My message to "GOMBIN EMAIL EXCHANGE FORUM" 1.11.97

...from Ben Guyer testimony:

It was saved, it is kept in the Ghetto Fighters Shoa Museum in Lochamei Hagetaot and is now available, in Hebrew in a book! I have finally found it... After 7 months of searching the original document...

 Dear Jeffrey Wruble. Please give this message to your father! I promised him and Ben Guyer... because they are mentioned there, as well as ALL the Gombiners who were transported with them on March 8^th, from Gombin to Konin Concentration camp, but only very few survived the hell.

Dear Martin Guyer, please phone Ben Guyer in my name and inform him that I found the diary of Rabbi Aaronson, which has been translated and published in an Hebrew book of 500 pages, in 1996!
He and Mel Wruble begged my father, who was in USA last summer, to tell me to continue my research for the diary of Rabbi Aaronson, and now finally I found it, already translated to Hebrew, as part of a book.

Now I have that book... and I am overwhelmed with what is inside. A "tombstone" to Gombiners men, who were deported from Gombin to Konin.

It is the diary where the rabbi documented all the life and chronicle of the concentration camp KONIN, where the men of Gombin, capable of forced labor, were deported on March 1942.

There are tens and tens of names of people "from Gombin"... Many perished in the camp and from the book I learn that they were buried in Konin and have a tomb in Konin, in the Catholic cemetery

They have a tomb! Not that it is a great comfort, but at least they are not ashes.
There is also a map in the book to the tomb! It is a mass grave, but you know now at least where his bones rest, not as most of the million of other Shoa victims...

There is another list of the victims (from Gombin and other cities, all from the Warthegau area ) and the date of their transport to Chelmno - the date of their death. Not only that, but the Rabbi Aaronson, blessed be his soul in heaven, wrote down also the year of birth of the victims and their marital status.

Among the names mentioned form Gombin: Laks, Ber, Zolna, Hodys, Lasman, Rusak, Shapira, Fridman, Biebergal, Optawski, Wolkowetcz, Tiber, Laski, Kerber, Sannicki, Cohen, Frenkel, Goldman, Boll, Lushinski, Maincik, Zaionz, Gelbert, Rak, Maydet, Shlang, Fuks...

The great rabbi Aaronson, realised there must be evidence left of the crime of the German Nazis, and endangered his life constantly in order to document the horror. He also tried his utmost, under the impossible conditions, to bury the deads in the Jewish tradition, as much as he could.

I was searching the notebook, to make a photocopy from the Yiddish original pages, for a very long time, and had problems with the Ghetto Fighters Museum to have access to the material. And through the help of Yad Vashem, I finally learned that the whole diary, "scrolls of fire" published as part of the book,

called:

"Alei Merorot", (Leaves of bitterness") It has been published, by the rabbi's son: rabbi Israel Yehuda Aaronson from Bnai Brak and I can give anyone his telephone and address, if you wish to obtain a copy of the book..

I have already visited the rabbi's son in his modest flat at Bnai Brak and bought 3 copies. The rabbi's son told me, there is another list of the inmates, which was not published, BUT he will make for me a photocopy of that list, but will take some time. He told me his father was in contact with Gombiners in Israel all his life. The rabbi was very kind and will help me with any more information I shall ask in the future. He told me about the book, about Theo Richmond who searched this subject for days and days... The Rabbi is very well mentioned in hTheo Richmond's book: "Konin a Quest", pages: 322-5,429,325,429...

The diary of rabbi Aaronson, is a rare document. It tells the story of the revolt in the Konin camp and is a most appalling piece of document, written while the events took place, and the writer was constantly in life danger if the diary be caught. He wrote for history, for remembrance, for commemoration...

Gombin men are thus commemorated, in may be the only, document. Last trace of human beings... But not them only of course. They were over 870 prisoners in the beginning. Also people from other small shtetls from Gostynin district, with the same fate: Sannicki, Gostynin, Jakszicz, Pedmewicz...

He also wrote why they did not fight back. Survival was a fight. He explained all about the devilish German death machinery and the deceit, about the conditions which prevailed and how Shoa happened.

It is a most unique piece of documentary, dealing with very difficult questions of faith in the gehenna, philosophy and Jewish religion.

I wrote all about the diary a while ago, when I wrote to Minna about Philip Zielonka from Gombin, who was one of the rebels in the historic revolt there.

In the book appears the last testimony of Faivish Kamlazh, from Gombin, son in law of Avrham Neidorff. His sister in law is Dora Makao, from Haifa... in our database, age 86...

They were the partners in a "Garbarnia" (leather processing factory) in Gombin, of Kerber, whose grandson, Izchak Weizman, has survived and in constant contact with me. He, of course, is very thrilled as well to know that the diary was published.

I already gave him one book and needless to say his eyes were wet when saw the names of his friends and family members who did not survive like he did...

 I am quite overwhelmed with this revelation, and will do my best to translate the relevant parts soon. If anyone cares to buy the book (it is in Hebrew) let me know and I shall do for him with more than pleasure.

We shall never forgive, we shall never forget!

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