Abram Lipski

Abram Lipski was born in 1926, in Łódź, Poland. Abram was the youngest of six children and had a happy childhood in a traditionally observant home. His father, Aszer, operated a wholesale store which dealt in textiles. His mother, Ester Ferga, also worked in the store.

When the German army occupied Poland, the name Łódź was Germanised and became Litzmannstadt. In February/March 1940 the Lipski family was forced to relocate from their home to a crowded apartment in the Łódź ghetto. Abram’s mother died of dysentery when an outbreak swept through the ghetto that year. Conditions in the ghetto worsened, and Abram’s father died from disease in 1942.

In 1944, rumours swirled that the Nazi were going to liquidate the ghetto. Abram along with other tailors and factory workers were deported from the ghetto to Auschwitz-Birkenau. Abram survived the initial selection and was assigned to carry out manual labour in Gleiwitz, a few hours away from the camp. In mid-January 1945, the work detail Abram was assigned to was ordered to march from Gleiwitz into Germany. Abram was liberated in Blechhamer (Auschwitz IV) a labour camp, by the Soviet Army.  He immigrated to Toronto, Canada in 1950.

Abram Lipski died in 2016 and his full testimony is part of the Canadian Collection of Holocaust survivor testimonies. It is preserved in the USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive and accessible through the Ekstein Library.

Abram Lipski

 Everyday they used to come, once or twice a day they used to come from German companies, to look us over, just like you look over cattle.