Warszewer cawoes. Warsaw Testaments.

  • Rachela
  • Auerbach
  • Tel Aviv
  • 1974
  • personal accounts
  • yes
  • in part
  • Yiddish
  • A journalist and a social activist. In the 1920s she worked in Lvov in the editor's office of 'Najer Morgen' ('New Tomorrow') magazine. She was one of the pillars of the Ringelblum's archive. She was writing "A Monograph about Folk Cuisine', which she was to prepare within the framework of the 'Two Years of the Ghetto' contest organized by Ringelblum. For a long time (almost three years) she ran a kitchen for writers, which later on fed other ghetto residents too. The kitchen was located in the Warsaw ghetto, at Leszno Street No. 40. At that time she was living at her relatives' place at Leszno Street No. 66. During the First Action both buildings became an integral part the complex of enterprises and living quarters which belonged to the W.C. Toebens company. Rachela, as the manager of the kitchen, still worked there. After the First Action she was moved to the factory located at Franciszkanska Street No. 30 which produced honey ersatz and sweets. The factory was located at the back of the building in which The Supply Section [of the Judenrat] was located. Many activist from Ringelblum's circle worked there. Rachela's task was to write down the testimony of one of the prisoners who escaped from the Treblinka death camp. After the Second Action she went to the 'Aryan side'. Teodor Pajewski led her to the 'Aryan side' in March 1943. After the fiasco of the Warsaw Uprising she was driven out of Warsaw with other Polish residents.