Sam Pivnik

Sam Pivnik is a Holocaust survivor (birthname Szmuel Piwnik) born on 1 September 1926 in Bedzin, in South-western Poland near the border with Germany, the second son of Lajb Piwnik, a tailor, and Feigel Piwnik.

As a Jewish family, the Piwniks were forced to live in the Kamionka Ghetto in Bedzin from early 1943 and on 6 August 1943 the family were deported to Auschwitz II/Birkenau. Sam Piwnik's father and mother, younger sister Chana and younger brothers Meir, Wolf and Josef were murdered on arrival. His older sister Handel survived for a period of around ten days before she was also 'selected' for the gas chambers. Sam Pivnik was registered in the camp and tattooed with prisoner number 135913. After a period of approximately two weeks in the 'Quarantine' area of Birkenau, Pivnik was assigned to the Rampkommando where he worked unloading newly arrived trains after the prisoners had been taken away for entry to the camp or gassing. This gave him access to food and valuables from prisoners luggage and he was able to use this to keep himself fed and to bribe Kapos, prisoner-overseers and trusties. On 27 December 1943 Pivnik was admitted to the prisoner infirmary in the Quarantine area KL Auschwitz II-Birkenau, B IIa, Block 9) with suspected typhus. He survived several 'selections' and on 11 January 1944 was admitted to the main prisoners' hospital at KL-Auschwitz II-Birkenau B IIf. Following his recovery from typhus, Pivnik was selected for a work detail to go to KL Auschwitz III/Fürstengrube, a coal mine at where he was assigned to the construction detail and appointed as a Vorarbeiter or overseer. During his period at Auschwitz, he came to know both Otto Moll and Joseph Mengele by sight.

On 19 January 1945, the camp at Fürstengrube was evacuated in the face of the advancing Red Army and prisoners who were fit enough to move were, initially, marched to a railhead at Gleiwitz. Many of those who were not fit were shot by SS guards lead by SS-Oberscharführer Max Schmidt. After a nine day rail journey, during which the prisoners were not given any additional rations, Pivnik's group arrived at KL Dora-Mittelbau on 28 January 1945. Pivnik spent the next three months on construction work before he - together with approximately 200 other former Fürstengrube prisoners - were evacuated by barge along the River Elbe to Holstein in northern Germany. In Holstein, the prisoners were assigned to farm labour, with Pivnik himself sent to work at Max Schmidt's parents' farm at Neu Glasau.

At the beginning of May 1945, Pivnik and other former Fürstengrube prisoners, were marched to the port of Neustadt from where they were loaded, on 3 May 1945, aboard the former German cruise ship Cap Arcona which was being used as a prison ship for concentration camp inmates along with the Thielbek, Athen and Deutschland. Within hours of Pivnik boarding, the flotilla was attacked by fighter-bombers of the Royal Air Force and both the Cap Arcona and the Thielbek were set on fire and sunk. As one of the last to board, Pivnik was on an upper deck and was thus able to jump from the ship and eventually swim ashore. Out of approximately 7,000 prisoners on board the two ships, no more than 500 survived.

Pivnik was liberated by the British Army in Neustadt on 4 May 1945.

External links

• http://www.sampivnik.org
• http://www.andrewlownie.co.uk/authors/sam-pivnik

See also: Piwnik