Surviving Hitler

Andrea Warren’s Surviving Hitler: A Boy in the Nazi Death Camps (2002), a children’s nonfiction book, tells the story of a young boy who survived the Holocaust and wants to share his story as an adult. The book won the 2002 ASJA Outstanding Book Award and the 2002 Society of Midland Author’s Award. A historical nonfiction writer, Warren specializes in making history accessible to children. Her books generally focus on individuals and their personal stories. Surviving Hitler is a Robert F. Silbert Honor Book and meets core state curriculum standards for ten- to fourteen-year-olds.

Surviving Hitler is the story of Janek “Jack” Mandelbaum, whose life changes when the Nazis invade Poland, forcing Jewish people into concentration camps. Jack is one of the few Jews who survived being moved around multiple camps, and he only survived because he was selected for forced labor.

Warren explains that she was inspired to write Surviving Hitler because she grew up knowing so little about Jews and the Holocaust. She notes that no one wanted to talk about the Holocaust in particular or the war more generally, even though her own father and uncle fought in the war. There was a sense that everyone wanted to put the past behind them.

Only when Warren later meets a concentration or “death” camp survivor does she realize how wrong it is to forget the Holocaust. She doesn’t want children growing up ignorant of the horror of it. It’s difficult for children to comprehend the scale of the Holocaust; Warren believes that using individual stories, such as Jack’s, puts the atrocities into a human, relatable context.

Surviving Hitler includes direct quotes from Jack about his experiences, although Warren admits that his recollections may not be entirely accurate after all these years. Where relevant, she includes pictures to add greater depth to her descriptions. The images are appropriate for a younger audience.

Above all, Warren wants to educate children that the Holocaust may happen again if we don’t eradicate racism, ethnic cleansing ideology, discrimination, and other forms of oppression. She hopes that, through Surviving Hitler, children will be better able to identify oppression when they see it and challenge it where appropriate.

Warren begins Surviving Hitler with a brief discussion of Jack’s childhood. He is twelve years old and lives in Gdynia, Poland. Before the war, Jack’s family is prosperous; his father owns a popular fish cannery. Jack spends his days collecting stamps and dreaming of far-flung, exotic places. He plans to travel when he is old enough. Nothing can prepare Jack for what is about to befall him and his entire family.

Warren describes how Jack’s family moves away from their home because it is a possible target for Nazi bombing. They move to a much smaller Polish village, and Jack encounters hostility towards Jews and Jewish heritage for the first time. Jack believes that he is Polish and that being Jewish doesn’t matter; he can’t understand why people treat him unkindly.

In August 1939, the Nazis invade Poland with full force, systematically gathering Jewish people and sending them to concentration camps. On Jack’s first encounter with the Nazis, he is separated from his parents, older sister, and younger brother. He will never see them again. Thinking of them is the only way that Jack copes with the separation.

Warren describes Jack’s movements between various camps—Blechhammer, Gross-Rosen, and Auschwitz. Warren explains what the concentration camps were, how they operated, and how prisoners were selected for death or forced labor. She touches on lesser-known details, such as how SS troops loaned out prisoners to local factories in exchange for payment, and how many prisoners were killed within twenty-four hours of arriving at a camp.

Surviving Hitler does not discuss the killing methods or the barbaric conditions in too much detail, given the age and emotional maturity of the intended audience. However, the book does include statistics showing how many people died during World War II, and how many Jewish people are estimated to have died in concentration camps, or prisoner of war camps. Warren includes these statistics at the end of chapters to recap what has been discussed.

Warren describes Jack’s character, and the tactics he used to stay alive. Importantly, she explains that Jack forgave his captors and prayed for them all the time. He understood that the soldiers didn’t all want to be there, even if that doesn’t make up for what happened. Jack teaches readers much about compassion and surviving horrendous adversity, even if he never finds his family again, despite his best efforts at the end of the War.

At the end of Surviving Hitler, Warren includes a suggested reading list for both younger and older children. She hopes that children who read Surviving Hitler will be moved to learn more about the Holocaust and the people who lived and died during it. Passing on the stories of the people who endured the Holocaust is the only way we can stop history from repeating itself.