Jerzy Bielecki, Polish and Catholic political prisoner, he entered Auschwitz on June 13, 1940. As to all inmates, was given a number, 243. At just 19 he was sentenced to hard labor. He became somewhat famous for being one of the few prisoners who successfully escaped from Auschwitz in July 1944 with his Jewish girlfriend, Cyla Cybulska.
Here is his testimony:
With each step he took toward the gate, Jerzy I was sure that at any moment he would shoot. It was July 21, 1944. Bielecki walking in broad daylight by the Auschwitz concentration camp, wearing a stolen Nazi uniform, with his Jewish girlfriend Cyla Cybulska at his side. Knees were trembling from fear, but tried to convey an image of confidence as he approached a security checkpoint. The German guard checked his passport counterfeit watched for a moment that seemed an eternity and finally said the words expected: "Ja, danke" (yes, thank you) and let Cyla Jerzy and regain their freedom.
Auschwitz Prisoners said that the only way out there was through the chimneys of the crematoria. Cyla Jerzy and did a side door. Bielecki, who was 23, took advantage of the relatively privileged status that gave him the fact that a Polish Catholic who spoke German to plan a daring rescue of his Jewish girlfriend, who was sentenced to die.
"It was a great love," said Bielecki, who is now 89, in an interview at his home in this small town in southern Poland, 85 kilometers (55 miles ) of Auschwitz. "We planned to get married and live together the rest of our lives." Bielecki was 19 when the Germans captured him thinking he was working with the resistance - which did not happen - and included it in the first group of prisoners sent to Auschwitz in April 1940. All were Polish. He was given the number 243 and was assigned to work in warehouses, where occasionally getting extra food that helped him survive.
That was two years before they started the influx of Jews, most of whom were burned away in the nearby Birkenau. A few were assigned to forced labor in appalling conditions, which delayed his death. In September 1943 he was sent Bielecki a grain tank. Another prisoner was showing the place when it opened a door and showed some girls. "I found one, a pretty woman with brown hair, winked at me," says Bielecki with a smile. It was Cyla, who had been ordered repaired sacks of grain. Started attending in the tank and fell in love.
In an article he wrote for an event on Auschwitz in 1983, Cybulska said that during his meetings were told their lives. The girl, her parents, two brothers and a younger sister were arrested in a raid in January 1943 in the Lomza ghetto northern Poland and were taken to Auschwitz-Birkenau. The parents and sister were sent immediately to the gas chambers, but she and her brothers were put to work. September, Cybulska, 22, was the only one still alive, with the number 29558 tattooed on his left arm.
As their love grew, Bielecki began to plan an escape. Through a Polish friend who worked at the depot uniforms, got an SS uniform and a pass. Using an eraser and a pen, changed her official name, if the guard knew him, and wrote he drew to a prison to be interrogated outside the field in a nearby police station. Sought some food, a razor blade and a sweater and boots for Cybulska. He told her what was her plan: "Tomorrow will come and get you someone in the SS for questioning. That person will be me." The next day, afternoon, Bielecki came to where she was and sweating, her supervisor demanded that it surrender. Took her to a side gate where a sleepy guard let them pass. They went into the countryside and hid in the undergrowth. At nightfall they resumed their march.
"Walking through the countryside and forests was exhausting, especially for me, I was not accustomed to such activities," said Cybulska in his report, according to a book he wrote Bielecki, "He who saves one life ...". "We had to cross swollen rivers. Jurek (Bielecki Polish name) took me to the other side." At some point he felt too tired to continue and told him to let her Bielecki. He refused. They walked nine nights at the house of an uncle of Bielecki in a village near Krakow. His mother was living there, that there was no joy when she saw him alive. Devout Catholic, did not want to marry a Jew.
decided it was safer for her to hide in a nearby farm and he was in Krakow. They spent their last night together in a pear tree, making plans for the future. Meet again after the war. When the Russians came to Krakow in January 1945, Bielecki ran 40 kilometers (25 miles) walk in the snow to meet Cybulska on the farm. But arrived four days late.
Cybulska thought "Juracek" was dead or had forgotten about it and went by train to Warsaw determined to find a guy who lived in the United States. On the train he met a Jew, David Zacharowitz, who began a relationship and married. They both went to Sweden and then to New York, where Cybulska uncle helped to open a jewelry store. Zacharowitz died in 1975.
In Poland, Bielecki also started a family and worked as director of a school for auto mechanics. Cybulska said he always thought of Jurek and longed to return to Poland and find out what had become of him. One day he told his story to a Polish lady he cleaned the house. The woman was taken aback. "I heard the story of a man who appeared on Polish television," said the woman, according to Bielecki. He found his phone number and one morning in May 1983 Bielecki responded to a call at his apartment in Nowy Targ. "I heard the voice of someone who was laughing, or crying, then a woman's voice says' Juracku, me, your Cyla," says Bielecki.
A few weeks were found in the Krakow airport. He took him 39 roses, one for each year they were separated. She visited Poland several times. Together they went to the Auschwitz museum, the farm owned by her and hid it elsewhere. In hotels slept together. "Reborn love," said Bielecki. "Cyla told me, leave your wife and come with me to America," he says. "She cried when she said I could not do that to my children."
She returned to New York and wrote: "Jurek, and not come back," said Bielecki. They did not look and she did not respond to his letters. Cybulska died in New York in 2002. Jerzy said: "I was in love with Cyla. The fate decided by us, but I would to do the same. "
In 1985 the Yad Vashem Institute of Jerusalem Bielecki gave him credit for having saved Cybulska.
Sources:
http://www1.yadvashem.org/yv/en/exhibitions/flickers_of_light/jerzy_bielecki.asp
http://www. thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/3065556/I-escaped-from-Auschwitz-with-Jewish-sweetheart.html? OTC-RSS & ATTR = News
http://www.tarbutsefarad.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3713% 3Aun-love-born-in-auschwitz-to-endure-decades & catid = 448 & Itemid = 100386 & lang = en
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