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Avoiding Auschwitz gas chambers by lying about age

Rose Schindler, 85, an Auschwitz survivor, originally from eastern Ukraine, returned to the concentration camp with her family to mark 70 years since its liberation.

Rose Schindler, 85, an Auschwitz survivor, originally from eastern Ukraine, returned to the concentration camp with her family to mark 70 years since its liberation.

When she arrived at the camp at the age of 14, Rose was warned by an inmate to tell the SS soldiers; who sorted people into two lines destined for either the gas chamber, or the work camps; that she was older.

鈥淚 was taken to Auschwitz in 1944, with 10 of us in our family...I said I was 18, otherwise I would have gone with my mother into the gas chamber,鈥 said Rose.

"They took all our clothes off, shaved all our hair. As we [Rose and her sister Judy] were standing waiting to see what happened next, at the back of the barracks there was a huge fire...we found out that they were burning the people alive, they did not even give them enough gas...so we knew what happened to my mother and four sisters and brothers."

Her husband Max, 85, originally from Germany, was in six different camps during the war - although not Auschwitz. He and their sons Benjamin, Steven and Jeffrey and granddaughter Moriah, accompanied Rose to the camp to commemorate the anniversary.

This clip is originally from 5 live Afternoon Edition on 27 January.

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2 minutes

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