AUSCHWITZ - Greta's Story

Printer Friendly Page

AUSCHWITZ - Greta's Story

By Fr Bobbie Gilmore SSC

The page in my diary states that it is the 27th of January. It could pass as any other day if you missed the small print on the top right hand corner of the page which states; Holocaust Memorial Day. Equally, it could be passed over lightly were it not for the fact that I knew someone who was a victim of such horrible atrocity that will always and should always scar the heart of Europe and remind us of what we are capable of.

I met and passed a woman on the street regularly. We just passed each other in silence. Many years later a message was left on the door of my room asking me to call Gerta (not her real name). I wondered who this lady could be. I returned her call. Having seen my name in a local London weekly newspaper she requested that I meet her as she had a problem she wished to share. On the phone her accent indicated that she was a foreigner. As I made my way around to her house I wondered who she was. I rang the bell and there stood the woman I regularly passed on the street. Greeting each other, we seemed to have known each other for a long time. We did, but at a long distance.

She invited me into a well ordered room. It seemed to be more than a usual sitting room/parlour where visitors are entertained. It had a desk, books, files, telephone and ledgers. At a glance the art looked expensive. One black and white picture on the wall showed a group of happy children. Another older picture showed a couple dressed similar to that of my own parents on their wedding day. Then she said, "this is a long story".

Gerta was born in Prague in 1929. Her parents were Jews. They both worked in a hospital in Prague. In 1939 aged ten, her parents aware of the expansion of the Nazi regime and the atrocities reported from Germany decided to send her to England on a train that had been organised to take Jewish children to safety. Her parent's thinking was that if she was safe they could follow later or she would return depending on the outcome of Hitler's threats. They packed a small suitcase with basic clothes and a little food for the journey. She wasn't fully aware of where she was going. They put her on the train and waved her goodbye. She waved back. That was the last time she saw them. A few days later she and her companions, all children, arrived in London's Liverpool St. Station. They were met a large group of people, all strangers. After some weeks she was claimed by a vicar and his family and taken to Lincolnshire. For the next eight years she lived with the vicar, his wife and their two children. They treated her as one of their own and brought her up in the Jewish faith in honour of her parents. But, the last view of her parents waving her off at the railway station always haunted her. Worse, the fact that she had heard through the system that they were murdered at Auschwitz left her distraught. Daily, she wondered, waited, sometimes in anger, but mostly in hope as they came in and out of her presence. 

Graduating from high school she went to university and graduated with a degree in psychology. At university she met another Jewish boy. He also was one the children that was put on a train by his parents to escape persecution. He graduated in medicine. They settled down, had a family and continued in their various professions. Later in life her husband was killed in a car accident. Still aggrieved by his loss she felt that she was not fully remunerated by an insurance company. She hired lawyers, went from one court to another seeking justice. Gerta antagonised her lawyers, annoyed judges, sought the support of her rabbi and other prominent people in her quest. She sought help of the association that was set up to support the children who like her were sent abroad for safety. However, listening to her anguished story I began to wonder; was it really the loss of her husband and the perceived lack of a just settlement of his case that was causing the real pain? On listening, one would have to admire the spirit of tenacity that energised her bereft life. Taking my leave I promised to support her search for justice.

As I walked up the road, I wondered and asked myself questions; is Gerta still on the train that left Prague those many years ago? Had she really gotten off that train? Was it the loss of her husband that reawakened the terrible loss of her parents those many years ago?

The Holocaust, like the European Slave Trade casts long shadows. They need to be aggressively highlighted, assertively kept in the forefront of the modern European and global mindset by annual commemorations. But commemorations alone will not prevent the Stalin's Ukraine, the Bosnias, Rwandas, Darfurs and Cambodias and other genocides perpetrated by European expansionism of previous centuries. Many would say; if the atrocity of European Slavery and indigenous genocides in colonialism were properly highlighted the Holocaust would not have happened. The Holocaust did happen. Gerta lost her parents and a large slice of her own life. The Holocaust should not be allowed escape public attention in the hope that as they say in the media - SO THAT IT WILL NEVER HAPPEN AGAIN. However, one is left to ponder if we learn any certainties from history other than the certainty that we don't learn anything from history.

However, I think we should listen to the advice of a survivor of the Holocaust.

"We won't solve the problem by UN resolutions on genocide.
 The only hope is that in the future every child in the world
 should be educated to immunise it against the tendency to
 to hate others and regard them as inferior."
 (Martin Stern, Holocaust Survivor. The Guardian. 27/01/10)

We Christians, Muslims, Jews, Hindus and other religions should keep in mind that the God who loves only me does not exist. Neither does the God who loves only those who love me exists either.
None of us has a prior claim on the name of God. 

Janaury 27th, 2010