“Janine’s story is one of tremendous courage during horrific circumstances and by hearing her testimony, students will have the opportunity to learn where prejudice and racism can ultimately lead”. KAREN POLLOCK, MBE AND CHIEF EXECUTIVE OF THE HOLOCAUST EDUCATIONAL TRUST
Emma Morgan
Statistics, numbers, people. People are inherently a collection of their experiences, a portrait painted from years of memory, we leave a mark, no matter how big or how small. Proof that we existed. But what happens when this portrait is marred, a blight cast upon the face? When we no longer can see the exact colour of the eye, the precise tone of the dress. The colours may no longer be intact, but we must remember that they were once vibrant. 6.6 million Jewish men, women, and children were murdered by Nazi Germany and their collaborators during the Second World War. This is comparable to the entire population of Bulgaria. An entire race, punished for their mere existence. In Auschwitz-Birkenau alone, 1.1 million Jewish people died in under five years. But we must remember that the Holocaust was a far broader issue of systematic discrimination and violence, eventually culminating in such tragic events. As we approach 75 years since the liberation of the camps, it is important that we take time to remember the individuals. Those who made it. Those who didn’t. Even those who contributed to it. Each and every one of them; a person. A person with individual hopes for life, aspirations they wished to fulfil; their own story they can no longer share. ‘When you listen to a witness, you become a witness’ - Elie Wiesel, a survivor who shared their story through their autobiographical novel ‘Night’. I had the privilege of hearing the testimony of Janine Webber BEM, who’s resilience, strength, and perhaps most importantly, luck, allowed her to escape the persecution that took the rest of her family. Her words were harrowing; her account of her time in the ghettos, the fear of hiding, the death that followed. Hearing the emotion behind her words is not something I will soon forget. Upon hearing her story, hearing the passion with which she speaks of her Aunt Rouja, without whom she would not have survived, I came to a stark realisation. The importance of stories, of people knowing, is unparalleled. Even with all she has overcome in life, she expressed the most pride in her children. The tolerance and kindness she taught them to carry forward, the reason she shares her testimony; all so the stories persist. Her nightmares were quelled by the sharing of her story, her family’s story, in the hope that we can cultivate a kinder world.
I can share her story because she lived to tell it, however this was not the case for all the victims. The Book of Names is exactly how it sounds. A book, filled with pages upon pages of every single name they could find from those murdured during the Holocaust. Yet it only contains 4.2 million, because how do we record the names that have no survivors to remember them. When entire communities were destroyed, when records were burned, with the intent of complete erasure. It is our responsibility to give back what was once taken away. The victims of the Holocaust were not a serial number, they were people just like us. As were the perpetrators. It is incredibly easy to look at those involved with the Holocaust and view them as evil, as monsters. But this limits our understanding of the true nature of events, and how people went on to commit such actions. A prominent example is of Rudolf Hoess, a leading Nazi within Auschwitz-Birkenau, who was undoubtedly responsible for hundreds, if not thousands of deaths. He brought his family with him, their house was close to the crematoria, where the bodies were burned. Because he wanted his family close as he worked. Nobody is wholly evil, he was a complex individual just like us, and must be viewed that way. Lest his actions be overlooked as nature, instead of accounting for the deliberate choices which led him here. But where do we draw the line? What about the train drivers who transported the Jews into camps, are they evil? They had families to feed and needed the salaries, but they wouldn’t have been punished for stepping away from the role, merely inconvenienced. People are complex, especially with the choices that define us. Reducing people down to ‘good’ and ‘evil’ limits our understanding of events and individuals, and therefore must be avoided in order to truly comprehend the human condition of the Holocaust. When learning about the Holocaust, it is common to focus on the bigger picture, especially when it comes to Auschwitz, and the resistance that took place there. The acts of rebellion were not always large, or historically impactful, but they were all important to the people within Auschwitz. What may seem to us like basic tasks such as bathing and maintaining hygiene, were acts of rebellion, their resistance to the dehumanisation that the Nazis imposed upon the camps. When there was no structure of religion and community, no Synagogue to unify under, it had little impact on the faith of the Jewish people. Women would trade old family recipes, determined to keep their history, their story, alive. When the food was not sustaining them, they were nourished by ideas, by the prayers that could be sung by all who knew them. They would pray even when the inevitable came as they approached the gas chambers, because even if they are gone, their songs will persist, and people will remember. Himmler could be described as the architect behind the Holocaust, and he desired it to be an ‘unwritten glory’ - so that the entire Jewish race, every single individual, would
be erased entirely from history. It is due to the actions of us, and individuals long since passed, that stop his vision from becoming a reality. Zalman Gradowski was a prisoner at Auschwitz, working in the crematoria. He kept a diary from scraps of paper found in the pockets of the deceased. He wrote his story and buried it underground. A diary not for him, but for us. He risked his life so we would know, so we would understand. It is our responsibility to carry it forward. That’s what it’s all about. Keeping the memory alive, so that when no survivors remain, we can still tell the stories. We can understand what happened, in the hope that it never happens again.