The Young Survivors

by Debra Barnes

  ‘When can I see her? She will know what happened to the others,’ I said.

  ‘Your sister is seven years old and probably suffered trauma. We don’t know how she is or what she knows. Children can be very resilient or very delicate. Please be prepared for the fact she may not be able to tell you anything.’

  How could I be so stupid? She was so young when she was taken. But she had been found. I should concentrate on the positive.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said. ‘Where is she?’

  ‘The sisters have asked that the location of the convent not be shared, but they will bring Georgette here tomorrow.’

  ‘Why the secrecy? What have they got to hide?’

  ‘Some people in the Church think the children they have been looking after should stay with them. Most of them have been baptised and have been living as Catholics for some years. You are fortunate that Georgette has been identified.’

  I was told to return the next afternoon to be reunited with my sister.

  Georgette

  Paris

  September 1945

  When I was called to the office of the mère supérieure, I wondered if I was in trouble. I had only been in that room once before, the day when I was welcomed to the convent. Sister Marie accompanied me, looking as nervous as I felt. We waited outside until we were invited to enter. The mère supérieure sat behind her desk and told us to sit down.

  ‘Hello, Isabel. Hello, Sister Marie.’

  ‘Good morning, Mère Supérieure,’ said Sister Marie, speaking for us both.

  ‘How are you, Isabel?’

  ‘Well, thank you, Mère Supérieure. I have been learning my Bible stories,’ I replied politely.

  ‘Good girl. Now, Isabel, I have received a telephone call. Do you remember your brother Pierre?’

  There was a moment of silence. Why was she asking me about Pierre? For as long as I had been living here I had been told to never mention my family and now I was being asked about my brother. I had thought of Henriette every day and every night, wondering where she and Claude were and if they were doing the same things I was, and I thought about the others too, but I had never spoken of them. I wasn’t sure if I should talk about them now – maybe this was a test?

  ‘It’s alright, Isabel. Please answer the mère supérieure,’ said Sister Marie.

  ‘Yes, Mère Supérieure,’ was all I could manage to say.

  ‘That is good. The call I received was from Paris to say that your brother Pierre is looking for you.’ The mère supérieure studied my face for my reaction.

  ‘Are Henriette, Claude and Samuel there too?’ I asked. It felt strange saying their names out loud after a year of silence. ‘And Maman and Papa?’

  ‘We only know about Pierre, but you will be taken to see him tomorrow.’ She sounded like she was trying not to cry. ‘It is almost time for prayers now. Off you go, Georgette. God bless you, child.’

  I hurried out of her office and it wasn’t until the door shut behind me that I realised she had called me Georgette.

  ****

  I couldn’t believe my eyes. This was the most beautiful place I had ever seen. It was like a palace. I was in a room with a lady called Lucille. She collected me early that morning and brought me to Paris. I ran my hands over the velvet chairs that, despite being very worn, felt like dancing fairies under my fingertips. The convent seemed a million miles away.

  I wanted to stay forever but Lucille explained I was only here to reunite with Pierre. I was given lunch while we waited for him to arrive. It was delicious! There was only a small amount of food on my plate, but I couldn’t eat it all anyway. Lucille told me my stomach was now small – I thought that was strange because my tummy seemed quite fat – so I could only eat a little at a time. But she said that soon I would get used to more food, and then I could have proper meals. When someone came to take my lunch plate away, Lucille told them to leave it so I could eat some more when I got hungry again. What was this place? Was I in Heaven?

  The strict modesty we lived by at the convent meant there were no mirrors, so it was a huge surprise when I first saw my own image. I went to use the bathroom and, while I washed my hands in the marble sink with the bar of soap which smelt of lavender, I looked up and saw a girl my age looking back at me.

  ‘Henriette?’ I cried with joy. ‘Is that you? They didn’t tell me you were coming.’

  I went to touch the girl’s face, but my hand stroked the glass instead. I touched my own face and watched as the girl in the mirror did the same.

  ‘I miss you so much. Where are you?’ Tears fell down my cheeks and I watched as the girl in front of me wept too.

  ‘Georgette? Are you alright?’ called Lucille from the other side of the door.

  ‘Yes. Just washing my hands,’ I said. I splashed some water on my face and dried it with the soft white towel. I looked in the mirror again. ‘Come on, Henriette, we’re going to see Pierre now!’

  Pierre

  Paris

  September 1945

  I didn’t sleep the night before my reunion with Georgette. It had been two years since I last saw her. I worried that I wouldn’t recognise her, that she wouldn’t remember me, but mostly that I wouldn’t be able to answer her questions about where the others had gone. I was concerned for her emotional state; everyone had suffered during the war but what must it have felt like to be separated from Henriette? They had never been apart before. I couldn’t imagine what she had gone through and how it must have affected her. The people at the Jewish Agency had prepped me for the reunion, telling me what to expect and how best to speak to my sister. The main consolation was their assurance that children of that age were resilient.

  I returned to the Hôtel Grande at the arranged time. I was told Georgette had arrived earlier and was looking forward to seeing me. At least I now knew she remembered me, which was one thing less to worry about. As we climbed the stairs, I chatted nervously with the Jewish Agency staff, asking about her well-being. ‘She is suffering from malnutrition, but that is quite usual. It’s important to not let her eat too much at one time, little and often is best, and nothing too rich. Her stomach is distended – bloated – due to protein deficiency. The doctor has seen her briefly and she’s well apart from that.’

  ‘I planned to take her to the pâtisserie,’ I said. It was all I could think of doing with a seven-year-old girl.

  ‘It’s a good thing we are having this conversation then,’ she laughed. ‘It would be better to take her to eat some meat or fish and leave the gateaux for later!’

  We stopped outside a room.

  ‘Here we are,’ I was told.

  I took a deep breath as we knocked gently on the door and entered. Georgette was standing in the middle of the room. She wore a simple white dress and had a white bow in her short hair. She didn’t look much taller than the last time I saw her but the main thing I noticed was her bloated stomach. I was pleased that I had been forewarned as I wouldn’t have wanted her to see my shock.

  ‘Pierre!’ she screamed with delight and came running over to me. I crouched down to her height and we hugged tightly, as if we never wanted to let go of each other again.

  Samuel

  Perreux

  September 1945

  Dear Samuel,

  I suppose you will read this letter when you return from your summer adventure. I have happy news. Georgette has been found and is staying with me for a few days in Paris. She is quite well. She has spent the past year in a convent, hidden by the nuns. She doesn’t speak much about it and she doesn’t know where Henriette and Claude are.

  I have been told that Georgette was taken to the hospital in Saint-Germain-en-Laye from Louveciennes with measles and that is how the children were separated. This was in July 1944 and we know the children’s homes were emptied on 22 July and the children taken to Drancy. Georgette was sent to the convent by the doctors and nurses when they were told the Gestapo were coming to the hospital to collect her. The nuns ca
lled her Isabel and told her to never speak of her family.

  The people at the Hôtel Grande are very helpful. Everyone agrees it would be best for Georgette to come to Perreux and be with you.

  She’ll spend another few days here and then she will arrive. I need to return to work so I can’t come with her, but you can both come and see me in Paris soon.

  Your brother,

  Pierre

  ****

  My sister arrived shortly after I got back from my hitch-hiking holiday. It had been over two years since we last saw each other. The day I left for the trade school in Paris seemed a lifetime ago. So much had happened during those years, and Georgette was so young that it was a huge chunk of her life. But her youth was a blessing; she didn’t ask me questions I couldn’t answer, and she quickly settled into her new surroundings and made friends.

  Georgette

  Perreux

  October 1945

  My bedroom was in a separate building to Sam’s, with other girls like me. I went to school for the first time and played with my new friends. Samuel carried on with his cabinet-making classes and hung around with the Kohn brothers, who always made me laugh. I saw my brother every day and spent Saturdays with him. A few of the children found their families, but most did not. When someone turned eighteen they were encouraged to go and find work and make lives for themselves elsewhere. We were given everything we needed and the days passed quickly in the company of kind friends.

  I never stopped thinking about my family, and Henriette most of all. Every time I looked in the mirror I saw her; when I spoke I heard her voice; when I hurt myself and cried I felt her pain; and when I laughed with joy I shared her happiness.

  I don’t know if anyone was fooled by my silence, but inside I felt incomplete, as if half of me was missing. My new friends had similar experiences but none of us spoke about them. Some had nightmares, and others wet the bed when they were old enough to know better. Many struggled to concentrate in lessons or refused to join in with games. We were all looked after with tolerance and understanding. It was a period of calm before we were sent off, one by one, to family members we had never met in strange lands.

  Now it was my turn. I was playing with the other children when the supervisor called me to her office. I was surprised to see Samuel as he was usually at his classes at this time of the day.

  ‘Bonjour, Georgette. Come in, come in,’ said the supervisor. ‘Sit down next to your brother.’

  I did as I was told. Samuel held my hand and winked at me.

  The Jewish Agency had been searching for relatives of the orphaned children in their care in Britain, America and Canada. As the oldest sibling, Pierre had a clearer memory of aunts and uncles who had moved abroad before the war began, and contact had eventually been made with our mother’s eldest sister Cloe in London and another sister, Alisa, in New York.

  ‘Georgette, we have found your aunt in England and she would like you to go and live with her.’ The supervisor spoke quickly. Looking back, I suppose she had learnt the hard way that when she started speaking of news and family having been found, some of the children would immediately think their parents had returned… only to be disappointed once again. Probably all of us there still dreamt of our parents coming back. After all, once that dream was gone, what was left?

  I was to be sent to London to live with my Aunt Cloe. She was in her sixties by this time; her three children Joanne, Stan and Danielle were grown up and married. Part of me wanted to stay in France in case Henriette and Claude were discovered, hidden somewhere like I had been, but the other part of me was pleased to leave and start a new life somewhere completely different. Samuel and Pierre would stay in France for the time being, but they promised to visit me in England once I was settled. They said England wasn’t far from France but I would need to get on a boat to cross the sea.

  Weeks later I was taken to the north coast where I saw the ocean for the first time. There was no golden sandy beach like I had seen in some of the picture books at Perreux, just an ugly-looking port, screeching seagulls flying over our heads and choppy grey water slapping against the harbour wall. A label was hung around my neck with my name and the name of the person collecting me once I arrived in England. All I carried with me was a tiny suitcase containing my few belongings. These were mainly clothes but also some small toys which Samuel and Pierre had given me and the photograph of the family which Pierre had rescued from the house in Sarry. And, of course, I still had my precious Bernadette, who now felt like my only link to Henriette.

  The crossing was mercifully short. The rough sea tossed the boat around and made me feel sick so I stayed below board but as we approached England I could see through the window a white line on the horizon which, as we got closer, turned out to be chalk cliffs. The sun came out for the first time that day, the water turned from dark grey to blue, and even the seagulls seemed less annoying on this side of the ocean.

  When I got off the boat I was handed over to a woman who hugged me so tightly I could hardly breathe. She wouldn’t let me go for ages and I couldn’t even see her face until she loosened her grip. Then, when I was able to look at her properly, I saw she was crying and smiling at the same time. That seemed strange, but I think I understood why. She told me in broken French that she was my cousin Danielle and she introduced her husband Jacob, who stood nearby. He took off his hat and shook my hand which I thought was funny; I thought maybe he didn’t kiss me because of the cigarette hanging out of his mouth.

  Jacob drove us to Aunt Cloe’s home in Canons Park, in the north-west of London. The house had a garden! It was a good start to my life in England. I was introduced to the rest of my new family. I spoke no English, but my cousins spoke a few words of French and some Yiddish. My first cousins, Stan, Joanne and Danielle were all much older than me; the only other child in the family was Joanne’s son Robert, who was around my age.

  Danielle and her husband Jacob didn’t have any children of their own. They smothered me with love and attention which I gratefully accepted, and it was soon agreed they would adopt me. I was enrolled in a local school and went to a Jewish youth club. I was desperate to fit in and learnt to speak English quickly although my French accent stayed with me for a few years, so I became known as the ‘little French girl’.

  ****

  Pierre and Samuel came to visit. They brought me our mother’s handbag which was one of the few items still in the house in Sarry. Apart from Bernadette and a family photograph in which Henriette and I were small babies, this bag was the only thing I had left to remember my mother. I wrapped the small leather handbag carefully and stored it away. It was too precious to use. My brothers made contact with our Aunt Alisa, who had moved from Metz to New York ten years before. She had been searching for any survivors from our family, and when she learnt the boys were alive she offered to make the arrangements for them to go to America. Samuel wanted to travel to Palestine but Pierre said he wouldn’t go to America without his brother so Samuel agreed to follow him but only for as long as it took to make enough money to leave for Palestine. Meanwhile our family in London were busy trying to convince my brothers to stay in England. Cousin Sid took the boys to Petticoat Lane, where he knew all the market traders. He bought the boys a whole wardrobe each, and even offered to adopt Sam. Samuel was eighteen by then and had been making his own way in the world for long enough to not want to be adopted by anyone.

  My adoption was not formalised until 18 October, 1950 when my cousin became my mother and my aunt became my grandmother. Pierre said my mother would have had a laugh trying to explain all these family relations, but I wasn’t sure what he meant by it.

  Georgette

  Juan les Pins

  June 2006

  Jacqueline took me to her favourite restaurant on the beach. The maître d’ greeted her warmly and she introduced me as an old friend. She ordered champagne for us and we made small talk about the beauty of this town she had made her home. She asked me about Alan, w
ho had gone for a walk to leave us time to catch up.

  ‘When we married forty-eight years ago, he didn’t know anything about my childhood. I never spoke about it. I remember little of what happened to me – I was very young. I just have a few static memories, like photographs. Probably my strongest memory is of taking Holy Communion when I was with the nuns,’ I said.

  ‘What about your brothers?’ Jacqueline asked.

  ‘They both settled in America. Pierre died some years ago, Samuel is well. We’re as close as we can be considering the distance between us. We spend most of our holidays together. Pierre and Samuel found out what happened to our family once the records appeared. Everyone, including our parents, were sent to Auschwitz in 1942 and never returned. The only person in the family who was not sent to Auschwitz was my grandmother Bubbe. She was sent to an old people’s home not far from Poitiers where she died from natural causes. And, of course, it was Sam’s daughter Sharon who discovered your book and recognised me and Henriette in the photograph on the front cover.’

  ‘Ah, yes. I remember when that was taken. My friend Christina had come to visit me at the orphanage in Louveciennes and brought her camera. After the war she gave me a copy of the photograph.’

  ‘It was quite a shock for me to see it. It was the first time I had seen myself at that age. I must have been six years old then. And it was the last photograph of my dear sister,’ I said.

  ‘I’m so pleased that you contacted me. When the publisher said one of the children in the photograph wanted to speak to me I was very surprised!’

  ‘Can you tell me what happened to my brother and sister?’ I asked.

  Jacqueline hesitated. I suspected she knew the question would be coming.