On June 22, 1941, the Nazis launched Operation Barbarossa to conquer the western Soviet Union territories for Germany. Non-Germans where forced into slave labor and they started killing "undesirables," which included communists, gypsies, the mentally ill, and especially Jews, in order to "cleanse" the country for the Aryan race. To facilitate the Nazi's plans, they forced all the Jews in Riga (approximately 29,000) into the Riga Ghetto. The Germans imposed restrictions on Jewish businesses and possessions. Jews couldn't ride on the street cars and trains, and could only walk in the street gutters. Rationed food could only be purchased at a few designated places, twice a week, during specified hours. All Jews had to wear a yellow Star of David on their left arm and back. Any Jew who violated any of these restrictions could be picked up and killed at anytime and murderers would be considered heroes.
One day while walking home with his allotted ration of bread, Nathan saw a policeman and a group of Latvians at the corner laughing at a dead Jew laying face down in a pool of blood. The Latvian policeman signaled Nathan to come over. When Nathan was standing in front of the policeman, he told Nathan he was supposed to walk on the opposite side of the street, in the gutter. The policeman said he was going to smash his skull since he didn't want to waste a bullet to kill him. Nathan had to think fast as the policeman had the butt of his gun raised over Nathan's head. At that moment time actually stood still for Nathan. He realized he couldn't successfully run away and it was useless to ask for mercy. So Nathan fixed his gaze on the policeman's eyes. They say that the eyes are the window to the soul, so it seems that in that moment as Nathan stared into the policeman's eyes, the policeman realized that Nathan was a human being. He lowered his hand and told Nathan to quickly run away, which he only needed to say once!
Nathan was forced to work for the Nazis outside the ghetto during the day. On December 8, 1941 (during the Rambula massacre) while coming back from work at night, he saw piles on both sides of the street for as far as he could see. At first, he thought they were piles of snow, but it hadn't been snowing. He then realized that what he was seeing were piles of dead people with blood flowing in the gutters. That day everyone that Nathan knew, including his parents, friends and his 19-year old fiancée, were all murdered. Nathan was only one of 6,000 Jews in Latvia who weren't murdered by the Nazis, since they were useful for slave labor.
Two days later a friend of Nathan's whose pregnant wife had also died in the Rambula massacre indicated that he had solved their problems. He had just traded his gold watch for two portions of poison for them to take. However, Nathan convinced his friend to throw the poison away, since they needed to honor their families by letting the world know about the Nazi atrocities. Years later in New York, Nathan's grateful friend invited him over to his house to toast his new wife and their expected son.
Initially they sent Nathan to Pleskau (or Pskov) a town between Latvia and Russia. Since there wasn't a concentration camp to detain him, the Nazis put him in a jail overnight; however, the Germans didn't come by in the morning to pick him up. Not knowing what to do next, the Nazis put Nathan in solitary confinement for three-weeks and then planned to have him executed. Solitary confinement was a brick room with a cobble stone floor and the only light was from a small, high window with bars. Inside there was only a cot and toilet, and Nathan only received the equivalent of three slices of bread a day. While in solitary confinement, Nathan maintained his sanity by conversing with strong-self and weak-self. He could see his whole life pass before him, but he then made peace with the fact that he was going to die, which made him feel "indestructible." Nathan was then taken out and lined up against a wall to be shot. A Nazi came over to Nathan and asked him what he was doing there, to which Nathan replied to be executed. The Nazi said he was supposed to be working on restoring their electricity and took him away to a labor camp.
Throughout Nathan's incarceration in the concentration camp, he survived by demonstrating his usefulness to the Nazis with his technical skills; however, this didn't stop him from finding humor during these dark times. One such humorous incident was when Nathan was summoned in the middle of the night to rescue the Commandant of Latvia (presumably Otto-Heinrich Drechsler) who was stuck in an elevator between floors. It wasn't a major problem to fix the elevator, but Nathan decided to have a little fun with the General. From the controls at the top of the elevator shaft above the 5th floor, Nathan shouted down to the General to sit on the elevator bench and raise his feet off the floor, which made the elevator lights go off. He then made the elevator go up and down from the 5th floor to the basement about seven times before asking the General what floor he wanted to stop. The General requested the 4th floor - Nathan set the controls to stop at the 4th floor and raced down to greet him. The grateful General thanked Nathan and shook his hand in front of several senior Nazi officers, even though it was a criminal offense to shake hands with a Jew. Nathan returned to his barrack and told his fellow Jewish workers what he had done. They thought Nathan was insane to make fun of the General since they could kill him and possibly the others for this stunt. Two days later a couple of Nazi officers came up to Nathan and asked him if it was really necessary to make the elevator go up and down seven times in the dark to fix the elevator. Realizing the dire consequences of his prank, Nathan said nothing. The officers grinned with a wink and left Nathan alone. Nathan realized the officers admired his courage to have fun with the General, which elevated their opinion of him.
