My Sack Full of Memories. Zwi Lewin

wasn’t too worried about carrying more goods.

      How we travelled from Yurburg that morning I don’t recall. It was said we took an early morning bus, but this bus has not made the history books and it is unlikely that such a bus would have been leaving at pre-dawn in Yurburg on a Sunday morning. It is recorded that in the early morning a steamboat on the river left the town for Kovno with some who were fleeing on board. Those who disembarked met the fate of the town. There were very few who escaped, some on bicycles, before the Germans arrived. The panicking Jews may have failed to organise themselves at such short notice, but most would not have owned a vehicle that could outrun the German invasion. Daniel had stolen the fire truck and Yosef, also being a mechanic, would have had access to a vehicle. They had the means to get away fast, which is what we did.

      We must have left at about 5 am, for by 6 am the German aircraft were dropping bombs, mostly landing in the Neiman River and damaging only a few buildings. By 8 am the German soldiers had marched in and the entire Jewish population of Yurburg of some 2000 was trapped. Few escaped what was to follow.

      I recall no troops, bombs or aircraft as we left Yurburg early that morning, just the panic and rushing. It would have been a trip of no more than two or three hours to get to Kovno. Yosef had loaded his pregnant wife and his two sons into the vehicle and had sped off through the chaos. As I was clinging on to Azriel, I was swept along as well and found myself with my cousins being driven away from my mother. I doubt Yosef even hesitated when he saw his extra passenger, for going back and trying to find my mother would have imperilled them all.

      It was said that my mother and Chaya were too slow in reacting and missed going with Yosef. However, I suspect the plan was for my mother, Chaya and me to go with Daniel and Rivka, and for Yosef and Sara and their children to go separately. Why did the men decide to divide the family? Most likely the fire truck Daniel had stolen only had a front cabin and so couldn’t have carried us all.

      My going with the wrong family and my disappearance in the chaos and confusion can be explained, but my mother, of course, panicked, assuming I was somehow lost. A seven-and-a-half-year-old child … not only did I not have a father with me, but the mother who doted on me suddenly wasn’t with us. I know I was crying as we drove away for I remember the sensation of having lost my mother. I wasn’t to know it then, but the tears were justified because it would be many months before I saw my mother and sister again.

      When the German soldiers reached Kovno (Kaunas), the nominal capital of Lithuania, in the days that followed, the so-called invading troops marched down the streets cheered by the people. The Lithuanians had detested their short period under Russian rule and believed the Germans would allow an independent Lithuanian State to be re-created. They were mistaken and Lithuania was soon under the German rule.