The rumors were true. The “protected” Jews are going to be relocated into the Fifth District into special yellow-star buildings. We don’t have safe-passes.

After 12 November

Earlier in the month, after both Lilys were taken to the Óbuda brick factory, my mother, Margit, didn’t feel safe and didn’t know where we should go. My father, Tibor (who was already in hiding) came to get us and spent the night. There was another raid: my mother and I were at risk. Tibor snuck out of the building and returned a few minutes later with a Swiss pass. [11]

Relocation to the “protected buildings” had to occur by November 15. For that reason, we were allowed freedom of movement on Nov 13, 14, and 15, between 8:00am and 4:00pm. Although the deadline was extended by 48 hours, this gave the Nyilas that much more time to rampage, plunder, and kill the Jews moving from one place to another. [12]

Sometime between 13-17 November

My father helped my mother and I move from Szervita tér 5 to a Swiss-protected building on Tátra Street. [This building is not on Lévai’s list, [13]nor is any building on Tátra Street.] These protected buildings are indicated on the map of the Yellow-Star buildings, but there there is no reference as to which country was the protector. The two Lilys joined us at this address.

One of my memories could fit here:

There was a large group of us, all the Jews from the building, gathered in front of the main gate (kapu). Only a few men with guns watched us while their leader argued with a well-dressed man. They argued for quite a while until we were told to return to our apartments.

I don’t know who the well-dressed man was—maybe Carl Lutz, Raoul Wallenberg, or another imposing figure insisting that we were under the protection of his country. Whoever he was, I am grateful. We owe him our lives.

I remember my mother was with me, but I don’t know who else was there.

My mother, still afraid, saw people in front of no 6 Tátra Street, where passes to Swedish-protected buildings could be obtained. My mother went there and didn’t leave until she got papers to a Swedish-protected building in Katona Jozsef Street [address unknown].

We are now receiving some information from the Jewish Council that a new, large ghetto will be set up in District VII, which has 162 yellow-star buildings. This means relocating about 12,000 Christians from that area into vacated apartments. It also means that about 60,000 Jews were to be crammed into an area of about 0.1 square miles (0.26 square kilometres).

Even children under the protection of the International Red Cross have to be transferred into this ghetto.

Sunday 26 November

I don’t remember the conditions in the protected buildings that provided us with a shelter, but Ferenc Wilde describes what he saw:

Went to visit Irma [in a protected building]. It was a horrific sight: the apartment was on the fourth floor, all the way to the top.  2-3 men sat on the steps and also crowded the walkways. Irma lives in a small 3-room modern apartment with a low ceiling; 72 people live in the three rooms. Before noon, only women are in the apartment so that they can cook; that’s why the men are sitting in the stairwell. Irma complained about how she had to escape her own apartment and couldn’t bring anything. She has no money. I asked what she needed the most. A towel, drying cloth for the kitchen, soap, any kind of food, but mainly tea and aspirin, because the windows cannot be closed even with 72 people sleeping and everyone has a constant cold. I gave her the 500P I had on me, and she was delighted that she can now contribute to the shared kitchen.

29 November

A new decree decribes the establishing of a large ghetto in District VII. Non-Jews have to leave the designated area and buildings by December 7.

The two older women (my grandmother Regina and her sister Irén) are still at Szervita tér 5, which is not a protected building. The two Lilys visit their mothers without a star, but they know that at some point, the mothers would have had to join us on Tátra Street or Katona József Street [They visited as often as possible. I don’t have an exact address]. The only alternative would be to allow them to be taken to the large Budapest ghetto.

December

Friday, 1 December

Posters announce regulations regarding the establishment of the large ghetto.

Saturday, 2 December

There are large posters announcing the organization of the ghetto. All Jews without protection papers must move by the 7th into a defined area of the VIIth district. The cost of all kinds of transportation, even hand-carts, has jumped a thousand-fold. All day we hear loud cannon fire; there are many overflights and an ARS.

Since I don’t have any recollection or information regarding any of us being in the large ghetto, I presume that by the 7th of December, the two older women, my grandmother and her sister, have moved in with us in the protected building.

We hear constant cannon fire.