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ROSIE POLKENFELD | CHAPTER 1

A STOLEN
HUNGARIAN YOUTH

Navigating Childhood Away From Home

Romania 1927

Born in Romania, Rosie Polkenfeld was one of six children to her Polish father, Jacob Polkenfeld, and Romanian mother, Chava Yenta. She lived in an urban area known as Petrova — an area she described as a “big city” — with her parents and siblings until she was about 14, when her mother's cousin fell ill.

Rosie was sent to care for the woman, who lived in Hungary at a time when that country was beginning to feel the increasingly, all-consuming pressure of a Hitler-led Germany.

"She treated me so great, like a princess," Rosie said of her mother's cousin, who never had children of her own.

In Hungary, she attended a good school and never wanted for a thing. But her life was completely upended in the late 1930s when she was ushered into a concentration camp as all male Jews in the country were relegated to brutal, forced labor.

"I lived a youth nobody in the world should have,” Rosie Guttman, who before the war was being groomed to become a seamstress, said. “I had a very, very, very ugly youth, in the prime of my teens."

Rosie wasn't more than 16 years old.

HUNGARY:
A YOUNG NATION IN FLUX

Political Pressure Brings The Country To WWII's Doorstep.

At the conclusion of WWI, Hungary formed its own kingdom, navigated a series of leadership philosophies and expanded its territory — with the help of Germany, a favor it would need to repay once Hitler pressured the country to fall in line with his policies on Jews.

By 1939, the country's political majority supported its own equivalent of Germany's Nazi party. When Germany invaded Romania in the fall of 1940, Hungary allowed German soldiers safe passage. And later that year, Hungary's prime minister signed an agreement that aligned the country with Germany, Italy and Japan, serving as the country's entrance to WWII. Hungarian Jews were sent to labor camps or concentration camps, based on their gender. At least 27,000 of those laborers died before the German occupation began in 1944.

"I'm one of the lucky ones."

— Rosie Guttman

HISTORICAL TIMELINE - POLAND 1918-1939

1918

Hungarian Democratic Republic forms

1919

Treaty of Versailles signed, recognizing end to WWI

1933

Adolf Hitler becomes Chancellor of Germany

1934

Hitler declares himself Fuhrer of Germany, becoming a dictator

1939

Romania's government declares short-lived neutrality in WWII

1940

Notorious Auschwitz concentration camp established in Poland.

1941

Romania joins Axis powers and provides support for Nazi Regime.

1941

Anti-jewish riots in Romania lead to the murders of hundreds of Jews.

1944

Germany occupies Hungary.

INTRO CHAP 2