Ellen Einstein honors her mother, Esther Silberstein Krause, who, like her husband, was born in Lodz, Poland. Her parents worked in the hosiery business and were considered fairly well-off. Esther did not meet her husband until after the war, even though they were both sent to the Lodz ghetto. Krause was sent to Auschwitz and later, to Merzdorf. After the war, she married Jerry on November 10, 1945, and moved to Marburg, Germany. The family eventually secured passage on U.S. Army transport plane and moved to the American South, where they started a family. Ellen notes that her parents survived because of luck and the kindness of strangers. She writes, “The woman who was in charge of mom’s barrack at Merzdorf gave her a hard-boiled egg every day, which mom shared with her two cousins. Dad was able to finagle food to stay alive wherever he was taken. Through determination and chance, they got out alive.”
The Nashville Holocaust Memorial