Gerda Weissmann, a Polish-Jewish girl, was 15 years old on the first of September when the German invasion tore through Bielsko, Poland in 1939. Gerda, her brother Artur, and her parents felt betrayed as they watched their neighbors motioning the Hitler salute as swaying Nazi flags.

Like all Jewish men between the ages of 16 and 50, Artur was required to register for the German army, and soon after he was summoned to a forced labor camp. Gerda and her family were displaced from their home and into their basement in December while their home was occupied by a German family. The basement was damp with no running water or electricity.

Later, the Weissmanns were confined to a Jewish ghetto where they remained from April until June of 1942. Her father was separated from her when he was taken to a camp. Before he left, he demanded that she wear her skiing boots although it was June. Her father gave the impression that he knew she would need them in the future. …show more content…
The crowd was divided into two lines, with Gerda and the other girls swept to one side, and their mothers to the other. Gerda, who wanted to stay with her mother, boarded the same truck. But she was forced to another truck by Merin, an SS guard. Metin told her, "You are too young to die!" The two trucks diverged, and at that moment Gerda realized that this would be the last time she would ever see her