Gena Turgel has to be one of the strongest people that ever lived. Her story is both tragic and miraculous.
The 90-year-old woman survived three different Nazi concentration camps throughout World War II, including the most notorious of all, Auschwitz-Birkeanau. Turgel, who was 21 at the time, even survived being put into one of Auschwitz’s gas chambers. She simply just walked out of it alive. She didn’t even realize what had happened until a friend told her what she came out of.
Turgel was also held captive in the Buchenwald and Belsen concentration camps. At the latter, she shared barracks with the legendary Anne Frank.
Gena Turgel telling her deeply emotional story.
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Turgel had to leave her hometown of Krakow, Poland, after it was bombed by the Nazis. She planned on moving to Chicago with her family, but they didn’t manage to escape to the United States in time.
While Turgel was able to miraculously survive the war, her two brothers were not as lucky–both lost their lives battling the Nazis. Her younger sister, who would sleep by her side, was shot for smuggling food. Turgel was surrounded by so much death in these incredibly trying years that, to this day, she claims to wear as much perfume as she can to try and block out the stench of human loss that she says sticks with her.
It’s hard to understand how anyone could survive that much tragedy in their life.
Auschwitz concentration camp where over 1 million people were killed.
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(via NBC)
When the Belsen concentration camp was liberated by the British, Gena Turgel met army officer Norman Turgel and married him six months later. Turgel has returned to Auschwitz twice with her grandsons since the war ended. Her story stands as a testament to the human spirit, as well as a reminder of the atrocities of war and the horrors of Hitler’s regime.
