Surviving Hitler: A Boy in the Nazi Death Camps

Warren, Andrea. Surviving Hitler: A Boy in the Nazi Death Camps. 2002. 146p. ISBN 9780060007676. Available as an eBook on Overdrive.

Jack Mandelbaum is Polish and lives with his well-to-do family on the shores of the Baltic Sea, but the rumbles of war with Germany are getting louder. Hitler gained power six years ago, and has been clamoring for both more land and for the destruction of Jews. Jack’s family is not very religious, but all the same, Jews are becoming stigmatized.

As Poland mobilizes for war, Jack and his family are sent to the country to live with relatives. His father will catch up with them the following week. Unfortunately, Germany invades, and the family is permanently split.

Life becomes increasingly difficult for the Jews, and even those who are not living in urban ghettos are beat and starving. Jack works as hard as he can, making sure to always keep busy. But eventually, even Jews in the country are rounded up. Jack and his family are violently separated, and he ends up in the Blechhammer concentration camp. Thus begins a horrific life, living one moment to the next with the goal of staying alive one more day.

Over the next three years, Jack moves from camp to camp, and experiences the despair of human violence on other humans. As the Holocaust moves along, unlikely friendships with other camp dwellers and the thought of being reunited with his family is what keeps Jack alive through it all.

This biography of Jack’s life provides a provoking look at life under the most horrible conditions of starvation, violence, and hopelessness and shows that, beyond all of this, there can be redemption and not only surviving but triumphing over oppression.