999: The Extraordinary Young Women of the First Official Jewish Transport to Auschwitz

Survival. That is the heart of this moving book. For the young women of the first transport, leaving their homes in Slovakia to do “government service” in 1942, to survive meant to withstand physical, mental, and emotional hardships and cruelty. It meant finding the will to keep living. Starving, sick (typhus, tuberculosis), abused, dehumanized, these young women lived. Those that survived the first 6 months, and then over the next two years somehow avoided dying from illness, being shot by the SS for fun, dying from cruel sterilization experiments, and ‘selection’ for the gas chamber, were ultimately part of the final death March. They were not freedom fighters or combatants or troublemakers. They were innocent civilians show more dragged from their families to be tortured and killed. The fact that any survived to bear witness is a miracle.

This book is an important addition to the historical record of the Holocaust. While we are regularly reminded of the numbers — how many people fit in a cattle car (more than cattle and yet weighed less), how many people were registered in camp and how many went straight to the gas chamber, how many days or weeks or months the girls were assigned to which building, how many Jews remained in a village, town, or city after the authorities rounded people up for transport — that isn’t what makes this book special. The author uses interviews and archives of testimony to help the reader imagine what it was like for these young women. Each difficult choice... Should a person starve or break the rule of kashrut against eating horse meat? Should she fast on Yom Kippur when she is already starving? Should she celebrate Passover and recite the words of freedom when she is a slave? Should she have sex with the SS officer or be shot for refusing? Should she break god’s law by killing herself rather than allowing the SS to take her life? Considering these questions, describing the unbearable choices .. that is the power of this book. show less

There were so many people included in this book and I’m afraid and sad that at times I lost track which person was which, despite frequent reminders.

At the beginning in particular I noticed that too much conjecture had to be done the way this story was told. Yes in a way the account can make the reader feel closer to the girls and young women but in another way it’s distancing not knowing how close to reality the account was. As the account went on the book got better and better and it was obvious that the accounts were genuine and there were plenty of details and well as getting a general sense of how things were. Truly horrific. The more I got into the book the more I “enjoyed” it and the more it became a page-turner. show more

Perfectly done were the testimonies of those who survived, of the family members of those who died, and completely but unfortunately realistically the mystery of what happened to some of the females on this first transport.

Many wonderful photographs are included. There is a large section of them in the middle of the book and there are also others scattered throughout the book.

There are several helpful maps.

I’m glad that this account exists. Much of it was emotionally difficult to read but I’m glad I read it. It’s a worthy addition to non-fiction Holocaust literature and not for the first time only after I read the account did I realize it’s yet another necessary one.

I do not fully understand how some people can withstand so much pain (physical and psychological) and so much terror and that goes for the survivors and the way too many who died at some point, whether early on or toward the end. This account does not shy away from the damage that lasts in people who have been through extreme trauma.

4-1/2 stars

My next book will not be but now/soon I need some lighter reading material.

I need to add that I have read hundreds of Holocaust books, nonfiction and historical fiction, and I had known nothing about this transport and I also learned a tremendous amount of information I never knew before about day-to-day life in the camp (camps and things about life before and after and after the war too) which included very diverse experiences. As far as each individual and relationship that was covered I learned a lot by reading about them. show less

999: The Extraordinary Young Women of the First Official Transport to Auschwitz, by Heather Macadam, is a unique look at the holocaust by examining the roundup of a group of women aged 16 to 36 from Slovakia. Told they would be working for Germany, likely in a show factory, families helped these young ladies gather their 40 kilos of personal items together for transport. Little did they know that their ultimate destination was Auschwitz and, in most cases, the gas chambers.

Published in 2020, this was a difficult book to research as most of the survivors are dead, and the video archives in Israel lack certain information that would have been helpful in the research of this book, such as prisoner numbers. Also, the Nazis apparently did show more not bother to keep as meticulous records about women prisoners as they did men and many of the records they had were destroyed in the waning moments of the war anyway. Considering this, the author did a truly magnificent job in collecting information about what happened to these women. The stories about work details in addition to the expected examples of senseless brutality make for a truly fascinating and depressing story.

One example I found rather interesting was the attempt by some prisoners, when allowed to write home, was their attempt to warn relatives about what was happening in such a way as to get past Nazi censors. For example, this passage from page 169: "When a postcard from Auschwitz arrived in Ivan's town, it appeared to report facts identicle to the others:'the Germans treat us fairly. Yes we work, but not too hard. We get enough food and sleep in hygienic barracks. Our family is almost complete, only Uncle Malach Hamowet is missing. We hope he will join us soon.' In Hebrew, Malach ha-Mawet is the Angel of Death."

Other examples of warnings might be references to being with long dead family members.

A unique and valuable addition to any World War 2 library show less

11-2024
Un libro duro. Sin recrearse en detalles escabrosos, logras hacerte una idea muy cercana de lo que fue el día a día de estas chicas en el campo de concentración.
Sigo sin poder creerme que nadie saliera vivo de allí. Es entre un milagro y magia, que alguien lo consiguiera.
Hay que leerlo, no sirve contar nada.
Al final, cuenta un poco y muy resumido, como fueron sus vidas posteriormente, de las pocas supervivientes.

An incredible book telling the story of 999 young women sent to Auschwitz. These girls were in their late teens and were told they were going to work in Germany. The author recounts their horrific journey so vividly. I felt drawn into the story as if I were there. I had to take many deep breaths and even put the book down a few times, as hard as that was, just to compose myself. The author had done a fantastic job telling these girls' stories! I highly recommend this book.

When I requested this book from the Queens Public Library I thought enough time had passed since I last read a Holocaust book, and that I would be able to manage it emotionally. But... when I picked up the book from the shelf on my living-room side table I doubted myself; had second thoughts. I decided to give it a try. I read the Foreword and just from the painful summary it provided I knew I would not be able to complete the book. But I did read the Author's Note.

I cannot, at this point in my life, at this time, read another book about deliberate, indefensible human cruelty, abuse, debasement, agony, wholesale murder of millions of regular people, innocents, who harmed no one. And all because of fear, misunderstanding, jealousy and show more irrational hate. And even worse is that many of these haters were RAISED, ENCOURAGED, COERCED, and BRAIN-WASHED into this egregious behavior. They weren't born hating, they were TAUGHT to hate others based on deceptive, false, fabricated reasons.

I can't. show less

Our girls

This author has quite a unique writing style and I loved it. An amazing story and one you have never heard but it must be. I promise you that once you finish this you will never forget these courageous women. I don't believe there has been anything like this before and I pray never again. You will have a struggle putting it down.