Haapalah / Aliyah Bet

In 1932, after Harry Schulman's death, Sarah Schulman moved to Paris, with Sam, to be near her family.
In May, 1940, when the Germans invaded France, Sarah supported herself by sewing leather pocket books for a Jewish manufacturer, and sold goods on the black market.
Sarah Schulman and her son had to register as Jews in order to obtain ration cards; she had to wear a Jewish star, but Sam Schulman, an American citizen, was exempt.
Since Sarah Schulman was officially stateless, she could not return to the United States.
In July, 1942, after the Gestapo conducted a round-up of Parisian Jews, they packed bedding and sheets in potato sacks and shipped them to friends in a town near Limoges, while they hid in a hotel near the Tour Eiffel for 2 weeks.
They were smuggled on a freight train to Limoges, in the unoccupied zone, from where they continued to La Creuse, where their bedding had been sent.

Sam Schulman, who spent three years, 1942-1945, with his mother in hiding in Pionnat, cites: "Far from the city where roundups were frequent, being in the middle of nowhere was about as safe as it could get given the circumstances."
Sam Schulman and his mother, Sarah, survived the war in Pionnat, but, most of his family in Poland, including his grandmother, aunts and uncles perished in Auschwitz.
After the war Sam met with the Hehalutz group in Paris, and wanted to go to Palestine with them, but Sarah Schulman preferred to return to the United States.
In February, 1946, Sam and his mother were repatriated to United States.