He could no longer see his workers as “hands.” He saw them as human beings being systematically exterminated. From that moment, his factory transformed. Emalia ceased to be a profit center and became a refuge—an Aussenlager (sub-camp) of Plaszów, but a uniquely safe one. Schindler began bribing the sadistic camp commandant, Amon Göth, with staggering sums of money and black-market goods. He argued that his factory was essential to the war effort, demanding that his workers be kept on-site, fed, and protected from the random violence of the camps. He started spending his growing fortune on food, medicine, blankets, and bribes. As the Eastern Front collapsed in late 1944, the Nazi regime accelerated the "Final Solution." The Jews of Plaszów were to be sent to the death camps—primarily Auschwitz-Birkenau. Schindler faced a choice: abandon his workers or act. He chose to act.
As he prepared to leave, the Jews he saved presented him with a gold ring, engraved with a line from the Talmud: "Whoever saves one life saves the world entire." Overcome with emotion, Schindler looked at his car and his Nazi lapel pin and sobbed, "I could have done more." He felt he had failed by not selling the car or the pin to save even a few more lives. schindler
The result was a nightmare. The men on the list were mistakenly routed to Auschwitz. Schindler raced there personally, spending a fortune in diamonds to secure their release and have them re-routed to Brünnlitz. The women were sent there directly, arriving in the middle of winter in nothing but rags. They were moments from the gas chambers when Schindler intervened. He could no longer see his workers as “hands