November/December 2002 Feature
Kristallnacht
Vivian Jeanette Kaplan
The following is an excerpt from my book, Ten Green Bottles (Toronto: Robin Brass Studio, Inc., October 2002; projected for publication in the United States in 2003), about my mother, Nini Kosiner, née Karpel, who is now 86 years old. It is the true drama of her life told in her voice. Dialogue, of course, has been imagined by the author; the genre is literary non-fiction.
Vivian Jeanette Kaplan
By November 1938, our plans for escape from Vienna have been set in place. I have arranged to meet with my brother Willi, my sister Stella, her husband Walter, and Fritz, my other sister Erna’s husband, at a nearby coffee house one evening, to prepare our final arrangements. Erna is in her own home with her baby, and Mama has stayed behind, alone in our flat. The night air is chilled as we huddle together in silence with just a few candles lit so that we can see one another in the shadows. We are all nervously puffing cigarettes and swallowing cups of hot dark coffee sweetened with lumps of sugar as we stare forlornly out the shop’s windows that have been smeared with signs of antisemitic hatred. There is no comfort nor shelter anywhere to be found.
Everyone is discussing the latest story that is buzzing in Vienna. Walter has a newspaper crushed in his hand and shows us the frightening headline, “Jew kills German Aide in Paris.” He begins to read the terrifying story aloud: “Ernst vom Rath, the Chargé d’affaires in Paris has been shot. The killer was a young Jewish man, seventeen years of age, named Herschel Grynszpan who, in a fit of passionate anger and madness, was heard to declare that he wanted revenge. The killer was apparently enraged by the capture of his parents, who he said had been sent to Poland. He has murdered a loyal officer of the Reich with a bullet to the head.”
“At least he killed the Nazi bastard, one less to torment us,” Walter says, looking down at the words on the printed page. “But I wonder what repercussions this will have on us all. No Jew acts alone. Forever it has been this way.”
Willi, inhaling nicotine wafts deeply like a drowning man gasping for air, a cigarette pressed between his yellowed fingers, replies in an agitated voice, “Was he mad to try such a thing? Not only did he assure his own death but we will all suffer for his act.”
“What more can they do?” I ask in frustration. “They have stolen all of our belongings; they are driving us out of our homes and making us hide like rats, trapped in cellars.”
“They will still find new ways to torment us. They want more than our lives. They want to inflict pain,” Fritz says bitterly.
We are all hushed for the moment, absorbing the latest event and considering what it might mean. Stella, distractedly stirring her coffee, her face drawn and pale, says, “We have to concentrate only on leaving this place, nothing more. Our exit visas are dated for January, a month ahead of yours. We will go ahead, and Nini and Willi will follow with Mama. With God’s help, we may all meet in Shanghai.”
At that we become teary eyed. We clasp hands around the table as we stare at one another, wondering if we truly will see our family ever again. Suddenly the door flies open amid screams of horrific distress. Frau Kaufmann, Mama’s old friend, has come running down the street, shrieking out of control and cannot be subdued. Her eyes are fireballs as she blurts out the words, “The shul has been torched! My God, we are finished!”
She is screaming in tones of shrill panic. We try to subdue her to find out what she knows.
“Sit down, Frau Kaufmann. Slowly, tell us what has happened,” I say, leading her by the arm to a chair by the window.
We can see the flames from where we stand. We remain paralyzed by the sight before us and watch as thick smoke rises in black clumps towards the sky. In the distance we are appalled to see the stained glass windows of our temple, so familiar to us all, pierced by thrown rocks, raining to the ground in an avalanche of colored shards.
“It is a plague, a catastrophe. They...they are everywhere. They are destroying our place, our holy place. I can’t bear it any longer. Our only bit of peace, the only sanctuary from the endless hatred, ruined. They are killing us all, one by one, one by one, one by one,” she rants unintelligibly, repeating the words over and over in wild confusion.
“The sacred Torah scrolls have been violated, do you understand? They have been ripped from the ark, desecrated by muddy boots, and all the time the brutes were laughing and cursing profanities. Old bearded men in white fringed prayer shawls with black yarmulkes on their heads have been beaten land left for dead, their blood pooling around them until the floor was a sticky, slippery mess. They cried and begged for mercy, for pity, but there was none. No one could answer their pleas. Don’t you see? They have murdered God, Himself, and only Satan remains. This has become Hell on Earth. It is the very end, can’t you see? Listen to me, listen to me, I was there. Listen to me, I saw it with my own eyes. Listen to me!” she screams.
“Please Frau Kaufmann, calm down. We will try to get you home,” Walter offers.
“We are doomed!” she screeches in escalating octaves. “We are doomed! All of the synagogues in Vienna are burning at once. They are going to kill us all tonight. We will be torched alive. Can’t you understand?”
Her whole body is shuddering in spasms, and she seems to have gone into shock. We try in vain to settle her down, but her mind has cracked and her sanity is gone. Succumbing to hysteria, she pushes by us and runs blindly out to the street into the path of the oncoming mob. We watch in horror as she is trampled, kicked in the stomach and in the head by several uniformed Hitler Youth who shout obscenities and violent curses as the poor woman rolls on the ground in anguish and pouring streams of blood. They continue to beat her senseless until she has become a bloody bundle of final silence where there will be no more suffering.
Any restraints on the Nazis have been cut and a pogrom unlike anything before is being unleash-ed. We can hear shouting outside and the sound of glass smashing as store windows are reduced to heaps of shiny splinters. On a wild rampage of deranged blood-lust, Nazi soldiers, followed by crowds of eager Viennese citizens, are shoving through the streets, looting from the shops and scorching their way through a path of random violence.
After a few quick farewells and promises to meet later, we all disperse. Fritz is trembling with worry about his wife and child. As he rushes out the door, we call, “God be with you.”
We scatter through the madness that courses everywhere. The others have disappeared into the night, each to a safe shelter from the turmoil engulfing us. I remain with Willi. Our minds are numb with the absorption of such upheaval and our thoughts muddle and swim disjointedly in our heads. Thinking where to go, where to hide, we remember that Mama is alone at home. Pressing against the shadows of the houses that we have known all our lives, we make our way back. Willi is clutching my hand and tells me to have courage. My throat is raw. Fear is so overwhelming that there is room for nothing else. We move forward like the blind. Where our feet are going, what thoughts keep us alive are not part of our awareness. In my mind, I see Mama lying on the floor like Frau Kaufmann, tortured, bloodied. Maybe they have taken her away. My thoughts race ahead of us as we rush through the black streets, showers of broken glass crashing around us as the destruction continues. We are coughing and gasping from the dense smoke suffocating us as we wade through clouds of soot and the odor of burnt timber.
At last we arrive home and begin to call frantically, “Mama, where are you? Mama, are you all right? Mama, please answer, please, please.”
Still there is no sound, as we tread cautiously through the dark, hollow rooms, our hands clenched together, terror strangling our throats so that we cannot speak. We are sleepwalkers, gliding through a nightmare of unspeakable horror, every step drawing us closer to an awakening that we dare not confront.
A weak voice can be heard from behind a door and we hurry towards it. “Nini, Willi, oh, my God in heaven, you’ve come back. I thought that this was the end and that I would never see you again.”
We find her shivering in a darkened room. A small candle, its dwindling wick still lit, rests on the table next to her chair. She is sitting near a window from where she can view by peering from behind the pulled drapes that Vienna is ablaze. The fire’s leaping scarlet flames create a dance of light and shadow on the wall and on her face. Catching the flickering glow, a silver needle shines in her quivering hand. There, alone in the dark, she has been sewing pockets into the hem of her dress to conceal her pieces of jewelry where they will not be found. Next to her on the table is a hot poker, pulled from the last shimmering embers of the fire, that she was planning to use as a weapon. She knows that this night is the final blow, that we will flee or die in the attempt. She has prepared to escape or to fight if she is attacked. I run to her and fold my arms around her neck. Together we cry until we are exhausted and can cry no longer.
Willi is kneeling at her feet, his head on her lap, his body shaking, tears in his eyes.
“Mama,” he says, “will we really die tonight?”
“Shhh, my child. We are still together. There is still hope. We can’t give up as long as there is breath.”
When the well of tears is dry and our sobbing has come to an end, I break the silence in a cracking voice. “Our beautiful city, vandalized and all for nothing. They have gone berserk, a meaningless orgy of violence, and for what? Why do they hate us in this way, to deny us the very air that we breathe? Why do they envy us our property that we have earned with sweat and sacrifice? Why do they hunt us like animals and treat us worse than they would treat any beast?”
Mama shakes her head sadly in reply but then asks, “What about the others, are they all right?”
“The family is fine, as far as we know. We will try to contact Stella and Erna tomorrow. With God’s help they will all be safe. But,” I say at last, after a long pause, “they have killed Frau Kaufmann.”
She stares at me in stunned disbelief, without words, and then replies simply, “Alevah Sholem.” (She should rest in peace.) Children, we have to get away or we will be next.”
She has no tears left to shed for her dear friend and the response seems strangely detached, but Mama has a family to think of, now as always, to preserve and protect. We have seen this strength of conviction before when Papa died. In the face of greatest adversity, she has been able to push all the dark thoughts aside and to concentrate on one goal, the preservation of her brood. Her eyes are gazing ahead, dry now, and her expression of resolve provides some courage to us to continue.
It is agreed that we must try to survive in hiding until the date that our exit papers have established when we may leave. The streets of Vienna have become a hostile place for us all. If we are not detained, or attacked, we will abandon the place that we loved so deeply, that we would have defended to our last breath, our only home, which has now expelled us like discarded refuse.
This, we later discover, has been named “Kristallnacht,” the night of broken glass and broken hearts. It is the culmination of all that has preceded. On this one night of terror and death, all the hatred against us, veiled before by rhetoric and explanations, is now bared to a clear light. We have been separated from the rest of humanity and told that we do not have a place in the world where we can be accepted. The atrocity is unforgivable. This mass destruction has nothing to do with war on the battlefields of Europe. We are being tortured and murdered by our own Austrian people, with no cause, no military agenda, except for the historically obvious that once again we Jews are scapegoats, an easy target against which so many are willing to rally.
Dawn, as always, awakens the citizens of Vienna with its golden radiance, but on the day following Kristallnacht, it also illuminates the wanton destruction of the previous night, revealing the full extent of hatred’s fury. Our minds cannot truly absorb what our eyes must witness. Looking down from our window, we see the ugliness spread out before us, no longer concealed in the previous night’s shadows but clear and sunlit in a harsh new reality. The crazed persecution however, has not ceased, but is only starting anew. Brazen Nazi villains have devised new forms of torment. To our horror, we see old Jewish people on hands and knees, bent and terrified, cowering at the boots of the SS officers who, with horsewhips in their hands and pistols at their sides, are standing above them, convulsed in fits of maniacal laughter. Defenseless, the poor victims quiver under the abuse, holding small wooden scrub brushes in their reddened fingers. The soapy water turns red, mixing with blood, while bits of glass become embedded into the flesh. Tears mingle with sweat, as they are being forced to clean the streets of the city, trying in vain to wipe away the sins of their oppressors. Viennese passersby, even children, point at them in contempt, spit on them and call out, “Jewish swine” as they walk along. The humiliation is unbearable.
We hear about one tragedy after another. Jews are quaking in renewed fear, remaining in their homes and only leaving on matters of urgency. In the streets, we move in hurried steps, heads lowered, our faces grim. We dare not speak except in urgent whispers. There are no idle pleasantries or talk of the weather. We are not like other Austrians anymore, just shadows of human beings. News of the tyranny spreads like noxious fumes, and so we learn of the latest assaults, revelations of an incomprehensible terror. There are eyewitness accounts, told to one another in passing, frightened words told in furtive bursts describing the many horrors that are occurring daily.
Each description of brutality surpasses the one before. We are numb when we hear about the events that have occurred at the Rothschild Hospital that has, for years, been a famous landmark in Vienna, renowned for the research and medical miracles performed there. It was founded by the famous Jewish philanthropic family and has many outstanding Jewish physicians on staff. On the morning following Kristallnacht, brutal Nazi soldiers attacked the building in belligerent disrespect, storming through the hallways and patient rooms. Their violence had no bounds. Doctors, chosen at random because of Jewish names on their surgical coats were dragged, screaming, to open windows and flung to their deaths from six storys above ground. Jewish children, dying of tuberculosis, were ripped from their hospital beds. Barefoot and clad in thin nightshirts, they were marched through the streets on display, forced to provide a source of ridicule for the gawking Viennese citizens. As they stepped on bits of broken glass, bystanders cackled with cruel delight, mocking the helpless victims with no sign of pity. The terrified, trembling children, coughing from the sickness and cold were forced to endure the torture while blood dripped from their pale torn skin.
As much as possible, we try to keep in contact with the family, although a mere walk from one street to another is hazardous. Like ghosts, we melt into the darkened doorways, keeping our heads lowered, walking quickly, trying our best to avoid the violent scenes in the streets and to bring no attention to ourselves. There are no restrictions on the limitations of abuse, and we are aware of our vulnerability. Still, I want to see my sisters again before they leave Vienna.
When I go to see Stella, I find her pouring coffee. She greets me and hands me a cup absentmindedly, her hand shaking so that it rattles the saucer. Her eyes dart from me to the door, over and over. “Nini, I don’t know what has happened to Walter. He should have returned from our shop hours ago. What will I do if he doesn’t come back?”
“I’m sure he will be back. Don’t think about the worst. Time always seems to drag when you’re waiting,” I tell her, trying to sound confident, but wondering whether something dire has really happened. Stella relies on her husband to make the important decisions in their life. His fatherly role is one that gives her reassurance and fills some void within her. Without him she will be unguided and desperately alone. The thoughts of that possibility come to us both at once as I see it mirrored in her bright blue eyes, wide with terror, wet with tears, and her fingers twisting in nervous tension.
The clock ticks loudly as if to announce the passing of each minute, and the clicking noise speaks like a voice, proclaiming disaster. Where has he gone? What is he doing? Has he been taken? Is he alive?
We are both dumbfounded as Walter comes through the door. He is blood soaked, bruised nearly beyond recognition. His left eye is puffed closed so that he cannot see. He tilts his head sideways to compensate for the impaired vision. He is hardly able to walk, staggering, weaving, leaving a trail of red splatters on the floor behind him, and finally collapsing into a chair. His arms are wound around his rib cage, hugging his sore, battered sides. When he lifts his stained shirt, we choke back our nausea in shock at the sight of his swollen, oozing flesh.
Stella is immobile at first, staring at the transformed man before her. Her voice choked dry, she stares in horrified disbelief at the pulpy face and gaping wounds. There is nothing that she can think of to say or to do.
“We have to clean him up and find a doctor,” I say at last, realizing that I must assume the position now of a rational voice within an irrational situation.
“No,” Walter says weakly. “There is no doctor to find. They are all busy trying to protect themselves and to flee from this Hell. Just do whatever you can. Patch me up and I will be all right. At least I escaped. They stopped short of killing me this time, but we are outrunning death by millimeters. The Nazi gangs are murderous and out of control. Their sticks and boots came down on me heavier and heavier. At first I could hear their cursing, and chanting, ‘Jew, Jew, kill the Devil Jew!’ But after a while there was no sound. The blood seemed to slosh in my ears and I must have gone unconscious.”
We sponge and wipe, trying to wrap bandages of torn sheets to stop the still flowing blood. He is moaning in pain, and Stella is crying uncontrollably.
“Here, take some coffee,” I say, offering him a sip of the hot liquid, but his lip is cut and the heat burns the open gash.
“Ah!” he cries, feeling the sting. Through thickened lips he says, “Nini, you have to go home. The streets are unsafe, and it will soon be dark. Go back to Mama and try to stay inside. We have no chance but to run from Vienna. There is only death everywhere that we go.”
I leave them behind. What else can I do? I scuttle through the streets, which are no longer neat and orderly as they used to be. With the rampaging Nazis causing destruction wherever they go, and the crude scrawls de-facing any Jewish property, an ugly squalor has befallen the city. The veneer of civility has been lifted, and suddenly I am fully aware of the metamorphosis. My beautiful Vienna has been stripped of all its finery and lies before me, its belly split open like a ravaged carcass, festering, stinking, and decaying in the sun.•
About the author
Vivian Jeanette Kaplan was born in 1946 in Shanghai, China, where her parents were married. Her family had fled to Shanghai from Vienna in 1939, eventually settling in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. She is a graduate of the University of Toronto, married, with three sons and one grandson.