Frida Shohat — Association of Jews of Vilna and vicinity in Israel

Frieda Schohat, daughter of Yosef and Rivka Yazgur, born in Vilna, Lithuania

I was born in 1927 in Vilna, Lithuania. My father was a tailor who made fur coats and also dealt in trade, and my mother was a fashion designer. I had two brothers and a sister. When I was a child I learned in a local Jewish school. Even before the war started we felt the early stages of anti-Semitism.

When the war began, my oldest brother was taken for forced labor in a coal mine, where he lost his life. The rest of the family were transported to the ghetto in town which was located directly opposite our house. Many of my relatives were taken to the Ponar forest where they were murdered.

My sister Leah and I were taken to dig trenches at the Porovnek airport. Leah tried to escape and was shot to death. As a result of these occurrences my mother became ill. My father found work in the food storage warehouse run by the Germans. I worked in making baskets and slippers out of raffia. Food was scarce, but we survived. My mother was murdered in the ghetto. In 1943 my father was deported to a concentration camp in Estonia, and the following day, my younger brother Yaakov and I were taken too. When we arrived in Vaivara there was a selection, my brother was pointed left and I never saw him again. I was transported together with another 600 women and 50 men to Klooga, where I worked in an industry that manufactured grenades. A few months later a German doctor called Borman arrived and another selection took place. I was put in a group of youngsters. For some reason they didn’t get around to executing us, but instead they deported us to Stutthof. Some acquaintances told me that my father was alive, and when we met I told him what happened to mother and my brothers. I was given to understand that I was included in an age group that was not supposed to stay alive, but I managed to join a group that was taken to Rusochin, where we worked laying railway lines and unloading freight trains.

In 1945 with the approach of the Russians, we were forced to go on the death march. Having survived the death march we reached Strelentin where we lived in huts. After three months we were marched over to Chinov. The Russians invaded and the Germans fled. An elderly lady took me under her wings, but I became ill with typhus and was transferred to a hospital in Lauenburg, Germany. When I recovered I wanted to return to Vilna, but the Russians refused me permission. Together with some of my friends, I was taken to Savhoz where we worked for six months. I worked as a translator from German to Russian and as a bookkeeper.

In the Holocaust I lost my mother Rivka, my siblings Leah, Mordechai and Yaakov, my grandparents Gershon and Feige-Merel Kaplan who were murdered at Ponar, as well as uncles, aunts and cousins.

In June 1946, I returned to Vilna. I had an uncle in Israel via whom I discovered that my father had survived. In Vilna I met Mordechai Schochat who was a soldier in the Red Army and we married in 1949. My two daughters, Rivka and Pnina were born in Vilna.

In 1957 we got permission to leave Russia and return to Poland, and two months later we made Aliyah from Vienna.

My late husband Mordechai worked in an industry that produced safe boxes and I worked at Ya’el (psychometric testing).

I keep in touch with my friends from the ghetto, and I also go to the Holocaust Survivors’ Clubs in Raanana and Kfar Saba, and participate in activities at the Officers’ College in Netanya.

I have five grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.

Taken from: Remembering for Generations - Testimonies of Holocaust Survivors.

Watch an interview with Frieda. Interviewed by Miri Krauser. Filmed by Gal Cohen.