Parts of Jack Carter’s life remained elusive, even to him.

He could not remember his mother’s name and had little recollection of his childhood. The name Carter didn’t even belong to him originally. The memories he did have seemed ones he preferred to forget.

“Jack avoided discussing his past,” said his widow, BJ Carter, who was married to him for 38 years. “He wanted to see his move to America as a fresh start, leaving everything behind.”

Jack Carter, marked with tattoo #125434 from his time at Auschwitz, passed away at the age of 92 just before the 80th anniversary of the camp’s liberation on Monday, an event marking the deaths of approximately 1.1 million individuals.

Jack faced unimaginable horrors under the Nazis who captured him and his mother in Poland. His father had passed away in 1938, a year before World War II began.

BJ Carter, who wed Jack in Cincinnati when he was 54 and she was 36, had many questions about her husband’s history that he couldn’t answer. As Jack’s memory declined in the 2010s, she grew concerned that his story would be forgotten, motivating her to learn and document his past for future generations.

Following his liberation, a man who had befriended the then-12-year-old boy attempted to locate his mother.

Upon discovering that Jack’s mother had been killed, Henryk Karter—who also lost his wife and children to Auschwitz—adopted Jack as his own son. He then married Anna Blander, a fellow Auschwitz survivor, and they traveled to America with Anna’s surviving daughter, becoming the Carters.

Jack Carter began his journey as a “cleanup boy” in a dry goods store owned by his adoptive father, as recorded in the 1950 U.S. Census. He graduated from Hughes High School that same year, according to a yearbook. Subsequently, his wife revealed that he enrolled in the University of Cincinnati’s Pharmacy School.

Those who knew Jack Carter would have had no idea of his past, his widow shared, though she suspects they might have had an inkling.

“I think some of his colleagues must have been aware since Jack had a tattoo,” BJ Carter remarked. “It’s not something you can easily conceal.”

In 2018, as Jack’s dementia deteriorated, the couple moved to Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C. About five years later, BJ stumbled upon a photograph of young Jack online, one she had never seen before.

She reached out to the individual who posted it and ultimately connected with historian Jeffrey Cymbler, who is also the son of Holocaust survivors. He uncovered details about Jack Carter’s experience that had remained unknown to her husband, including that Jack arrived at Auschwitz on a transport on June 24, 1943, with 1,600 Jews, of whom all but 25 were exterminated in gas chambers.

Jack was one of 18 young boys chosen for medical experiments overseen by Josef Mengele. BJ believes he was spared due to his ability to speak several languages, making him valuable as a messenger—a scarce piece of information he had shared with her regarding his time at the camp.

“Jack always said it was luck that prevented him from being gassed,” BJ Carter recounted.

Through Cymbler, BJ discovered her husband’s birth mother’s name was Cewja and saw the only known photograph of her—a portrait printed on a Nazi-issued identification card, often referred to as a “ghetto card,” which Jewish people were compelled to carry. Jack had a similar card issued when he was around nine years old, as noted on the back of his document.

“I did show him the photo of his mother, and he just gazed at it,” BJ said. “I’m not sure he fully understood; his dementia was quite severe. By the time we learned all this, he was already in memory care.”

After starting life in America, Jack Carter never referred to himself by the name given at birth: Jakub Tanz (or Tanc, as it was occasionally spelled).

“He felt that once he arrived, he became an American,” BJ Carter shared. “That was the end of it.”

Although he may have forgotten much and chose not to speak about what he did remember, his widow wishes to ensure that his story endures.

“He was simply a good man,” she said, “and he lived a fulfilling life.”

Contributing: Michael Loria,