guardian angel. She used all her power to obtain certain well-deserved advantages for Iréna and made that her personal business.
Through her intervention, for example, Iréna was given other work because the work she had been doing, the packing of arms, was too exhausting.
What should be pointed out is that there existed a hierarchy among prisoners. Mathilde, who was French and spoke German, was at the top of the ladder. Then came Simone and I, two British subjects. At the bottom of the scale were all the others, except the Jews, who were unclassifiable. So, thanks to Mathilde, Iréna was assigned to another, less physically demanding job and found herself, like me, assembling belts for machine-gun bullets. With the consent of two officers, Mathilde managed throughout our captivity to leave Iréna’s name out of the Lottery of Death.
Special Days
A t the camp, we lost all track of time. Our only reference point was the day of Hitler’s birthday, April 20, because then we were entitled to a slice of sausage. How generous of him! That’s how I could tell how many years I had been locked up here.
Gradually a certain routine settled in, in spite of the horror around us. The production of arms seemed to be our guards’ main concern. In the course of my second year of captivity, however, the German soldiers started behaving more violently toward us. There must have been a reason. At the beginning of the war, Mathilde said, the German army was confident it would win. But the situation had become more difficult, owing to the huge loss of life on the battlefields. The troops’ morale was affected by this. It was out of the question for Hitler to suffer another defeat like the one of 1914–18.
One day, after our shift and roll call, the soldiers decided to make up a new game to avenge themselves for the deaths of their countrymen killed in action. They would place the prisoners’ names in the helmet of a soldier and the woman whose name was drawn was shot on the spot, in front of all the others. We called this appalling game the “Lottery of Death.” It took place once a month.
How can I describe the dread they made us endure while we waited for them to draw the name of the woman who would be doomed to die? We would stand close together. When we heard that our name hadn’t been chosen, we couldn’t help but be relieved, but at the same time we felt immensely sad for the woman who was going to be shot.
When the soldier took aim at the prisoner and she began to scream, we turned around so we wouldn’t have to witness that horrible scene. It was unspeakable. The screams of those girls have always haunted my sleep. Yet the height of barbarism hadn’t been reached yet.
There were twins among us, just eighteen years old. They were from Quebec. They happened to be in Brittany when they were arrested. Their father, an engineer, had been awarded a two-year contract for the building of a bridge and decided to take his little family with him. On a certain day, a soldier drew the name of one of the twins. Her sister started howling and clung to her. The girls who shared their mattress tried to hold her back, but when the gun went off and her sister fell, she cried and screamed even louder. As no one was able to calm her down, the soldier ordered the girls to stand back with the tip of his gun and then fired at the other twin, who collapsed on top of her sister, who was already dead.
This time, we didn’t have a chance to turn around and we saw it all. We never expected such an inhuman act. The soldier himself seemed surprised by his impulsive decision. He was no longer able to look us in the eye. I had a feeling that the soldiers found our distress so difficult to bear that their rage turned them into real beasts. Perhaps they wanted to indicate to us that they really had no choice but to act this way, they were just following orders and couldn’t do anything about it. Otherwise, they might go mad …
Another ordeal was
Through her intervention, for example, Iréna was given other work because the work she had been doing, the packing of arms, was too exhausting.
What should be pointed out is that there existed a hierarchy among prisoners. Mathilde, who was French and spoke German, was at the top of the ladder. Then came Simone and I, two British subjects. At the bottom of the scale were all the others, except the Jews, who were unclassifiable. So, thanks to Mathilde, Iréna was assigned to another, less physically demanding job and found herself, like me, assembling belts for machine-gun bullets. With the consent of two officers, Mathilde managed throughout our captivity to leave Iréna’s name out of the Lottery of Death.
Special Days
A t the camp, we lost all track of time. Our only reference point was the day of Hitler’s birthday, April 20, because then we were entitled to a slice of sausage. How generous of him! That’s how I could tell how many years I had been locked up here.
Gradually a certain routine settled in, in spite of the horror around us. The production of arms seemed to be our guards’ main concern. In the course of my second year of captivity, however, the German soldiers started behaving more violently toward us. There must have been a reason. At the beginning of the war, Mathilde said, the German army was confident it would win. But the situation had become more difficult, owing to the huge loss of life on the battlefields. The troops’ morale was affected by this. It was out of the question for Hitler to suffer another defeat like the one of 1914–18.
One day, after our shift and roll call, the soldiers decided to make up a new game to avenge themselves for the deaths of their countrymen killed in action. They would place the prisoners’ names in the helmet of a soldier and the woman whose name was drawn was shot on the spot, in front of all the others. We called this appalling game the “Lottery of Death.” It took place once a month.
How can I describe the dread they made us endure while we waited for them to draw the name of the woman who would be doomed to die? We would stand close together. When we heard that our name hadn’t been chosen, we couldn’t help but be relieved, but at the same time we felt immensely sad for the woman who was going to be shot.
When the soldier took aim at the prisoner and she began to scream, we turned around so we wouldn’t have to witness that horrible scene. It was unspeakable. The screams of those girls have always haunted my sleep. Yet the height of barbarism hadn’t been reached yet.
There were twins among us, just eighteen years old. They were from Quebec. They happened to be in Brittany when they were arrested. Their father, an engineer, had been awarded a two-year contract for the building of a bridge and decided to take his little family with him. On a certain day, a soldier drew the name of one of the twins. Her sister started howling and clung to her. The girls who shared their mattress tried to hold her back, but when the gun went off and her sister fell, she cried and screamed even louder. As no one was able to calm her down, the soldier ordered the girls to stand back with the tip of his gun and then fired at the other twin, who collapsed on top of her sister, who was already dead.
This time, we didn’t have a chance to turn around and we saw it all. We never expected such an inhuman act. The soldier himself seemed surprised by his impulsive decision. He was no longer able to look us in the eye. I had a feeling that the soldiers found our distress so difficult to bear that their rage turned them into real beasts. Perhaps they wanted to indicate to us that they really had no choice but to act this way, they were just following orders and couldn’t do anything about it. Otherwise, they might go mad …
Another ordeal was
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