Bella Centnarski

Bella Centnarski (Gottlieb), 94, of Manalapan died April 9, 2018. Born in Karnosia, Poland, she was the only member of her family to survive the Holocaust.

After the Germans invaded and occupied Poland, her family was forced into the Warsaw Ghetto. She eventually escaped through the walls of the ghetto to hide in the woods with other Jews, where she met her husband, Gerson.

They married and fought the Nazis as partisans in the Resistance. After the war, they lived in a Displaced Persons camp near Frankfurt, Germany, before immigrating to the United States in 1949, living in Jersey City for 46 years before moving 23 years ago to Manalapan.

She volunteered at Jewish Home and Rehabilitation Center.

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Predeceased by her husband in 1994, she is survived by three daughters, Eva Russ of Rockaway, Celia (Alan) Henne of East Brunswick, and Marilyn (Ben) Rosenblum of Morganville; seven grandchildren; and five great-grandchildren. 

Services were held April 12 with arrangements by Bloomfield-Cooper Jewish Chapels, Manalapan. Memorial contributions may be made to United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.