Szymon (Shimon, Simon) Srebrnik (April 10, 1930 – August 16, 2006) was a

Polish Jew The history of the Jews in Poland dates back at least 1,000 years. For centuries, Poland was home to the largest and most significant Jews, Jewish community in the world. Poland was a principal center of Jewish culture, because of the long pe ...

and

Holocaust survivor Holocaust survivors are people who survived the Holocaust, defined as the persecution and attempted annihilation of the Jews by Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, its collaborators before and during World War II ...

of the

Chełmno extermination camp Chełmno, or Kulmhof, was the first of Nazi Germany's extermination camps and was situated north of Łódź, near the village of Chełmno nad Nerem. Following the invasion of Poland in 1939, Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany, Germany annexed ...

– a German

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

death camp Nazi Germany used six extermination camps (), also called death camps (), or killing centers (), in Central Europe, primarily in occupied Poland, during World War II to systematically murder over 2.7 million peoplemostly Jewsin the Holocau ...

established in

occupied Poland ' (Norwegian language, Norwegian: ') is a Norwegian political thriller TV series that premiered on TV 2 (Norway), TV2 on 5 October 2015. Based on an original idea by Jo Nesbø, the series is co-created with Karianne Lund and Erik Skjoldbjærg. ...

during World War II. Srebrnik escaped after being shot in the back of his head at close range, two days before the Russians arrived in 1945. His testimony along with that of the few other witnesses was critical to the prosecution of camp personnel and other Nazi officials, because of the destruction of evidence by the Germans of their mass extermination of Jews in Chełmno. At the age of fifteen, Srebrnik testified in June 1945 in the Polish trial of Chełmno personnel. He testified again about Chełmno in the 1961 trial of

Adolf Eichmann Otto Adolf Eichmann ( ;"Eichmann"
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. ; 19 March 1906 – 1 Ju ...

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

, and in the Chełmno trials in Germany (1962–1965) of the former SS men from the SS Special Detachment '' Kulmhof''.

Life

Ghetto and camp

Srebrnik witnessed his father killed in the

Łódź Ghetto The Łódź Ghetto or Litzmannstadt Ghetto (after the Nazi German name for Łódź) was a Nazi ghetto established by the German authorities for Polish Jews and Roma following the Invasion of Poland. It was the second-largest ghetto in all of ...

. He was thirteen years old when he and his mother were deported to the Chelmno extermination camp. His mother was killed in a

gas van A gas van or gas wagon (, ; ; ) was a truck re-equipped as a mobile gas chamber. During World War II and the Holocaust, Nazi Germany developed and used gas vans on a large scale to kill inmates of asylums, Poles, Romani people, Jews, and prison ...

. The camp SS selected Simon to work with a Jewish work detail which incinerated bodies of the victims in open-air crematoriums. Being only 13 and a half, Srebrnik was given the nickname "Spinnefix" (''quick spider'') by the Germans. During his time in the camp, he participated in the disposal of evidence of genocide. He took part in the gathering of crushed bones and ashes of gassing victims. He helped take the sacks away at night. He rowed a flat-bottomed boat on the Ner River where the sacks were being emptied into the water. While rowing, Srebrnik used to entertain the Nazi SS guards by singing Prussian military songs which they taught him. Srebrnik also won jumping contests and speed races which the SS organized for chained prisoners to participate in. The SS usually killed those who lost. On January 18, 1945, two days before Soviet troops arrived and liberated the camp, the Germans shot and killed most Jewish ''

Sonderkommando ''Sonderkommandos'' (, ) were Extermination through labor, work units made up of Nazi Germany, German Nazi death camp prisoners. They were composed of prisoners, usually Jews, who were forced, on threat of their own deaths, to aid with the di ...

'' prisoners who took part in the disposal of Holocaust evidence. Despite being shot in the head like the others, Srebrnik survived.Stuart Jeffries
"Claude Lanzmann on why Holocaust documentary 'Shoah' still matters"
''The Guardian'', 9 June 2011, accessed 22 May 2013. According to his own testimony, the German bullet missed the spine ("vital brain centres") and exited through his mouth without substantial blood loss. He testified about Chełmno at a trial held in

Łódź Łódź is a city in central Poland and a former industrial centre. It is the capital of Łódź Voivodeship, and is located south-west of Warsaw. Łódź has a population of 655,279, making it the country's List of cities and towns in Polan ...

, Poland, in 1945. Later, Srebrnik emigrated to

Ness Ziona Ness Ziona (, ''Nes Tziyona'') is a city in Central District (Israel), Central District, Israel. In it had a population of , and its jurisdiction was 15,579 dunams (). Identification Lying within Ness Ziona's city bounds is the ruin of the Arab ...

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

Life in Israel

After his emigration to Israel, Srebrnik lived in a

Kibbutz A kibbutz ( / , ; : kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1910, was Degania Alef, Degania. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economi ...

and went into military service, eventually taking part in four wars. He and two other survivors of Chełmno testified at the 1961 Adolf Eichmann Trial in Jerusalem (session 66-68). In addition, he testified in the

Chełmno Guard Trials Chełmno (; older ; , formerly also ) is a town in northern Poland near the Vistula river with 18,915 inhabitants as of December 2021. It is the seat of the Chełmno County in the Kuyavian-Pomeranian Voivodeship. Due to its regional importance ...

, which were conducted in Germany from 1962–1965. He was interviewed by the French filmmaker

Claude Lanzmann Claude Lanzmann (; 27 November 1925 – 5 July 2018) was a French filmmaker, best known for the Holocaust documentary film ''Shoah'' (1985), which consists of nine and a half hours of oral testimony from Holocaust survivors, without historical f ...

for his documentary ''

Shoah The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

'' (1985). According to the ''

Jerusalem Post ''The Jerusalem Post'' is an English-language Israeli broadsheet newspaper based in Jerusalem, Israel, founded in 1932 during the British Mandate of Palestine by Gershon Agron as ''The Palestine Post''. In 1950, it changed its name to ''The Je ...

,'' Srebrnik died in Israel in 2006 at age 76.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Srebrnik, Simon 1930 births 2006 deaths Chełmno extermination camp survivors Łódź Ghetto inmates Sonderkommando Polish shooting survivors Execution survivors Polish emigrants to Mandatory Palestine