Smuggled in potato sacks : fifty stories of the hidden children of the Kaunas Ghetto

Edited By Solomon Abramovich And Yakov Zilberg. This is a unique and valuable book, a powerful account of fifty Jewish children hidden in the Kovno Ghetto during the Second World War. Each story has its own character and its own resonance, which will bring this harsh period into stark relief. There is much in these pages of suffering, but also of courage, endurance and nobility of spirit. To those in these pages who saved the lives of Jewish children, a great debt of gratitude is due, and admiration at the grave risks they took to show that even in the midst of evil, there are human faces and humane individuals.--Sir Martin Gilbert, Author of The Holocaust: The Jewish Tragedy The stories cover the background of the families before the war, life in the Ghetto and the main tragic events that happened in Kaunas during three years of fascist regime in Lithuania. The memoirs describe how children were smuggled out of the ghetto and their experiences and feelings living with the gentiles who sheltered them. The subsequent reunions for the fortunate ones whose parents had survived, and life with adoptive parents or in orphanages are portrayed. Information is also provided about what became of the child survivors and where they are today This book is a collective memory of events that happened to Kaunas Jewry during the Nazi occupation of Lithuania in 1941-44. It contains fifty stories of persons who experienced the Holocaust in their earlier childhood in Kaunas. Most participants are writing about their ordeal in this book for the first time, after more then sixty years of silence. These people are among the very last living survivors and witnesses of the Holocaust Yakov Zilberg was born in 1942 in the Kaunas ghetto and survived the Holocaust as a `hidden child'. He graduated from the Kaunas Medical School in 1965, and in 1972 emigrated to Israel where he was actively involved in the management and administration of Israeli Health Care services. He retired in 2009 aged 67. --Book Jacket Solomon Abramovich's sister Ariela Abramovich Sef was rescued by their parents from Kaunas Ghetto. They were able to preserve some documents and retell those incredible human stories of survival in adversity. Solomon Abramovich is a surgeon at Imperial College, London and is also engaged in academic work and teaching The book is a tribute to the heroic parents of the `hidden children', to the resistance movement that played the crucial role in the organization of the rescue operations, and to the gentile people, who endangered their own and their families' lives to save the Jewish children About 5,000 children were imprisoned in the Kaunas Ghetto in 1941-44, of which some 250-300 were smuggled out of the ghetto, hidden by gentiles and survived