Boot camp at Fort Dix, New Jersey was entirely different than my Beitar training in underground military tactics. In the regular Army, it was all about the drill, following precise instructions to stand, march and respond to orders. “Sir, yes, sir,” and all of that. The idea was to transform a batch of flabby civilians into disciplined soldiers prepared for combat. The drill sergeants tried to make life tough for the trainees, but for someone like me accustomed to refugee camps and much worse, the rigorous routine and spartan conditions were not so bad.
USHMM Holocaust Encyclopedia
Lvov Pogrom, Jews rounded up, beatings
Film | Accession Number: 1991.254.1 | RG Number: RG-60.0441 | Film ID: 402
[My boss] agreed to sell me his old truck for just $200 and I even convinced him to let me pay for it over time. That prewar Ford had a lot of mileage on it, but I knew from having driven it on the job that it was still in decent shape. I figured I could use my mechanical skills, acquired in Germany in ORT vocational training, to keep it in running condition.
There was one big Jewish real-estate operator that I ran across a fair amount who is not necessary to name. Suffice to say that he had a reputation as big dealmaker. He was a real schwinger when it came acquiring properties, and that’s what I called him, the schwinger. A guy like that with very deep pockets was too much competition for me, who was usually looking for bargains.
Through the fence I could see activity in the streets of our neighborhood. Ukrainian men were entering homes and coming out with bulging sacks. Carts were pulled up in front of the finer homes, as heavier items were loaded up and hauled away.
The Jewish quarter of Skala, having been emptied of its residents, was being ransacked by our Ukrainian neighbors, even as we sat and watched from behind barbed wire. None of the many policemen and soldiers stationed outside the enclosure raised a finger to stop the looting. Instead, they looked the other way and let it happen.
One night Sroel came back early from a food run with alarming information. He had been told by a peasant that German troops and Ukrainian police were preparing for a massive sweep of the forest on the following day.
Panic spread through our camp. Did they have specific information about our location? If we sheltered in our bunker during the raid, would we risk being smoked out and shot? It didn’t matter since it was too late to go anywhere else; we would have to take our chances. We disassembled our lean-tos and restored the camp to natural condition.
Lonye was delighted to have stumped me. It was indeed right where I had looked but was so artfully blended in with the vegetation that I hadn’t managed to see it. Lonye found handgrips on the sides of the hatch and lifted it open, revealing a short ladder about four steps down to the chamber below. He took me in and I found there was enough headroom only to lay down or sit up. Even a small boy like me, not to mention adults, had to crawl to get around inside the bunker.
It was decided that Izzie [the carpenter Israel Blutstein] and I would go together on a night visit into Skala.
This would be my first time back to Skala since we had set foot in the forest months earlier. I was feeling both excited and apprehensive. I remember there was light snow the evening we set out for town. We made our way to the logging road, careful not to leave any tracks in the patchy snow.