Itka Zygmuntowicz was born in April 1926 in Ciechanów, Poland. It was a small town. They lived in two different places there. They were a small Jewish community of about 2,000. She had a lot of relatives. One of them emigrated to Palestine when Zygmuntowicz was eight years old. This would be the only child in that family to survive the Holocaust. Her father was in the wholesale dairy business. Later he became a photographer. He would travel to Warsaw, Poland to take the pictures and he would frame them at his house. They left it all behind when chased out by the Germans. She attended public school, but it was mostly Jewish kids. She went to Hebrew school as well. She did not want to learn Hebrew, but she did. Her parents were wonderful. When the Nazis invaded Poland and took Warsaw, the troubles began. Every day produced different laws. They had to wear the yellow stars and could not walk in the street. They were not allowed to have transactions with non-Jews. A man came to sell household articles, and everyone came to look. Her mother got worried and invited him inside so they would not be seen. Only one person, Calfus, bought something, but the man denounced her family. This was the first time her mother lied. If one person had done something wrong, the whole family would be killed. The Nazis took her mother away and Zygmuntowicz started to follow them. Both were taken to the Gestapo station and separated. Zygmuntowicz could hear her mother screaming terribly. Then she became quiet. They dragged her mother out and then took her in. Zygmuntowicz was 13 years old and did not understand. She was beaten and then finally let go. Calfus was saved. While being beaten, she did not understand why her mother would not talk. She wondered if her mother cared more Calfus than her. Only later did she understand, and she respected and admired her mother for the kind of person that she was.

Itka Zygmuntowicz lived in Ciechanów, Poland when the Nazis started rationing food. There was a lot of starvation. They wore the yellow stars [Annotator's Note: Jews living in Nazi occupied areas were forced to wear a yellow Star of David on their outer clothing to identify them as being Jewish] and she could not attend school any more. Every day was worse than the last. There was no one to answer her questions of why. She was only attacked once for being Jewish before this. She was now 13 years old and could not understand. It does not bother her now as long as they do not hurt her. She knows who she is but back then her faith in humanity was tested. The Nazis came to her village in 1939. She was 15 years old when she was taken to the Nowe Miasto Ghetto for one year. Her grandmother died a natural death there. Zygmuntowicz was placed in one house with six or seven other families. Bickering started over who could cook when. Her parents said they were leaving and she thought her mother had lost her mind. They moved to an empty space where grain used to be stored. Her parents collected bricks and built a stove. Her mother said that they at least had peace there.

Itka Zygmuntowicz was 15 years old when she was taken to the Nowe Miasto Ghetto. There were outbreaks of typhus there and she caught it. There was no school there. She was still young and the atmosphere was very depressing. She was taken out to work the fields once in a while. She was at least outside, so she enjoyed it. Inside the ghetto, people were dying and people would be just sitting and crying. She does not remember very much of it though. Her parents shielded her from a lot of it. Her mother would read to them and keep it as normal as possible. There was a lot of fear. There were dead people lying around. She considers herself lucky in that her whole family was still intact. She did not know of any non-Jews being in the ghetto. Her family was in this ghetto for 13 months. After that, she was put onto a cattle train and traveled for days. Nobody knew where they were going. It was so crowded that it was difficult to sit, and people died in the cars. Her deep faith in God is what kept her going. She did not know whether she would be saved or not. Her parents protected her as much as they could. They traveled in unsanitary conditions, with no food, for three straight days without stopping.

Itka Zygmuntowicz was 15 years old when she and her family were taken by train from the Nowe Miasto Ghetto. They rode in indescribable conditions for three days before stopping at Auschwitz. They were told to leave all of their belongings behind. Men were lined up on one side and women and children on the other. She never saw her father again and does not know where he died. Zygmuntowicz and her mother were chosen to go into the camp, but her younger brother and sister were taken from them. Her mother told her, "You are a big girl. I have to go with my little children. Remember, my child, that no matter what happens to you, do not become hateful and bitter. It will destroy you." That was the last time she ever saw her mother. Zygmuntowicz was marched into the camp and saw people in striped clothing who had no hair. She was taken into a room where she was questioned, had numbers put on her arm, had her hair shaved from her whole body, and was given clothing that had the same number as what was on her arm. They were not people now, just numbers that all looked alike. They went into the barracks where there were too many people for each bed. They got little food in the mornings before they lined up to be counted. Some people died overnight. After that, they marched to the gate. Anyone who could not march or looked sick would be taken away. In each barrack, there was a woman guard. In the yard it was both men and women. Sometimes people were taken out of line at random. There was no place for them to relieve themselves in private and they were timed as to how long they could take. Guard dogs were used to pull people out of line. The Germans addressed the dogs as humans and vice versa. If anyone got diarrhea, they were finished. If you were not clean, you were taken to the gas chamber. Zygmuntowicz did not know about them at the time. She kept asking when her parents would come back and nobody would answer. Finally, one girl told her the truth. At that point, Zygmuntowicz became indifferent. She sat down and started crying. A girl thought she was crying due to hunger and she gave her bread. They remained together the rest of the time and they became like sisters.

Itka Zygmuntowicz was in Auschwitz and had to work outside. She got lucky and started working in a place where the Germans were bundling the items they took from the Jews to send to Germany. This was indoors. After they would leave, they would be searched to make sure they had not stolen anything, including cavity searches where were so humiliating. Her best friend and she owed each other their lives. They supported each other fully. The people who did not hold up were the ones who were just finished. The physically unfit were the first to go. It was often at random as well. If you were marching, you wanted to be on the inside of any group. The Germans would make their dogs bite the people on the outside. If you got sick, you were finished. She does not know if anyone did not make it due to their mental condition. Some people gave up. She had been in the ghetto already and she knew if she did not survive there would be no one to tell her family's story. She lived for the next minute, you could not live for the next day. The prisoners were completely at the mercy of the moods of their captors. Her parents had taught her, "as one is at seven, one is at 70." Not everyone there was alike. They were treated alike, nevertheless. There was a girl named Esther. Zygmuntowicz could not eat, and she left a piece of bread out one night. Esther showed her empathy for someone stealing her bread. Another night she did not eat her bread but woke up to see Esther eating it. The next morning Esther said, "poor Itka, someone has eaten your bread." Zygmuntowicz told her that she knew she took her bread. Esther told her to curse her or at least say something. Zygmuntowicz would not stoop to her level and she remained silent. Most of the girls tried to help each other.

Itka Zygmuntowicz learned to appreciate life in Auschwitz because she could lose her life at any second. Even among the Nazis, there were some who were less cruel than the others. Mengele [Annotator's Note: SS-Hauptsturmführer Dr. Josef Mengele] was the worst. Zygmuntowicz had no interactions with him, but she saw him. Zygmuntowicz knew a woman who survived his experiments on her, including castration. It is pure chance that Zygmuntowicz survived. She would not commit suicide. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer tells how Mengele selected people.] Zygmuntowicz does not know. Once the Nazis came and said that anyone who wanted extra bread should come forward. Zygmuntowicz did not trust them. Those who left were experimented on by Mengele. The cruelty had no limits. Zygmuntowicz says Mengele was good looking. There were many selections made at the gate of the camp. The people from a lot of countries other than Poland did not last more than a few months. Deprivation of liberty was the worst. They could not even go to the bathroom. If they were allowed to go, the guards would stand and watch. [Annotator's Note: The interviewer asks if they stripped them of their dignity.] Dignity was not up to them, dignity was up to the individual. She tried to do everything she could that would not make her less of a human. Her strongest memory is of the Muselmann. [Annotator's Note: Muselmann literally means Muslim but was used as a slang term by concentration camp prisoners to describe those among them who had given up all hope and had lapsed into a state of despairing apathy.] To see the cruelty was terrible. You never know your own strength until you are tested. She and her best friend would not have survived without the other. Knowing somebody cares helps. The Nazis did not care.

Itka Zygmuntowicz had no information and no idea about the war or world outside of Auschwitz. A girl was there [Annotator's Note: Roza Robota] who had been a leader of a Zionist organization [Annotator's Note: Hashomer Hatzair Zionist-socialist youth movement] before the war. She worked in the ammunition factory [Annotator's Note: Krupp "Weichsel" factory] and she saw the Nazis were trying to destroy the evidence of the camps because they were starting to lose the war. She smuggled some ammunition and managed to blow up one of the crematoria [Annotator's Note: this event was known as the Sonderkommando prisoner revolt, 7 October 1944]. She was caught and was kept naked and without food in solitary. They tortured her and then publicly hanged her [Annotator's Note: with three other women - Ala Gertner, Estusia Wajcblum, and Regina Safirsztajn on 6 January 1945]. Before she died, she said "be strong and brave" in Hebrew [Annotator's Note: "Chazak V'amatz" or "Be strong and have courage"; Biblical phrase, and motto of Hashomer Hatzair]. Another girl was helped to escape by a non-Jew. She was captured and was going to be hanged. She slapped a Nazi and called him a pig. She was then taken away and killed. The Nazis did not want the world to know what they were doing. On 18 January 1945, Zygmuntowicz woke up and was ordered to march out of the camp. They did not know where they were going. Usually, if they ate, they did so in the morning, a meal of coffee, bread, cheese. In the evening it was soup. The Jews were a minority and the most sophisticated army in the world took all of their possessions and lives. For 2,000 years, the Jews have said, "next year in Jerusalem." Zygmuntowicz survived Auschwitz and was able to go to Jerusalem, Israel. She met Calfus there, a man that her mother and her had saved by not giving his name to the Gestapo, even when beaten earlier in Poland.

Itka Zygmuntowicz stayed in Auschwitz until 18 January 1945 when she and the other inmates were marched out of the camp. Anyone who could not walk fast enough or fell, was shot. There was no mercy whatsoever. There was no food. She marched to Ravensbrück, Germany. [Annotator's Note: The Ravensbrück concentration camp in Ravensbrück, Germany was a concentration camp exclusively for women.] After that, they marched until the Allies got close and then they were put on trucks and taken to the Malchow concentration camp [Annotator's Note: Malchow, Germany; sub-camp of the Ravensbrück concentration camp]. The Swedish Red Cross liberated those who were close to death there. They were then put on trucks again. Shrapnel came into the truck, hitting a girl in the foot and it had to be amputated. They were taken to Sweden and then it was figuratively over but it will never be over for her as the ones lost will never be replaced. In Sweden, there was a rabbi's wife who was Orthodox and wanted to save some of the children by sending them to a refugee center. Those under 21 who wanted to go did so. Zygmuntowicz did not want to separate from her friend, Bina, so she did not go. Bina promised she would take her later. At first, they were put in quarantine. After that, they worked in the camp. Zygmuntowicz was liberated 26 April 1945. At first she was afraid to go with the Swedes, so she remained in Sweden for eight years. There were Germans at Malchow, but the camp was not as strict due to losing the war and the Swedish Red Cross was able to liberate the camp. The Swedes were very kind. The freed inmates were taken to a hospital first. Zygmuntowicz could not speak Swedish. They were in Sweden in a camp for a while so they could not spread any diseases. People would come to see them through the gates.

After being liberated from Malchow [Annotator's Note: the Malchow concentration camp in Malchow, Germany, a sub-camp of the Ravensbrück concentration camp], Itka Zygmuntowicz and her best friend went to work at a hospital in Sweden. Zygmuntowicz worked in the kitchen for a nice woman who helped her learn the language. There was another boss who was not nice to her. One day the mean boss told her she could not have her day off. Zygmuntowicz said that she was free now and she would do what she wanted and walked out. The nice boss asked her to return and she started to, but then decided she could not do that. [Annotator's Note: She starts to speak but the tape cuts and restarts at a later point.] Zygmuntowicz went to the train, said good-bye to her friends, and went to Borås, Sweden. She was completely alone in the world. She lifted her head to heaven and prayed that she had survived with her dignity and hoped she would not lose it now. She came across a girl she knew from the concentration camp. The girl had a room and took her in. She went to the unemployment office and got a job. Her other two friends came there as well, and they worked and lived together. They worked in a clothes factory and took turns going home to make food for their lunch. She fell once and a man picked her up and helped her home. He wanted to clean her scraped knees. She warmed the food and he wanted to pay to have some food. She invited him to Sunday dinner, and he became a friend and came often. After one year, he invited her and her friend to his apartment. When they were leaving, he asked if he could walk her home and she said yes. He later told his friends about her, one of whom would become her husband [Annotator's Note: in 1946]. They would be married for 52 years before he was killed in a car accident. Nobody Zygmuntowicz knows died a natural death.

Itka Zygmuntowicz lost her whole family other than one cousin who had made it to Palestine. She does not know for certain that they all died, but she never heard from any of them again. When she arrived at Auschwitz, there were Jewish prisoners playing music at the gate. [Annotator's Note: Zygmuntowicz shows the interviewer an album.] She assumes this kept people from revolting right there. Everything was a lie. Zygmuntowicz cannot deal with people who lie. Her most vivid memory is her mother telling her at the gate, "Whatever happens to you, do not become hateful and bitter. Do not let them destroy you." "Menschlichkeit", humanity, the highest form of religious education, to be a little mensch means to be a decent human being. Anybody can be humane or inhumane. Zygmuntowicz would like young people to speak up and stand up to injustice. She started to work in America [Annotator's Note: Zygmuntowicz immigrated to the United States on 15 February 1953] for a fashion designer as an apprentice. Her son was not feeling well and was hospitalized. Her boss told her that if she did not come to work, she would not have a job, so she left. She does not argue. She went home and asked her husband if he would be able to take care of their son while she went to design school to become her own boss. She finished and became a fashion designer. She worked from home so she could be with her husband. All of the clothing she produced was custom. In America, she realized how terrible she felt when her children asked why they did not have relatives. She stopped working then to focus on raising a good family. Once her youngest son was in high school, she started volunteering at Senior-living facilities and hospitals. She started working in a prison doing therapy work. She had the inmates sit in a circle and asked them to hold hands. One did not want to, and she explained that she had been in concentration camps. They then wanted to hear her stories. One of the prisoners she really loved, later committed suicide and it destroyed her. Her children will do anything she asked of them. Certain people say she must be lonely because she lives alone but many people come to see her and she treats everyone with respect.