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I was born in Romania, in Soimeni village, Cluj province, part of North Transylvania (that at the end of August 1940 become annexed to Hungary under the Horthy Government).

In the early hours of May 3, 1944, I with my family (including my grandparents and the rest of the Jewish villagers) were arrested from my village Soimeni and transported to the local police station in the neighboring village Fodora. On the following day, I with my family were sent to the Cluj Ghetto and, on June 6 were deported to Birkenau-Auschwitz. On June 9, 1944, with the 5th transport from the Cluj Ghetto, we all arrived at the Ramp of Death of the Birkenau-Auschwitz Concentration Camp: my parents and my six brothers. My seventh brother Tiberiu, the eldest, who was 21, was not with us as he already was taken to a forced labor camp in the country.

My mother, Iolanda Hermann, 43, and my three little brothers, Cornel and Cornelia (twins, age 14) and the little one Valentin (age 8), were selected, upon arrival from the train's ramp to go straight to the gas chamber. I, who was not yet 18, with my brother Emilian, 16, and with my father Edmund, 45, went into the Camp "E," in Barrack 19. After a few days, my father was sent to Mauthausen from where he never returned. I with my brother Emilian were relocated to Barrack 21 known also as the "Kinder Block" (the Children Block).

My elderly sister Eva, age 19, stayed only a few weeks at Birkenau, at the Women Detention Center "C." After that, she followed her ordeal through the concentration camps of Kaiserwald, Dundaga, Stutthof, and Malchow from where she was liberated by the Soviet Army.

At the end of September 1944, I and my brother Emilian were sent from Birkenau's Camp "E" to K. Z. Landsberg Camp (Kaufering - 4 and 5), part of the Dachau complex. There, upon my arrival, on September 29, 1944, I became Prisoner ("Haftling") No. 112398. I was freed on April 27, 1945 by the U. S. Army.
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Editor's Note:
(December 2004)

After "graduating" from the Auschwitz -Dachau School of Hell, upon his return to Cluj, Romania, Oliver Lusting had embarked into a most productive and distinguished career.

After finishing his high school, he continued his studies and, in 1949 he graduated from the Babes-Bolyai University in Cluj. Twenty five years later, in 1974, he got his Ph.D. in Economics from the same school.

Joining the Army in 1949, he worked for the military press as a journalist and retired from the Army in 1986 as a Major-General in reserve. Currently, he is still very active as a publicist and writer.

As a writer, almost his entire career was dedicated to the subject of the Holocaust. He is the author of several books on Holocaust (unfortunately mostly in Romanian), among them:

--- "From the Shadow of the Crematorium" ["Din umbra crematoriului"] (1960)
--- "Life in the Kingdom of Death" ["Viata in imperiul mortii"] (1969)
--- "Then.... There.... At Auschwitz" ["Atunci... acolo... la Auschwitz"] (1977)
--- "Language of Death" ["Limbajul mortii"] (1986);
---"Journal Covered in Blood" ["Jurnal insingerat"] (1987) where it is presented the ghetto life and the deportation of over

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Oliver Lustig's Concentration Camp Dictionary January 2005 Internet Edition

150,000 Jews from North Transylvania to Birkenau-Auschvitz with all authentic names being revealed, both of the victims and the perpetrators alike.
--- "Concentration Camp Dictionary" ["Dictionar de lagar"] (1982; 2nd. Ed. 2002) that was translated into Hungarian, German, Portuguese, and Italian. In a not too great English translation obtained from Romania, we have posted, in full, this remarkable and unique presentation of the Holocaust through Oliver Lustig's own vantage view.

In 1991, he translated from Hungarian into Romanian the Diary of Eva Heyman [Jurnalul lui Eva Heyman] (for whom he consider her as Anne Frank of Transylvania) under the title "I Lived So Few Years." ["Am trait atit de putin."]

For us, Oliver Lustig has prepared an exquisite selection of photos from the extraordinary Auschwitz Album published by Yad Vashem and the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, with his own commentary. It is therefore our distinct pleasure and privilege to reveal in here the selected photos through Oliver Lustig's own eyes.

To see that selected Photographic Album from Auschwitz-Birkenau with Oliver Lustig's commentary, please click on the book's cover at left or on the CONTINUE button below.

Oliver (right) with his brother Emilian in Bucharest holding a copy of the precious Auschwitz Album.

Selected Links: Two Appreciations (from the many received) to Oliver Lustig Arrival at Auschwitz: Testimony by Oliver Lustig. The Inferno of Auschwitz: An Interview (in Romanian) with Oliver Lustig

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