Petr

16 min readAug 30, 2022

Chava (Eva Ginz) Pressburger and Petr Ginz

How does one simply “promote” a family? The Ginz family have a very special place in my heart and in my life. This is about Petr.

Petr Ginz’s life was short and it shouldn’t have been. A talented boy was taken away for no real reason at all,other than because he was Jewish.

Petr’s beautiful mother Maria Dolanska was born in 1898 in Cibuz, Czech Republic. Her mother Maria went to a commerce high school, where she studied German and French. She was one of five children. She worked so her younger siblings could study. She got married when she was twenty-nine. According to Chava, she did not know if her mother actually converted to Judaism, but once her parents were married, she lived her life as a Jew.

His father, Otta (Ota) Ginz was born on July 19, 1896 Zdanice, Czech Republic. He had five other siblings. His siblings were Anna, Viktor, Herma and Milos. None of his siblings survived the Holocaust, only he did and his niece, Hanka survived.

He was big in the Esperanto movement. He was the manager of exports of a textile company. He was a withdrawn person who did not show his feelings, though he loved his children dearly.

His parents met at an Esperanto conference in 1927. Petr’s parents were married on March 8, 1927.

Petr was born on February 1, 1928 in Prague. He was the first born and he was the pride and joy. Though his mother was a non -Jew, Petr and his sister grew up in a traditional Jewish home.

Chava said this:

“My brother was born in 1928 in Prague. Our childhood was more or less the same. Petr was two years older and I loved him very much. He had his bar mitzvah in the Maisel Synagogue in Prague, I remember that afterwards there was a small celebration at home with relatives, and a chocolate cake. Petr was a talented boy, and when Jews were no longer being accepted at high school, my parents put him in a school named the Experimental School, in Nusle. It was a special school for talented children where they were attempting to teach with not completely conventional methods. Our parents thought that here his talent would take root and develop. But soon after they threw Petr out of this school as well, because of his Jewish origin. My brother was always very curious and Mother and Father supported education. Petr began to write already as a child, he wrote many articles, stories and poems. He drew a lot as well.”

Petr’s gift of literacy and being a talented artist began when he was young. Petr had an imagination and loved to reach Jules Verne. Petr’s family were a close knit family. According to his younger sister, Chava, they visited their maternal grandmother, Ruzena in Bohemia on Sundays and they also visited their paternal grandparents and cousins. They were very close with their uncle Milos and his family. Milos had two children, Pavel and Hanka.

Petr’s education was very important to his family The family sent him to a progressive Jewish school. He was very smart and according to Chava, he was sent to a school for gifted children, but it lasted only a year.

Petr’s parents raised Petr and his sister to have good manners, and distinguish the difference between right and wrong. They raised Petr to be a good man.

Petr’s parents loved Petr and they encouraged his artwork and stories.

Petr’s sister, Chava, said this:

“ In the morning we rose, the maid prepared breakfast and then Petr and I would walk by ourselves to school. In those days there weren’t very many cars and the streets were safe for us. We lived at Tesnov, close to Hlavkuv Bridge. It was a beautiful walk; on winter mornings the gas lamps would still be lit and the snow would crunch under our feet. School was in the morning, I usually finished earlier than Petr and my mother would be waiting for me in front of the school. Then we would have lunch at home; only our father was in the office and came home later. After lunch our mother would go lie down and we would do our homework; in those days there wasn’t much of it.”

Petr really enjoyed the sciences, drawing and reading. He took education very seriously, even at a young age.

He wanted to be a scientist, novelist, book binder or a reporter. He made his first diaries himself. According to Chava, he made them out of household items and he enjoyed the process of book-binding as well as being creative. Petr wrote little articles and he wrote five short novels.

Some of the novels he wrote from the time he was eight to fourteen were: From Prague to China, The Wizard from Altay Mountains, Around the World in One Second and A Visit from Prehistory. The only surviving novel was A Visit from Prehistory.. He wrote in the style of his favorite author, Jules Verne and illustrated himself.

Petr’s happy childhood came crashing down in March of 1939, when the Nazis came to town. The Nazis began imposing Anti-Jewish laws on the Jews of the Czech Republic. Because Petr and Chava were half-Jewish, they made laws that applied to them as well. They were considered “Mischlinge” (Children of a Mixed Marriage). The only difference between them and regular Jewish children is that they were sent to concentration camps when they reached the age of fourteen.

In 1941, Petr began keeping a diary. He wrote his daily activities and he wrote down important events that had happened to him.

His first diary entry was on the 19th of September, 1941:

“19. IX. 1941 (Friday)

The weather is foggy. Jews were told to wear a badge, which looks approximately like this:

When I went to school, I counted sixty-nine “sheriffs,” Mummy counted more than a hundred of them.

Dlouha avenue is now called “The Milky Way.”

In the afternoon I went with Eva to Troja; we went on a ride on a tethered boat.”

Petr’s diary continued to be written. According to Chava, she said that she never saw an entry of Petr’s saying he was worried or frightened (by the Nazis). In his diary, he recorded facts, not feelings. As like Otto Wolf, Petr felt he needed to record the facts, not his feelings. The feelings, he remembered, the facts he was afraid of forgetting.

Petr was very friendly and made friends often. He loved to play jokes on them and he spent time with them, whenever he could.

In his diary, he wrote about his friends:

“27. IX. 1941 (Saturday)

Quite nice all day. In the morning at home, in the afternoon with Popper and Martin in Troja. Martin became a member of SPVL, which made Popper very angry, because M. is not allowed to give up a membership that forbids him to sign contracts, without my permission. M. invited me to his house for his birthday. So on Sunday I’ll go to him.

I arranged a boycott against Popper.

They announced a so-called civil state of emergency (martial law) valid from 28. IX. 1941, 12 o’clock.

Signed by Heydrich instead of Neurath.”

His friends were very adventurous and creative, which Petr thrived.

He loved his friends as much as he loved his parents. He had a real close relationship with his mother and loved his father dearly. He and Chava rarely fought and their relationship would only strengthen as the war pressed on.

When the Nazis forbade the Jews to go to school and only go to Jewish schools, Petr and Chava were affected by this.

He wrote about school in his diary and he had excellent grades.

(Petr — the serious looking one- in the dead center, at the Jewish school)

In his diary, he began to describe the deporations that were taking place. When he could no longer be in school, he got a small job cleaning typewriters. He loved the work and he got along with everyone.

Petr continued to draw and write. As Chava recalled “When it came time to his own deportation, his handwriting became disorderly and messy.” The Terezin Ghetto was established in 1941. The family soon realized that his fourteenth birthday was vastly approaching and his parents got so worried.

(Petr and Chava)

Petr found out he was in the transport on September 22, 1942.

He recalled :

“After I finished cleaning a couple of typewriters (I wrote down the numbers conscientiously. Old Fuchs later copied them and collected payment for the cleaning. Of course, I didn’t get paid.), I was sent to inspect typewriters. Every fourteen days there was an inspection of typewriters in all the departments of the Jewish community, to see if any needed cleaning. That day, it was the Legal Department’s turn, at 21 Norimberska Street. I was sent there with a small case, in which I carried gasoline for cleaning the platen, alcohol for cleaning the keys, and for the same purpose a wire brush and a cloth. My case also contained several replacement ribbons (13, 14, and 14.5 mm), a notepad for recording the replaced ribbons, a couple of chisels, and an oil can. On the way, I had collected a few cigarette butts. But I found most of them on the stairs of the Jewish religious community center.

I sat down in front of a typewriter in the legal department and began cleaning it. Suddenly, the phone rang. It was the typewriter repair shop, telling me to go to the workshop immediately. I was very surprised, because it was normally “I who phoned them (that’s when I tore a string somewhere) rather than the other way around. But I kept my surprise to myself, collected my things, and walked to the workshop. As soon as I entered, Wolf said calmly: “You’re in it, don’t worry about it.”

Petr was always a boy who remained calm in dire situations, which was amazing, because in any case if any family figured out they were being deported, they would be freaking out.

Petr then said :

“So I went home. While walking, I tried to absorb, for the last time, the street noise I would not hear again for a long time (in my opinion; Father and Mother were counting on just a few months). I arrived at home (I hid my star on the way from the corner to the entrance to our building, till I reached the apartment, so that it would not be noticed that Jews still lived in our house). All the way to the third floor there were only offices, on the fourth floor lived the Kohners (they left for Poland three months ago, people say all their luggage was confiscated), the Mautners (they left for Theresienstadt), Ichas (Aryans, railway employees), and us. We had been saved from moving out because the apartment was registered in Mother’s name.

Finally, I arrived home and knocked on the door. “Who is it?” Mummy asked from inside. “Me.” Mummy opened, surprised that I was home so early. “Mancinka, don’t get frightened, I’m in a transport.” Mummy was immediately beside herself; she started crying, she didn’t know what to do. I comforted her. Suddenly the doorbell rang. Auntie Nada arrived to tell us to tell us I was in a transport, but we already knew it. Auntie Nada is a practical soul; she went straight into action. First, we hurried to the community centre to pick up the forms that were about to be distributed. Otherwise we would have heard about the transport only at noon. We were to board at 6 P.M., at Veletrzni Palace. Afterward we ran quickly back home; my good friend, Harry Popper was already waiting to say good-bye to me, which he had succeeded in doing. There was a lot of action; we were packing; some women helpers from the Jewish Community arrived to help us pack. In the meantime we somehow managed to eat lunch. I no longer remember what we had for lunch that day, although I would really like to know it; I believe it was hamburgers.”

Petr’s mother was so upset and she had every right to be, her boy was going to be deported and who knew when they would meet again?

Petr’s deportation notice came to them on October 22, 1942. It stated he must report to the assembly grounds at Veletrh in Prague. He was allowed to bring some belongings with him.

He prepared for deportation. He wrote:

“After lunch I was told to choose which of my toys I wanted to take along. I took a supply of paper (including this notebook), linoleum, small knives for cutting it, the unfinished novel The Wizard of Altay Mountains, which at the time consisted of about 260 pages. I wanted to finish writing it in Theresienstadt, but in the end nothing came of it. I will speak later about laziness in Thereisdant. I also took thin leather for binding, and a few sheets of endpaper. That was all. Sorry, also a few broken watercolour paints; the rest were left at home. And that was definitely all from my own drawer in the wardrobe, and the big case from Macesky. I packed these items lovingly with the other luggage, and it will probably be seen as bad that I was more worried about losing them than anything else.”

When his deportation day came, his mother hugged and kissed him, not knowing that would be the last time she’d ever hug or kiss her son. His father and Petr arrived at the grounds.

(Curious Petr- this photo Chava would later use for her artwork)

Petr’s father remembered :

“On October 22, 1942, I accompanied our Petr there. We had an earnest talk, but I avoided triggering sad thoughts in him, and we comforted each other by saying that we would both meet at home soon. On the basis of examples I knew I warned Petr in the last moment before his departure to be careful when dealing with German guards, with whom he would soon be confronted. We reached the point beyond which those accompanying the victims were not allowed to go, I pressed our Petr to me, we kissed, and Petr went inside. He turned around a few times, we waved to each other, and Petr disappeared in the gate. I turned away and at that moment a loud cry escaped my insides, more like a scream of pain. I controlled myself and forced myself to calm down. I don’t know how I made it home. I was well aware that my wife’s nerves would not have managed the separation I had just lived through.”

Petr’s father did not realize that would be the last time that he would ever see his son alive.

When Petr arrived in Terezin, he was assigned to be in a barrack with boys his own age. He was not sure of what challenges he would face, but he would quickly encounter one: HUNGER. There was hardly anything to eat in Terezin.

He was growing and when teens are growing, they need a lot of food to eat, and when they don’t, they can get sick. Petr got sick many times while in Terezin. While there, he and a group of boys, began to write and publish a secret underground magazine entitled Vedem, meaning “WE LEAD!” The boys began writing their own satirical commentaries about Terezin, the Nazis and the world around them. Petr would mostly illustrate and put it together. The inspiration for this magazine was a teacher, and the leader of their barrack, Professor Valtr Eisnger. He encouraged the boys and he inspired them to do something about their love of literature and the arts and hence VEDEM was created.

Each of the boys would take on a nickname or a pseudonym for the paper. When there was not enough content, Petr himself wrote under false names. The Nazis did not realize the boys were creating this, and if they had, the boys would have been shot on the spot. Luckily, Petr’s life was spared in Terezin.

In 1944, Petr began documenting his time in Terezin. He opened his diary in February of 1944, he had been there for almost two years. Petr had just turned sixteen. Unlike his counterparts, Ilya Gerber, who was imprisoned in the Kovno Ghetto and who also wrote a diary, did not describe his daily activities or interactions with girls. He made “plans” that he wanted to achieve by the end of the month or the next month.

His entries were filled with wonderful ideas and plans . He wanted to prepare himself for liberation.

In May of 1944, his sister, Chava was also deported to the Terezin Ghetto. She had just turned fourteen that February.

She recalled that she saw Petr and he made her feel less homesick. He began to teach her English. He urged her to prepare for liberation. Petr became very concerned about Chava’s education and continued to give her books that were available to read and study. For example, they found a book on shorthand, and they studied it together. The problem with Terezin, is that it was a concentration camp and a transit camp, meaning there were deportations to different extermination camps, such as Auschwitz.

Petr’s view on Judaism would soon change, while being in Terezin. As Chava recalled in her diary, said that Petr would renounce the religion as soon as he returned home.

Petr’s love for his sister, however, never ceased to change. He was always educating her and trying to keep her safe.

With Terezin getting more and more gloomy, he tried to be positive. As Chava later said, “It had been two years since I hadn’t seen him. He was very tall, very pale and very thin. I was very concerned for his health. I became a mother to him, instead of a sister.”

(Petr and Chava)

Petr’s body was slowly adjusting to the hunger that was in Terezin. He lost a lot of weight, to the point of looking like a skeleton.

In September of 1944, Petr wrote his last diary entry and on September 28, 1944, Petr and his cousin Pavel (who had been sent to the Terezin Ghetto, along with his uncle and cousin Hanka), were on the list for a transport to Auschwitz.

Chava recalled the last day she ever saw her brother alive.

“I grabbed him a piece of bread for the journey, and I managed to get past the crowd and under the rope and handed him the bread between the bars. I had enough time to hold his hand before a guard drove me away.”

Petr’s journey lasted ten hours on a train, with no food and no facilities to relieve himself.

When Petr arrived there, he was looked at by the Nazi guards and Nazi doctors. He was extremely thin and did not look well enough to work. He was sent to die in the gas chamber. He died on September 28, 1944 at the age of sixteen. But his story does not end there.

(Petr and Chava- 1939)

In February of 1945, his father, Otto was also sent to the Terezin Ghetto. He was there with Chava.

In May of 1945, they were liberated. They were able to return home. When they arrived home, Petr’s mother asked where Petr was. They began to search for him but were told that Petr was murdered.

(The Barracks at Terezin- by Petr)

(Petr, 1939, right before his deportation)

(Petr’s photo that Chava chose for Petr’s page of testimony for Yad Vashem)

Petr had been dead for fifty-eight years and Chava got a call that Yad Vashem had Petr’s two original diaries. She was able to get them back and still has them today.

In 2002, Petr and Chava’s stories and diaries were shared with the world for the first time in the book Salvaged Pages by Alexandra Zapruder.

In 2004, Chava made the decision to have her brother’s diary published.

She wrote a long preface to the book. She expressed her feelings about Petr’s diaries and his life.

Petr’s story continued to gain some attention in the mid 2010’s.

In 2012, a small studio made a very well done documentary on Petr, entitled The Last Flight of Petr Ginz. Chava was interviewed and the studio used his art work in animating the film. The film was beautifully scored by John Califra. The film was all animated, except with the interviews of Chava and other historians.

Petr’s death caused a big hole in the parent’s house. This prompted Petr’s father to say that they would no longer discuss Petr, so they would not suffer as much. Unlike Felicitas Garda, who did not talk about her brothers, Chava does just the opposite. She submitted Petr’s “Page of Testimony” (Death Certificate) for Yad Vashem , the Israli Holocaust Museum. Chava talked about Petr and she did a video for Yad Vashem discussing him. With him, she wanted to make sure he was kept alive. As she said when she saw his diaries, she stated that she felt like Petr did not die, but he was gone. He had been reduced to ash.

There was one witness that saw Petr die. A friend of Petr’s saw him walking towards the gas chamber.

Petr’s love would never leave Chava. Chava loved her brother and their father donated a lot of his artwork to Yad Vashem.

In 2003, when the American Spaceshuttle Colombia was going to space, Israli astronaut, Ilan Ramon, who was the child of a Holocaust survivor, wanted to take something with him to space. Yad Vashem gave him a copy of Petr’s artwork “Moon in Space.” Sadly the space shuttle blew up upon its arrival back to Earth. Ramon died in the explosion.