Juliusz Jerzy (Piotr) Tober, born in 1942
The Nightmare Continues
My parents, whom I did not know because they perished in the Warsaw Ghetto when I was six months old, were of the Jewish faith. At the last moment, sensing their approaching death at the hands of the Nazis, they handed me over to the Tober family. Mrs. Tober was from then on my guardian angel and protector and treated me like a son. As she told me later, she managed, with the help of the underground resistance, to get my birth registered in the municipal office in Sochaczew with the birth date of January 15, 1942, the same as that of her son, Piotr, who had died as an infant. This helped her to pass me off as her own child. Because I had been circumcised, Mrs. Tober baptized me at the Evangelical-Augsburg [Protestant] church in Żyrardów in 1942.
The name Doński weaves in and out of my life story. Mr. Doński, who was also of the Jewish faith, was the intermediary between my parents and my adopted mother. He also was the only person who ever described to me what my father looked like. It was he, as well, who in later years told Mrs. Tober that my parents had perished in the Warsaw ghetto. Mr. Doński must have received a significant amount of money from my parents with which he was to pay for my upkeep. This supposition was confirmed in correspondence in the 1950s with my guardian-teacher, Mr. Michał Cubert, who was also my sole support and help during the most difficult period of my early youth.
Mr. Tober was, without question, a German. He died in 1942 in unexplained circumstances. My adopted siblings (two brothers and a sister) made it painfully clear to me that I was a foundling of unknown parentage and of Jewish origins. Mrs. Tober, because of her husband’s ancestry, had been on the Volksliste, which made it easier for her to provide assistance—though at the risk of her life—to other Jews and AK [Home Army] activists. Toward the end of the war, because of the ancestry and activities of her husband, as well as those of her sons and daughter (Nazi supporters), she had to escape to Germany. Seeking shelter there, she took me with her.
In Germany we settled in Bavaria in the Donauwörth district. I remember this period quite well; I was six years old at the time. But even there, I was beaten and harassed by my older stepbrother. My guardian, a woman with higher education, a person with a tender heart, gave help to everyone who needed it. But she herself, because of the extreme poverty that prevailed in Germany right after the war, had to beg in the streets to get us a piece of bread. Despite these difficult conditions, she made it possible for me to attend school there, and I finished the first grade. Due to her critical situation, she established contact by letter with Mr. Doński and her friend and former classmate, Mrs. Barbara Święcicka.
They both insisted that she send me back to Poland, promising to take care of me and to educate me. My guardian placed her trust in these people, and believing that my fortune would change for the better, agreed to send me back to Poland.
In 1949 I returned with a transport to Warsaw. I remember the moment when the train station emptied out and I stood there like a living, abandoned parcel. Finally, after a few hours, Mr. Doński, my alleged guardian, appeared, and he handed me over to the children’s home in Chylice. At that time I was a boy whose mental and physical health had already been affected by painful experiences. Mr. Doński’s care was limited to making minimal payments to the children’s home. There I completed five grades. Frequent illnesses and the rebelliousness of my young heart, thirsting for kindness and warmth, in place of which I encountered physical blows and threats, caused me to fall deeper and deeper into apathy, enclosing me in the pain of the “orphan’s syndrome”.
In 1955 the children’s home was closed, and the children were transferred to the home in Ząbkowice. The friend and patron of the children’s home in Ząbkowice was the aforementioned Mr. Cubert. He was also a frequent visitor there. The administration of this home urged Mr. Cubert, who was of the Jewish faith, to confirm their suspicions that I was circumcised. When he verified this, he spoke with me cordially and at length about my wartime and postwar experiences. He promised to do everything possible to get in touch with my guardian, Mrs. Tober, and to fill in the gaps of my history by finding Mr. Doński, who had so miserably betrayed the trust of my parents (whose names I do not know to this day). Mr. Cubert, with great warmth, which I had so lacked, always emphasized that Jews were one large family of whom we should be proud and that the complexes which I had acquired in various places of refuge were the product of stupid and malicious tongues.
Nonetheless, I was burdened by the stigma that I was a child from nowhere. Mr. Cubert, seeing my advanced stage of orphan’s syndrome (as he told me), fulfilled his promise. He tried, with great effort, to find documents that I was not a person from nowhere. In 1956 he established contact by mail with my guardian angel, Mrs. Tober. She was overjoyed at receiving some news about me, because she herself had for a long time searched for me without success. She informed him that although Mr. Doński had possessed information about my parents, he had never revealed it.
Despite Mrs. Tober’s and Mr. Cubert’s valiant efforts to have me return to her, the administration of the children’s home categorically opposed my leaving. At that time Mrs. Tober used to send me packages, which didn’t always reach me. This bitter disappointment, that the prospect of a better life at the side of my guardian—whose circumstances had improved and who very much wanted to have me with her—had come to naught, caused a deterioration of my performance in school and changes in my behavior. The way I expressed my pain was to distance myself from the positive role models I saw around me—my schoolmates, who were fortunate to be by the side of their parents.
I was sent to a vocational school to train as a bricklayer, contrary to my interests and abilities. After the closing of the home in Ząbkowice, which was during the freezing winter of 1962, there was nowhere and no one to whom I could go. The beginning of my independent life was very difficult. I began building my “pseudo-life” on my own. I regret many decisions from that time. To escape from this emptiness, I joined the army. There, after a thorough medical examination, it was found that I had balance problems, distortions of the spine (the result of carrying heavy sacks of soil at the children’s home), stomach ulcers, and manic- depressive disorder.
After leaving the army, seeking a roof over my head, I married a person who could not understand me, and her family treated me, from the beginning, like a foundling stripped of his own identity. In 1981, due to the deteriorating atmosphere of our marriage, my wife left for the United States, and my mother-in-law took our sons. Divorce followed, and I was again left alone.
I tried to get work, but in a period of depression I sought to forget my problems in bad company. I shook off a nervous breakdown and an inclination toward alcohol by myself. During the depths of depression, there were once again casual, short relationships with women. There was also vodka and everything that comes with it.
I began to lose hope. I lost the roof over my head. At this critical time, when I was often cold and hungry, I met a friend from the children’s home who advised me to go to Dzięgielów to the Diakonis Sisters’ Home. This was in the fall of 1983, and I stayed there until December. But I could not adjust to it, and at that time I found warm hearts at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Breull, relatives of the Wojnars and the Grosses.
Then, searching for work that included the possibility of housing, I left Cieszyn and moved to Ustroń. However, my illness and frequent stays in hospitals made it necessary for me to obtain a permanent disability pension from the Social Welfare Office. The Welfare Office also allocated me a room—ten square meters.
Every day is like another; I don’t believe that the sun will ever shine for me again. I don’t expect much, just a semblance of family and a little heart, and perhaps the good Lord will let me find out who I really am. To this day, I am still searching for family—to no avail. It has become my obsession. At the age of fifty-seven, I discovered that I belong to the large family of the “Children of the Holocaust”, and this fact has become a bright ray on the dark horizon of my life. Perhaps things really will get better?
