Joseph Morton Summary

Summary

Joseph Morton

Born Joseph Morkkwitz on July 11, 1924 in Lodz, Poland.  He was the oldest child having five brothers and one sister.  His father was a tailor and his mother a homemaker.  Morton went to school until the 7th grade.  The war started in September 1939.  Two days later, the German's marched in.  His father was in the Polish Army and was captured in Russia as a prisoner but was later released.  Jewish people was made to wear yellow bands on their arms to show they were a Jew then a yellow star on the front and back of their uniform.  "In 1940 they enclosed the Ghetto and that's when the real problems started."  As a result, starvation, people dying from hunger, and always living in fear.  The German's guarded borders and there was no leaving the Ghetto's.  When the Ghetto was enclosed, the whole family was together. The Warsaw uprising began and German's came in with trucks, took belongings and closed the Ghetto in 1944 then loading the Jews onto cattle trains to be taken to Auschwitz.  There would be 50-60 people standing in the trains with no food other than what one brought with him.  They would be on the trains for two or three days but didn't know where they were going.  Once they were in Auschwitz, the German's split the family up.  Morton, his father, brother, and cousin was sent to work and the rest of his family was killed.  They worked to build barracks underground.  As a result to the horrible conditions, Morton became ill with Typhus, being hungry, and losing so much weight so he was sent to the sick camp by train.  The American Army came and liberated the Jews and Morton was taken to a hospital for being so sick where he reconnected with his father and brother.  They left the hospital by jumping a fence and went to Canada.  In 1949 he registered to come to the U.S. and went to Chicago.  (330 words)

"In 1940 they enclosed the Ghetto and that's when the real problems started."

"Why do you think you survived?  By luck, strictly luck."