Holocaust Remembrance Day starts May 4th and ends May 5th. It’s a day when survivors of the Holocaust can speak out and tell their stories. It’s when the thousands of Jewish people that died in the Holocaust can be remembered.
Anne Frank was one of the many Jewish people that went into hiding to avoid being sent to concentration camps. She hid, along with her family and 4 other friends of her family, in what she called ‘the Secret Annex’, a hidden complex in her father’s business building. They were eventually discovered and all but Anne Frank’s father died in the concentration camps. Still Anne Frank’s legacy lives on in the diary she wrote during her time at the Secret Annex.
Sophie Scholl, her brother Hans Scholl, and their friend Christoph Probst, were three German college students at Munich University during the Holocaust. Together they formed the White Rose and spoke out against Hitler by distributing the pamphlets they wrote. When they were found out and executed, Sophie Scholl’s final words were “Somebody had to make a start. What we wrote and said is also believed by many others.” The member of the White Rose are still remembered today by the many streets, squares, and school named after them.
Survivors speak of their time during the Holocaust. Eugene Black was transported to Auschwitz in 1944 and was moved to several other Nazi slave labour camps. Leisel Carter escaped Germany via Norway age 4 and then, a year later, she traced herself back to her Norwegian foster family. Iby Knill worked for the Resistance in Hungary before she was sent to Auschwitz as a political prisoner.
This is an important day to understand the horror of what happened during the Holocaust. To ensure that it never happens again. To remember the people who died during the genocide… and to listen to people who tell of their experiences during the Holocaust.
See more stories from Survivors of the Holocaust: http://holocaustlearning.org/survivors