Isaac's Army (74 page)

25
Tuvia grabbed her and pulled her by the hair
Ibid., p. 182.

26
Zivia, meanwhile, had fainted, and Isaac carried her on his shoulders
Zuckerman,
Surplus of Memory
, p. 543.

27
In all, some 5,200
people managed to escape Old Town
Bartoszewski,
Powstanie Warszawskie
, p. 94.

28
“drunken soldiers practiced Caesarean sections with bayonets”
Davies,
Rising ’44
, p. 344.

C
HAPTER
38: F
OOLISH
E
RRANDS

1
the death toll in the Warsaw Uprising was approaching 150,000
Tadeusz Sawicki,
Roskaz Zdlawic Powstanie
(Warsaw: Bellona, 2010), p. 190.

2
Marshal Rokossovsky’s 3,360 tanks were now in Praga
Zenczykowski,
Samotny Boj Warszawy
, p. 122.

3
“a purely adventuristic affair to which the Soviet government could not lend a hand”
Rudy Abramson,
Spanning the Century: The Life of W. Averell Harriman
(New York: William Morrow, 1992), p. 382.

4
“without the prior knowledge of Soviet military command”
Zenczykowski,
Samotny Boj Warszawy
, p. 118.

5
“They’re pigs, not soldiers”
Cezary Gmyz,
Rzepospolita
, May 17, 2008, p. 1.

6
“I’ve got used to the sight of male corpses”
Davies,
Rising ’44
, p. 353.

7
“He took me and my mother by the hand”
This occurred to the author’s mother, Dr. Wanda Brzezinski.

8
A nearly mile-long trench separated the rebel and German positions
Piotr Basmajew,
Historia Zoliborskiego Powstanca
(Warsaw: PAX, 2008), p. 90.

9
“all black and splattered with mud, reeking and covered in feces”
Ibid., p. 74.

10
“She ordered us to dunk our heads into it”
Edelman,
I Byla Milosc w Getcie
, p. 141.

11
where half of the thirty documented murders of Jews by Gentile insurgents were committed
Paulsson,
Secret City
, p. 181.

12
“Part of the evidence was that Frenchy was frequently seen in the company of a Jew”
Ibid., p. 176.

13
“Why endanger ourselves for papers? … For history”
Ratheiser-Rotem,
Kazik
, p. 126.

14
historians estimate as many as 4,500
Paulsson,
Secret City
, p. 168.

15
“He immediately brought out a large sum and gave it to us”
Zuckerman,
Surplus of Memory
, p. 546.

16
grains seized from the Haberbusch and Schiele breweries
Goldstein,
Five Years in the Warsaw Ghetto
, p. 211.

17
one hundred and ten B-17 Flying Fortresses, escorted by 72 Mustangs
Zenczykowski,
Samotny Boj Warszawy
, p. 119.

18
“Everything around going up in flames, walls caving in—and that music”
Ratheiser-Rotem,
Kazik
, pp. 127–28.

19
“This river rat was always squirming his way everywhere”
Edelman,
I Byla Milosc w Getcie
, p. 130.

20
They climbed inside, momentarily safe
Simha Ratheiser-Rotem, author interview, Jerusalem, March 2009.

21
one hundred thousand people were already crammed behind the hastily strung barbed wire
Davies,
Rising ’44
, p. 386.

22
had permitted a two-hour cease-fire to evacuate nine thousand residents
Sawicki,
Roskaz Zdlawicz Powstanie
, p. 154.

23
almost twenty-six thousand German casualties, including ten thousand dead
Rozwadowski and Ignatowicz,
Boje o Warszawe
, p. 153.

24
“There were shiny new automatic weapons, tinned meat and milk”
Borzykowski,
Between Tumbling Walls
, p. 186.

25
“Every house in the quarter was hit several times by shells”
Ibid., p. 189.

26
had to be fired at very close range—less than fifty yards—to be effective
Badmajew,
Historia Zoliborskiego Powstanca
, p. 66.

27
“The echo of that shooting made me completely deaf”
Zuckerman,
Surplus of Memory
, p. 547.

28
“The whole unit had come back, except for Zivia”
Ibid., p. 548.

29
“I asked one of the Gentiles to bring me some spirits”
Ibid.

30
“Do you want to know what color a person who has taken a direct hit from a tank shell leaves on a wall?”
Edelman,
I Byla Milosc w Getcie
, p. 144.

31
of the twenty-one people in his unit, he was the only one alive
Assuntino and Goldkorn,
Straznik
, p. 105.

C
HAPTER
39: Z
IVIA
’
S
C
UPBOARD

1
After sixty-three days and nearly two hundred thousand fatalities
Lukas,
Forgotten Holocaust
, p. 219.

2
“You can’t do this!”
Simha Ratheiser-Rotem, author interview, Jerusalem, March 2009.

3
“Don’t shoot, there are women down here”
Ratheiser-Rotem,
Kazik
, p. 131.

4
to run fire hoses through coal chutes to drown everyone inside
This was experienced by the author’s mother, who as an eight-year-old stood on her mother’s shoulders in a cellar in Warsaw as water poured in. The flood stopped when the water pressure broke a door down.

5
“The ruins are exceptionally photogenic”
Stanislaw Kopf,
Wyrok na Miasto
(Warsaw: ASKON, 2001), p. 9.

6
“They were probably taking us there to rape the girls”
Simha Ratheiser-Rotem, author interview, Jerusalem, March 2009.

7
a Wehrmacht officer stopped the Ukrainians and asked where they were headed
Ibid.

8
its cemetery had been transformed by the SS into a makeshift crematorium
http://www.Swiety-wojciech.pl/historia
.

9
“And how long have you had that name?”
Ratheiser-Rotem,
Kazik
, p. 133.

10
A total of 650,000
people would eventually pass through its gates
Kopf,
Wyrok na Miasto
, p. 28.

11
“Three hundred thousand people are now enjoying the fresh air”
Ibid., p. 27.

12
“Hundreds of human beings had to parade in front of German officers”
Ratheiser-Rotem,
Kazik
, p. 135.

13
along with 150,000
other able-bodied Varsovians
Paulsson,
Secret City
, p. 219.

14
“A mood of apathy descended on me”
Ratheiser-Rotem,
Kazik
, p. 135.

15
“I suppose fate had dictated that we should live”
Lubetkin,
Zaglada I Powstanie
, p. 151.

16
The spiteful omission affected four hundred combatants in Jolie Bord
Sawicki,
Zdlawic Powstanie
, p. 154.

17
“We didn’t know what to do”
Lubetkin,
Zaglada I Powstanie
, p. 151.

18
“The women knew, and we knew, too, that our presence was not to their advantage”
Borzykowski,
Between Tumbling Walls
, p. 199.

19
He soon grew “very mad at Zivia,” because “it seemed she pinched me the hardest”
Zuckerman,
Surplus of Memory
, p. 551.

20
“must completely disappear from the surface of the earth”
Ceiechanowski,
Powstanie Warszawskie
, p. 662.

C
HAPTER
40: D
ESPICABLE
Y
IDS

1
“Everything beneath us lies in ruin”
Kopf,
Wyrok na Miasto
, p. 100.

2
Pens filled with a few grams of explosive, enough to remove a hand
Ibid., p. 93.

3
“We budgeted the precious liquid with mathematical precision”
Borzykowski,
Between Tumbling Walls
, p. 203.

4
“Get us some help”
Ibid., p. 215.

5
“I had a feeling that Gestapo agents were everywhere”
Ratheiser-Rotem,
Kazik
, p. 140.

6
“I was sure the SS would be looking for me sooner or later”
Simha Ratheiser-Rotem, author interview, Jerusalem, March 2009.

7
“It seemed as if several platoons of soldiers had invaded the house”
Borzykowski,
Between Tumbling Walls
, p. 215.

8
“We got to know the soldiers working around our house”
Ibid., p. 216.

9
“That night was a night of horrors”
Zuckerman,
Surplus of Memory
, p. 552.

10
“She had to be careful since she didn’t know whom she was telling it to”
Ibid., p. 553.

11
“Passing Germans looked at us with curiosity”
Borzykowski,
Between Tumbling Walls
, p. 220.

12
warning
“Achtung, Fleckfieber”
Beres and Burnetko,
Marek Edelman
, p. 213.

13
“Despicable Yids”
Mark Edelman, author interview, Lodz, May 2007.

C
HAPTER
41: M
ARK AND THE
M
OHICANS

1
“It was the saddest day of my life”
Mark Edelman, author interview, Lodz, May 2007.

2
“I finally realized that it was over”
Simha Ratheiser-Rotem, author interview, Jerusalem, March 2009.

3
“Are you crazy?”
Ibid.

4
“Give them everything they want, for after all, they are killing Germans”
Abramson,
Spanning the Century
, p. 345.

5
Soviet losses were sixty-five times greater than America’s
Hitchcock,
Liberation
, p. 132.

6
More than twenty million Soviet citizens had died fending off Hitler
Ibid., p. 131.

7
“the barbarian invasion”
Abramson,
Spanning the Century
, p. 395.

8
“Harriman was never included in the private talks on Poland”
Ibid., p. 376.

9
“He is a very sick man”
Conrad Black,
Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Champion of Freedom
(New York: Public Affairs, 2005), p. 1075.

10
On April 5, 1945 … the United States formally … recognized the new Provisional Government
Slawomir Cenkiewicz,
Sladami Bezpieki I Partii
(Lomianki: LTW, 2009), p. 37.

11
“his heart bled for them, but the brutal facts could not be overlooked”
Hitchcock,
Liberation
, p. 155.

12
in Warsaw, the population had rebounded to 162,000
Luczak,
Dzieje Polski
, p. 492.

13
“I cannot believe how fortunate I am to be alive”
Olczak-Ronikier,
W Ogrodzie Pamieci
, p. 298.

14
“I went crazy and almost killed them”
Simha Ratheiser-Rotem, author interview, Jerusalem, March 2009.

15
“She thought a tearful little girl with long plaits would fall into her arms”
Olczak-Ronikier,
W Ogrodzie Pamieci
, p. 297.