World War 2
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“As long as a name is mentioned, someone is not forgotten,” meaning if you mention the name of one person, that person is remembered. I know it sounds quite obvious, but when you think about it for a minute, it is the essential first step to ensure that the Holocaust will not happen again. I…
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David Eduard Izaks would have celebrated his 90th birthday today. He was born on 14 April 1933 in Woerden, the Netherlands. He was the youngest son of Eliazar Izaks and Henriëtte Izaks-Glaser. He had two brothers, Gerson and Salomon Albert, and a sister, Saartje Henriëtte. The family lived at 83 Voorstraat in Woerden. In 1941,…
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I had planned to write a post on the victims of Buchenwald that died shortly after liberation, I was sidetracked by stumbling across the story of Albert Leonard Wittenberg. Albert was born on 14 April 1909, in Paramaribo, Surinam. Surinam was a Dutch colony in South America. Like many of his fellow countrymen and women,…
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Who is Berthold Mendel Judenfreund? He was just a farm labourer, not a man of violence or a criminal, just a farm labourer. On April 10, 1943, 25 years before I was born, the Nazis murdered him at Auschwitz. What makes his story so sad is that he could have survived. His nephew said the…
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A baby shoe and a date— Not a birth date, The date she died. Today 8 April 2023, is the day I cried. Why? I don’t know. I did not know the baby, nor did I know the parents. On 27 March 1944, this baby was murdered. Today I cry. I did not know her,…
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It is quite hard to describe this story because it is a tragedy and a miracle at the same time. It isn’t clear when baby Ruben was born, some sources say he was born on 6 April 1943, while other sources say it was 9 April 1943. On his grave’s headstone, it says 9 April.…
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One of the definitions for music is vocal or instrumental sounds (or both) combined in such a way as to produce beauty of form, harmony and expression of emotion, but it is so much more than that. Music brings hope in times of despair, comfort in times of grief and joy in times of sorrow. Music…
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I wish I could tell you the story of Rolf Dirk Ullmann’s long life. I wish I could tell you about all his children and grandchildren, visiting him today for his 80th birthday. But I can’t. I can’t tell you about Rolf’s first experience eating an ice cream or chocolate bar or anything about his…
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Every time I see a picture of a sweet little angel like this, I feel like giving up on the research and reporting on the Holocaust I do. I get an overwhelming feeling of anguish, panic, anger and confusion, and I can feel physical pain. It feels like someone just ripped out my heart. Then…
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Dear Gert Steinmann, I never met you, yet your story has moved me. I am not the only one who has never met you. How could they, you were murdered when you were 6 days old. There are no baby pictures. There are no baby footprints. There are no baby shoes. Six days were all…
History of Sorts 