An Act of Gratitude

Elie Wiesel was a Holocaust survivor.

Elie Arrives At Auschwitz

 

       During the 1940s, Auschwitz concentration camp in Germany was one of the most infamous concentration camp. The remains of the buildings are here today, telling the horrible story of what occurred.

           

Elie Wiesel was one of the hundreds brought to the concentration camp, but one of the few to survive. The journey for Elie started after the Nazi’s had invaded their ghetto in Sighet. Elie, his family, and the rest of the people of the smaller Ghetto were taken away.

           

Initially they were told to each pack one small bag in which they would carry a few vital things they may need. On the final day in Sighet, all of the Jews were forced to stay in the Synagogue until the Nazi’s were ready to take them.

 

 

Finally the Nazi’s brought them out to a train ordinarily used for transporting cattle. They were boarded eight to a car and were given a few loafs of bread and buckets of water.

 

Here’s what Elie had to say about the journey. “Lying down was out of the question and we were only able to sit by deciding to take turns. There was very little air. The lucky ones who happened to be near a window could see the blossoming countryside roll by.

After two days of traveling, we became tortured by thirst. Then the heat became unbearable.”

 

            They finally stopped in a town along the Czechoslovakian and Hungarian border called Kaschau. It was then the Elie and the others realized they weren’t staying in Hungary. The Gestapo officers took all the remaining jewelry that they had and started the train up again.

           

            A woman named Madame Schacter and her ten year old son had been with Elie on the train ride. Her husband and two sons had been separated recently been separated from her. On the first night she had already seemed delirious, moaning about how she had been separated from her family and on the third night her condition worsened.

           

            She suddenly screamed in the middle of the night, “Fire, fire, look!” Everyone awoke with a startle but there was nothing she continued to do this during the nights and eventually she was tied up and beaten. All her ten-year-old son could do was watch.

 

             They finally arrived at the train days later and realized that what Madame Schacter had said about the fire had been true. A horrid smoke filled the air as they finally arrived at Auschwitz carrying a putrid smell of burning flesh.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Elie’s Father Passes Away

 

       When someone passes away there is always sorrow. There is always someone that is left behind, alone. The feelings of sorrow and aloneness are multiplied when the person being left behind is a child and the person leaving is a parent. After battling through the Holocaust for eight months next to his father, Elie was suddenly taken away from him. It’s impossible to imagine the feelings of sorrow and aloneness Elie must have had.

 

            Eli’s father dies of digestive infection, exhaustion, and starvation and his there are may things leading up to his death that foreshadow his fate.

 

            One of the first signs of Chlomo’s (Elie’s father) body deteriorating is when he is almost chosen to go to the crematory. At first when Elie’s dad when for inspection he was told that he had passed. However days later he found out that the Nazi’s had written down his name as one of the people who was weak and should be sent to the crematory. Elie later found out though that his father found a way to convince the SS officers that he was still strong and avoided the crematory.

 

            Later, Elie finds out that his foot is in very bad shape and that he needs surgery. He receives the surgery and is waiting in the hospital, when all of a sudden all of the prisoners are evacuated from the camp. Even though his foot is not fully healed, Elie decides to stay with his father and leave the camp. Unfortunately, what Elie found out two days later is that if he had stayed in the hospital he would have been freed.

            They are told to run in the snow and those who are slower are shot. By the time they stop they’ve ran 42 miles. He and his father go into a shed and somehow are able to fall asleep for a short while. They are then put on a train to another camp. When they stop, Elie’s father won’t wake up and the SS officers think he is dead. He is about thrown out of the car when Elie slaps him hard on the face and he stirs. They reached the camp a couple days later.

 

            When they reach the camp though, Elie’s father is extremely exhausted. He lays in the snow and Elie feels frustrated that he is giving up. He tries to care for him but his father simply wont get better.

 

            In Eli’s story, Night he writes this about his fathers death, “I climbed in to my bunk above my father who was still alive. It was January 28, 1845. I awoke January 19, at dawn. In my father’s place lay another invalid.”

 

           

 

 

           

           

           

 

      

 

The Holocaust

 

       There are many events in human history that were utterly barbaric and inexplicably horrifying, and the Holocaust ranks among the top of them. Somewhere between the 11 and 17 million people were killed and the 2/3 of all of the Jewish people in England were killed.

           

            The Holocaust not only affected Jews, but Polish and Soviet citizens, homosexuals, people with disabilities, and people of other religions. It was truly a horrifying event.

 

            The leader of the Holocaust was Adolf Hitler the dictator and tyrant of Germany. He said he wanted to perfect the world by killing of those who were imperfect and although his main target during the Holocaust was the Jews, he ultimately anted to some day rule the world.

 

            At the time Germany, Japan, and Italy were fighting against us in WW2 while The Soviet Union and the UK were on our side. In the end we defeated Hitler and the Germans and the Germans were forced to have no military for 50 years. The lives that were taken in those few years can never be made up for though, and the people will always remain in our hearts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Elie Wiesel

 

Elie Wiesel was born September 30, 1938 in Sighet Romania. He was taken care of by his fairly wealthy parents, Chlomo and Sarah, and studied hard. He says his mother instilled his belief while his father instilled his humanism.

In 1944 Elie and the rest of SIghet was captured by the Gestapo and taken to concentration camp. Elie was taken to Aushwitz and many other camps during the Holocaust. He lost his mother and younger sister very early.

After battling through concentration camp for eight months, luckily never being separated from his father, his father finally passed away. Weeks later though, Elie was liberated from the camp.

 

After the Holocaust Elie became a professional journalist, however for the first ten years after the war he refused to write about his experiences. Finally he was persuaded to write about what he had gone through, and he wrote the book Night. He wrote seventeen other books.

 

Elie received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1986 for speaking out against racism, violence, and repression. He is truly a role model for us all.