Last Letters from the Holocaust
This past week in class, we were assigned to read letters from the “Last Letters from the Holocaust” exhibition in Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center. The letters we were assigned to read spanned the years 1941-1944 and gave many different perspectives of people living in ghettos, concentration camps, boarding deportation trains, and various other scenarios. After spending some time reading these letters, I was choked up. I couldn’t fathom having to write a last letter to my family. There were many times when individuals didn’t know that the letter they were writing was their last letter.
Warsaw Ghetto-1941
The first letter I chose was written in 1941 by a woman named Perla Tytelman, her son Samuel and her daughter Rega from the Warsaw ghetto to the head of the family, Yosef, and Rachel in Siberia. As I was reading, I noticed a progression of sadness and worry which spanned the different members of the family who lent their voices in writing this text. In one of the first paragraphs, Perla writes how the war would have to end at some point like all things do. In writing this, Perla shows a type of analytical intellect into how the world operates. She understands the reality that everything ultimately comes to an end. As the letter progressed, different family members mention that the recipient of the letter hadn’t replied to any of the letters. Ten letters had been sent and none were sent back in return. This raised many questions for me. I wondered if this was a response to the experiences Yosef and Rachel were enduring? Was it a personal choice? Were they angered at the “better position” the other half of their family was in living in the Warsaw ghetto?
At the end of the letter, Samuel writes that Perla is frying chicken cutlets in the kitchen and desires to send a portion of the food in the letter envelope. However, due to the nature of the postal service, she is denied permission to do so. This part of the letter shows a piece of humanity and “normalcy” into how a family lived their “everyday” lives. “Everyday” is obviously used loosely as this was taking place during the Holocaust and inside the Warsaw ghetto. Nothing about these experiences were normal.
Deportation train, Italy-24 February 1944
The second letter I chose was a postcard written by a woman named Anna Ventura from a deportation train leaving Italy to Auschwitz in 1944. When Anna completed the 24 word postcard to her family, she actually threw it from the cattle car and it was eventually discovered. After reading this letter, I was struck by a variety of details. The first being how short the letter actually was. Anna was able to convey how strong her love was for her family as well as her optimism for how soon she was going to see them. It was amazing how high her spirits were. Imagine! She is sitting on a train headed to a death camp and she is hopeful and has the strength to tell her family how strong her bond is with them. Anna also has a selfless attitude in that she writes that “all my thoughts are on you” indicating a selfless attitude. She isn’t thinking of herself but rather her family.
