Pregnancy was a death sentence at Auschwitz. But three Jewish women sent there managed to conceal their pregnancies and give birth to some of the Holocaust's youngest survivors, now 80 years old.
Analysis & Context
Pregnancy was a death sentence at Auschwitz. But three Jewish women sent there managed to conceal their pregnancies and give birth to some of the Holocaust's youngest survivors, now 80 years old. The special bond shared by 3 of the Holocaust's youngest survivors. Stay informed with the latest developments and expert analysis on this important story.
Pregnancy was a death sentence at Auschwitz. But three Jewish women sent there managed to conceal their pregnancies and give birth to some of the Holocaust's youngest survivors, now 80 years old.
60 Minutes Overtime 3 of the Holocaust's youngest survivors share a special bond: Their pregnant mothers all deceived the Nazis By Lesley Stahl, Lesley Stahl Correspondent, 60 Minutes One of America's most recognized and experienced broadcast journalists, Lesley Stahl has been a "60 Minutes" correspondent since 1991. Read Full Bio Lesley Stahl, Aliza Chasan, Aliza Chasan Digital Content Producer Aliza Chasan is a Digital Content Producer for "60 Minutes" and CBSNews.com. She has previously written for outlets including PIX11 News, The New York Daily News, Inside Edition and DNAinfo. Aliza covers trending news, often focusing on crime and politics. Read Full Bio Aliza Chasan, Shari Finkelstein, Shari Finkelstein Shari Finkelstein has been a producer at 60 Minutes since 1998, working with correspondent Lesley Stahl. She loves not having a fixed beat and reporting on great stories of all kinds. She began her career at ABC News. Read Full Bio Shari Finkelstein, Collette Richards February 15, 2026 / 7:00 PM EST / CBS News Add CBS News on Google Anka Bergman went into labor as the Nazi death train she was packed onto arrived at the Mauthausen concentration camp, where more than 95,000 prisoners died during the Holocaust.She gave birth to Eva Clarke on April 29, 1945, just one day after the last gassing of prisoners at Mauthausen and shortly before Germany's surrender in early May. Clarke and two others whose mothers also concealed their pregnancies from Nazi guards are among the youngest survivors of the Holocaust. "Had the train arrived on the 26th or 27th, none of us would've survived," Clarke said. Falling in love in a time of warClarke is now 80, as are two of her fellow survivors, Hana Berger-Moran and Mark Olsky. Clarke's mother was from Czechoslovakia, as was Berger-Moran's mother, Priska. Olsky's mother, Rachel, was from Poland.The mothers each fell in love with their husbands as Europe was descending into war. Jews were rounded up in ghettos and sent to camps as Nazis occupied Poland and Czechoslovakia. Olsky's parents spent much of the war in the Warsaw and Lodz ghettos. Clarke's parents were sent to a Czech camp called Terezin, where she was conceived in violation of camp rules. From left to right, Eva Clarke, Mark Olsky and Hana Berger-Moran are seen with their mothers after the Holocaust. Family handouts The three young Jewish women were all newly pregnant in 1944 when they were sent to the notorious death camp Auschwitz. Pregnancy was an offense punishable by death in the camps, yet all three women managed to survive horrific conditions, give birth and keep their newborns alive through seemingly impossible twists of fate and luck.Berger-Moran's parents talked about possible baby names while on the packed train to Auschwitz, even though they knew they were headed toward a death camp.Concealing pregnancies while being used as slave laborFamilies were ripped apart upon arrival at Auschwitz. Most, including mothers, children and the elderly, were sent straight to death in gas chambers where, at their peak, 6,000 people were murdered each day. Some prisoners, including the mothers of Clarke, Berger-Moran and Olsky, were selected for work as slave laborers. They were stripped, shaven and sent to overflowing barracks.Berger-Moran's mother saw her father only once after their arrival in Auschwitz, through a barbed wire fence that separated male from female prisoners. "'Think only good thoughts.' He just kept repeating that sentence," Berger-Moran said her father told her mother. Berger-Moran never had the chance to meet her father. Josef Mengele, a Nazi doctor known for his gruesome experiments on camp inmates, often conducted selections of prisoners at Auschwitz, determining who would live or die. Women, including Berger-Moran's mother, were forced to line up, naked, in front of Mengele, who asked her if she was pregnant. She was faced with a choice: confess, or deny her pregnancy, according to author Wendy Holden, who has studied Auschwitz and written a book about the three women and their children."Each of them sensed that they were in the presence of great danger, and they each denied it," Holden said. Wendy Holden 60 Minutes The three pregnant women, who never knew about each other, were sent to a slave labor camp in Freiberg, Germany. They were among more than 1,000 women prisoners manufacturing parts for German fighter planes during 12-hour shifts in a converted porcelain factory. "Living on really [a] diet of water, ersatz coffee in the morning and thin soup, and then maybe a tiny piece of bread every day," Holden said. The women were able to conceal their pregnancies because they'd been given baggy dresses, clothing from women who'd been gassed, at Auschwitz, Holden said. Clarke's mother was there for six months, becoming progressively more starved and more obviously pregnant. "But fortunately, none of the Germans realized she was pregnant, because had they done so, they might well have sent her ba
