Oswald Adler (Vienna, May 27, 1920) was married to Gertrude Glaser when he reached Italy with her to embark in Trieste with 302 other Jewish refugees to reach Palestine. Mr. and Mrs. Adler were in Naples on August 29, 1940. After spending three weeks in the Poggioreale prison they were moved to the camp at Ferramonti di Tarsia (Cosenza), to Sipicciano (Viterbo) on Sept. 9, 1941, and from there to San Donato Val di Comino on March 31, 1942.

Arrest of Oswald, Gertrude and the other internees

On April 6, Maundy Thursday for Catholics and Easter Eve for Jews, the Feldgendarmerie soldiers went into action in the early morning hours: they picked up Klara Babad and Grete Berger at an apartment adjoining the Albergo Gaudiello; they stopped Osvald Adler and Gertrude Glaser, who had voluntarily presented themselves to the command on Via Piave to rescue Henriette, who had been threatened with execution because she was accused of being a spy; they took Grete Bloch in Carlo Coletti Square and the Levi family in the house on Via Cerasole; they captured Ignatius Gross, Rosa Blody; Chane Feldhorn and daughter Edith Kreiner, Samuel Stein and wife Edith Landsberger.

San Donato - Fossoli - Auschwitz

From San Donato the arrestees were transferred to Fossoli concentration camp. On May 16, 1944, they were deported by train to Auschwitz. Gertrude recalls that about eighty men, women, children, and the elderly were crammed into each carriage. They were all huddled together, there was no place to sit and they took turns getting a little rest. Mothers held the little ones in their arms, leaving the elderly to lean against the walls of the wagon. The facilities consisted of a bucket without a lid that overflowed and spread an unbearable stench and was only allowed to be emptied once a day. During the journey many deportees fainted, others fell ill, and several of them died. The stench, the stale air and standing for hours on end made the days unbearable.

Daily life in the death camps

The deportees arrived at Auschwitz on May 23, 1944. When the train was opened, the SS separated the men from the women, the old from the young, and the fathers from the children. Of the sixteen Jews from San Donato, only eight survived the first selection: Osvald Adler, Klara Babad, Rosa Blody, Geltrude Glaser, Ignazio Gross, Edith Landesberger, Enrico Levi, and Samuel Stein. Osvald Adler was eliminated in the Flossenbürg camp on March 4, 1945. His wife Gertrude survived several of Mengele's selections and was freed by the arrival of Russian soldiers in 1945.