Along the streets of the lost childhood: story of Leszek Allerhand

“Childhood experience is the most truthful and colorful picture of life – the first and perfect image of the time and the people. It does not matter that the ears and eyes are little – they can hear and see best.”
Leszek Allerhand

leszek-allerhand Leszek Allerhand in his house, Zakopane, Poland, 2010 © Jason Francisco

This is the story about three people in Lviv out of the hundreds of thousands of Lviv victims of the Holocaust. It is the story of three persons out of only several hundred who managed to survive in the city. There were over 35 Allerhands' family members, yet only 13-year-old Leszek and his parents survived the war. It is a rare, almost unique, case when a child and both parents managed to survive. Leszek Allerhand was born in 1931 in Lviv to a family of Jewish Polish intelligentsia, but his peaceful and happy childhood was violently disrupted by the Nazi occupation. His father and grandfather lost their positions in Lviv University, the family home was confiscated, and in autumn 1942 the Allerhands were forcefully resettled into the Lviv ghetto. Leszek and his parents managed to escape. He and his mother, were in hiding for over two years in Lviv, regularly changing their shelters to flee persecution. The familiar streets of their city concealed many traps and were turned into into a place of continual and paralyzing fear and fragile hope. On their way to ultimate rescue, Leszek and his mother experienced an entire range of human behavior found in dark times – from hatred and violence to blackmail, indifference and, eventually, selfless kindness and help. After the war, Leszek Allerhand moved with his parents to Poland, became a Doctor of Medicine, and lived in Zakopane. As with many others who survived, Leszek had been silent about the dreadful experiences, never speaking about his ordeal. It was due to an unwillingness to re-live his deep trauma and because the Communist policy to suppress the memory of Jewish war victims. Leszek was finally able to openly speak about his experience in the autumn of 1992 when he took part in the World Jewish Congress of Children of the Holocaust in Jerusalem. It was there that he learned about the 1941-42 diary of his grandfather, a well-known lawyer Maurycy Allerhand. The original copy of the diary is stored in the archives of the Jewish Institute in Warsaw.

I read through the records of my grandfather. I was deeply moved to leaf through the dozens of old office papers that rendered the atmosphere of a lawyer’s business. Most of the papers were taken by my grandfather from his office as he wanted to retain the details of his court proceedings. I remember the papers were lying in the corner of our room in the ghetto and how we secretly fixed the fire in the oven.... On the back of the papers grandpa would write his impressions of the life of the times... writing in pencil in his tiny illegible handwriting while leaving wide margins, the same as in the manuscripts of his books which were so familiar to me...
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

The surprising discovery inspired Leszek to establish the Allerhand Institute in Krakow to commemorate his grandfather, and to share his own experience. In 2003 Leszek published a book, "Notes from the Other World" (Zapiski z tamtego świata), in which the diary by Maurycy Allerhand is intertwined with Leszek’s recollections of the Holocaust in Lviv. The dialogue between the generations through time and space represents a perspective of extreme violence and genocide from both a child’s and an adult's impressions.

A virtual walk along the sites of the Allerhand's family in Lviv focuses on personal experiences and emotions against the background of the 20th century history of the city.

University: place of integration and isolation

universytet Jan Kazimierz University, 1920-30, Photo from the National Digital Archives in Poland, No 1-N-3177

Maurycy Allerhand, Leszek’s grandfather, was born on June, 28, 1868, to a wealthy family. After their family estate of Bobrowniki was sold the Allerhands moved to Rzeszów where Maurycy finished secondary school. He received his higher education and doctoral degree at the Vienna University. Afterwards, in the early 1900s, he moved to Lviv and started his legal practice at the Office of Dr. Leon Nussbrecher and Szymon Fleischner (presently a building at 12 Sichovykh Striltsiv Street). During that time he married Sarah-Salomea Weintraub and they had two children, a daughter Maryla and a son Joachim (father of Leszek Allerhand). The family belonged to assimilated Jews and their major language of communication at home was Polish. In legal practices German was also widely used. Some assimilated Galician Jews called themselves the Israelites, others presented themselves as Germans or Poles of the Mosaic faith.

On the threshold of the Second World War Lviv was one of the most important Jewish centers in the Polish Republic and represented virtually all the typical religious, cultural, and political trends characteristic to Jews in East and West Europe. Lviv had a dynamic Jewish population of Orthodox, Reformist, Zionist and Conservative religious practice, established and Socialist political leanings, supporters of traditional Jewish education and the Haskalah movement (Jewish Enlightenment), outstanding rabbis, scientists, political figures, artists, actors, poets, and athletes. It is impossible to think of the entire pallet of the prewar Lviv life without them. In 1931, there were 157,490 Poles, 40,743 Ukrainians and 99,595 Jews living in Lviv. It was the third largest Jewish community of prewar Poland, preceded only by Warsaw and Łódż. Other residents included Armenians, Germans, et al.

In the interwar period universities of the Polish Republic, which included Lviv, were academic milieus that united men and women of various ethnic, social, cultural, and religious backgrounds. They mingled in classes, laboratories, libraries, and corridors. For Jewish and Ukrainian students, universities were both a place for integration into the dominant Polish culture and a place of isolation and social exclusion. The Jews in particular had to overcome financial, social and linguistic barriers (the language of study was strictly Polish), ostracism in daily relations, and even physical violence. However, the greatest challenge was the practices of numerus clausus, a quota for the number of Jewish students that could not exceed 10%, and “bench ghettos”, a practice of allocating separate benches for Jewish students in classrooms, first used in Lviv Polytechnics. The activation of the Polish Nationalist movement and an outburst of anti-Semitism in the late 1920's impacted all Jewish students regardless of the degree of their assimilation or Orthodoxy. In the 1921-22 academic year a share of Jewish students in Universities in Poland was 24.6%, in 1930-31 – it was 18.5%, while in the late 1930s, the share dropped to 8.2%.

Professor Maurycy Allerhand authored over 1,000 publications in German and Polish in civil and procedural law. He was also interested in ethnography and advanced mathematics. While lecturing at the University he organized seminars for talented young lawyers and students of law in his home office. His students included the well-known lawyers Karol Koranyi, Kazimierz Przybyłowski, Jerzy Sawicki and Ludwik Dworzak. They would always gratefully recollect the intellectual atmosphere of the meetings and the warm friendly attitude. Professor Allerhand enjoyed such authority and popularity that he even received a special guard for his family and himself against the protesters in times of anti-Semitic student unrest.

Lost home

Jagiellonska 20/22 (20/22 Hnatiuka)
Courtesy of Igor Zhuk, 2011

Maurycy Allerhand and his family lived not far from Jan Kazimierz University. His law office was at his home on 20/22 Jagiellonska, presently, Hnatiuka Street, which he ran with his son Joachim. In addition to his teaching and legal activities, Maurycy Allerhand was a well-known public and national activist. He was part of the Codification Commission and the National Tribunal of the Polish Republic. He was also active in Jewish associations – he was member of the “B’nei B’rit Leopolis” society and was a Commissioner of the Jewish Religious Community in Lviv and elected President of the Community in 1929. During the Nazi occupation, due to his significant role in the Jewish Community, Maurycy Allerhand would be pressured to preside in the Judenrat but he managed to avoid the position due to his advanced age.

parents Salomea (Sarah) Allerhand (nee Weintraub), photo of the early 20th century Portrait of Maurycy Allerhand, Marek Munz, 1920s. Was stored in a house of the Jewish Religious Community at 12 Bernstein Street (presently – Sholem Aleichem). Today, the portrait is stored in the holdings of the Borys Voznytsky Lviv National Art Gallery

Leszek and his parents spent a lot of time in his grandfather’s apartment. He recollects that Maurycy Allerhand was rather strict, reserved, and very disciplined. As Leszek wrote,

... You should know that my grandparents were not the kind of persons to hold you on theirlap, or to read the Grimm brothers stories and continuously give you candies. I could randomly kiss grandpa on his bald spot when he was sitting leaning forward in his chair in his office... When he was high-spirited he would sometimes stroke me on the head… Also, I liked it very much when grandpa showed me different books and explained their meaning. Unfortunately, this only happened when our kitty was taking a nap on his chair and he did not dare to break its sleep.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

The Allerhands lived in a tenant house and paid a monthly rent for their apartment at Jagiellonska. Their apartment was on the second floor, had 7 rooms, a kitchen, a room for the housemaids, two closets, and a spacious hall. Some rooms hosted the attorney’s office, where there were several secretaries and a stenographer. There was also a waiting room for visitors. The family belonged to the upper middle class and had a collection of crystalware, porcelain, precious dinnerware, Persian carpets, and antiques. Maurycy Allerhand also collected art, such as the works of famous Polish artists Jacek Malczewski, Wojciech Kossak, Teodor Grott, and Wacław Dobrowolski.

At the start of war, during the Soviet rule (1939-1941), authorities assigned living quarters in their apartment to two military families, Doctor Konovalov and Major Gudkov. The Allerhands had to live in the living-room and give the 'guests' their rooms. Within the first months of the German occupation the apartment was confiscated by the Nazi, along with all the family valuables. Looting of Jewish private property, businesses, synagogues and community buildings was the first stage in the policy of extermination of European Jews. At first, Maurycy Allerhand could not believe it was happening. He had graduated from Vienna University, was fluent in German, and genuinely believed in the high legal and cultural level of German civilization. Thus, he prohibited his wife to hide the family treasures at the Polish neighbours, writing: “If Bolsheviks respected the property of a university professor, Germans would respect it even more so.” However, before long he had to faced the cruel reality. The most dramatic experience for Professor Allerhand, up to that point, was the loss of his academic library:

August, 7, 1941
Af 12 o’clock noon a police officer arrived demanding to confiscate the apartment. While I was giving away my office to him I addressed the landlord, in Polish, saying, “Here is my library that I have collected for over 60 years.” The police officer replied as he obviously spoke Polish or another Slavic language, “Sie ist nicht mehr Ihre Bibliothek. Sie war es” (It is not your library any longer. It used to be yours.), and added, “Sie werden ohnehin nicht lange leben” [Anyway, you will not live long].
The Vienna Society of Kompos that confiscated our apartment and all the valuables, along with the library, was not a public institution. I had no idea why I was separated from my library, home,, and pieces of art. None of the people I knew weres able to comprehend it, even some Germans were surprised by the fact of confiscation.
(from the diary of prof. Maurycy Allerhand)

Childhood sites

Asnyka, 7 (presently – Bohomoltsia Street) child
Leszek Allerhand with his mother Zinaida, Lviv, early 1930s. Private collection of Allerhand family

Leszek Allerhand was born on October, 1, 1931 in Lviv. His memories of the prewar carefree childhood were cheerful, joyful, and nostalgically heart clenching. He was the only child from the so called good home. He attended the private kindergarten of Mrs Goldfaber at Asnyka Street (presently - Bohomoltsia). The family’s favourite place for taking a stroll was a park called Governor’s Walls not far from his home (presently – Pidvalna Street). Leszek had private tutors who taught him foreign languages, piano, and rhythmic gymnastics. Leszek recalled that,

In the future, I was supposed to continue the legal tradition of the family. I was supposed to be the smartest. I was supposed to be an award winner in music contests and a champion of many competitions. Unfortunately, I was not taught to swim for fear of accidental drowning.
I was really fond of the street. Whenever I had a chance I would escape from my tutors using various tricks. With a group of my friends we would chase each other in the streets of the inner town playing police and villains. I knew all the alleys and squares, and the names of the sellers and shop owners. All the passthrough hallways of the old townhouses was my paradise.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

One of the favourite childhood places of Leszek was a shop counter where Auntie Kentsia sold warm buns and milk (presently – 31 Staroyevreyska Street). Courtesy of Anna Chebotariova

Building opposite the synagogue

Sobieskiego, 32 (presently – Brativ Rohatyntsiv Street)

Leszek used to live with his parents on the fourth floor of the townhouse at 32 Sobieskiego Street, opposite the Great City Synagogue (presently – Brativ Rohatynstiv Street). In the first months of the Nazi occupation they would witness from the windows of their apartment as this sacred place was burned down, as well as the Golden Rose Synagogue. Despite the fact that the area had been historically considered Jewish, in the interwar period the population was mixed – it hosted Poles, Ukrainians, and Jews. Leszek recollects that this section of the city was rather poor and was not considered prestigious.

Leszek’s father Joachim had worked with Maurycy Allerhand in his Lviv attorney’s office and at Jan Kazimierz University. His mother Zinaida was a housewife who originated from a Russian speaking Jewish family that fled the Russian Revolution from Zhytomyr to Galicia in 1917. The Allerhand family would attend the Great City Synagogue and celebrate Jewish holidays there. However, at Christmas they also decorated a Christmas tree at home. They had a cook who also helped around the house.

Listen to Leszek recollecting about his family apartment, the building, and its prewar residents:

Well, it was not a luxurious apartment. It did not have any central heating, I don’t remember having a gas supply, it was just a normal prewar apartment of the urban middle class, unlike the well-decorated place of my grandparents. There were the so-called backstairs used to take up coal in buckets from the cellar. It was a small apartment, also in modern terms, and there was not even a separate room for a cook. My mother did not cook since she was a madam. A neighbor, Władysław Głowik, had a two-bedroom apartment similar to ours. He was a nice old single gentleman who also owned a winery, a wholesale place located in the basement of the same building. Next door, there lived a senior officer, Dornbach. He was a cavalry captain but then became a civilian and sometimes liked to use a lipstick. On the floor below lived the landlady whose name was Leszczyńska, who was Polish. She was an old lady who used to sit still and was quite noble. There were some other people too, while on the ground floor there lived a Jewish family Zamoyra. Our house was not religious, and although the key symbols were preserved I don’t remember anyone from my immediate or remote family with the side-locks, hats, or beards worn by Orthodox Jews. I am not sure whether it was good or bad but that’s the way it was. We were very much assimilated and at the same time we all thought of ourselves as Jewish.
[translation of a fragment of the interview with Leszek Allerhand recorded on 15.07.2014 in the town of Zakopane, archives of the Center for Urban History of East Central Europe]

“War seems to be here.”

(15 Kopernika Street)

August-September 1939
The boys and I used to play mock battles and once I almost had my eye plucked with a stone. However, in fact, I did not realize what was going on around me. My regiments of tin cavalry and soldiers were sadly lying under the piano while outside crowds of people were chaotically hustling in different directions. Planes were hovering over the city. Their rumble was deafening. On the adjacent Holy Spirit square archives were on fire. The stench reached down to our apartments. On the radio they were jabbering something incomprehensible and then we would all head for the basements. Later the bombing stopped and while the streets were still empty they said Germans were entering the city, and then the Russians, and it circulated on and on.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

“In Soviet Lviv,” 1939, Urban Media Archive of the Center for Urban History

On August, 23, 1939, an event happened in Moscow that critically changed the fate of Lviv. According to a secret Appendix to the signed agreement between Germany and the Soviet Union (known as the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact), the territory of Poland was divided so that Lviv, along with the western Ukrainian lands, was claimed by the USSR. Arrival of the Soviet Army caused ambiguous feedback from different strata of urban populations – from utter resentment to ardent support.
Many Jews were fleeing to Lviv from the territories that fell under Nazi occupation. With the wave of refugees the Jewish community grew by around 40-60,000 more. Refugees often found themselves stranded with no job or permanent accommodation. The Allerhands apartment hosted the Feiners family, refugees from Kraków. One night, the Feiners were arrested for deportation by Soviet Special Services. Leszek’s mother arranged in the apartment a clandestine center to aid deportees so they would leave with parcels of food such as lard, sugar, and dry sausages.
Leszek started attending school on Rutowskiego Street (presently - Teatralna), which was a school with Ukrainian of tuition. A bright childhood memory of this period was the Palace of Pioneers located at Kopernika Street. There the boy, who was not even nine yet, was able to watch the marches, parades, and songs from behind the fence. The Allerhands were not destitute but Leszek recalled some interruptions with food supply.

At that time there was deficit of many things in the stores. White bread, sugar, and meat were sparce, candy, all kinds of ice-cream and a wine called Champaign were available. In many empty stores there appeared big boxes with fish roe called caviar. It was black, red, and light yellow.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

Leszek’s father Joachim, as many others, lost his job at Lviv University. In 1940 the University was renamed after Ivan Franko and Ukrainian became the official language of instruction. Despite the repressions, the University administration tried to keep some Polish scholars, enabling their further employment and securing certain preferences for them. Thus, professor Maurycy Allerhand continued his lecturing and had access to the special University store “Konsum”.

“And then the night fell. Night and fog.”

(Brygidky prison – 24 Horodotska Street)
Brygidky prison, July, 1941, Photo from the National Digital Archives of Poland, 2-1702

The first days of the Nazi occupation were accompanied by anti-Jewish violence and bloody pogroms. The Ukrainian Popular Police, established by the OUN (Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists) took an active part in the pogroms. They were joined by local citizens, influenced by the Nazi propaganda, which accused the Jews of all Communist crimes. Several thousand Jews fell victim to the pogroms. Joachim Allerhand, along with other captured Jews, was cruelly beaten and forced to take out the dead bodies of prisoners killed by the NKVD in Brygidky prison.

July, 1, 1941
Dr. Joachim Allerhand, his wife, and his son were beaten with bats by the Ukrainian police. Dr. Joachim was robbed at Jagiellonska Street, while at Kołłątaja Street he was given away to German soldiers who took him to Brygidky. There, he worked for 10 hours loading the dead bodies. When he came back home he discovered 12 wounds on his head.
(from the diary of prof. Maurycy Allerhand)
June, 30 – July, 1, 1941
The house was filled with silence. Grandpa was in his office, Grandma was still and looking up at the ceiling. Mom was in the bathroom washing her and my blood stained dirty clothes. There was dried blood on her head and neck. We had no idea what was happening with my father. Nobody asked anything – we were all silent. The evening wore on. Suddenly I heard a weird mixture of sounds from Grandpa’s office, sobbing, moaning, and rattling, impossible to describe in words. I peeped into the hole – Grandpa was crying but in a weird different way. Those were moans and wailing I never heard before. "So, grown-ups can cry, too, not only children." It lasted for a very long time. Eventually I fell asleep. I was woken up by some noise in the corridor. My father came back – he was barefoot and covered in blood, with his eyes swollen. We were all very scared by the violence and cruelty of those who used to politely smile at us.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

Road to the ghetto

(Danyla Halytskoho square) danyla-halytskoho
Collection of Volodymyr Rumiantsev, Urban Media Archive

Persecutions of Jews were gaining the deadly momentum. On the way to extermination the Nazis isolated Jews in ghettos, enclosed Jewish quarters. Lviv ghetto was one of the largest in Europe, the third largest ghetto in the territory of occupied Poland. A decree was issued to have all the Jewish population from other areas of the city resettled to the ghetto within one month, from November 16 to December 14, 1941. The ghetto was located in the north section of Lviv, in the neighborhoods of Zamarstynów and Kleparów, and isolated from the rest of the city by the railway bank. The Nazis forced some 138,000 Jews, nearly 80,000 of them from districts outside of Lviv, into an area that previously housed 20 to 30 thousand people. The Allerhands were also forced to move into the ghetto.

November, 1941
I remember that foggy morning when we loaded our bags onto the rented horse cart. We followed it along Podwale Street, through Strzelecki, and Krakowska squares, along Żółkiewska Street, towards Zamarstynów. We passed by Wały Gubernatoskie street, the entire world of my childhood. I would recall the chestnut mock battles, the competition on the scooters, the running races. My old friends were gone. I walked by the building of the fire brigade where I used to spend many hours watching the fire-fighters drills. There were increasingly more bystanders on the sidewalks and our crowd on the road was getting more dense.
Many more than one stone flew into our direction and we heard many offensive words. At Strzelecki square, near the “Bałtyk” cinema, our coachman refused to proceed. No money or anything my father offered could help. He ignored my mother’s tears. Perhaps he just got scared, maybe more than us.
We approached the railway bank and the gate underneath. There were many Ukrainian and German police members at the gate. They would promptly drag out of the crowd anyone who looked sick or weak and sent them to the nearby prison.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

Temporary address

Building at 58 Zamarstynivska Street in the Lviv ghetto where the Allerhands lived during the war (current view). Courtesy of Anna Chebotariova

In November 1941 the Allerhands were relocated to the ghetto, six of them in a tiny room at 58 Zamarstynowska Street. According to the diary of Maurycy Allerhand, it was not easy to get even the smallest residential area in the ghetto and homeless people risked immediate shooting or deportation to death camps. The Allerhands' former apartment at Sobieskego Street was inhabited by the Stokłos family of Volksdeutsche (ethnic Germans who enjoyed special privileges during the Nazi occupation).

November, 23, 1941 The removal of Jews from their apartments and the ban against taking one's furniture led to an unparalleled exploitation of the situation by Ukrainian and Polish citizens. For an apartment in the Jewish quarter, they demanded several hundred or even several thousand Deutsche Marks. They almost always succeeded to get the price because it was extremely difficult for Jews to find the housing. The Housing Management Authority of the Judenrat did their best but still failed to satisfy the housing hunger.
(from the diary of prof. Maurycy Allerhand)

Hunger and fear were regular companions of life in the ghetto. Because of repeated bloody Aktions against Jews the population of ghetto decreased constantly. Leszek Allerhand, the same as other children, tried to take every single opportunity to get out of the ghetto searching for food:

May-June, 1942 I continued my wandering around the neighbourhood, on my own or with a group of daring friends. We left the ghetto for valleys and meadows filled with waste and garbage. Sometimes we would find some grass where we played and bathed our slim pale bodies in the sun. We kept digging into the garbage in search for anything to eat.
I stopped sneaking to the Arian side. I was not afraid of the Germans because they spotted Jews by the armband and generally ignored us. It was the gangs of Ukrainian and Polish boys roaming around the ghetto who sought out Jews. They would surrounded them, and demanded money and beat them. Passers-by would often stop and look but I never saw them interfere.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

Fight for life

(Jesuit park (presently – Ivan Franko park)
In the summer of 1942 Joachim Allerhands decided to escape the ghetto with his family and go to the Arian side. Joachim worked at a company on Lenartowicza Street (presently – Nechuya-Levyts'koho Street), where he arrived everyday by marching in organized columns. However, Maurycy Allerhand and his wife, flatly refused to leave the ghetto. On the day of escape Leszek saw his grandparents for the last time.

August, 1942
There was a crowd in the streets and Jewish police were forcing workers into columns using bats. My father pushed my mother and me inside a column while standing nearby. I was covered by the mantle, and than we set out. The column pushed from behind and from the sides. I was walking covered with my father's coat and looked down at the cobble-stones, bending over and keeping a tight grip of my father. All of a sudden I started breathing a different air. I got from under my father and found myself in a hallway. It was still very early in the morning as we walked along Kazimierska Street, then onto Brajerowska and to the Jesuit Park, towards the Lviv Polytechnics University. The world around was serene and beautiful. Some people were taking their dogs out for a walk, others were going out shopping. The park was full of flowers and morning chilliness. I saw my father stop and look at the building of the University where he used to work with my grandfather for many years. However, there was no time for dreaming – the city was waking up.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

The first short-term shelter was the apartment of Allerhands' former Ukrainian neighbor Janka Figlus. However, Janka’s brother was a Wehrmacht soldier, so the family could not stay there long and had to separate. Joachim Allerhand left for Jaworów where he worked at a sawmill under a fake Arian ID. Zinaida Allerhand and her son Leszek stayed in Lviv. Hiding outside the ghetto demanded merging with the crowd. Zinaida bought fake IDs on the black market for both of them, with the names of Wanda Janikowska and Bazyli Szczepanski. They had to learn new biographies and new family stories. They changed their appearance, too. While Leszek’s mother was a blue-eyed blonde lady and could easily be taken for a Polish or Ukrainian woman, Leszek's red hair was considered typically “Jewish” and it had to be dyed with perhydrol or hid under the cap.

August, 1942
Our fight for survival, the fight for life, had started. It lasted for over 800 days and 800 nights. We were hiding and living in different places, for payment and without payment, with familiar or unfamiliar owners. Sometimes for a day, sometimes for a week or more and always in different circumstances. Often in extreme situations. Our hosts were old acquaintances or random people who we happened to meet, or apartment owners who were renting out rooms, or even beds for the sick. Sometimes we were able to have a room or beds at a church. Often the skies above us were our ceiling.
However, we always had to go some distance in an unsafe area to get to places, and to cross a street, a square or an alley. We had no idea whether the street would allow us to reach the destination. The destination that was often unknown to us. We had no idea whether the street would allow us to live through another day. My mother and I, we moved around separately and communicated by whistling.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

Labyrinths of streets

Kurkowa Street (presently – Lysenka Street) kurkowa
Courtesy of Illya Pavlyk, collection of Oleksandr Korobov, Urban Media Archive

I was followed by a feeling of great fear. When I was outside I felt like everyone was watching me I was surrounded by suspicious, evil, interested, and mocking looks that penetrated through. Even in the empty streets I saw eyes that were following me from everywhere, that were ready to report me at any time. Many times we were discovered by szmalcowniks (persons who demanded money from Jews and threatened to report them to the Nazis. The word came from the German word schmaltz, which means money - editors note). We had multiple narrow escapes from being arrested and were blackmailed several times.
April, 1943
My mother and I were walking along Kurkowa Street. As usual, I was following her from 10 meters behind. Suddenly, I noticed two women passing by my mother and they stopped to approach her. They talked to her and used aggressive gestures. My mom took some papers out of her purse and then all of them went into the next gate. I watched her from the hallway of the nearby house. After some time the two women left. Then, my mother came out. She did not have her purse or charcoal-grey jacket, and was now wearing wooden shoes on her feet. We resumed our trip.
July, 1943
As usual, we found ourselves in the streets. Mother had some meeting and had no idea what to do with me. Eventually she decided we would go to see Mrs. and Mr. R. and ask them to watch me. They were an intelligentsia family we have been friends with for many years. My mom was supposed to pick me up shortly but an hour passed, then another, and I was waiting, and waiting. I was hungry, thirsty, and scared. It was silent and dark around. Suddenly, the door opened and my mother entered. She grabbed my hand and we quickly went outside. It turned out that my mother came back within an hour but Mrs. R. refused to give me back and demanded a large amount of money. After several hours my mother managed to collect enough money and bought me out. Later, after the war, we met these people again but the incident has never been mentioned.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

In the darkness of the cinema

(7 Lychakivska Street) metro The yard of the house at 7 Lychakivska Street – present view. Former place for posters of the Metro cinema. Courtesy of Andriy Boyarov, 2012

May, 1943
For a while we attended movies. We chose small cinemas in the outskirts, entered after the start of the screening, and left shortly before the end. Once, we went to the "Metro" cinema at Łyczakowska Street. After the film, we went to Franciszkanska Street to manage to get back before dark. But, all of a sudden a police patrol came from the corner. There was a German soldier in a helmet with the gun on his back and a Ukrainian policeman. We were detained and after some time my mother was showing our pitable Arian IDs. The German soldier studied me carefully and told me to pray. I kneeled and folded my hands in prayer, and started reciting: “Ich bin Klein, mein Herz ist rein… and something else… Nur du allein, gute Nach Mama, Papa, und Fraeulein Mathilde Ganz” It was the prayer my German governess Mathilde Ganz taught me and I was supposed to say it every night before going to bed. The German took off his helmet, propped his rifle against the wall and sat down on the stairs, and kept listening.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

Place of peace and silence

Lychakiv cemetery cemetry
Collection of Juriy Zaverbnyj, Urban Media Archive

May-June, 1943
We decided we would go places by tram since it was often dangerous to walk around the city on foot. We chose short distance cycles. We sat separately. I pressed my face against the glass window and my mom would always stay in the section of the tram assigned for Germans.
We would take the the tram to the Łyczaków cemetery which was spacious, hilly, and full of trees. Once, we looked into a tomb with the headstone slightly moved aside. We were able to move the headstone and go inside the tomb. Inside there was some empty space and the coffins must have been walled up. We brought some leaves and tree branches in. Once inside my mother moved the headstone back. It was quiet, peaceful and safe in the tomb. No ghosts, fears, or witches. We breathed in the humidity, the smell of leaves, of balmy herbs and dead flowers. We stayed in the section where they no longer buried the dead. There was only one time when there was a funeral nearby and they opened the headstone of another tomb. We almost fainted with fear, even more so because we had become accustomed to the silence of the cemetery and every voice and every word sounded like the roar of cannons.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

In a shelter

Na Bajkach, 23 (presently – Kyivska Street)

July, 1943
One day, my mother told me that she contacted our former housemaid Ryśka who promised to arrange a dwelling for us. There was no more telling tales. Everyone knew who we were and how much we could pay. We settled down on the ground floor in a house at 23 Na Bajkach Street, in a room with a kitchen. Our hostess was a widow who had a 14-year-old son. She was a seamstress and had many customers so her apartment always had people coming in and out.
...There was a large family bed in the room, with a pile of featherbeds and pillows covered with a blanket nailed to the wooden frame. This is where they decided to arrange a shelter for us, in between the pillows. We had to breath through rubber tubes that came out of the bed. Our physiological needs turned into a highly painful nightmare. The room was always full of people but nobody expected there were two Jews in there. It was only once that a dog suddenly stated barking at our shelter but it could not get through the wall of suitcases.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)
September-December, 1943
One day mother came back with a piece of news that an acquaintance agreed to host me in a house where the owners had moved out for some time and left the keys. He agreed to host only me. I did not know where my mother was staying but I knew that she was always close by. I found myself in a large apartment with carpets, paintings, and covers on the furniture. I had a card which listed what I was not allowed to do. I was not to walk, not to move, not to use gas, electricity, or water. I had to sleep on the floor and it was strictly forbidden to go close to the windows or balconies. I had to be like dead.
Weeks passed by. There was no living soul around. I was talking to myself. I dreamt of peeping out to the street. I was reading old newspapers and calendars. All books were locked in the bookcases. There were only two books available, “Opera Guide” and “Napoleon and His People”. After some time, I learned them by heart.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

Become invisible

Dvirtseva square train-station Courtesy of Wilhelm Demmer, collection of Dietrich Demmer, Urban Media Archive

November, 1943
For a while we lived in private dormitories for railway workers near the railway station. We arrived late at night when the rooms were full of merchants who were snoring loud. We paid in advance and went to sleep in the corner without even taking off our clothes. In the dawn we went to the cemetery. I was wrapped in a woolen scarf and seemed almost invisible. My mom, too. We had splint baskets in our hands that were supposed to make us look like other merchants. The places we stayed in were often controlled by police and we never knew whether we would see the morning.
It was autumn, rainy and chilly. Our precious neighbor Mr. Glowik brought money and warm clothes into arranged places. We met szmalcowniks twice but somehow we got away. My absolutely Jewish appearance was neutralized by my mom with her Arian-like beauty and femininity.
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

A sunny day in July

22 Vynnychenka Street st-michael Courtesy of Nazariy Parkhomyk, 2015

July, 1944
We waited for our future fate. One day I was looking out of a little cellar window half covered with sacks of sands. One could hear some random shots and explosions. Someone close to the entrance of the cellars, shouted, “Come out! Soviets are all around and our people, too.” Someone picked me up and I squeezed through the little window and found myself in a little garden at the church. The warmth of July was making me melt and, the sun was blinding. From behind the nearby fence my smiling mother waved at me. My legs felt feeble and gave way. I sat down on the ground and leaned against the wall. I closed my eyes. When I opened the eyes there was a crowd of people around me, both children and adults. They were staring at me in silence and surprise. “A Kike!" I heard. Tears were falling down my cheeks. I was afraid. “A Kike - they whispered - Survived, who would have thought.”
(from Leszek Allerhand's memoirs)

The Allerhands lived to see the end of the Nazi occupation of Lviv from a small cellar of the Discalsed Carmelites church (presently – St Michael’s Church). Joachim Allerhand returned from Jaworów. The family settled for some time in their prewar apartment at Sobieskiego Street. They failed to find anyone else from the family. Before the end of the war, in March 1945, the Allerhands moved to Poland.

Farewell and return

Space of Synagogues

Together with his parents, Leszek settled down in Krakow. Twenty eight years later they decided to visit Lviv for one day as tourists, which was not easy to do in the Soviet times. Leszek became a Doctor of Science and worked as the chief doctor of the National Olympic Team of Poland in winter sports. Until his death in 2018 he lived in Zakopane, along with his wife, an artist Alina Towarnicka-Allerhand.

Despite his traumatic experience, Leszek Allerhand often returned to Lviv. He made a documentary about his family and was always open to conversations and meetings. His last visit to Lviv was for the opening of the memorial “Space of Synagogues.” In his speech he shared the happy and tragic memories of his childhood in Lviv.

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...I was not fortunate to live through my first teenage passions and affections, my hopes and plans could hardly come true. For me, Lviv remained a city of play in a sandpit, of merry-go-rounds, of rocking horses, of the weary care of my governesses, the place of street fights when I often ended up with a blue eye. It has always been a place of my murdered childhood. I love this city.
Leszek Allerhand

walk

Author – Anna Chebotariova.

Developed on the basis of the materials of the city walk that took place on September, 6, 2018, as part of the program Lwów, לעמבערג‎, Lviv, Lemberg’43: City that Did (Not) Survive.

The publication uses visual materials from the Urban Media Archive of the Center for Urban History, a Lviv Interactive project, the National Digital Archive of Poland, and a private archive of the author.
Translation – Svitlana Bregman.
Editing – Wendy Fontela, Anna Chebotariova, Taras Nazaruk

Published – Taras Nazaruk

Along the Streets of the Lost Childhood

Story of Leszek Allerhand | Lviv Interactive

Українською | In English

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