MARTA WASCHUK

Date and Place of Birth: April 22, 1936, Buchach, Ukraine

Date of Interview: June 13, 2023

Place of Interview: Toronto, Ontario

Interviewer: Andriy Shwec

Length of Interview: 2 hours

(Excerpt):

MW: I know we were hungry because I really didn’t like milk but when they gave me milk, I drank it by the time I got back to my room. I remember I drank that milk although I hated milk.

Interviewer: Do you remember the name of the camp?

MW: Strasshof. They transported us from this camp to another camp called Neumarkt.

Interviewer: How did this camp differ from Strasshof?

MW: We arrived in Strasshof on October 25, 1944, and at the beginning of November they transported us to Neumarkt. There I became ill with measles. I don’t know who exactly it was, but they told my mom to not report my illness and not send me to the hospital.

Interviewer: For what reason?

MW: So that I would survive. Later we found out that one of the children that was in the hospital became ill and died. My mom hid me in straw. There was an inspection, and every morning we went outside the barracks, and they hid me in the straw. Somehow, they counted me as present. That’s how I hid so that they wouldn’t put me in the hospital. An official told us to not go to the hospital because it was dangerous. At the end of November, they transported us through Degendrof to Prackenbach where my parents were put to work loading wooden planks onto trains, I don’t know why this was needed. We lived in a building. The lower level was an inn and the upper level was a large room where 28 of us slept on the floor. I think it was an area where they normally went to drink, but because they had people there, we slept there.

Interviewer: Your whole family was together?

MW: Yes, we were. In February my mom and dad began working at Fichtentall, loading those planks onto trains.