Fear
Fear
Lucia Heilman had this to say."On 12 March German troops marched into Austria. I was eight years old and, as far as I remember, I went by myself to Helden-Platz, since I had heard there was some kind of event there. And as I reached the area I couldn’t go any further – there were so many people on the Ring and on the side streets.And I stood there and heard the yells, the roaring, and this cry, “Heil, Heil, Heil…” and I knew that I didn’t belong there.I found it all very threatening, immensely threatening. I stood there for a while, listened, and watched as people climbed trees so they could get a better look. And the cries didn’t stop! Then panic gripped me and I ran, arriving home completely distraught.[pause]Reinhold Duschka was my father’s best friend. We’d known him, it seemed forever. Reinhold kept visiting us after Hitler’s invasion. Well of course he was afraid, but he came anyway. When the transports began taking Jews away, Reinhold came and offered to hide my mother and me. He just didn’t want to see his friends murdered. I think there were only a few people in Vienna as courageous as Reinhold. There were around 115 in all of Austria who have been designated as Righteous Among the Nations. Reinhold hid us in the workshop. He built for us a kind of shed, so that if someone came into the workshop – and various people did come: customers, the mailman, and deliverers – and if someone rang the doorbell,  we crawled into the shed.In the evenings, Reinhold would sit with us, read to me, calm me down. He was like a father. Of course I wasn’t allowed out and we lived in absolute  fear. All of the time. But every once in a great while, in the night, Reinhold would take me to the front door and tell me—‘go, run, have fun!’And I ran as fast as I could and I am sure I ran at least ten kilometers, just to feel the freedom. In hiding, you see, I was always afraid. But when I went running, I never was."
As seen on
Centropa Jewish Vienna Tour
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