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

by Heather Dune Macadam, Caroline Moorehead (Foreword by)

Overview

A PEN America Literary Award Finalist
A Goodreads Choice Awards Nominee
An Amazon Best of the Year Selection

The untold story of some of WW2’s most hidden figures and the heartbreaking tragedy that unites them all. Readers of Born Survivors and A Train Near Magdeburg will devour the tragic tale of the first 999 women in Auschwitz concentration camp. This is the hauntingly resonant true story that everyone should know.

On March 25, 1942, nearly a thousand young, unmarried Jewish women, many of them teenagers, boarded a train in Poprad, Slovakia. Believing they were going to work in a factory for a few months, they were eager to report for government service and left their parents’ homes wearing their best clothes and confidently waving good-bye. Instead, the young women were sent to Auschwitz. Only a few would survive. Now acclaimed author Heather Dune Macadam reveals their stories, drawing on extensive interviews with survivors, and consulting with historians, witnesses, and relatives of those first deportees to create an important addition to Holocaust literature and women’s history.

“Intimate and harrowing. . . . This careful, sympathetic history illuminates an incomprehensible human tragedy.” —Publishers Weekly

“Against the backdrop of World War II, this respectful narrative presents a compassionate and meticulous remembrance of the young women profiled throughout. Recommended for all collections.” —Library Journal

“Staggering . . . profound. [Macadam’s] book also offers insight into the passage of these women into adulthood, and their children, as ‘secondhand survivors.’” —Gail Sheehy, New York Times bestselling author of Passages and Daring: My Passages

“Heather Dune Macadam’s 999 reinstates the girls to their rightful place in history.” —Foreword Reviews

“An important addition to the annals of the Holocaust, as well as women’s history. Not everyone could handle such material, but Heather Dune Macadam is deeply qualified, insightful, and perceptive.” —Susan Lacy, creator of the American Masters series and filmmaker

“The story of these teenage girls is truly extraordinary. Congratulations to Heather Dune Macadam for enabling the rest of us to sit down and just marvel at how on earth they did it.”
—Anne Sebba, New York Times bestselling author of Les Parisiennes and That Woman

“An important contribution to the literature on women's experiences.” —Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel, founder and executive director, Remember the Women Institute

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780806539379
Publisher:	Kensington
Publication date:	01/26/2021
Pages:	464
Sales rank:	176,136
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Heather Dune Macadam's is the acclaimed author of 999: The Extraordinary Young Women of the First Official Jewish Transport to Auschwitz and Rena's Promise: A Story of Sisters in Auschwitz. A board member of the Cities of Peace: Auschwitz and the director and president of the Rena's Promise Foundation, her work in the battle against Holocaust denial have been recognized by Yad Vashem in the UK and Israel, the USC Shoah Foundation, the National Museum of Jewish History in Bratislava, Slovakia, and the Panstowe Museum of Auschwitz in Oswiecim, Poland. Ms. Macadam has a master's degree in creative writing and received a Presidential Grant for Research from Savannah College of Art and Design, and a PEN American stipend. She is the Producer and Director of the documentary film, 999: The Extraordinary Young Women of the First Official Jewish Transport to Auschwitz and her work has been featured in National Geographic, on PBS, and other major media outlets. Visit Heather Dune Macadam online at HeatherDune.com or find more information on 999 at 999TheMovie.com.

Table of Contents

Foreword Caroline Moorehead xi

Author's Note xvii

Principal Characters on First Transport xxiii

Part 1 1

Part 2 123

Part 3 309

Homecomings 345

Afterwards 355

One Final Word 375

List of Photographs and Illustrations 377

Archives 383

Source Notes 385

Bibliography 409

Acknowledgments 419

Reading Group Guide 425

Index 427

Editorial Reviews

The Experts Praise 999

“Almost one thousand young Jewish women, some no older than sixteen, were rounded up across Slovakia in the spring of 1942 and told that they were being sent to do government work service in newly occupied Poland, and that they would be away no more than a few months. Very few returned. Macadam has managed to recreate not only the backgrounds of the women on the first convoy but also their day to day lives—and deaths—during their years in Auschwitz. Books such as this one are essential: they remind modern readers of events that should never be forgotten.”
—From the foreword by Caroline Moorehead, New York Times bestselling author of A Train in Winter
 
“A staggering narrative about the forgotten women of the Holocaust.  In a profound work of scholarship, Heather Dune Macadam reveals how young women helped each other survive one of the most egregious events in human history. Her book also offers insight into the passage of these women into adulthood, and their children, as ‘secondhand survivors.’”
—Gail Sheehy, New York Times bestselling author of Passages and Daring: My Passages
 
“An important addition to the annals of the Holocaust, as well as women’s history. Not everyone could handle such material, but Heather Dune Macadam is deeply qualified, insightful and perceptive.”
—Susan Lacy, creator of the American Masters series and filmmaker
 
“However much one reads about the Holocaust there is always something more with the power to shock. The story of these teenage girls is truly extraordinary. Congratulations to Heather Dune Macadam for enabling the rest of us to sit down and just marvel at how on earth they did it.”
—Anne Sebba, New York Times bestselling author of Les Parisiennes and That Woman
 
“An important contribution to the literature on women's experiences . . .With passion and extensive research, Heather Dune Macadam gives the first official women’s transport to Auschwitz its rightful place in Holocaust history.”
—Dr. Rochelle G. Saidel, founder and executive director, Remember the Women Institute

“A fresh, remarkable story of Auschwitz, on the 75th anniversary of its liberation. Dune Macadam (co-author: Rena's Promise: A Story of Sisters in Auschwitz, 1995) chronicles the tale of nearly 1,000 Jewish women from Slovakia, the first women to be shipped to the Polish death camp. While not the majority of inmates, a majority of the Slovakian Jews were sent there. The author makes great use of her "interviews with witnesses, survivors, and families, and USC Shoah Archive testimonies." Most readers have learned about the many shocking aspects of the camps, including slave labor and other countless deprivations, but the author shows us how every time a train pulled in, there would be a selection, for work or extermination; the same would occur at morning roll call. There was no rhyme nor reason to the selection process; it was often just a whim. Those women in this first shipment were tattooed beginning with the number 1,000, but within a year, they were numbering nearly 39,000. As Dune Macadam notes, there were some work assignments that were safer and slightly more comfortable: sewing, laundry, mail, clerical and, hospital. The most sought-after assignment was sorting the clothes of new arrivals. Often, the women would find a piece of bread or other contraband they could carefully smuggle out. One woman found a tube of diamonds. When she was caught, she claimed she was saving it for one of the Nazis in charge; she got off, and he took leave, bought a farm, and never returned. Throughout the book, readers will be consistently astounded by the strength of these women. They fought desperately to survive and supported each other, often literally holding up friends and hiding sick inmates. "My goal," writes Dune Macadam in an author's note, "is to build as complete a picture as I can of the girls and young women of the first ‘official' Jewish transport to Auschwitz." It's not easy reading, but consider that goal achieved. An uplifting story of the herculean strength of young girls in a staggeringly harrowing situation.”
—Kirkus

“In this intimate and harrowing account, historian and novelist Macadam (coauthor, Rena’s Promise) reconstructs the lives of dozens of young Jewish women who were on the first convoy to arrive at Auschwitz in March 1942…  This careful, sympathetic history illuminates an incomprehensible human tragedy.”
—Publishers Weekly

From the Publisher

11/18/2019

In this intimate and harrowing account, historian and novelist Macadam (coauthor, Rena’s Promise) reconstructs the lives of dozens of young Jewish women who were on the first convoy to arrive at Auschwitz in March 1942. Collected from villages in eastern Slovakia, the unmarried women were told that they’d be working for the government in occupied Poland for three months. In reality, the Slovakian government had agreed to pay the Nazis 500 reichsmarks (roughly $200) per “contract” laborer. Of those on the train, sisters Edith and Lea Friedmann were nearly exempted, but their paperwork didn’t come through in time; Rena Kornreich had escaped Poland for the relative safety of Slovakia and was planning her wedding when she boarded the transport to Auschwitz. Macadam writes that many of the women thought they were going on an adventure; none were prepared to haul dead bodies from crematoriums or tear down buildings with their bare hands. Macadam doesn’t shy away from the gruesome details but also notes the women’s close-knit bonds and willingness to protect each other when they were sick. She movingly describes how the legacy of trauma has impacted the children and grandchildren of the handful of survivors. This careful, sympathetic history illuminates an incomprehensible human tragedy. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

2019-10-21
A fresh, remarkable story of Auschwitz on the 75th anniversary of its liberation.

Dune Macadam (co-author: Rena's Promise: A Story of Sisters in Auschwitz, 1995) chronicles the tale of nearly 1,000 Jewish women from Slovakia, the first women to be shipped to the German death camp. While not the majority of inmates, a majority of the Slovakian Jews were sent there. The author makes great use of her "interviews with witnesses, survivors, and families, and USC Shoah Archive testimonies." Most readers have learned about the many shocking aspects of the camps, including slave labor and other countless deprivations, but the author shows us how every time a train pulled in, there would be a selection, for work or extermination; the same would occur at morning roll call. There was no rhyme nor reason to the selection process; it was often just a whim. Those women in this first shipment were tattooed beginning with the number 1,000, but within a year, they were numbering nearly 39,000. As Dune Macadam notes, there were some work assignments that were safer and slightly more comfortable: sewing, laundry, mail, clerical, and hospital. The most sought-after assignment was sorting the clothes of new arrivals. Often, the women would find a piece of bread or other contraband they could carefully smuggle out. One woman found a tube of diamonds. When she was caught, she claimed she was saving it for one of the Nazis in charge; she got off, and he took leave, bought a farm, and never returned. Throughout the book, readers will be consistently astounded by the strength of these women. They fought desperately to survive and supported each other, often literally holding up friends and hiding sick inmates. "My goal," writes Dune Macadam in an author's note, "is to build as complete a picture as I can of the girls and young women of the first ‘official' Jewish transport to Auschwitz." It's not easy reading, but consider that goal achieved.

An uplifting story of the herculean strength of young girls in a staggeringly harrowing situation.

Kirkus Reviews