Prisoner B-3087: Yanek Gruener

Prisoner B-3087 was an intense story about a ten-year old boys will to survive during World War Ⅱ. Throughout the story we are brought through ghettos, concentration camps, death marches, and work camps that are all made up with the intention of wiping out the population of Jews. Each place he ends up is worse than the last they have less food, stricter staff, and harder work. The only way to survive is to work and be invisible because if you stand out you are a threat and you will be killed. Yanek, the ten-year old boy who tells this story is surrounded by death. His entire family is wiped out by the Nazis, but he must survive, he will not let them take his life. He succeeds with much determination and follows his dreams to america where

"If I had known what the next six years of my life were going to be like I would have eaten more. I wouldn't have complained about brushing my teeth, or taking a bath..." (Gruener, 2). These are the words of Yanek Gruener looking back at what he had dealt with the past six years. The book, “Prisoner B-3087”, by Alan Gratz is based on a true story of a boy, Jack Gruener, who survived 10 concentration camps in six years. Yanek Gruener had went through way more than he would have ever imagined, beatings, starvation, death marches, and scarce food supply. However, he survived. Yanek could have never survived if it wasn't for his resourceful way of thinking, his courageous mindset, and the help from everyone else, including himself, through

The Holocaust will forever be known as one of the largest genocides ever recorded in history. 11 million perished, and 6 million of the departed were Jewish. The concentration camps where the prisoners were held were considered to be the closest one could get to a living hell. There is no surprise that the men, women, and children there were afraid. One was considered blessed to have a family member alongside oneself. Elie Wiesel was considered to be one of those men, for he had his father working side by side with him. In the memoir Night, by Elie Wiesel, a young boy and his father were condemned to a concentration camp located in Poland. In the concentration camps, having family members along can be a great blessing, but also a burden.

Day by day the Nazi’s would come and take people off the streets and they would disappear and never return. Adolf Hitler had been in power and declared that Europe would be Jew free. From this point on, Yanek and the rest of the Jewish population in Europe had been hiding, in fear of the Nazi’s.

In 1944, World War II was close to over, but not for everyone. Six million Jewish people had been taken from their homes and put to the most dehumanizing work in history by being transported to concentration camps to work 12+ hour shifts. With little to no food, complete segregation, and torturous treatment by sadistic guards, this time of life was a literal hell for these Jews. The SS guards stationed there were so brutal, that the prisoners felt constantly in fear for their lives. In the award winning memoir, Night, written by Elie Wiesel, he narrates his experience as a young Jewish boy during the Holocaust. At the concentration camps, they were separated and put to work, not office work, interminable amounts of forced labor, no mistakes, and if so, shot or beaten to death. The Nazis decimated the Jewish population, and in doing so, exposed Hitler’s true intentions and cruelty. Wiesel discloses the radical changes that the Jews undergo, from normal people, with family and friends, into violent, self-centered crazies who look out for no one else and must fight for

In Night, Elie Wiesel descriptively shares his Holocaust experience in each part of his survival. From the ghettos to the Death March and liberation, Elie Wiesel imparts his story of sadness, suffering and struggle. Specifically Wiesel speaks about his short experience in the Sighet ghettos. Ghettos were implemented early on in the Holocaust for the purpose of segregating and concentrating the Jews before deportation to concentration camps and death camps. Depending on the region, ghettoization ranged from several days to multiple years before deportation. All Jews in ghettos across Europe would eventually face the same fate: annihilation (“Ghettos”). Wiesel’s accurate account of the Sighet ghettos illustrates the poor living conditions, the Judenrat and Jewish life in the ghetto as well as the design and purpose of the two Sighet ghettos. Wiesel’s description of the Sighet ghettos demonstrates the similar characteristics between the Sighet ghettos and other ghettos in Germany and in German-occupied territories in addition to the differences between the various ghettos.

The book Night by Elie Wiesel has become popular worldwide teaching people all ages about the Holocaust. Night tells about young Elie Wiesel’s life story as he lives as a Jew during the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel tells how things changed for him and Jewish families all across Europe as they were sent to concentration camps where they were brutally treated. Elie Wiesel’s family was sent to Auschwitz concentration in 1944. In the concentration camps families would be split up including Elie Wiesel’s, he was split apart from his mother and sister and was forced to live with only his dad. At the concentration camps Jews were treated like animals many Jews died at these camps, others became insane. The Nazis treated the Jews like animals by taking away their humanity and causing them additional pain.

You would think, a young boy, sent to different camps, fighting to live, gets luckily abandoned by the surrendering Nazis and saved by the allies. But, the story is so much more. The boy is taken from everything he knows and loves and has to find a way to live. He is left with nothing and everything valuable is taken away. He is then marked as an object and treated worse than a

On a cold fall morning, hundreds of Jewish families woke up to be told that they were to come with the Nazis and that they would be leaving their homes. No explanation, no clue as to where they are going to end up, they bagged up their necessities. The mothers and fathers carried bags upon bags of things that they believed that they were going to get to keep. The children cried, the mothers trembled in fear, while the fathers tried to hold their families together. Out on the cold streets they went, to wait. The Nazis were mean, strict, and rude. Telling the not to move or talk, having them stand never giving them a break. Basically treating them like a dog they were trying to teach a new trick. They taunted and made fun of them and laughed at their looks.

In the spring of 1944 so many Jews driven out of their homes, and forced into Ghettos. Beaten by the German Army treated like prisoners and sent off to concentration camps. “The Hungarian police made us climb into the cars, eighty persons in each one.”(Wiesel42) This quote made me stop reading because the

Kulski was only ten years old when Germany invaded Poland, but he quickly joined up with the underground and survived the war to tell his story to the West Point Center for Oral History in an interview in October 2015. During his interview, Kulski explains the harsh treatment of Poles under German occupation, describing the torture that he endured when he was taken to a police station when he was more of a child than a man, at the age of fourteen. He also tells a story of how he volunteered for the fire brigade and used it as a cover to sneak weapons into the Ghetto for the Jewish resistance fighters. Kulski also discussed that the Polish Underground did not want to sell too many weapons to the Jews because they wanted them for their own uprising. In the Warsaw Uprising of 1944, Kulski was captured and held until two Americans that spoke limited Polish rescued him shortly before the end of the Second World War.

In 1939, WWII began when the Nazi Party invaded Poland, causing six to nine million Jewish people to fear for their lives. This fear began when all citizens had to register with the government, and the Jews had to wear the Star of David. Second, the Jews were forced into ghettos. Third, they were taken from the ghettos to concentration and death camps. For example, in “The Diary of Anne Frank”, “Violins of Hope”, and “Resistance during the Holocaust”, we can see the different ways of passively resisting Nazi atrocities.

When it was 1944 I was 15 years old. When I was 15 years old, the Nazi soldiers rounded up all the jews including me and my family and then took us to a ghetto. Some of my friends were taken too. When we arrived, I noticed the ghetto had very tall walls that had broken glass on the top. After everyone was inside, the gates were closed which meant we couldn’t go out. Then we were taken to a little room that already had a family in it. It looked like they barely came too. The first few days they would give us a little bit of food and the conditions were not as bad. A few days later

They were searched and any possessions of value were taken by guards. Families of civilians were separated and anyone who dared to even speak was beaten. When the gates to the concentration camp opened, Robert heard screams, gunshots, and much worse. The guards then classified different prisoners with a marking system. Robert was classified with a red triangle, meaning he was a prisoner of war. Anyone who was deemed unfit for work was executed on the spot, and the rest of the prisoners were assigned arduous tasks. When a woman was separated from her crying baby, Robert protested. A large, intimidating guard instantly beat him for speaking out, knocking him unconscious. Everything then faded to

Wladyslaw Szpilman’s story was both tragic and inspiring in some ways. His story teaches us that human nature cannot be broken down easily without trying to fight and survive first. Szpilman had to go through many hardships for him, as a Jew, to survive in Germany. No human beings should be treated the way Jews were treated during the Holocaust. At that time Hitler was in power and he used the Jews as a scapegoat because he believed that the Jews were the main cause of many Germany’s problems such as the Treaty of Versailles. Jews were treated like animals, they were caged and had no choice but to be confined to the Warsaw ghetto where walls built around it by the order of Hitler. They were also not allowed to walk beside the Germans on the