Transcript of the BBC/FRONTLINE Interview by David Marks with "Elisabeth"

And then one day my mother came home and she mentioned that as far as these railroad cars were concerned, there was a request of shipping people through the Gotthard and we talked about it within the family and my mother said that she was approached to be part of this committee and she explained that there were people, we didn't know at that time what kind of people or who this was, and she was asked to participate in order to... actually, that wasn't the way it was. She knew what it was. She was asked to participate because the trains would stop in Zurich and, for humanitarian reasons, they then would distribute blankets and coffee and soup.

And in the beginning we didn't believe this. This was at the time maybe only a rumour, we didn't believe this, but then there was, as time went on, a couple of weeks, there was more talk about this. And then finally my mother at one point came home and said to my father: "Well, that's it and I have volunteered and I'm going to do it." And my father was sort of against it. He said, why do you want to get involved? But she said, no I feel I have to do this. And as time went on we heard that this was the deal: since the Brenner Pass was closed because of the snow and they couldn't ship anybody through the Brenner, the Italians had Jews and gypsies, this is the way we got it, gypsies too, which they had or wanted to ship through Germany and the Germans had suggested to use these empty coal cars to ship them back with people and the Swiss Red Cross at that point had intervened and they had negotiated a deal whereby these railroad cars would stop at night in Zurich and we were allowed to give them some comfort in terms of hot beverage, soups, and especially blankets.

So as the day approached, actually we didn't believe it, my mother went around trying to get coffee because coffee was very much rationed and also she asked everybody if she could get their rations of beans. Beans was not rationed but, still, you couldn't get it that freely. And these beans were used then to make soup and carrots I guess and potatoes.

So we went around doing this and then, another night, my mother said that we are going to have some schooling. So we went to a meeting. I don't remember where the meeting took place - it wasn't in our home. Somewhere else. It was somewhere in, I believe a school building, in a gymnasium, and we got instructions. And there was a Red Cross official, the lady, who told us that the trains would come in at night, that we were supposed to bring flashlights, that we would be in teams of four, and we would be stationed at certain spots which what they would tell us, we would have to bring all the goods - the blankets and the coffee and the beans one day before to the spot where they would collect it, and we were also supposed to bring our gas masks which I didn't understand at that time at all why we would have to bring our gas masks. Now everybody had a gas mask at that time because they were given out for nothing. Every building had gotten so many gas masks.

So my mother did all that - gave all the coffee and whatever. And then the day came. We of course had no car and at that time there was blackouts, that I remember we took the street car with the gas masks, and we had also been told that we would have to make a chain. We would get big buckets of soup and big pots of coffee and the soup we would ladle out in smaller containers and we would have to hand it down from one person to the other and in our team there would have to be one person who would be stationed right next to the railroad cars.

So we arrived. It was about, I think, nine o'clock at night and we were four in our team - my aunt, my mother, the housekeeper and myself. And my mother was the one who stood next to the railroad car. And I think there were maybe 10 teams and they were placed in intervals on the platform, and we waited. And when everything was done and where everybody was waiting, they brought these hot soups because they were made somewhere -- I don't know. -- Yes, I do know. I think even some of it was made in the Jewish community house. I am not sure of that but I think my aunt told me that the soup was made there. And then they brought big containers of coffee. And my job was the soup. I had to ladle the soup into smaller containers - not in plates, it was sort of gamella (?) they called it. Metal.

And so we waited and then sure enough, very slowly, these cars came and stopped. And somebody from the outside opened the door - it was like a wooden bar and that was opened and then some keys and then the door swung open and we all were waiting there. And a man came out on our station and he stood there. And that was my sign to start ladling the soup. I remember it was very difficult because the flashlight was sort of on the floor and it was hot, the soup was pretty hot. I had to ladle it and then I gave it to housekeeper and the housekeeper gave it to my aunt and the aunt gave it to my mother and she handed it to this man and the man swung around and, there must be people in the car who took it from him.

And this went on for about a good half an hour. And it was very tense. We were also instructed not to talk, not to whistle, not to do anything, it was a very tense situation. And I also remember I thought, what would happen if all of a sudden all these people came tumbling out of these railroad cars. And I was thinking, what would be in these railroad cars. Would they have beds? Or chairs? Was there a stove in these railroad cars? It was very cold, very raw weather. And I was thinking, well, if they are coming out, what are we supposed to do? Are we supposed to push them back in? Or would we keep them and maybe we would bring them home and I would share my room with them? Because my mother had brought some of the Jewish refugees who were in camps at the time in Switzerland, they came very often during weekends. Because that Ās when they were allowed to go out and I always had to share my room with them so that's what I thought at the time, maybe I have to share my room again.

But no, nothing happened, and when everything was done, soup was finished and coffee was done. And the blankets, the blankets were also distributed, then we went home and we went back home with the streetcar. I remember we had to keep a certain time with the streetcar because they stopped running. And that was it.

And then the next morning or maybe a day after, there was an article in the newspaper - Zurich local newspaper I believe - that the citizens who had houses next to the platform number one, they complained because apparently the people in the railroad cars they had made noise, they banged and they had apparently said "Leave [let] me out" and people could not sleep who were living around the railroad cars. And it was suggested that maybe these.... the next transports should be left on the side of the Landes museum because nobody slept there and would be quieter. And I remember the article. The article was very ambigious. Our own feeling at that time were very ambigious. I don't think we wanted really to deal with this. What would happen... we knew they were going to Germany, we knew they were Jews, we knew about the concentration camps. But we also had a feeling that we had helped them, that we had done good and that the fact that they were now hollering at night, they shouldn't have done that because we had helped them. It was a very strange and ambiguous feeling and the article in a way said that, look we have helped you and now you're making a big racket and now our good citizens can't sleep. And, of course, you know, this was wartime and we were all a little bit warped in our thinking, in our feelings.

That... this type of thing always troubled me. And even today when I have to review it [voice breaks - sounds close to tears] it is very troublesome. And I always wondered, why couldn't we help more? Because if the Swiss wouldn't have left... if the Swiss would have said, all right, we're going back on our word and we are not leaving this people... we are not letting these people go further to Germany then I guess the other transports wouldn't have followed. As it was, I think they had about eight to 12 transports. And I went once more with my mother and, sure enough, the cars were on the far side of the station, on the Landis Museum part, and pretty much the same thing happened on that platform, and that was the last time I went because then my mother felt since I still went to school, that it was too late and well maybe she also thought it wasn't a good thing to bring a young person to see this. And she said, you don't have to go any more.

I was first told by my mother but at the meeting it was confirmed because there was a question. Somebody raised his hand and said, why do they have to go through Switzerland? I mean, nobody was very happy about it. They thought it was... it wasn't a question that they were against it, but they didn't feel that Switzerland should lend its hand to letting these trains through. On the other hand, the feeling was, well, if we don't let the trains through, maybe they suffer even more by... I don't know what they thought really.