Magda Herzberger

I had no idea that those were the furnaces, because no one could imagine such a thing.

— Magda Herzberger

Biography

Magda Mozes Herzberger was born on February 20, 1926, in Cluj, Romania. On August 30, 1940, Romania was annexed by Hungary, an ally of Nazi Germany. Life for Cluj's nearly 17,000 Jews grew steadily worse over the next four years. In March 1944, the Germans occupied Romania and took large-scale anti-Semitic measures. The Mozes family, along with thousands of other Jews, was forced into the Cluj Ghetto. It was liquidated only a month later. Magda and her family were sent to Auschwitz, where most of them perished.

After six weeks in Auschwitz, 18-year-old Magda was shipped to Bremen, Germany. She did forced labor as the city was bombed by Allied forces. In March 1945, Magda was transferred to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Her job there was to dispose of thousands of bodies that had accumulated in and around the barracks. On April 15, 1945, she collapsed from exhaustion. Magda was near death when she was found among the corpses by a liberating British soldier.

Magda returned to Cluj late in 1945. In April 1946, she began medical school, where she met and married Eugene Herzberger. Fearing persecution under communism, the Herzbergers fled Romania for Israel in 1947. The British, who severely restricted immigration to Israel, captured her ship in the Aegean Sea and brought it to Cyprus. The Herzbergers were held in a makeshift prison camp until permitted to leave for Israel in January 1949.

In 1957, after nine years in Israel, the Herzbergers immigrated to the U.S. They and their two children settled in Monroe, Wisconsin, where Magda's husband practiced medicine for 20 years. The Herzbergers moved to Dubuque, Iowa, in 1976 and to Arizona in 1994.

Magda has spoken extensively about her experiences. She has published two memoirs (Eyewitness to Holocaust and Survival), and several volumes of poetry and fiction. They are available from her website. Magda is also a former mountain climber, skier and runner. She competed in a marathon the summer this interview was conducted.

Pictures

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