The Story of Two Brothers (And the Sisters Who Loved Them)
The Holocaust destroyed so many families. This is the story of two siblings who both lost their brothers.
We start with the Ginz Siblings: Eva and Petr.
Petr was the oldest. He was born on February 1, 1928 in Prague, Czech Republic.
The sweet boy was a talented artist and writer. He wrote little novels and illustrated them all.
Eva, born on February 21, 1930, also in Prague, adored her brother and the two became so close.
When the Nazis came to power in 1939, things changed. Petr and Eva’s school came to a sudden halt. They were half-Jews, but that didn’t save them from any of the Nazis treachery.
In October of 1941, the Terezin Ghetto was established in and in October of 1942, Petr was deported to the Terezin Ghetto. He was 14 years of age. His parents could have had him hidden, but sadly, they had nowhere to hide. Eva was able to stay at home (for the time being).
Petr brought with him paper, color pencils and other things to do. He was surrounded by boys his own age. While in the Ghetto, he was starving. Hardly any food and he was growing thin. The other boys and him decided to create an underground magazine called Vedem (Meaning We Lead!) . Petr did most of the writing, and illustrations.
In May of 1944, Eva arrived to the Ghetto, but not without the same hardships as her brother. She was placed amongst girls her own age and older. She brought with her a diary that she wrote in Terezin. Eva’s health deteriorated in Terezin. Petr came to the little hospital she was placed in and would visit her two, even three times a day.
In September of 1944, Eva made a note in her diary that she found out that Petr would be on the next transport. These “transports” would be going to Auschwitz.
Petr was 16 when he was killed at Auschwitz, as soon as he got there. He was thin and he didn’t look like he could work. Petr’s life ended there, inside a gas chamber, but Eva’s story remained.
Eva was liberated in May of 1945.
After losing so many years of not being able to study in school, she was eager to study anything: history, literature, mathematics, art, secretarial work, driving and anything she could fit into her day. She then went to the School of Applied Arts on Narodni Avenue for two years.
When she was in high school, she learned French, which she took full advantage of. She was supposed to graduate in 1948, but she left for France with future husband, Jindrich (Abraham) Pressburger. They had met during a ski trip in the Zionist Youth grop “ Hashomer Hatzayir”. He was born in 1924 and from Slovakia. He was a Zionist. Zionism is about the pursuit of an independent Jewish state.
After they were in France, they wanted to move to the Holy Lands, Israel. They arrived in the fall of 1949. She did not know the language and she was learning English, as Petr had taught her. When she arrived in Israel, she chose her Hebrew name, which is Chava. Chava is what she goes by.
Petr was always on her mind and she said it was a terrible loss for her not to have known Petr as an adult. She is sure that given his many talents, he could have been something great.
Eva’s parents stayed in Prague until 1956, when they too moved to Israel. Their mother was a supporter of the Zionist movement. Her parents had a hard adjustment in Israel.
Her father died in 1975. Her mother died in 1990 at age ninety-three.
For the past fifty-three years Chava and Abraham lived in Omer. They have two children, Yoram and Tamar. Chava also has three grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.
Eva (now Chava) became a renowned artist in Israel .She taught and then directed the Visual Art Center in Ber-Sheva for ten years.
She thought she had lost Petr’s diaries for years but then they resurfaced.
A man from Prague contacted Yad Vashem offering to give them what he thought was Petr’s diaries. The museum then contacted Eva and she looked at them and they were Petr’s! She managed to get possession of them. She still has them.
Chava is an artist. She had exhibits in Europe, Israel and The United States. Her style changed through the years. She began with realism, and then abstract, and sometimes she would mix both together. In 1993, she received the Sussman Prize for her Holocaust related artwork. Chava taught art and created art for many years. In 2016, the art historian Dr. Ilka Wonschik published a book on her art work.
In 2011, when I was doing research about Petr, with Yad Vashem’s help, I was able to email Chava. She was the sweetest thing and was kind enough to answer all the questions I had about Petr and her. I had written about Petr in a school newspaper and wanted to get the full story. She was kind enough to tell me what I needed to know. I also included her story in the article.
She published Petr’s diaries in 2004. She and Petr’s diaries are featured in Salvaged Pages by Alexandra Zapruder.
Eva still has her diary that she wrote in Terezin.
She has since talked about Petr in interviews, documentaries and TV specials on the Holocaust.
Felicitas on the other hand, had another story.
Felicitas had a brother named Otto. Otto was born on June 5, 1927 in Mohlenice, Moravia, Czech Republic.
Otto was the youngest of three. His brother Kurt was the oldest and Felicitas was the older sister.
When the Nazis invaded their homeland of the Czech Republic, they were forced to go into hiding.
They hid in the Czech forests and they were hidden by a gardener named Jaroslav “Slavek” Zdaril from 1942–1944. Then they were hidden by their former maid, Maria (Marenka) Zboril until March of 1945. Finally, they were hidden by the Ohera family.
On April 18th, 1945, Otto was mistaken for a Partisan and was arrested by so called Vlasov Troops (Russian troops fighting for the Germans). They arrested 23 other men from the surrounding areas.
Otto was among the youngest there. He was only 17, though people say he was 18. He would have turned 18 that June.
Felicitas wrote down what had happened to him in his diary that he left behind. She completed his diary for him.
Otto was interrogated. He refused to give the Germans any information about him, or where his family was. He was tortured for two days and then, on April 20, 1945, along with 18 other men, he was shot and then burned. But some say they were just burned to death in a cabin.
Felicitas and her parents survived the war. Only after the war did they find out about Otto.
She said that “Of course, we were immediately looking for our Otto and we were told that Otto had already been tortured and burned alive on the twentieth of April, when he had revealed nothing and no one.”
It was his love that saved them. He loved Felicitas and his family that much, that even with a broken legs, hurt face, and probably stab wounds, he wouldn’t give any information. He didn’t like the Germans. Also after the war, she found out that her other beloved brother, Kurt, was killed in action by the Germans on March 9, 1943. He was 28. This news made her mother so deathly ill for a long time.
When the war was over, Felicitas got married to man named Otto Gratzer. She began working in her own clothing store. She said this “We did not receive any support. I applied to the Ministry of Defense to help me obtain a trade license, as trades were not allocated and I did not want to live illegally. I finally received a trade license — based on my two brothers laying down their lives so we could live — and I was satisfied. I bought machines and equipment in installments, so I started my meager trade, which I fed even my troubled parents. The mother was paralyzed after the loss of two sons. Although I was successful in my business, I was later blamed — I was a “monster” of capitalism. “ When the Communists came in and took over the Czech Republic, the business was nationalized without any compensation. She moved to Ostrava, so her husband could find a job. But she became a mother, twice. She gave birth to Eva (later Vavrecka) and to Hannah (who I’m still trying to find some information on).
In 1968, Felicitas moved to Florida, where she lived until she moved to Wisconsin, where she would be buried there. Unlike Eva (Chava) who spoke of her brother, Felicitas did not.
She thought it would be too painful to speak about her brothers. Otto was lost, but she did not speak about her brothers in interviews or anything.
The women have been tested so many times with their patience. Let me explain,
There are some idiots out there who disbelieve that Otto or Petr even existed. These Jewish boys have been lost to the test of time.
Unfortunately, it has taken Chava to not engage in arguments, but I will get into those fights and say how they existed. I have spoken before (well, let’s put it this way, loudly spoken, almost yelled at) legislative people who try to remove the Holocaust from schools. Not my strongest moments, but I don’t want these families to be lost forever.
Chava is not in the best of health and I am doing all I can to preserve her, Petr and her legacy. Her children are lovely and I adore them.
Felicitas’s family is a little more tricky to get to know, but I hope to know them some time in the future!
These boys gave their lives up for you. They are martyrs. They didn’t deserve to die at such young ages, and their lives stopped. But they never left. Within their sisters, they lived.
Their spirits live on and are in places that we least expect.
It seems that now, when educators are fighting for their rights to teach the Holocaust, the lives of these boys come spiring out. The Holocaust Museum in Houston, Texas, has both of these sibling’s stories on display in the AND STILL I WRITE Exhibit. I will say, every time I go to the Museum, I go to the exhibit and see them (when I can!)
These boys may have had a short life, but their legacies are in our hands, and we don’t want to let them slip away.
