Kiwa Zyto
May 1945 Germany
The guards order Kiwa and the other prisoners to line up. They force them to march for many hours. Some prisoners are so exhausted that they lie down on the roadside. Others try to escape by pretending they are dead. But a truck full of SS officers trails the marching prisoners, ready to shoot anyone who lies down or falls behind.
AFTER AUSCHWITZ-BIRKENAU, Kiwa came to Dachau forced labour camp. He was later moved to a camp in Landsberg. It was from there that he and the other prisoners were ordered to set out on a “death march”.
After walking for nearly two days without food, they were finally allowed to rest. Kiwa fell asleep. When the prisoners awoke the next morning, the guards had vanished. They were free. Everyone ran in different directions. Kiwa searched abandoned houses for food and clothing.
After liberation, Kiwa was first sent to live in a school with other freed prisoners. Kiwa was twelve years old, and for the first time since hiding in that attic in the Kielce ghetto, he was finally around other children.
Later that year, Kiwa was reunited with his older brother Marek, who had fled to the Soviet Union at the start of the war. Their mother Zelda had also survived and arrived on one of the White Buses to Sweden and Örebro.
Death marches
At the turn of the year 1944–1945, the SS began emptying extermination and concentration camps of prisoners. The Allied armies were approaching and the SS command hoped to hide the extent of the systematic murder from the outside world.
Emptying the camps started with the murder of those who were weak. The others were forced to walk to other camps closer to the centre of Germany. Tens of thousands of people died during the so-called death marches. Those who could not continue to walk, were shot dead. Many died of cold, disease and exhaustion.