Dawid Kohane Testimony (doc. 301/191)

Original, manuscript, 6 pages, 145 x 208 mm, Polish language

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Dawid Kohane

Born 10th of July 1917 in Rzepiennik (Gorlice district) 1Note 1: It has not been possible to establish which Rzepiennik the author lived in: R. Biskupi, R. Marciszewski, R. Strzyżowski or R. Suchy

A Talmudist – a yeshiva in Tarnów

When the war broke out – with the army. Wounded and taken captive near Lvov on 22nd of September 1939. Escaped. Came back home.

Rzepiennik – 500 Jews

There were no Germanauthorities until 1942. Things were very peaceful.

In December 1941 an order arrived (from Gorlice) to give up fur coats.

From 1942 a Sturmführer from Arbeitsamt used to arrive and take people (men) to work. He took ransom in the form of vodka, pork fat, bedclothes,coffee, tea. He would take 30-35 men into a camp near Sanok. They worked for 2 months. Then they escaped. A deputy of Kreishauptmann, 2Note 2: District headGartner, the Schulrat, 2Note 2: Schools supervisorcame from Jasło in March to inspect schools. He’d burst into Jewish flats. He’d beat the women. He broke one elderly lady’s arm and leg. He burst into the Judenrat with a revolver, threatening to kill everyone unless he’d be given 20 litres of slivovitz.

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All Jews escaped. He vandalized flats, robbed whatever he could. A Polish canon priest Krzemień accompanied him ([he had been] in Rzepiennik before then). The Germans would always stop by at his place; they drank at his place and with him too. He would always invite them.

A German committee of 8 people arrived in April for junaks. They demanded the Judenrat deliver vodka and cigarettes – it did. They asked for more vodka to be prepared for the evening – there wasn’t any. All Jews had fled. In the evening they went looking for Jews and thieving with the Polish police: Jan Wid and Hubert Kuczera. They caught a 60 year-old woman from Cracow, Lorier. They beat her in a horrible manner, they told her to climb over a wall (Wid).

A contribution in July – 25000.

A few days later they demanded 35 men’s suits. Next, Romański, head of Liegenschaftsamt, 4Note 4: Real estate office came and robbed everything: furniture, clothes. He filled up 10 trucks.

July 1942

The Judenrat gave a Jew deported from Łódź a paper to a Jew who lived 2 kilometres outside Rzepiennik. When stopped outside the town, the Jew produced this paper as identification. Thus, the Judenrat was accused of issuing passes. A day later the Obmann 5Note 5: Obmann – president, head and the Judenrat’s secretary received a summons from the Gestapo in Gorlice. From there they were sent on, allegedly to a court hearing in Jasło, and shot dead the day after.

Beginning of August – Kreishauptmann arrives from Jasło. Doctor Gentz – on the square all Jews are put on a registry. He calculated. He asked boys between 18 and 35 year-old to step forward. There were 45 men. Everyone came back home. An order came two days later from the Gestapo in Jasło, saying these men were to go to work in Bobowa. The Judenrat’s Obmann in Bobowa asked for a few people to be released, to which he got this reply from a Gestapo soldier: Die Leute werden mir dankbar

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sein, dass sie hier sind. 6Note 6: These people will be grateful to me for being here.

They were taken to Prokocim on 8th August 1942. On 11th August 1942 the head of Gestapo came to Rzepiennik from Jasło along with the head of Liegenschaftsamt and they demanded a contribution of 10000 for restoration of furniture. At the same time, they summoned the commune head and the chief of Polish police to choose a location for a Jewish grave. The Germans came with the junaks at 3 in the morning the day after, they woke all Jews up, telling them they’d be deported. They told everyone to take 25 kg of their best possessions. (The youth were digging a grave at that time.) Everyone was herded into a square, along with their bundles. Twelve Gestapo men arrived, they went into a tavern, drank 12 liters of vodka. They told everyone to kneel down – 3 hours, 6-9 in the morning, they told them to give up their belongings, put them on autos. Next they were all taken towards a forest (and beaten along the way), to a square near Dąbra. 7Note 7: Forest near RzepiennikThey were told to give up money. Then, they were told to take clothes off, 10 people at a time. Adults were shot, thrown into the grave, often wounded but still alive; they buried the people,

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shouts could be heard: It’s burning my eyes. Children were smashed against trees and torn apart. After the execution was over the canon priest invited all the Gestapo men to dinner. The shooting went on from 10 o’clock in the morning until 3 o’clock [in the afternoon].

Abel Kahane (currently in Cracow) witnessed the execution, he was standing on a hill 100 metres away. He, his sister and her husband and children and one other family lived out of the town and so they didn’t get surrounded by the police cordon and managed to escape. The OD who came to wake them up saved himself too. All of them, however, except for Abel Kahane, died later. Abel Kahane hid in the forest. His sister and her children took hide with a farmer. Four weeks later, when the farmer would not have them any more, Dawid Kahane came (without the band) from a camp and took his family to the ghetto in Tarnów, and took his brother to the camp.

46 people from Rzepiennik worked in Prokocim. Three months later, 5 people, sensing that things were getting unsteady, escaped to Rzepiennik. They paid their Polish neighbours there for letting them hide at their place, sometimes hid in forests, sometimes also ventured further away

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when manhunts were on.

Two friends of Dawid Kahane from a neighbouring village – Samuel Oline and Michael Schiff hid with farmers in Łużna. They were denounced and police came from Gorlice to take them. They were stripped naked (January 1943), handcuffed. While the Polish were digging a grave, the Germans went to a tavern. The boys escaped, went to a carpenter who cut through the handcuffs. The Germans came after them. Oline grabbed hold of a wooden board, hit a German on the head. The German fell down. The other German shot one Jew dead. Oline escaped. A few hours later he was caught too.

I.[za] L.[auer] 8Note 8: Signature of the person recording the testimony.