The Kallos Family Book 2022

PART 1: THE KALLOS FAMILY • 27
May 1944. Thousands of Jews have come off just one train. Only one year before the war ended
320,000 Hungarian Jews were gassed on arrival. This photo is one of the few records of what
occurred, apart from testimony, which is often not believed, especially by deniers. On the right side
of the train tracks Hungarian Jews from Sub Carpathian Ruthenia are being selected for slave labour
or the gas chambers in Birkenau. The Nazis are armed with rifles and sticks. Infirm Jews (lower right)
are sitting against the train wagons. A Kapo in civilian clothing leaning on a stick and wearing a cap
can be seen (centre) between the two lines of Jews. In the background piles of Jews’ belongings are
being placed on a truck to be taken for sorting (upper right). On the left side of the train tracks Jews
are walking in lines to the gas chambers (upper centre).
PHOTOS FROM THE AUSCHWITZ ALBUM (ARROWS INSERTED BY THE AUTHOR). BERNHARDT WALTER / ERNST
HOFMANN, PHOTOGRAPHERS.
already a widow at 36 – her husband had died
in the Hungarian Labour Service – was also
selected for work. As well as losing her husband,
Ilonka also had a stillborn child, which meant
she arrived in Birkenau a widow and childless.
Ilonka and Lili were very close. Zoltan Kallos, 49,
and Laci, aged 16, were also selected for work.
In Biri’s 1999 Rotterdam interview with Hans
Ellger, she recalled that
We said goodbye to my father, to my brother,
and said goodbye to everybody. Of course,
weeping and crying, but we had no time
because we were chased with blows.
On the way to the C lager, Block 16, after being
shorn of all bodily hair, deloused, showered and
dressed in rags but no underwear, Biri crossed
paths with her father. She cried out in shock as
she had never seen such a pained expression on
his face as the one she saw now. Able to briefly
speak to him, Biri, who was her daddy’s girl,
took his hands in hers and said in their native
Hungarian: ‘Apuka [Daddy], I feel I will get out of
here, I will be free. Please take care of yourself so
we meet again.’ It was the last time she saw her
father alive. Zoltan perished on a death march
from Buchenwald to Theresienstadt ghetto, two