FAQs

The German SS arrested Henry at a time that Germany had sworn to destroy Poland, eliminate all Polish culture, and close education. Again, why Poland? The answer lies in Germany’s historical desire to eliminate Poland as a country, steal Polish cultural symbols, clear space for German families to ‘colonize’ Polish lands, and take advantage of Poland’s many natural resources.

Geographically, Poland lies squarely positioned in central Europe, between her two historical enemies, Germany and Russia. Outside powers have always wanted the benefits of Poland’s strategic location along trade routes, rich farmlands, coal, and other natural resources. For centuries, the pattern of all invaders was to commit wholesale slaughter against the Poles and destroy villages, farms and whatever else they could after they stole anything of value.

In 1793, Prussia (precursor to Germany), Russia, and Austria maneuvered to divide Poland between their countries. By 1795, Poland disappeared from the map of Europe. Poland would not regain independence until 1918 at the end of World War I. For 123 years, Poland ceased to exist.

From the very beginning of World War II, “Accordingly, I have placed my death-head formations in readiness—for the present only in the East—with orders to send to death mercilessly and without compassion, men, women, and children of Polish derivation and language. Only thus shall we gain the living space that we need.” Adolf Hitler

As Reichsführer, or head of the dreaded Nazi SS (secret police), Heinrich Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and the chief architect of the Final Solution. He further advocated that “all Poles will disappear from the world… It is essential that the great German people should consider it as its major task to destroy all Poles.”

I am not Polish, Jewish, or Catholic. I am a former journalist and nonfiction writer who sensed a unique story at risk of being lost to history.

This answer is solely my opinion, which is based entirely on historical facts.

 The story of the Jewish Holocaust has been well-told, studied in-depth, and memorialized in thousands of memoirs, books, and scholarly texts. There is a push for mandatory Holocaust education in schools, and museums dedicated to Holocaust history abound in cities across the world, including the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) in Washington D.C. and Yad Vashem in Israel.

Per the USHMM, “The Holocaust was the systematic, state-sponsored persecution and murder of six million Jews by the Nazi regime and its allies and collaborators.” By this definition alone, the focus, scope and direction of Holocaust education is dedicated to the Jewish portion of World War II history, and not the plight or full focus or viewpoint of Poland’s viewpoint of surviving or dying under Russian and German rule and occupation from 1939 to 1945.

Editorial note—I stand strongly against anti-Semitism, (see my video against anti-Semitism) (URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nLU-qcdSau4), support Holocaust education, and the need to educate millions of people about the dangers of unchecked hatred and the need to prevent genocide. Telling the broader scope of World War II losses does not diminish the huge scale, horror, and mass murder of European Jews. Nazi Germany, as part of a deliberate program of extermination, systematically killed over eleven million people, including six million Jews.

Besides Nazi concentration camps, the Soviet gulags (labor camps) led to the deaths of 3.6 million civilians. The total scope of World War II casualties is in the tens of millions.

During World War II, Poland ceased to exist. There was no Poland from 1939 to 1945, except as an occupied territory under Germany or Russia, subject to wartime laws and governance of each regime. A Polish government-in-exile existed in London, but the three major allies often ignored this entity completely.

Stalin was allied with the U.S. under Franklin Roosevelt, and England under Winston Churchill, so Stalin’s crimes against Poland received little attention in the U.S. or Britain, lest they anger their Russian ally. Even worse, after the war, Poland came under Russian communist rule, and censorship existed. The UK snubbed Poles for decades after World War II in one of the worst insults in history. But that is another story.

American military were never dispatched to Poland’s aid, thus the U.S. version of World War II history covers primarily where Americans fought and died. Thus, there is brief mention of Poland’s suffering in western stories of World War II.

In 2002 I wrote for The Arizona Republic newspaper in Phoenix, Arizona. I often featured interesting people or organizations in the local community. I received a phone call from a contact, who gave me Henry Zguda’s contact information and encouraged me to call him for a story. “Now, there’s a story. Someone needs to write about him. You should do it.”

I called Henry to schedule a meeting. His wife, Nancy, scheduled it without even asking him. “Doll, I’ll make sure Henry talks with you.” He and Nancy lived a mile from my house.

We clicked from the very first meeting. Since he was eighty-five-years-old, we began our interviews right away. He’d made it this far. Even so, life is uncertain.

The rest is providence. From the moment I offered to interview Henry and write his story, the right people continued to enter my life at the right time. I believe there is a reason Henry and I met. Meeting Henry changed the direction of my life.

When I met Henry Zguda, my only goal was enough information to craft an interesting 600-word newspaper column. From the very first interview, I sensed a compelling and unusual story risk of being lost forever. Henry had no siblings, and never had children, so there was no one else to hand his stories to. Conversely, he had already told me “nobody is interested in my stories. I’ve told Nancy to throw everything out when I’m gone.” As a history geek, it struck a nerve and switched on a light bulb. Perhaps I was meant to do this?

I still cannot explain why I impulsively called him up and suggested we work together to write his story. He was already eighty-five years old, so I knew the stories had to be captured right away. From the very beginning, the story came to me unexpectedly, has stayed with me for reasons I cannot explain. I have set it aside more than once, as the size of the task overwhelmed me. But, it kept calling to me, the right people kept coming into my life at the right time.
How long did it take you to write this book?

I write because I’m a communicator and have something to say. Nonfiction calls to me and always has. Real life is often crazier than anything I could dream up. From my newspaper days, I loved to highlight little known stories or people in the community. My favorite reactions from readers were “Gee, I didn’t know that” or “So that’s why …”

Thousands of memoirs and books exist on the Holocaust. I believe the inspiring stories of Poles and other victims of Hitler and Stalin deserve equally widespread recognition. In the front of the book, I included this quote by A. Whitney Brown. “The past actually happened. History is only what someone wrote down.” By writing this story, I know my words will outlive me, and Henry’s story will be told. A broader motivation soon developed as I got more into the story. Henry’s story represented millions of other Poles, whose voices needed to be heard.

First, as a prisoner in Auschwitz and Buchenwald, Henry’s story is a witness to the Holocaust and crimes against Jews from a Pole’s perspective. This alone makes the story different. As a cook in Auschwitz, he had an insider’s viewpoint.

Second, the Polish point of view and suffering during World War II is far less told, and nearly omitted from Holocaust education. This book fills in an enormous gap in this part of history.

Third, Henry Zguda had keen insights into the motivations of his captors and fellow prisoners. Beyond the historical aspect of this story, Henry held a wry sense of humor throughout his life, even in a concentration camp, and the attitude that life is precious. Whereas so many survivors of the camps either refused to talk about their experience, or remained traumatized for life, which we now refer to as PTSD, Henry held a more positive attitude that I truly admired. This book is a true human survival story.

I survived three years of hell. But that was only three years. But I survived, and I have had more good years than bad.—Henry Zguda

Fourth, over one-hundred-fifty documents and original photos exist that verify Henry’s story and fill in background history. The book features over eighty of these documents and photos, several never published elsewhere.

I met Henry in November 2002, and he passed away a year later. There were years I set the project aside, overwhelmed at the magnitude of the research and fact-checking. Life was very busy between three children, an aging parent, and working. But I always came back to talking about Henry. Also key was that I became exceptionally close with his widow, Nancy. We often talked about Henry. I miss her dearly.

Beginning in 2012, I began to translate documents and re-transcribe earlier tapes, and so many stories came into focus. When Nancy Zguda passed away in June 2013, I knew in my heart of hearts I could not live with myself until I finished. Since then, I continued with two goals–to hold the finished book in my hands, and to get it to as many readers as possible.

During the interviews, when Henry discussed some of the harder aspects of concentration camps, or when we looked through books of black-and-white photos, I wanted to stop the conversation. Redirect to something more pleasant. I wanted to honor Henry, and so many others who did not have the opportunity to stop the tape, close the book, and change subjects. This story represents far more than one man’s story.

Equally challenging was transcribing each of the interviews. There were so many foreign words in both Polish and German, or places, street names and people I initially wrote them out phonetically. It was impractical to ask Henry to spell or explain every other word. When I reviewed my notes ten years later, I had so many “aha” moments about what Henry said that I had not understood initially. Until the last revision, I had trouble finding people who understood the “old” German used in the 1940s and who could figure out words I only knew phonetically. Even some of the camp documents used an older German alphabet. At one point, I searched YouTube for the names of two songs Henry had referred to, just to spell them correctly. It was sheer luck two German-speakers came into my life in the very last three weeks before going to print for the advanced reader copy.

A ton. When I began, I had never interviewed a concentration camp survivor, nor was I Polish or Jewish, so I did not grow up with a family history. I knew very little about Poland, especially during the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s. Henry’s story called to me, stayed with me, and it soon became clear that Ineeded to comprehend the social fabric and cultural biases of a pre-war Poland, and a country at war. In addition, if I needed the history, then my readers would also, so a lot of history is woven into these stories to set the scenes and somewhat educate the reader. Beyond that, for credibility, I had to verify and cross-reference Henry’s stories, which also included a lot of fact finding.

The research component began with visiting the university library, combing websites for credible museum and institutions, and subsequent translation of Polish and German documents. There came a point that I knew I need to visit Poland and Germany, retrace Henry’s steps, and walk the grounds of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. There is no substitute for visiting in person, and while I had learned a lot of information, our tour guide filled us in on details only evident in a first-person visit. Museums do not post their entire collections of photos online, so most of the documents featured in the book cannot be found on the Internet.
A key part of the research also involved translation of many German and Polish documents – which I began in 2012 to do so, then I really knew what I had. Another huge leap came in 2014 when I discovered 130 documents on file with the International Tracing Service. Someone had encouraged me to contact the ITS, but in my mind I did not need to ‘trace’ Henry. I knew all his facts and where he was. The ITS is far more than a tracing service. It is an international repository of some 20 million documents from the Nazi era.

Hands down, it would be Na zdrowie (Cheers!) as we raised a toast of good Polish vodka.