Touro Marks Holocaust Remembrance with Survivor Testimony

“I Stand Here by the Grace of God”

Dorothea Szczesniak began to speak. 

The 96-year-old always begins her story the same way. “I am standing before you by the grace of God,” she said. “I owe it to my murdered parents.”

Born in Germany in 1929, Szczesniak lived in Berlin with her parents and younger sister. “I went to a Jewish school and wore a yellow star,” she said. “I remember the Hitler Youth chasing us through the streets.”

One moment of exclusion stands out: Szczesniak’s father took her and her sister to skate at a local pond, only to be greeted by a sign forbidding entrance to Jews.

Flight and Concealment

Recognizing the unsustainability of life in Germany, Szczesniak’s father traveled ahead to Brussels, then sent a message for his wife and daughters to follow. “The three of us spent months trying to slip into Belgium,” recalls Szczesniak. “We were repeatedly caught and sent back. We were sleeping in the woods.”

Eventually they succeeded, living freely in Belgium until the Nazis invaded in 1940. “We moved between hiding places, trying to stay ahead of the Gestapo,” said Szczesniak. “There were close calls.”

One Morning on the Farm

At one point, a kind woman hid the family on her farm — until the morning two men entered the girls’ room speaking German.

“I pretended not to understand them,” said Szczesniak. “The woman hiding us came in behind them and said, ‘These are my grandchildren — I watch them while their mother works. And they are late to school! Go!’ she said, gesturing toward us. We took our satchels from the floor and left.”

On their way downstairs, the girls wordlessly passed their parents. They never saw them again.(Szczesniak later learned her parents were sent to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where both perished.)

Various people took in Szczesniak and her sister, though they were not together. “I stayed with a family and assumed the identity of their dead daughter,” Szczesniak said. “A rope was kept in the bathroom for emergencies. When the time came, I swung onto a neighboring roof.”

Living With Memory

Following liberation, Szczesniak married a Ukrainian refugee and emigrated to the U.S. The couple had a son and a daughter, and Szczesniak found places to pursue her passions: singing and music.

“I’ve not stopped singing,” she says. And she still shares her story. “I’ve spoken to thousands of students. I tell them, ‘Hug and kiss your parents. I would have given anything to have had my mother at your age.’”

Today, Szczesniak still wears a Star of David — though she hides it under her clothes when she’s out. “I should not have to do that,” she said. 

Still, she considers herself blessed. “After saying shema each morning, I thank God for another day,” she says.