"I became [prisoner] 88 at age seventeen
….I was there Day ONE, 14 June 1940, part of the first Polish transport to
Oswiecim (Auschwitz)….and I was still there on Day ONE THOUSAND SIX HUNDRED
EIGHT, 7 November 1944…
More than 405,000 numbers were issued at
Auschwitz, leaving uncounted nearly 1.5 million Jews led directly to the gas….
…to understand the [prisoner] numbers,
think of your hand.
Each finger is worth about 80,000. Of total 405,000 numbered, less than one
fingernail’s worth, about 2,000 were released, none of whom were Jewish.
One nail clipping, 200, including a few
Jews, escaped. About one third of total,
finger and a half, were transferred or evacuated before liberation: 60% of
these died during evacuation, or in other camps, leaving maybe 2 knuckle’s
worth.
Soviet Army liberated 7,650, less than a
knuckle.
Altogether of those numbered, of the
whole hand, one pinky, about 15%, is all that survived." From Prisoner 88 (p6)
Elly: my true story of the Holocaust by 
The Boys: the untold story of 732 young concentration camp survivors by 
Prisoner 88: the man in stripes by 
Guns and barbed wire: a child survives the Holocaust by 
Surviving Hitler : a boy in the Nazi death camps by 
Anne Frank’s Tales from the Secret Annex by
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From Eva’s Story,
p. 6
