Ala Gertner (1912-1945).
German Nazi concentration camp victim.
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Referred to in other sources as Alla, Alina, Ella, and Ela Gertner, she was one of four women hanged in the Auschwitz concentration camp for her role in the Sonderkommando revolt of October 7, 1944.
Gertner was born in Będzin, Poland, one of three children in a prosperous Jewish family.
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In October 1940 Gertner was ordered to report to the train station in nearby Sosnowiec, where she was taken to a Nazi labor camp in Geppersdorf (now Rzedziwojowice), a construction site where hundreds of Jewish men were used as forced laborers on the Reichsautobahn section (now Berlinka) and where women worked in the kitchen and laundry. Gertner, who was fluent in German, was assigned to the camp office, where she met prisoner Bernhard Holtz whom she would marry in the Będzin Ghetto in the following year.
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In 1941, Gertner was allowed to return home. She and Bernhard Holtz were married in the Sosnowiec Ghetto of Środula in May 1943. They lived in the Będzin Ghetto neighbourhood of Kamionka until sometime after July 1943 (the date of Gertner's last known letter) and were probably deported to Auschwitz with the remaining Jews of Sosnowiec and Będzin in early August, 1943.
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At Auschwitz, Gertner worked in the warehouses at first, sorting the possessions of Jews who had been gassed. She became friendly with Roza Robota, who was active in the underground resistance. Gertner was then assigned to the office of the munitions factory, where she and Roza became part of a conspiracy to smuggle gunpowder to the Sonderkommando, who were building bombs and planning an escape. Gertner recruited other women to join the conspiracy, and passed the stolen gunpowder to Roza.
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On October 7, 1944, the Sonderkommando blew up Crematorium IV, but the revolt was quickly quelled by the armed SS guards. A lengthy investigation led the Nazis back to Gertner and Roza, and then to Estusia Wajcblum and Regina Safirsztajn, who were also implicated in the conspiracy. They were interrogated and tortured for weeks. In January 1945, the four women were publicly hanged in Auschwitz. This was the last public hanging at Auschwitz: two weeks later, the camp was evacuated.