I was helping.

Illness and Shifting Conditions

A: That happened to me one time. It was winter and I caught a cold and my ear was hurting, everything, high temperature. I told the German I can’t work because I can’t do nothing because I’m sick. He said, “You’re gonna stay there till you die.” So I have to stay there. Next day I went to the ambulance and I told him that I’m sick and he can’t do nothing. So I was staying inside the ambulance. I looked, I got somebody aspirin or something. After this they bumped some place and they took us from there to work in the clean up. There it was bombed. It was lucky because the place was bombed but nobody was killed because it was a time and nobody was working.

Final Days and Liberation (April 1945)

A: It was unbelievable. It was already a day, awful day. It was quiet and the journal said, “Come on, look, look, faster, faster, faster.” A German soldier come on the road and saw the German woman. “Are you a dog? Why do you think these people are dogs? The war is over.” He said, “Don’t have to push them anymore. You’re going to be in worse condition than they.” And he was a German soldier.

A: Then it was standing there on the road. It got quiet like your career here. I fly running around. We didn’t know that the city had many soldiers in the hospital and they backed them. The southern bomb displays because there are six soldiers in. So they didn’t want, but they close up the gas. The water couldn’t get nothing. We walked on the street and I couldn’t believe that’s at the end forever. It’s not they’re gonna kill us.

A: So we didn’t have water, we didn’t have food. So if that’s a German army man who was an old man and he was always good to us, he took us, a couple people, to the river and we took water from the river, we bring for other people, and he gave us potato chips. We didn’t know about potatoes, something like potato, dried potatoes. That’s what we had to eat till we were liberated. It was the 14th of April 1945.

Q: I wanted to ask you, what date if you can recall you were transported from Auschwitz to the working camp?

Transfer and Human Treatment

A: I think it was fall. I mean it’s a silver because over three months and in the last nine months. 

Q: What year were you taken to the working camp?

A: 1945.

Q: From Auschwitz to the working camp?

A: Yes, I think it was maybe still winter because they gave us a coat. In between the coats I recognized my sister’s coat, but I couldn’t put it on because she had the children’s coat, my younger sister Vicky.

Q: What was the name of the working camp?

A: Zolz Vader, I think. It took a couple days. There were German soldiers who were there. He was a very human being. He brought us water, but we didn’t have food. He couldn’t bring food, but water he brought. He told me what to do and what not to do. So I that’s why all right in this wagon. They promised they’re not going to say that I’m not perfect German, but when we arrived there they said they speak perfect German. They spoke English.

Q: What were your thoughts when you were taken to Salzburg? Where did you think you were going?

Living Conditions and Rations

A: Then I believed that we’re going to work because we were selected. We were treated more humanly than before. I was just thinking on my two sisters who were left behind.

A: When we arrived there, there was a general from Yashi. You heard about Yashi. He called me out and he was the first to give me a toothbrush and a small comb and a little soap. 

Q: He asked me, “Did I have a wish?” 

A: I said, “Yes, I have two sisters left in Auschwitz.” He never heard about Auschwitz. Somehow I think maybe he didn’t hurt. I also didn’t know. So that’s the way. I don’t brush my teeth and could come. Literally here what I had. Like I said, I was a good looking girl.

Q: What were the living conditions at Salzfeld like in the Lager?

A: There was like we had breakfast. We had a piece of bread with coffee, also not called real coffee. For supper we had also soup with potatoes, but two small potatoes swimming around, smaller bread. At night we had soup but it was more. Many people had. You also work in the kitchen and somehow they took them out some food that has left over. Every food in where they clean the potatoes, the cover, the potatoes has a shell or whatever you call it, that we eat it like sugar.

Q: Were they female and male in the kitchen?

A: Just female. In the camp, male and female. Later we heard that the girl who was head for the kitchen, she was from Slovakia or some place in Yugoslavia. She was a very good looking girl, tall. She had something with a German. Later heard that he never heard such a thing. So that’s why she was in the kitchen. She was always here for the kitchen. Some people told him that they steal food to give to other people.

Q: Where did you stay in Salzfeld?

A: We have also barracks, but we didn’t sleep 20-30 in one. On a proper planet everybody had their own bed and they have covers and they had a pillow. More human.

Q: While you were in Salzburg, did you know that the war was coming to an end? Did you hear about it?

Forbidden Contact and Compassion

A: No, no. But the war we didn’t know about. See, that’s Lager where we’ve been. I told you they put me on. I was working in a field and they are not far away where French Jewish soldiers. So the far away the boys started to come to see the girls. It can pass over. There were two young men who looked after me. After they were reason I tried to think Peter. I would like to think I want the tall one, not the little one. The short one was from Hungary and the third one was a French guy, 30 years old. I was young girl. They bring me a piece of two bolt X and two bold potatoes. I mean that was like you got here a million dollars in the lottery. But I could eat it alone. I had my father’s cousin’s sister who was there. I find her there and some other people. We went under the covers and everybody had a bite for everything.

A: The German woman who looked after us, when she was not an access, revolved by work. Her father, her grandfather, her father, her husband, her son were taken with force to the Army. She was a professor. She was so sorry for me because she didn’t believe me that it was taken because of her Jews. Because she couldn’t believe in her mind. So she started to bring me two pieces of small bread, very thin like needles, with margarine or something. I also couldn’t eat it alone. I get it with my cousin’s sister. My heart didn’t let me to eat it all. One time she bring me an apple. I mean I didn’t saw an apple for a year.

A: But she told me so. I thought, look this girl, this is 13 years old, and told this old woman, “Did they look like robbers and killers?” Then she started to believe me. Then she told me her story that her grandfather who was an old man and her husband was a professor too, was taken also to be in the Army and they had to do things. She was forced to work here.

Q: You told us a little while ago about the day you were liberated. What went through your mind when we were liberated?

A: That is took in my mind. I try to think how it was exactly. It was Shabbos, 14th of April 1945. All the judgments fled. 

Q: Who liberated you?

The Day of Liberation

A: The American Army. The ones who liberated us were Jewish soldiers, Jewish American soldiers. They come close to the camp and they were saying with a loudspeaker: “Jewish woman and Jewish girls, we are here to liberate you. We are also Jews. We know you were suffering. We’re gonna liberate you. We’re gonna go home to your families, whoever is left.”

A: I remember I went to the end from the camp. Standing there and I saw that soldiers come in. I couldn’t believe it — Jewish soldiers in the American Army. It wasn’t Russian. They come and they told us we should all go. They prepared a beautiful meal in a hotel or they don’t know that. I said I’m not gonna go. I’m not going no place. I stay here. I’m liberated but I’m staying here.

First Encounters and Departure

A: So the first day everybody bring me food because they liked me. They all went there. They said it’s so many good things and everything. So I meant I have entered to you. It was prepared cheese and salamis and this time we wasn’t interested. Instead of water I was drinking milk. It was lots of milk, natural. I never forget it.

A: When I liberated, the two friends come to the door from the camp and they’re standing there. They know about each other. So what should I do? With whom I should go? I go to the tall one. He’s older but he’s so. I went to the tall one and he hold me and he kissed me. He said, “You kiss like you never kissed anybody.” I said, “No, I never kissed anybody in my life. I’m religious.” “What you mean religious?” The Jews. No, average. He was a free Jew. A lot. He was taken in the Army because in the French in the beginning, but Jewish soldiers there too.

A: The soldiers are going to tell you also they in the war in Japan was still on. They wanted to take the soldiers to Japan to be in the war there. Now that he wanted to go. Everybody had already a girl. So they put in middle of the night in the wagons and an open car opens. We know that we cut for example is flowers, so we throw them flowers so you don’t know which one of us which. You couldn’t tell from far away. But they didn’t let us out because they don’t want that somebody should cry or do something. Later we heard it was in Japan they’re taking. I never know that he’s alive or not. His name was Alex Prince, from Paris.

Q: Where did you go after liberation?

Immediate Post-Liberation Events

A: After liberation we were taken to a hotel like the Germans used to have it with foreign, but I don’t remember exactly. Then they took them away. Then we was free. We went out. It was the sun was shining and I almost made me a short and I sitting in the sun reading a book. I don’t know which kind of book.

A: Then some two girls come to me and one said that I’m very sick. I have to go to the hospital but my cousins, he had two cousins that my cousin don’t take care of me. So I thought somebody want to take care of my sisters. That’s what I thought. I’m gonna help her. So I went to the French, particularly, and I told him this girl is very sick, has high temperature, she’s typhus or something. She got me a truck and a truck driver, a big black fellow. He gonna take us to the hospital. He called the hospital, told them this would be a bed for this girl.

A: Then we went. I wasn’t thinking that this is a black man in heaven in my life. I saw a black man before. When they took her to the hospital they said it’s no bed. I said no bad, it does not wrote a German and they’re gone. She’s going to have a bed. So she had a bed. Every day the French man who was over the people told us that she’s getting better and better.

A: Then I come back. I got scared I would not be.

Q: How old were you at liberation?

Moving Towards a New Life

A: I looked like 16. He saw that I was very scared of him. He told me, “I’m a darker color but I never treat people badly. I never touched people who didn’t touch me.” He tried to explain to me. The whole time I was telling him myself should help me. I didn’t know what to pray. I know by half and I say it in myself when I arrived there. So he didn’t touch me nothing.

A: But they said it’s like we wanted to eat a noticeable. They went and they wanted cigarette, they want the chocolate, so they wanted for something. But they saw on me that I was a shy girl in the draft. It’s just unbelievable.

A: So later you want to hear about this anymore. Where did you wait away? So after the liberation we was taken to where was this camp where people was taken and not was killed. Because the DP came. But before, when we were liberated we were taken there. So we decided with my two friends and three men that we’re gonna try to go away in order to go there. We wanted to go another camp.

A: I took over version of as a young woman. They want to have young people with them when they go home because the road is better than you have young girls because they used to travel in Germany a lot. So they know the way home. We had no idea. It was never in Germany before. So event is one the engineer got himself a movie of a full movie. Later they stole it from him. They always still saw something.

Q: Finish. Can I? Did you want to go home? What did you want to go back to Romania?

Mathilda Stroli, Holocaust Survivor: Yes.

Q: So how would you been back? We’re going to continue this on the next day.

**Here is the cleaned transcript rendered as readable paragraphs:**

Liberation, Post-War Life, and Reflection

The Journey Home

A: I remember my father was a religious man. My mother, my family—they had to be killed. Why? They were in Bergen-Belsen. In the street before us, children, my friends—you know, I could see Hungarian soldiers kill my children.

A: They never forged anything. We went home to America, but home was Israel. We were in a train, one wagon. That wagon was like a prison. We were in Germany, Italy, many places. They never would touch a woman who looked like a sister or a family member. The two girls and I were told, “No, we would never touch this place.”

A: Another train came to bring some water. The train started to go and we were laughing. Later a man checked the tickets, came to us, and told us we had to go down at the station because we were going to be separated.

Reunion in Budapest

A: We got to Budapest. In Budapest they put us in a place, and a man said, “You go home. You can look down and you can see my brother, my cousin, whoever. I know my brother is home.” But I knew how it was. I went to my brother. He said, “It’s my sister.” He told me they told him I was coming home.

Courtship and Marriage

A: My brother, my husband’s sister, and the whole family were there. Later that afternoon I was in the house with my girlfriend. We had peanut butter—I thought peanut butter was like nuts— and I made a cake, but the cake was so hard like stone.

A: My husband came and said something about my girlfriend. Anyway, I showed my girlfriend. He was walking up and down before me. I told my girlfriend, “Look at him, how he walks up and down.” I don’t know, I was sick. We got married in April 1946.

A: You see, my husband married me. My mother-in-law was a real speaker.

Life in Israel

A: Later we went to Israel. I baked cake for the office to make his job better. My daughter’s name is Miriam—Miriam Rachel. She was born in Tel Aviv.

A: My husband was in Israel. My daughter was years old, my son was twelve years old. I told my daughter later about my experiences during the war. She was terrified. My family was lucky to get away from Hitler.

Settling in Canada and Family

A: We came to Canada and put the children in school. He was a smart boy in computers. I have five children and five grandchildren.

Reflections on Trauma and Memory

A: You know, I try to talk about my parents, my sisters, my father. Still, it’s not strong. When I was thinking about my husband, he didn’t want to get upset. For years he wanted to hear many things, not like me, but still he wanted to hear. Later he couldn’t take it.

A: I still have my cousin in Israel. We talk and share experiences. He came to visit us in Toronto. We went to Israel. His first wife died and he married again, but they had a big family with grandchildren already. 

Q: You’ve been through so much.

Enduring Values and Hopes

A: I’m Jewish. I just want to keep the religion of my parents. I am happy to have a special family. I just want my children to be happy and healthy, never to go through what I went through. We hope nobody ever has to experience what we did. I want the family to stay together and live together.

Cherished Objects and Final Words

A: My family, the war, my mother, my sister Miriam, my sister Adolf…

A: My husband Valentin—I loved him for many years. I cherish him. He was a wonderful man.

A: This picture was taken in school. I remember exactly. My mother made a nice pillow after the concentration camp. I enjoyed it very much because I made it a long time ago. Before we left for Israel we couldn’t take too many things, so I took the pillowcase by hand.

A: Roses have a special meaning for me because in my parents’ home and in school I did them. Thank you.