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Today we see one of the first letters I asked Roslyn to translate. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, when I first found the stack of World War I letters, they seemed like an interesting artifact, but unrelated to my immediate family’s story. I changed my opinion when I saw this letter from 19-year old POW Erich Zerzawy in eastern Siberia to his aunt Helene in Vienna.
28 November 1917
Dear Helen, the usual birthday greetings. I wish for the only thing I can wish for in my situation – to see you again soon after a long, sad time. And the prospects for this really aren’t so bad! But nobody knows anything for sure, that is the only sure thing.
If it makes you happy on your birthday, I want to reassure you, as I have done many times, that I am fine. I think it must be the same for you; I know you!
Greetings and kisses from your old […?] Erich
This was the first evidence I found of Helene living in Vienna before my mother was born. Now I had the address where she lived while she was single. Salzgries was in the Jewish quarter, about a mile away from her eventual home on Seidlgasse, where Eva and Harry lived as children.
Like the Red Cross letters Helene sent during World War II, prisoners were not allowed to write long letters. The warning on the top reads: “Do not write between the lines!” Space was limited, at least partly because censors wanted to be able to easily decipher what was written.
Like Erich, I wish that he had been able to see his aunt and loved ones again, and to live a long and happy life. What a sweet boy, remembering his aunt’s birthday and thinking of her comfort and happiness. He unknowingly foreshadows Helene’s husband’s words to her from Buchenwald that we saw in the September 10th post. Both prisoners tried to reassure Helene that they were fine and were confident (or pretended to be) that they’d see each other again. Tragically, that was not to be.