I blogged about the rivetting book Night here and at the back of my mind I have been thinking about a story I read of an Auschwitz midwife the whole time I read it. The tireless work of a Catholic midwife in the depths of hell. I finally found the article, Midwife at Auschwitz. Here is an exerpt:
During her imprisonment, Stanislawa helped deliver over 3,000 babies. But there was something even more remarkable than her trying to cope amidst these hostile conditions. As she explained to her son, the Lagerarzt ordered her to make a report on the infections and mortality rate for mothers and infants. She replied, "I have not had a single case of death, either among the mothers or the newborns." The Lagerarzt's response was a look of disbelief. "He said that even the most perfectly handled clinics of German universities cannot claim such success. In his eyes I read anger and envy." In a self-deprecating manner, Stanislawa attributed this to fact that "the emaciated organisms were too barren a medium for bacteria." However, her children and fellow inmates ascribe this miraculous record to causes more than natural.
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