A Farm Girls Fight to Survive© by Sandra Baum Barikian

A Farm Girls Fight to Survive©
The following is the true story of Eta Baum
Written by Sandra Baum Barikian
The following piece was written by my sister, Sandra Baum Barikian.  I present this today on the eve of Yom HaShoah, to tell the story of our grandmother, Eta Baum z'l, a survivor of the Holocaust


The stench of cow manure permeated the rundown barn.  She would need to sell another month’s worth of butter and cheese to make it out of this suffocating town. The country town of Iska was a tight knit farm community in Czechoslovakia with rolling hills and lush soil. In its single grocery store, you could hear many different languages spoken in the aisles including Czech, Slovakian, Hungarian, Yiddish and Russian depending on the politics of the year and which army was in charge. Eta was always getting in trouble at school because frankly she was the smartest one in the room and the local teacher was not amused by her wit. While the other Jewish girls snuck out of the backdoor when the town priest came in for the morning prayers, she would listen intently to the words: ”Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name”…as the group of girls chanted the prayers, she hummed along, even though she knew these prayers were not meant for her. 
Eta was no stranger to hard work. While her step father Moishe was away for weeks at a time selling pots and pans to the neighboring towns and villages, she was up at sunrise to milk the cows, feed the horses, and help her overwhelmed mother, Rachel, care for her three younger step siblings: Itzu, David, and little Rebekah. Altogether, there were 5 children. Eta and her older sister were close, but they were very different. She often envied her sister Shaindul, who seemed completely satisfied with country life. It was unsettling, but deep down she always knew she was destined for more.  Eta was fluent in all five languages spoken in the village and she had no idea how helpful this would be on her journey to the beautiful bustling city of Budapest, Hungary. The year was 1938 and at 20 years old, she gathered her life savings and set off to the big city. 
For the first year, she managed to find work as a cook and a maid with a wealthy family with many children. She learned to cook elaborate meals for large groups of family members. Though it wasn’t her dream job, she was able to save up money and buy some new clothes. One day on her walk to the market, a sign advertising a vacant position in a hotel caught her attention. She walked in and asked to speak to the manager. That next week, she began her new job as a maid in a beautiful boutique hotel on the Danube that catered to high end clientele. Within six months, she was managing the front desk, the finances, the supply chain, and the entire staff. She was 21 years old and though she had a petite 4’10 frame, she was whip smart, reliable, and exhibited a restless energy and a need to get things done. This made some of the other workers envious of her quick rise to the top.  
Eta kept mostly to herself, and was vigilant about following the news. She understood that her Jewish identity was to be kept to herself. There were rumblings and rumors going around about the German invasion of Poland that she didn’t want to believe. Her body was in an endless state of high alert. It occurred to her that she wouldn’t be safe without new identity papers; thus, used a large amount of cash to purchase fake papers and a baptism certificate. The forger asked what town he should use and she smartly chose a town that was under Russian control. This move proved to save her life more than once. 
The rumors increased in severity. Something told her that she needed to go back and save her family. She made the trek back to Iska. Her mother Rachel fell into her arms and wept of relief when she walked into the house. Eta explained that it was dangerous to stay there and wanted to take all of the children with her back to Budapest. A heated argument ensued between the two, but eventually her mother agreed to allow only Itzu, the oldest child, to return with Eta back to Budapest. They left the next day. This would be the last time Eta would hug her mother, her sister, and two younger siblings. In 1944, a year before the war ended, her family would be rounded up on cattle cars sent to Auschwitz. Her mother, two sisters, and brother were murdered in the gas chambers immediately upon arrival. 
With her little brother in her care, she returned back to Budapest. Unable to hide him in the hotel due to fear of being discovered, she placed him in a local orphanage. With this added responsibility of caring for her brother, she felt the pressure mounting. Every day, there was a new story of a Jewish family being shot, bodies thrown into the Danube. The Germans and Hungarians were allies against the Russians, and the local Hungarian Nationalists were eager to show their loyalty to the movement. 
One jealous employee of the hotel suspected Eta was too smart and therefore reported her to the authorities as a Jew. A Hungarian Gestapo arrived to the hotel and took her down to the station for questioning. Eta sat alone on the cold medal chair and gathered all of her nerve as the eager Gestapo began to question every detail of her story.  “What town are you from, why are you here alone, what food did your mother cook, what church did you attend, what was the name of the town priest…” This was her opportunity to convince him the allegations against her were wrong. She began reciting the ‘Our Father’ prayer from memory followed by the other prayers she memorized as a young girl. How would a Jewish girl know such prayers, she argued? They kept her in that cold room for two days of questioning, trying to catch her in a lie. They were unable to verify her story as the town she claimed to be from was under Russian rule. She was finally released and returned back to work. 
A few months following this incident, she received a tip from the underground that the orphanage was to be liquidated. All of the children were being sent “away.” She needed to get her brother out, but how? Where would she hide him without exposing herself? She managed to pay off a local family that agreed to hide him in their basement. With this new plan in place, she approached the orphanage under cover of darkness. The only way she could get him out was to break a window, and have him crawl through it. They managed to escape without being caught. That next day, all of the Jewish children in the orphanage were transported on a train straight to Auschwitz. Nobody survived. 
Eta learned how to live with the fear that at any moment, the lies she built around her could unravel. It seemed surreal that she had managed to survive this long under the guise of a lie. Her will to survive at any costs carried her through the dark moments. One day at the local train station, a Hungarian Gestapo asked to see her papers. He began to hassle her and question whether she was in fact a Jew trying to escape Budapest. She knew that all this Officer needed to do was take her around the back and shoot her on the spot. There was no such thing as due process and no one would question his actions. Eta did not know how to get out of this debacle she found herself in. After several minutes, a handsome Hungarian officer walked over. He asked the Gestapo why he was harassing his sister. He threatened to shoot the Gestapo on the spot if he ever approached her again. The Gestapo backed off. Eta jumped on the next train and never saw this Hungarian Officer again. This random individual saved her life, and for no reason that she understood. In her mind, she knew that someone was watching over her and that perhaps she remained alive against all odds for a reason. 
In 1944, the Germans orchestrated a coup and invaded Hungary after discovering that the President was attempting to negotiate a surrender to the Allied forces.  Several hundred thousand were either shot or sent to concentration camps, and the remaining Hungarian Jews were thrown into a central ghetto .1 square miles long. No person or contraband were permitted in or out, and the dead were left lining the streets of the ghetto. Eta’s status as a Christian allowed her to operate freely, allowing her to avoid the ghetto. 
After several years of living in constant fear of being discovered and executed, the war finally came to an end. Soviet forces managed to liberate Budapest on February 13, 1945. In early March, a Russian Army Captain came into the hotel asking to speak to the manager in charge. He was seeking rooms for his soldiers. Eta spoke to him in Russian and the man was impressed, as most Hungarians did not know Russian. He returned the next day with a uniform and a machine gun and offered her a position alongside him. It turns out that the Captain’s supervisor spoke Yiddish and was also Jewish. He needed a translator who knew both Russian and Hungarian and Eta was someone familiar with the city. She worked with the Russian army and helped them gather intelligence about captured Hungarian Gestapo agents responsible for the murder of innocent civilians. As a reward, Eta was given ownership of restaurant in downtown Budapest until a year later the sitting Hungarian government passed a law that all non-native Hungarians should return to where they came from. 
Eta relocated with Itzu to a displaced person camp in Czechoslovakia, where she would eventually meet Frank Baum, a tall blue eyed man five years her junior. After just one week of meeting, the Rabbi placed a sign in the window of their engagement. Eta saved her brother Itzu, despite losing the rest of her family. She would eventually make it to the United States with no money to her name to pursue a successful real estate business from nothing. Her acts of untold bravery would result in 3 children, 8 grandchildren, and 13 great grandchildren that carry on the memory of a farm girl, who against all odds, made it out of the depths of hell to create a new life for her family.  
Ex 1. Eta Baum; Ex 2. Yad Vashem Testimony Page 



   

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