Story of the Blitz family

The most information we have about the Blitz family comes from memoirs published in Israel after the death of Meir Blitz, born February 7, 1922 in Czarny Dunajec (thanks for the help of Anna Brzyska of the Association "Memory and Dialogue. Common History" which describes the stories of the Jewish community of Brzesko, where some of the Blitz family is believed to have perished). Meir, born Majer, was the son of Juda Szabse Blitz and Miriam (née Klausner), who came from Wisnicz, but moved like many people from their town to Czarny Dunajec.

Judah Szabse was born in 1878, his parents were Majer and Wite Blitz of Wisnicz, who had at least five more children (according to the 1880 census). On the other hand, Majer's parents, and Judy Shabse's grandparents, were Mendel and Tyle Blitz, also from Wisnicz. Miriam's parents were Abraham and Lieba Klausner of Wisnicz.

The 1880 census of Wiśnicz, photo: Archiwum Narodowe

It is not known when Judah Szabse and Miariam moved to Czarny Dunajec. The first mention in the archives of their children is from 1915. On 23.01.1915, Tońka Blitz was born in Czarny Dunajec. This was the information she gave in her application with a photo for referral for deportation from Cracow to Brzesko in 1940. It shows that in 1938 she was already living in Cracow.

Application for referral for deportation from Cracow to Brzesko submitted in 1940 by Tońcia Blitz from Czarny Dunajec, photo archive of the Jewish Historical Institute.

Other children of Judah and Miriam born in Czarny Dunajec were Amalia (Malka) - born on May 8, 1920, the aforementioned Majer (07.02.1922), Tultsa (Tolcia) - born in 1923, Sala Ita (Sara), born on 06.02.1924, and Wolf (01.02.1926). In his memoirs, Meir Blitz still mentioned his brother Mendel. In 1922, Abraham Blitz died in Czarny Dunajec, but it is not known at what age. Perhaps he was another son of Judy Schabse and Miriam.

Fragment of the birth book from 1924 with the entry of the birth of Sala Ita (Sara) Blitz, photo: Archiwum Narodowe

There is also a reference in the archives to another Tolcia Blitz, possibly Judy Schabse's older sister, who was born from 1866 in Wisnicz (and her parents were Majer and Wite - Ittla Blitz, but from Rawa Ruska, not Wisnicz, though the same parents are probably meant), and who also moved to Czarny Dunajec, where she married baker Symcha Gutfreund (also known as Gutfraj), who ran a bakery in the market square. Tolcia and Symcha had at least three children: Freida, Gavriel (born 1904) and Chana (born 1907). In the book of the dead, there is an entry from 1909 about the death of Tolcia Blitz, daughter of Majer Blitz of Vistula.

Freida Blitz married Abraham Spitz, a merchant from Czarny Dunajec, with whom she had at least two sons, Hirsch Leib (b. 1920) and Isaac (b. 1922). It is likely that Freida died before the war, as an entry from 1936 about the remarriage of Abraham Spitz and Chana Blitz, her sister, survives in the marriage book.

In his memoirs, Majer Blitz describes that his father Juda Schabse had a clothing store in Czarny Dunajec, and the house was very orthodox. When the war broke out the family fled on foot to another town where they had relatives (possibly to Brzesko), but on the way Majer and Sara (Sala Ita) got lost. They traveled east by train and arrived in the Soviet Union. Majer was 17 at the time, and Sara was 15, and they lost contact with their parents, who, according to his account, died in the Belzec death camp. The siblings spent almost four years in a camp in Siberia, with Majer working in logging, among other jobs. In 1943 they were able to leave the camp, their next stop in their wartime wandering was Uzbekistan, a city where many Jews, probably refugees like them, lived at the time. There Majer worked as a porter and Sara sewed cotton sacks.

At the end of the war, they managed to return to Poland, and in Krakow Majer met his future wife Debora, whom he married in 1945. As a couple posing as Greeks, they left via Czechoslovakia and Germany for France, from where they sailed by ship to Mandate Palestine. The Bad Arolsen archives preserve a document from the period when Majer was in a so-called "dip camp" in the former lancer barracks in Bamberg, Germany.

Majer Blitz stayed after the war in Germany in a camp for dipis at the lancer barracks in Bamberg, photo archive Bad Arolsen

The ship was detained by the British in the Mediterranean and the couple stayed in a British camp in Cyprus for eight months and did not reach their new homeland until 1947. They first stayed in a camp in Atlit and later Kirjat Mockin and Ramatayim. Majer began learning Hebrew, worked in agriculture, on knitting machines, laid tiles, was employed as a clerk and co-owned a company, and was a member of the Labor Party. With Deborah they had two children, Yehuda Barak and Miriam, and at least seven grandchildren. Meir Blitz died in 2000 in Israel. It is not known what was the further fate of Sarah, who probably also emigrated to Israel. It is likely that the rest of the family perished during the war.