Herman Sachnowitz (born 13 June 1921 in

Larvik Larvik () is a List of municipalities of Norway, municipality in Vestfold county, Norway. It is located in the Traditional districts of Norway, traditional district of Vestfold. The administrative centre of the municipality is the Larvik (town) ...

, - 5 March 1978 in

Oslo Oslo ( or ; ) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of 1,064,235 in 2022 ...

) was a Norwegian merchant. He was one of the few

Norwegian Jews The history of Jews in Norway dates back to the 1400s. Although there were very likely Jewish merchants, sailors and others who entered Norway during the Middle Ages, no efforts were made to establish a Jewish community. Through the early mod ...

who survived deportation to a concentration camp. He was son of Israel Leib Sachnowitz (born 31 March 1880 in Russia, died 1 December 1942 in

Auschwitz Auschwitz, or Oświęcim, was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It consisted of Auschw ...

, Nazi German-occupied Poland) and Sara Sachnowitz (born 15 June 1882 in

Riga Riga ( ) is the capital, Primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Latvia, largest city of Latvia. Home to 591,882 inhabitants (as of 2025), the city accounts for a third of Latvia's total population. The population of Riga Planni ...

, died 16 October 1939 in

, Norway). Sachnowitz was one of 772 Norwegian Jews to be deported to

. He was arrested together with other men in the family on 26 October 1942. Sheriff Gran in

Stokke Stokke is a List of former municipalities of Norway, former municipality in Vestfold county, Norway. The municipality existed from 1838 until its dissolution on 1 January 2017. The area is now part of Sandefjord Municipality. The administrative ...

arrested them and sent them to

Berg concentration camp Berg interneringsleir (Berg internment camp) was a concentration camp near Tønsberg in Norway that served as an internment and transit center for political prisoners and Jews during the Nazi occupation of Norway. Establishment The camp at Berg ...

. The deportation to Germany happened on the German transport ship in November 1942. Only 34 of the deported Jews survived the stay in Auschwitz and the other concentration camps. Sachnowitz attended the

death march A death march is a forced march of prisoners of war, other captives, or deportees in which individuals are left to die along the way. It is distinct from simple prisoner transport via foot march. Article 19 of the Geneva Convention requires tha ...

from the camp in Buna on 18 January 1945, and they walked 80 km the first day. He estimated that his group consisted of up to 100,000 prisoners, most of whom died under the march. From

Gliwice Gliwice (; , ) is a city in Upper Silesia, in southern Poland. The city is located in the Silesian Highlands, on the Kłodnica river (a tributary of the Oder River, Oder). It lies approximately 25 km west from Katowice, the regional capital ...

they were sent with train which went all over the present-day

Czech republic The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the south ...

and

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

and finally arrived in the camp at Dora at

Nordhausen Nordhausen may refer to: *Nordhausen (district), a district in Thuringia, Germany ** Nordhausen, Thuringia, a city in the district ** Nordhausen station, the railway station in the city *Nordhouse, a commune in Alsace (German: Nordhausen) * Narost, ...

after approximately 10 days. The prisoners at Dora and

Buchenwald Buchenwald (; 'beech forest') was a German Nazi concentration camp established on Ettersberg hill near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within the Altreich (Old Reich) territori ...

worked in underground factories with building

V-1 flying bomb The V-1 flying bomb ( "Vengeance Weapon 1") was an early cruise missile. Its official Reich Aviation Ministry () name was Fieseler Fi 103 and its suggestive name was (hellhound). It was also known to the Allies as the buzz bomb or doodlebug a ...

s and

V-2 rocket The V2 (), with the technical name ''Aggregat (rocket family), Aggregat-4'' (A4), was the world's first long-range missile guidance, guided ballistic missile. The missile, powered by a liquid-propellant rocket engine, was developed during the S ...

s. Sachnowitz was a witness of the many bodies, which each only weighed 35–40 kg, which were burnt outside the camp in huge fires or sent to the crematorium at Buchenwald. At the end of the war, Sachnowitz and his comrades were sent by foot From Dora to

Bergen-Belsen Bergen-Belsen (), or Belsen, was a Nazi concentration camp in what is today Lower Saxony in Northern Germany, northern Germany, southwest of the town of Bergen, Lower Saxony, Bergen near Celle. Originally established as a prisoner of war camp, ...

. When British forces attended Bergen-Belsen,, Sachnowitz was the only surviving Norwegian there. On 28 April 1945, he and other sick prisoners were evacuated to a hospital in

Eindhoven Eindhoven ( ; ) is a city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality of the Netherlands, located in the southern Provinces of the Netherlands, province of North Brabant, of which it is the largest municipality, and is also locat ...

. From there he was sent to a hospital in

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...

, Denmark for proper treatment. Sachnowitz lost his father, three sisters and four brothers in

(his mother died in 1939). Sachnowitz told about his stay as a Jewish slave in Auschwitz in the book ''Det angår også deg'' (It concerns you too), co-written by Arnold Jacoby. After the war, Sachnowitz married Paula Sachnowitz. His late brother Elias had opened a ladies' clothing store "Ekko" (Prinsegata 8) in

in 1935, that Herman now took over.

References

Sources

* Sachnowitz, Herman and Arnold Jacoby (1976).
Det angår også deg
'. Oslo: Cappelen. . {{DEFAULTSORT:Sachnowitz, Herman 1921 births 1978 deaths People from Larvik 20th-century Norwegian Jews Berg concentration camp survivors Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp survivors Bergen-Belsen concentration camp survivors Auschwitz concentration camp survivors