David Natanson

https://www.aicgs.org/2019/12/hidden-in-plain-sight-the-life-and-me...

Roughly sixty-seven years before the telephone call, on May 10, 1940, the Germans invaded France. Within weeks, German troops entered Paris. At the time, Raymonde Nathansohn was three years old.[2] She had been born on August 22, 1936, to David and Esther Nathansohn. David was from Minsk and was the youngest of six sons.[3] He had done his studies in Germany, and in Paris, he “went into the handbag business” working for his uncle.[4] In Paris, he met Esther Bendet, who was one of six daughters, and who had come to the city from Poland. Esther had fled Poland because she was a communist. She had taken on the identity of her sister, Liba, and had her sister’s identification papers. Thus, to the outside world, Esther was Liba. Esther worked as a dressmaker in Paris.[5] Raymonde says that, later in life, she was told by her older cousin that David and Esther “lived in sin” for some time in Paris before getting married.[6] David and Esther did eventually marry in Paris, and in 1936, Esther gave birth to their only child. They named the girl Raymonde after David’s deceased mother. Raymonde would never meet any of her grandparents. The Nathansohn family lived in an apartment on the Rue de Turenne in the Jewish section of the city known as Le Marais. Raymonde remembers it being a “fairly big” walk-through apartment on the third floor of the building with combined kitchen-dining room, a big living room that overlooked a yard, a bathroom, and a bedroom.[7] The apartment had a balcony, and Raymonde remembers once throwing her bracelet from the balcony and it landing on the terrace below from which it could not be retrieved.[8] She says she remembers the kindergarten she attended and that it was located just a block from the family’s apartment.

Photo courtesy Raymonde Fiol.
Raymonde has vague memories of her parents. She believes that her father was the more outgoing of the two. She was later told by her uncle that her father had a beautiful voice, was an opera buff, and was an avid photographer.[9] She believes her mother was a progressive thinker and had a special elegance, as evidenced by the photographs of her, some of which Raymonde believes were taken by her father. She notes that he had an old-fashioned camera that opened like an accordion.[10] Raymonde remembers a sewing machine in the house, and believes that her mother worked from home as a dressmaker.[11]

She remembers the beginning of the war. She remembers sirens, gas masks, and going down with her parents into a common cellar for the whole apartment building. She also remembers her mother and her being stopped by a German soldier, who asked Esther why her daughter was not wearing the yellow star with the word “Juif” (“Jew”) on it. Raymonde was not yet of the age in which Jews had to wear the yellow star, but Raymonde explains that since she was somewhat big for her age, the soldier wanted to know why she was not wearing it. Esther had Raymonde’s birth certificate with her, and, thus, was able to show the soldier that Raymonde did not yet have to wear the star. Esther was wearing her yellow star.[12]

Raymonde has very little memory of her parents beyond this. She believes that her memory is “blocked.” Much of what she knows of what happened next is based on what she was told after the war. When asked once in an interview what her happiest memory of her parents is, Raymonde responded, “I don’t think I have any.”[13]

She states that her father was rounded up in a raid of foreign-born Jews and sent to the Vélodrome d’Hiver, a stadium in Paris where the Jews were held until they were sent to various labor camps. According to the official website of the organization Anonymes, Justes et Persécutés durant la période Nazie dans les communes de France (AJPN), the raid that David got caught up in was the “Rafle du billet vert” or “green ticket raid” of May 14, 1941, and the camp he was sent to was Joué, in Gironde.[14]

Photo courtesy Raymonde Fiol.
Whereas David was sent to a labor camp, initially, Esther and Raymonde were not. Raymonde got sick and was sent to a hospital, leaving Esther alone. Eventually, David was given what appeared to be a choice—although it is not clear if there actually was one—for the family to live together in a different labor camp in the village of Bulson, in the northeastern part of the country close to the border with Belgium.[15] According to the AJPN website, David arrived in Bulson on March 29, 1942, and Esther and Raymonde arrived on July 18, 1942.[16] In Bulson, they were forced to work as farm laborers.[17] Raymonde explains, “The Germans forced the residents [out and] made a camp out of a small village. And they forced the people out and lodged several Jewish families in one house. All I remember is steps and an alcove, and I think this is where we were put.” She remembers “my father’s hands being dirty and scraped [from having] to work the land.”[18] She also remembers seeing her father cry. She thinks that her mother may have been pregnant and that her parents did not know what they were going to do, and her father was very upset.[19] According to the Yad Vashem website: “The living conditions were very difficult, and when rumors circulated that the Jews there were to be deported, the Nathansohns decided to look for a shelter for [%E2%80%A6] Raymonde.”[20] David Nathansohn approached Gabriel Cailac, who was delivering agricultural products to the occupying Germans.[21] It was decided that Raymonde was to be taken in by Gabriel Cailac and his wife, Sara. Raymonde explains, “I was turned over to the Christian family that saved my life.”[22] She remembers parting with her parents in front of the Cailacs’ home in La Besace: “I remember being taken [%E2%80%A6] by my parents, I guess it was nearby where the camp was, so they probably had the possibility to get out or snuck out, and left me with this couple. And they said, ‘We’ll come back for you,’ and said, ‘Goodbye.’ That was the last time I saw them.” It was June 1943, and Raymonde was seven years old.[23]

• Reference: Ancestry Genealogy - SmartCopy: Dec 20 2021, 0:24:56 UTC