Before the publication of a dossier on the issue of refugees in Switzerland, dorot | association d’histoire publishes the testimonials of a couple who had passed through an exile which was both very similar to the Austrian group and yet quite exceptional: from the USSR to Switzerland, passing through the Maghreb, France and Italy.
Mottel Kurys, like a number of men of his generation who had taken refuge in France, signed up to the Foreign Legion in an attempt to escape internment. However the collaborationist politics of Vichy and the big roundups of August 1942 caught up with him. His wife, Lena Winter, whom he met at the internment camp of Rivesaltes in 1942, followed a more familiar, if not classic, itinerary. The unusual element of their common destiny is to have realised in time that in spite of the 1943 armistice and the allied landing in Sicily, danger was still ever-present in Italy. Switzerland thus represented the only possible escape route.
As with the Kornweitz – Linder – Spira group, the Kurys passed through St Martin Vésubie and entered Italy whilst Italian soldiers were in a state of disorder. Why were they not arrested by the Wehrmacht at Valdieri? How many hours or days separated them from their pursuers, allowing them to escape from the arrests and internment at the Borgo San Dalmazzo camp and from deportation? So many questions without answers, so many miraculous occurrences. The Kurys couple, in their own words, in a sometimes clumsy but always “well thought through” French told Swiss soldiers the details of their journey through Italy to Switzerland and their story of exile. The transcripts of these interrogations are reproduced here by the researchers of dorot | association d’histoire.
"Barbed wire separating the enclosure of the interns from the personnel enclosure"
Source : F/7/15110 Archim database
Transcripts of the interrogations,
Bellinzona, Switzerland, June 2nd 1944
Mottel Kurys
"My father was the joint owner of a mill and a sawmill at Wladimir Volinsk. I took my primary and secondary education in my country of birth and in Warsaw (Poland). I started up as a businessman in Warsaw. In 1928 I moved to France, where I lived at 19 rue Monge in Paris’ 5th district and where I continued my trade of traveling salesman for several silk manufacturers. In September 1939 I signed up as a volunteer in the French army. I undertook my military training in Sidi-Bel-Abbès (Algeria) and Fès (Marocco). After the armistice of June 1940 I worked in the construction of the Trans-saharian railway. On March 8th 1941 I was discharged from the regiment base at Fès (Morocco) and sent to France, specifically to Brive-la-Gaillarde (Corrèze), where I worked at the town gas factory until August 1942. Due to my belonging to the Jewish race I was subsequently arrested and sent to the concentration camp close to Limoges (St Paul d’Eyjaux ?), then to be transferred to Germany. As a former combatant I was freed and as six weeks after the Germans wanted to arrest me, I received warning from the police and managed to evade them and then escape to Italian occupied territory, taking up regular housing in Voiron (Isère). At the time of the armistice (NB: September 1943 in Italy) I left the area and went to Saint-Martin Vésubie (Alpes Maritimes) and from there, having crossed the mountains, I arrived with the Italian soldiers at Terme di Valdieri (Cuneo). We stayed until the end of October 1943 in the mountains, and then we hid ourselves at Genova on the advice of the village priest. I didn’t know the person who housed us. We never went out until the moment we left for Switzerland. Route followed: on May 25th 1944 we headed for Lake Maggiore. As it proved impossible to pass through this way, we made our way to Como, then disembarking at a locality on Lake Como. A stranger, to whom we paid 2000 liras, was our mountain guide and we crossed the border on May 30th 1944 at 2h 30. We signaled for help by calling and with an electric lamp. Two soldiers picked us up and drove us to the post of Cabbia and then to Chiasso and then, this morning to Bellinzona."
Lena Kurys-Winter
"In 1929 on the death of my father, a fabric shop owner, I left Rostov with my mother to join her parents at Anvers in Belgium. I completed my primary and secondary school education in Belgium, where I remained until the death of my mother in July 1942. A few weeks later, I left, turning in the direction of non-occupied France, where I was interned in various concentration camps on account of my race. I met Mr Kurys in the Rivesaltes camp (Eastern Pyrenees), where I got married in order to have protection from the authorities, my husband being a former combatant. When the Germans refused to free me, I seized on the opportunity of my transfer to Gurs (Geurst in the original transcript) camp to escape, and in this way joined my husband at Brive-la-Gaillarde, where the French authorities gave me the necessary documentation for a regular residence permit. At this stage we were still wanted by the Germans. Hence in April we left for Voiron in the Italian occupied zone. After the armistice we reached the locality of Terme di Valdieri (Cuneo) with the Italian troops via Saint-Martin-Vésubie (Nice) and the mountains. We stayed in the mountains until the end of the month of October, and then left, on the advice of a priest, for Genova with a view to escaping the Germans who were going to search the area. We lived in hiding with unknown people until May 25th 1944, and then we decided to cross the Swiss border via Lake Maggiore. Unfortunately we failed in our attempt. We then went to Como and to a locality on Lake Como. A stranger escorted us to the border on the mountain, which we crossed on May 30th 1944 at 2h 30. From there we were taken to Chiasso and Bellinzona, Casa d’Italia."
Mottel Kurys
Nationality: Russian Born in Wladimir Volinsk, Ukraine on October 21st 1911 Son of Alik Kurys and Toba Goldhaber
Traveling silk salesman. Former home: Voiron, Isère France
Motive for escape: racial persecution In possession of:
birth certificate and two French copies
one old Polish identity card
one Polish military pass-book
one French military pass-book
military demobilisation papers, military enrollment papers
certificate of good conduct at regiment
notice of departure from Bou-Arfa, certificate of termination of work at Bou-Arfa
certificate of good conduct at Bou-Arfa
Certificate of presence at Bou-Arfa, inventory of belongings at Bou Arfa
registration form for Jews at Brive-la Gaillarde
social insurance card
Combatant’s card for the federation of friends of former foreign servicemen (EVE)
clothing coupon from Brive-la-Gaillarde
supplementary slip to the identity card of Brive-la-Gaillarde
search order from Brive-la Gaillarde
Residential permit, Chambéry
Letter of recommendation from the federation of friends of former foreign servicemen (EVE), Grenoble April 25th 1943.
Accompanied by his wife
Lena Kurys-Winter
Nationality : Russian. Born in Rostov March 24th 1921 Daughter of Soullin Winter and Nacha Serzach.
Dressmaker Arrived in France on September 08th 1942, interned in Rivesaltes coming from sector K to sector J on September 24th 1942 in Gurs transferred on 23rd or 24th November to Gurs
Former home: Voiron, Isère France.
Motive for escape: racial persecution
In possession of:
French identity card
Death certificate of her mother dating 03/08/1942 at Anvers
Birth certificate
Clothing coupon from Brive-la-Gaillarde dated 19/01/1943
Certificate of the Voiron detention centre dated 14/05/1943
