A long-time citizen of Oswiecim who assisted escaped prisoners from Auschwitz, we met Wladyslaw through our friend Ania, who grew up in Oswiecim and happens to be his niece. Combined, Wladyslaw and Ania epitomize the fact that, while the former Nazi extermination camp of Auschwitz is located here, the people of Oswiecim reject and combat such hatred - and have from its inception.

The raw transcript of our interview with Wladyslaw follows. Much of the conversation flowed through Ania, so you will see some references to her. The discussion begins in front of Wladyslaw's house:

TLP: How long has he (the witness) lived in this house?

Wladyslaw: The house was rebuilt in 1955 and I moved in in 1960. In the house next door lived somebody who shot people at the "Wall of death." Yes, this was Scharfuehrer Gerhardt Palitzch.

I will tell you a short story about him. He lived here with his family, a wife and two boys, and when a typhoid epidemic broke out in the camp his wife died. Perhaps she did not get a shot like him; I do not know. His mother-in-law came from Germany and took the boys home with her. Well, he started to bring home young and pretty Jewesses - prisoners, of course - and they caught him. He was punished with a slap on the wrist, as he was regarded as a merciless sharp shooter and such people were hard to find. A few years after the war, a group of German visitors came to the camp and one of the participants was a young man who would not go into the camp itself but spent his time walking around the house and taking photos. Approximately two weeks later a letter arrived to the museum in which that young man apologized for not visiting the campgrounds but he knew all that his father did and was asking for forgiveness. It turned out that it was Palitzsch's son who came for the visit under an assumed name because he was afraid that when people learned who he was, he might not leave alive.

TLP: (Question directed at Ania) You said that your uncle helped to get letters from the prisoners out to the outside world. Would he tell us about it?

Wladyslaw: These are difficult things to talk about. (The witness gets up and points to his belt, shirt, pants.) One would hide things in every possible way - under the belt, in the leggings of one's pants; some even put things in the bike pump. On the whole, such smuggling was very difficult. Mostly they were letters from prisoners to their families or reverse - a letter from a son to a mother, etc. Sometimes people were caught and the punishment was death. They would bring the family, make them stand by the main gate ("Arbeit macht frei"), and then bring the one who was caught, Palitzsch would pronounce the death penalty and shoot the prisoner. The whole thing was very risky.

TLP: Why would he be willing to do it? Why was it important to help these prisoners? Your uncle carried the letters. If they found him they would punish him - why was he willing to do that?

Wladyslaw: Out of pity. I was young, a bachelor, had nothing to lose. Also, there was a call from the Underground to help these people. We just looked at this as helping the other.

TLP: I understand, what he did was risking his own life. Was it worth it to be risking his own life in order to help the prisoners?

Wladyslaw: This is how it was. A lot of it was simply an impulse; anyway, I never thought that they would catch me. I do not have anything! And please tell them one more thing. This is in a way of thanks. I would like to tell you of one German capo who saved dozens of Poles. For example, when they did selections, picking every tenth prisoner to be shot or gassed, and the tenth turned out to be an important man, he exchanged him for a "Moslem" (?) who was already at death's door. He saved so many people. He was Austrian and had the red badge (red triangle - indicated political prisoner). How could we not help if this German capo helped and he was also a prisoner? But, as a German Obercapo he could help indeed. His name was Rheinhold Morgenberg.

TLP: Whom was he saving? Any particular person?

Wladyslaw: The Underground selected the people who should be protected. There was a saying among the prisoners: "If the camp were liberated today we would carry Rheinhold in our hands." He was so respected, that German capo with the red badge.

I want to add one more thing. From Hoess's house there is a path to the river Sola. One day I was working there together with other carpenters putting a diving board for the SS men who used to bathe there. It was a nice day and I noticed an SS man walking along the river with a young seven year-old boy. He was showing the youngster how to skip stones in the river when, all of a sudden, there was a whistle from Hoess's balcony. The SS man immediately ran to the house and found himself berated by Hoess, who shouted that this was not the way to bring up the boy, that he does not want him to be a monk but rather an SS man. I realized that the SS man was the boy's tutor. I knew enough German to understand what they were talking about. The tutor told Hoess that he would do his best to teach the boy SS manners. He ran back to the boy, grabbed him, swung him by his legs, and threw him into the river. Hoess laughed aloud and called happily from the balcony. So, the father treated his son harshly. The older son was 14 years old, a tall boy driving a car on the campgrounds. I was 19 years old when I started to work in the camp. I was 23 years old when the war ended. There is enough to talk about for a week.

TLP: Why was it important to help the prisoners?

Wladyslaw: The network of assistance was very active and spread throughout the area. Also, there was a willingness in the local population to help as much as they could. For example, I, a Pole without HJ (Hitler Jugend) band managed to travel with the hidden documents all the way from Oswiecim to Raciborz and that prisoner who sent me (he was from the camp Underground) told me: "You get off at Raciborz railroad station, walk to the bridge, there would be a German policeman on each side of the bridge, you open a newspaper and feign being so immersed in reading that you prod one of them, say sorry, this way they let you through without checking." How did they know all of this! That is not all. "Close to the house where my mother lives there is a newsagent shop. If there is a man in it, buy a box of matches and go on. But if instead there is a hag ask her politely if there are here 'porwole' (unknown - perhaps slang of that time for whores)." When I got into his apartment I found an older lady, his mother, sitting on the bed. When she saw me she exclaimed: "Holy Mother, Joseph has sent you!"

There was a system of codes all over Poland, all over Oswiecim, of signals to get these letters out. Thus, I recall the story of [Ania's] grandmother who told us about scratching one's head. How did that system get into place, meaning how was it possible without the SS knowing that in German-occupied Poland, after four years of German occupation? How did the people manage to get that system in place that gave the prisoners a means of having hope, that they could get the word out?

Well, the Germans knew a lot, but not all. Only tough guys were selected to these Underground organizations. When they caught somebody that was the end. The death penalty. But no one would talk as only highly reliant people joined in.