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Holocaust Memorial Day 2021
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Holocaust Memorial Day – Inge Auerbacher
As part of St.Ninian’s commemorations for Holocaust memorial Day we were honoured to welcome an amazing woman… Inge Aurbacher.
Inge’s story
Inge Auerbacher the only child of Regina and Berthold Auerbacher, was born in 1934, a year after the Nazis came to power. She lived in a small village in southern Germany where her father had his own textile business.
On the night of November 9th, 1938, just before Inge’s fourth birthday, countrywide acts of terror and destruction were carried out against Germany’s Jews. Inge’s father was arrested and sent to a concentration camp. After his release a few weeks later, the family realized the need to leave the country, but they had nowhere to go. They moved to her mother’s home town. Inge could no longer attend the local public school. In 1941, she was forced to wear the yellow star. In late 1941, Inge, her parents and her grandmother were told to report for “resettlement.” Her father, a disabled World War I veteran, obtained a postponement, but her grandmother was sent to Latvia where she was murdered.
On August 22, 1942, Inge and her parents were arrested and deported. Forced to leave all their possessions behind, they were sent to the Theresienstadt ghetto in Czechoslovakia. Conditions were horrendous. Always hungry, Inge and her parents constantly lived with the fear that they would be deported to the death camps in Poland. In the spring of 1945, the Germans began building gas chambers in Theresienstadt, where they planned to kill all the remaining Jews. But on May 8, 1945, Soviet troops entered the ghetto and ten year-oldInge and her parents were freed.
Of the 15,000 children who had been imprisoned at Theresienstadt, only 100 survived and Inge is one of them.
We would like to thank Inge for coming to the school and for being so gracious as to hand out awards for pupils S1-S6 who had successfully taken part in our creative responses competition.
As time moves on our opportunities to meet witnesses to these atrocities , to ask them questions and to feel their passion, diminishes. Inge left us with her story, some hugs and plenty of inspiration “it is your job to be everything today for those who are not here” and who can argue with that.
On Wednesday 27th a group of pupils will be attending the Scottish National Holocaust Memorial Day event at Falkirk town hall where we will be able to meet us with Inge again.
Pictures of the event
Holocaust Memorial Day Winners
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This is a selection of the winning entries to our Holocaust Memorial Day Creative Responses Competition 2016.
Pupils were asked to respond on the theme “Don’t Stand By” in the format of either a post-card, poem or photograph.
Winners will attend the national service in Falkirk Town Hall and also be presented with their certificates of achievement by Inge Auerbacher one of only 100 child survivors of Theresienstadt ghetto in Czechoslovakia.
Many thanks to all the pupils who took the time to take part.
Dear Mum,
hope you are doing well. Did you hear what was on the television? It was a man called Martin Luther King Jr. He stood up for his rights which he deserved. He didn’t just stand and listen to people say thing that are not true about his friends and family. He stood up and said “I have a dream” he spoke to 200,000 – 300,000 dissidents and millions of television viewers. I was one of them, he was very inspirational. I think that we should do something to help him. Maybe we should start a campaign or try to change the rights so he gets the rights he deserves. What are your thoughts please write back soon.
Love you lots,
Grace xxx</strong>
I just stood there, I didn’t move, even if I wanted to it wouldn’t be possible. Not then at least. Where I found myself was the history corridor of my school third period had just ended and I was headed to French but I was delayed because of something, that something being what I was seeing, my classmate on the floor and a beefy figure stood over him grinning while my classmate squirmed to get free of his iron grip. At that moment I had two choices: stay and help him or leave him to fend for himself. In the end I chose option B. as I would soon find out that was the wrong choice. Fast forward four weeks later that same boy the one I left to fend for himself was in front of me, he had many emotions on his face in the thirty seconds we were there, happiness wasn’t one of them. I couldn’t bare to look him in the face so when we had contact I averted my eyes so I wouldn’t have to look at what me being a coward had done to him, but I couldn’t just look away, I had to make sure that he was ok. He wasn’t. he had bruises all over his face and his eyes and lips were very puffy but also bright purple, still to this day I wonder what would have happened if I didn’t just stand by, I won’t make the same mistake again.
By James
It makes me wonder, wonder all day
What happened? To make people this way?
How can they watch? And merely stand by
As hundreds upon thousands of people … Die
These people shan’t be overlooked and neglected!
How can’t we feel? How can’t we be affected ‽
Have we fallen to a point, in our world and society
Where we lose all sense of humanity and piety?
We are one. We are the same. We are the human race,
And despite all differences, we all end up in the same place.
So all across the nations I say, open the doors! Let them in!
Because when we learn to love, that’s when life, truly begins.
By Tom
The person who hides behind a computer screen
Fingers typing hate filled messages
Click of a button that changes it all
The victim innocent and alone
Thoughts that could end a life
Coward of a bully who destroys it all
Their future, dreams, ambitions crushed
As nobody helped
People will die.
Don’t stand by.
By Maria
Holocaust Memorial Day
Prize winners accepting their awards from Ela and Hasan
We were very fortunate to be able to spend some time with Holocaust survivor Ela Stein Weissburger and survivor of the attrocities at Srebrebica Hasan Hasanovic.
The message from each speaker was simialar; Hasan reminded us of the fact that genocide still continues in some parts of the world and that we must remember each act and honour those who have been lost in a meaningful way and Ela spoke of the need to remember her friends and teachers and to live in remembrance of them.
The fact that Ela still had her yellow star and brough it with her was a touching and moving moment for the pupils assembled.
Many thanks to both Ela and Hasan for coming to the school and the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust for supporting the event.
If you would like to know more about the holocaust or events in other parts of the world take a look at the HMDT web site or pop in to the library for some books.
Holocaust Memorial Day Competition
Congratulations to our creative writing competition winners:
S1
Winner – Easham Manzar
Runner Up -Diarmaid Leahy
S2
Winner – Lily Collins
Runner Up -Holly Edgar
S3
Winner – Amy Harte
Runner Up – Emma Murphy
Excerpts from the winning entries:
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S1 Winner
To Amy,
If I had known, known that coming into this world as a Tutsi was such a crime, then I would have wished I were never born. If I had known, Known that coming into Rwanda would cause such a war, and then I would have wished I had never came. If I would have known, known that the village where my home was would turn into a graveyard, then I would have never considered it a home. If I would have known, known that I would see my family get killed right in front of my eyes, then I would have wished that it wouldn’t have hurt as much as it did. If I had known, known that I would hear the screams of pain, then I would have wished that it wouldn’t play in my head whenever there was a silence. If I had known, known that the cause of death of millions of lives were because they were a certain race then would have wished that I could stand up for us Tutsis. If I had known, known that all this would happen then I would have wished that racism and hatred was never a thing, if only I had known,
Yours sincerely
Easham, xxx
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S2 Winner
“It was 1944 in Germany, Adolf Hitler was Führer – you were only 4 or 5 years old at the time. Your father was a politician who had been arrested for being a traitor, and the soldiers continued their search for the rest of your family -simply for being Jewish. Your family -you, your mum and brother -were in hiding to avoid the terrible fate of being moved to concentration camps.
One night Nazi soldiers captured your family and were taken to a train where hundreds of German Jewish citizens were forced to board. Your mother held you and your brother so tightly and close to herself -scared to let go. When you finally reached the camp and left the train, you had your hair shaved, males and females were separated and were all given a striped uniform. The smell of burning was unforgettable and the screams and cries in the distance sent cold shivers through the new arrivals.
The group of females were surrounded by guards but there was a gap that you could just fit through without being noticed. So, your mum told you to run as far and as fast as you could – not stopping, not looking back until you reached the Red Cross and could tell them you needed a new family.”
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S3 Winner
Dearest Anna,
I am writing to thank you. Thank you for the times you shared with me in that hell. Although these words may mean so much to you they mean the world to me. When I think of how you kept me alive, I cry. I cry not out of sorrow or out of hatred for what the Nazis did to us but for the love and joy I feel knowing that you, my best friend, gave me a life worth fighting for. I do not want these memories of the camp filled with horror, sorrow and disgust. I want us to remember how we found friendship in the most unlikely of places. Although we shall not be around forever, we must keep the memory alive because if we so not all that suffering will be for nothing. Pass it on through the generations. Write these letters and let the world continue to remember what awful sufferings we encountered so it will never happen again. Pass it on to the children like Miriam, my sweet Miriam, who you Anna, you saved with your kindness and sacrifice; when you starved to save my poor child although yours was gone. Keep it alive. No matter what happens we should never let these memories slip away. I’m missing you dearly but we will meet again soon,
Sending lots of love, kind wishes and gratitude from Berlin,
Isabelle and Miriam x
Holocaust Memorial Day
27 January is the day for everyone to remember the millions of people killed in the Holocaust, Nazi Persecution and in subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur. 27 January marks the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp.
On HMD we can honour the survivors of these regimes of hatred and challenge ourselves to use the lessons of their experience to inform our lives today.
HMD is a time when we seek to learn the lessons of the past and to recognise that genocide does not just take place on its own, it’s a steady process which can begin if discrimination, racism and hatred are not checked and prevented. We’re fortunate here in the UK; we are not at risk of genocide. However, discrimination has not ended, nor has the use of the language of hatred or exclusion. There is still much to do to create a safer future and HMD is an opportunity to start this process.
Theme: Keep the Memory Alive
Rules:
Pupils must be in S1- S3 at St.Ninian’s High School
All work must be original. Any examples of plagiarised work will result in automatic exclusion from the competition.
Characters must be fictional and based loosely on real events. The tone of the work must be sympathetic to the sensitive nature of the topic. The piece must also be, where applicable, historically accurate.
The work for this year should be in the format of a letter.
This can be to a newspaper to a friend, to a loved one or from a witness.
Letters can be formal or informal or even postcards. Maximum length 800 words
The closing date for all entries is 4pm Friday 12th Dec 2014 and the winners will be announced on Monday 5th January 2015.
All entries must be in an electronic format and created in word or publisher.
Entries should be sent to bairdd@st-ninians.e-renfrew.sch.uk
One entry per pupil.
Inspiration can be taken from www.hmd.org.uk/
The judges decision is final.
