Vlasta Serynková

Vlas­ta Serynková lived with her moth­er Anastázie Serynková and her sib­lings Alois, Karel, Eduard, Anna and Antonie in Pilsen. All the sib­lings already had chil­dren when the war started.

In 1942, the entire fam­i­ly was herd­ed into a school in Pilsen[1] and tak­en to the con­cen­tra­tion camp at Lety u Píseku, where they were reg­is­tered, pho­tographed and fin­ger­print­ed. In the spring they were trans­port­ed from there to the con­cen­tra­tion camp at Auschwitz,[2] but they had no idea where they were – they did­n’t find out until lat­er. There were up to eighty peo­ple, includ­ing chil­dren, in one wag­on; they had only what they were wear­ing. They had no food or drink for the jour­ney, and the chil­dren were cry­ing with thirst and hunger. The trans­port was escort­ed by Czech police and then hand­ed over to the Ger­mans; they arrived in Auschwitz at about 11 a.m. The guards drove them out of the wag­ons and herd­ed them into vehi­cles, which took them to the camp. From the gate the whole trans­port went to the quar­an­tine room, where they were giv­en num­bers, prison clothes and clogs. The fam­i­ly then spent three weeks in quar­an­tine. They were scared because they did not know what to expect.

She remem­bered that they were in block 22.[3] There was no heat­ing; the fam­i­lies slept togeth­er on three-storey bunk beds. The pris­on­ers had no blan­kets and suf­fered from the cold. The wood­en toi­lets were at the end of the block; the win­dows were small. The staff were both Ger­mans and Czechs, and the kapos were from the ranks of the pris­on­ers. Serynková report­ed that there were Czech women impris­oned there who were made block kapos and beat them very bad­ly, alleged­ly more than the Ger­mans.[4] The roll­calls last­ed for an hour or two, and only those who were deemed sick by the guards did not have to stand for the roll­calls; women with small chil­dren also had to stand there, and big­ger chil­dren from about ten years of age stood alone for the roll­call. Serynková said that once the guards drove them out into the cold and they had to kneel out­side for two hours. They were giv­en cof­fee and bread to eat, soup (antop) and 3 pota­toes after work, and soup in the evening; they usu­al­ly saved the bread for the evening. Some pris­on­ers received parcels, but it was not usu­al. Serynková her­self did not receive any­thing, as the whole fam­i­ly was in Auschwitz. The pris­on­ers were hun­gry and mal­nour­ished; Serynková tells how she used to col­lect pota­to peel­ings from the dunghill and then cook them on the fire. Sca­bies, typhus and tuber­cu­lo­sis were ram­pant in the camp, and there were no cures for any of them. Pris­on­ers were giv­en injec­tions with­out know­ing what they were for. The bod­ies of the dead were left on the block for up to three days and rations tak­en for them, and only then were the deaths report­ed. If a pris­on­er tried to escape, the rel­a­tives did not report him, lest they too be pun­ished. When an escapee was caught, the guards tor­tured him. It was said that thefts did not occur because there was noth­ing to steal, but peo­ple quar­relled and fought over food and rations.

Serynková report­ed that the pris­on­ers knew about the gas cham­bers and cre­ma­to­ria and that they were afraid of each new day because of this. She said that the worst day came when they called her moth­er’s num­ber and sent her to the gas cham­ber. Serynko­va begged the guards to let her see her moth­er, but in vain; she nev­er saw her again. The fol­low­ing day she lost her sis­ters Anna and Antonie and eight nieces and nephews in the same way. One by one she also lost her broth­ers Karl and Eduard. The lat­ter was beat­en to death by the Ger­mans because he could no longer work due to hunger. On the day she lost her sis­ters, they shaved her and cut her hair again and forced her to bathe with the men; when she refused, the guards beat her.

Serynko­va passed through oth­er camps as well; she said they worked 12 hours a day every­where. In Leipzig she was in an ammu­ni­tion fac­to­ry, in ​“Laze­brik” [Ravens­brück] she worked in a quar­ry and recalls that when they could no longer work, the Ger­mans sent dogs after them and beat them with bull­whips; in Buchen­wald they loaded shells, and in ​“Liten­berg” [Wit­ten­berg] they cut sheet met­al for air­planes; there she was due to go to the gas cham­ber, but was saved at the last moment by the fact that, on Hitler’s orders, pris­on­ers who were young and able to work were no longer killed but made to work. She said that the repeat­ed trans­ports saved her life.[5]

She did not remem­ber the exact date of lib­er­a­tion, but remem­bered that on 3 May 1945 the Ger­man com­man­der shout­ed that things were bad and let them go. She described how they all ran ​“like mad”, the Ger­mans shot at them and some pris­on­ers died on the elec­tri­fied wires. Many sick pris­on­ers remained in the camp, includ­ing children.

[1] It is not stat­ed by whom.

[2] Trans­port of May 7, 1943. (ed.)

[3] In fact, Block 22 remained vacant at first and lat­er a camp hos­pi­tal was set up there. The Czech Roma were placed in blocks 21, 23 and 25 on the oppo­site side of the camp road. (ed.)

[4] Serynková was refer­ring to the female prison offi­cials of the Ravens­brück con­cen­tra­tion camp. In the Gyp­sy camp, the women pris­on­ers rarely act­ed as kapos. (ed.)

[5] She was trans­port­ed to the Ravens­brück con­cen­tra­tion camp on 24 May 1944 and from there she was suc­ces­sive­ly assigned to the branch­es of this camp: in Leipzig-Schöne­feld and in Taucha (where she was trans­ferred via the Buchen­wald con­cen­tra­tion camp) she worked in the HASAG — Muni­tion­swerke Hugo Schnei­der AG fac­to­ry, and in Wit­ten­berg in the Linger­w­erke fac­to­ry. (ed.)

Those who sur­vived head­ed for Berlin, and from there Serynková and oth­ers walked to Prague. They walked only at night, but they did not reach Prague; they were stuck in Česká Lípa because there was fight­ing in Prague. Marie Ned­vě­dová and Alžbě­ta Danielová also returned from the camp. Serynková was ill for a long time after her return and due to the effects of the tor­ture she was com­plete­ly dis­abled. From the fam­i­ly, only her broth­er Alois returned.