In the Sewers of Lvov (9 page)

Klara had been led to the evil-smelling domain by Margulies, seated beside her. She sat amongst this maze of limbs and feet, while the last few moments with her sister played over and over in her mind. Somewhere amongst all the shapes were old Mrs Weiss, her son and the young girl Halina. Suddenly, everything became quite still. There were some seventy or more gathered in that space, each one isolated within their own thoughts and fears.

They sat upon black, unyielding silt that had built up in the tunnel. Gathered from hills to the south, the rich dark loam that supported the neighbouring villages of Bielosko and Snopkow was carried away in the waters of the Peltwa to be deposited against the walls of the sewers. Now it provided a floor that oozed dark moisture when a foot or hand pressed upon it. In that dank hole, a host of breathless souls whispered soothing messages to each other. They knew that for the time being at least, they had been saved. Three or four candles etched out groups of faces gloomily peering out of the darkness like images from an old Dutch master. Some heads were thrown back against the stone, staring into the middle distance, others coughed loudly, while some cradled their loved ones and tried to comfort them. As Chiger recalled, ‘… each was occupied in his own thoughts. How would this end? How will we survive? What was our fate?’

Above the muffled roar of the river, there came the sound of movement. The shuffle of someone moving down the pipe towards them. A blazing carbide lamp flooded in, seeming to populate the space with faces and shapes that had not been there before. As Socha fanned the light across the blinded faces, no one made a sound. All that could be heard was the soft hiss of the lamp as he moved amongst the feet and limbs.

Chiger saw the lamp illuminate Socha’s own face, now creased with worry.

‘What is it?’

He shook his head. ‘There are maybe a hundred people scattered about, here and nearby.’

‘What will you do?’

Socha shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I said we would help you and your family. The rest …’

These hundred or so survivors accounted for a fraction of the numbers that had escaped to the sewers. The total had been closer to four or five hundred, most of whom had perished in the Peltwa or returned to the surface where they were captured. According to Chiger’s account, there were more than seventy gathered with them or nearby.

‘I’ve just been up to the street.’ Again a shake of the head.

‘And …?’

‘Everything on fire – still burning. So many dead.’ The images he had seen in the street remained with him for the rest of his life. It became apparent to those who knew him that what he had witnessed that night had shaken his most fundamental beliefs. He seemed to be a man who approached matters with an inherent optimism, yet he had seen things that would have darkened anyone’s soul. It weighed upon him and threatened to break the man at a time when the fugitives were depending upon him most. He was exhausted, too exhausted to do anything about it then and there. It would soon be dawn and he badly needed to sleep. He took another look at the crowd and then turned back to speak to Chiger.

‘I’ll be back in the morning with some food,’ he said. Then he crept out again and left them to their thoughts.

In the re-darkened space, the silence was chilling. Somehow, the atmosphere had become harder to breath. In fact the air had become stifling.

‘Blow out the candles. They are eating up the air,’ said Chiger.

‘I need to see.’

‘What is there to see? There is nothing. Blow them out.’

Klara clutched Mrs Chiger’s hand in hers. She had heard Socha say something about an agreement to save ‘some people’. She couldn’t bear to think about the prospect and contented herself with Paulina’s hand. On the other side, young Krisia, exhausted like the others, dozed against the shoulder nearest to her. She was suddenly jerked awake by Berestycki, wrenching his arm away.

‘Why are you so heavy? You’re so small, but you’re so heavy. I can’t carry you.’ In Berestycki’s voice, one of the most amiable of souls, there were perhaps the first notes of irritation that threatened to affect everyone. The twin spirits of fear and suspicion were easily the most deadly infection to flourish in that domain and threaten the group’s chances of survival.

Sleep came in brief snatches for some, others remained alert for some imminent catastrophe. The hours passed by grudgingly and as they did, the struggle to suppress their fears became more difficult. What gnawed away at them constantly was the sense of absolute helplessness.

Margulies recalled someone voicing their anxiety: ‘To be at the mercy of those
goyim
, who might all become heroes by simply bringing the Germans on an expedition through the sewers.’ Fears spread swiftly. Most of them had not the faintest idea who Socha was. The only logical reason why he should return was the lure of money. Nazi law was clear: whoever handed over Jews in hiding was rewarded with whatever wealth was captured with them. Either way, there seemed no reasonable way to sustain hope. Only a few clung to their conviction that Socha could be trusted, when logic dictated otherwise.

The following morning, Socha returned with his softly hissing lamp. With him he carried two workmen’s bags, normally weighed down with rough heavy tools, but that morning they were filled with bread and potatoes. With this he planned to feed the multitude, passing out fists of torn bread. He had visited the other groups scattered around and done what he could with the food that he’d brought. There was no ceremony, no gasps of gratitude as he arrived. The food was simply passed around in complete silence.

This manna brought about a transformation of feelings. The sense of embattled hopelessness subsided. Chiger asked about what was happening. Any report from the street was eagerly devoured in the hope that it might dispel the nightmare. The prospect of news was almost as nourishing as the food he brought. But at the moment, though burdened with knowledge, Socha found it hard to deliver. What he said confirmed their worst
fears. His description banished all hope that they might have been wrong about the German intensions.

‘We saw terrible things. The ghetto was set on fire. Everything. The shooting went on all night and still now it goes on. They rounded up ten, twenty people at a time, stood them against a wall and shot them. Then they brought in trucks, loaded up the bodies, took them somewhere outside the city and returned for another load.’

In his book,
The Death Brigade
, Leon Wells described being transported from the ghetto. Wells was a friend of Berestycki’s and had been tempted to hide with him in the sewers, but at the last moment decided against it.

SS commandos drove men, women and children in front of them. Most of us were calm and composed; many women were singing. We were loaded on tram trucks and taken to the Janowska camp. There we were herded into the parade ground, the last gathering place of so many thousands. We remained there for a day and a night, guarded by the SS. At night searchlights were trained upon us.
⁵

Not everyone had left calmly, singing as they were herded into the waggons. A large number had hidden themselves in the very fabric of the buildings. The man who supervised the
Aktion
was SS General Katzmann, who wrote five weeks after the event:

The Jews tried every means to evade evacuation. They not only attempted to escape from the ghetto, but hid in every imaginable corner, in pipes, in chimneys, in sewers and canals. They built tunnels under the hallways, underground; they widened cellars and turned them into passageways; they dug trenches underground and cunningly created hiding places in lofts, woodsheds, attics and inside furniture … we were compelled, therefore, to act brutally from the beginning in order to avoid sustaining greater casualties among our men. We had to blast and burn many houses.’
⁶

There had also been many prepared to resist with arms. Socha and those in the sewers would probably never have heard about it. In the building that had housed the bakery was:

… a team of young men, who had sworn not to be taken alive. They were well armed with automatic weapons they had bought from Rumanian soldiers who had passed through Lvov on their way to the front. When the Germans uncovered the bunker they were hidden in, yelling ‘
Juden Raus
!’ and waited for a few Jews to come … they left through a reserve exit and began mowing down the startled SS and Ukrainians. Alarmed by the resistance, the Germans called for reinforcements and an overwhelming SS force arrived. In a prolonged battle, they shot and killed twice as many Germans as their own number.’
⁷

In contrast, Socha’s account was bleak and unrelenting.

It still goes on. Hundreds, thousands are dead. Like a machine, they work their way through, searching for life. In any inaccessible corner, they simply toss in grenades. Many were taken alive in the tram waggons, down the track to the Janowska camp.’ Everyone knew the fate of the rest. They’d heard about the killings at the Janowska camp, and they had watched the trains to Belzec for over a year.

Inside the camp, many thousands were assembled on the parade ground and made to stand there for days. At irregular intervals, the SS would order certain age groups to step forward, then the victims were made to undress and were led away. The process continued until there were less than 400 men and women between the ages of fourteen and thirty. These would be put to work in the camp and were marched off to the barracks.
⁸

Meanwhile, Socha continued, ‘We were ordered to stay out of the sewers while they lifted the manhole covers and sprayed everyone with machine-guns and grenades. They even want to conduct patrols through the tunnels in search of any survivors. They’ve done this before. They simply stand at the end of the tunnel with flame throwers and no one can escape.’

The thought terrified everyone.

‘I think the Jews out at the airfield working for the Luftwaffe are still alive. And some of the other camps, perhaps. I don’t know.’

According to Chiger, Socha’s description had a deeply shocking affect on all of them. They listened as he went on to describe
one horror after another, but they paid particular attention to the facts about the Germans making patrols of the sewers.

‘That won’t be a problem. Kowalow normally puts me in charge. I know where to take them and where not. They won’t find you – but it is something that has to be done. It may go on for some weeks, but I’ll tell you everything.’

They devised certain warning signals, should anyone be strolling about the tunnels when a patrol was about. If they saw Socha’s lamp and he could be seen to be rotating it slowly in a wide circular movement, then it meant he was not with the Germans and it was safe to approach. If not, they were to return as quickly as possible to their hiding place and Socha would ensure the Germans came nowhere near them.

In his absence, thoughts turned to his description of the scenes in the ghetto. Had their families survived and been amongst the ones taken to the Janowska camp? Isolated with their separate memories, a sullen hush settled on them all. Klara was constantly reminded of her sister Manya, whom she last saw in Weiss’s room. Would she survive for long if they discovered she had typhus?

Margulies’s thoughts were for his brothers with whom he had lost touch months before. Weiss thought of his wife and how tragic it was to have parted in anger. So they passed the time.

Occasionally a voice would call, ‘Is Ruth here?’

‘Is Rothfeld there?’

‘Is there a Feldman here?’

This way, an unofficial roll-call was taken. The two engineers who had worked on the project from the outset were not present. ‘They’re dead now. They never came down, they were taken away,’ recalled Margulies.

The following few days passed slowly, marked only by the arrival of Socha and Wroblewski laden with food. Each time Socha turned up, it was clear he was overwhelmed by the vastness of his task. Something would have to be done, but he hardly knew what. Despite the money he was paid, it was still beyond him to gather enough food to feed so many people. In his absence,
speculation was rife. How could he buy so much food without raising suspicion? How long would their money last? How long would they need to stay there? What already seemed clear was that their present accommodation would not be practical as a long-term shelter. There was hardly room to move, no one could sleep stretched out, the walls were perpetually running with water, the floor a sludge of dark filth.

Some seemed to accept the reality of the situation swiftly, and were content to sit there and simply get accustomed to the noises of the tunnels: interminable echoes broken occasionally by what they thought were gunshots or explosions, the constant roar of the Peltwa in the main chamber, and during the day, the incongruous sounds of street vendors floated down from the market overhead.

Just as Socha had predicted, the neighbouring tunnels were invaded by a German patrol. Orders shouted, the thunder of boots, cries of their victims – and the gunshots that seemed to echo endlessly. They sat frozen with fear in their little cavern, waiting to be discovered. Inevitably the danger drew nearer. ‘We could hear the Germans shouting as they ran through the neighbouring pipe, searching amongst corpses for fugitives,’ Chiger recorded. ‘It was absurd; amidst all that, we could still hear the voices of street vendors, trying to sell their merchandise.’

The hunters never arrived.

Nevertheless, it was a brave man who ventured out to explore their domain. Berestycki and Margulies realized they could not always depend upon Socha to bring them water. They would have to fetch it for themselves. A number of water pipes appeared here and there throughout the system and they found the one to which Berestycki had ingeniously fitted a tap weeks before. Socha also discovered, at a spot that was much nearer to the group, a crack in a pipe that trickled fresh water. To collect the water, however, was a slow and tedious operation. A piece of cloth had to be wedged into the crack to direct the trickle of water into their jug. It took more than an hour to collect enough to have made a trip worthwhile.