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Auschwitz report by Catherine Robertson and Emily Imray
In 1933 the National Socialist German works’ party came to power in Germany. Initially the Nazi party did not have any elaborate plans concerning Jews. By 1945 6,000,000 were dead. Anti-Semitism had existed in Europe for many centuries but Jews were usually permitted to live peacefully in their own communities and govern themselves. Prejudices against Jews did exist prior to Nazi rule but this dislike was changed to pure hatred, turning an entire generation against one race. The Holocaust occurred during WW2 and it has no real definition but during it, not only Jews were exterminated, but also Gypsies, homosexuals, disabled people and communists. Today, it is still not known the exact number of people who lost their lives due to the Nazi party. How was this ever allowed to happen? How were millions of people allowed to die due to racism, fascism and hatred?
The Holocaust Educational Trust set up the Lessons from Auschwitz (LFA) project which involves a trip to Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland. The project aims to educate two pupils from selected schools about pre-war Jewish life, the Holocaust itself and its relevance today. We were both selected by the Faith and Philosophy department at Hawick High School to take part in this opportunity, after submitting a letter describing why we would like to be involved in the Lessons from Auschwitz Project.
We travelled up to the Orientation Seminar in Edinburgh on Thursday the 1st of September not knowing exactly what to expect. Firstly we were told about pre-war Jewish life. We learnt that by the beginning of the 20th century the Jewish population of Poland was 3.5 million which was just over 10% of the overall Polish population. The Jews made up over a third of the population in the cities where the small towns were nearly 100% Jewish. After the war, with 3 million Polish Jews murdered, only a few thousand of those who survived the Holocaust returned to where they used to live. We learnt a lot of very shocking and useful information about the Holocaust itself. The highlight of the day was the testimony from the Holocaust survivor, Zigi Shipper. He told us how he went from leading a very happy, comfortable lifestyle until the age of 9 when war broke out in 1939 when everything changed. He gave us a very detailed account of these changes and his journey from then on. Zigi’s story was the most shocking but inspirational story we’ve ever heard. His story also made us furious, to hear first hand that people had to live through the torture was so much more than reading it. Hearing how close he came to death and how he managed to escape it so many times was unbelievable. Zigi helped us to begin to feel the pain and suffering they went through and we can honestly say we will never forget his story.
On the 7th of September we travelled, at three in the morning, to Krakow, Poland. There were over 200 people involved in the LFA project so the plane was hired especially for us. On arrival in Poland we made our way by bus to the town of Oswiecim which is Polish for Auschwitz (Auschwitz is a German word.) Before the war the Jewish people lived in peace and harmony with everyone else in Oswiecim. We first visited the site of the Great Synagogue which was burnt down when the Nazis invaded. Today, sadly not a single person in Oswiecim is Jewish whereas before 1939 58% of the population of the town was Jewish. This perhaps shows that in some cases the Nazis were successful in exterminating Judaism because not only Jewish people were destroyed but also every cultural signs of the religion including synagogues.
Afterwards, we headed to Auschwitz I, the camp which was used to hold mainly non-Jewish prisoners which included gay men, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Soviet Prisoners of War, and Polish political and religious opponents of the Nazi regime. We were shocked to note that it was not only Jews that suffered due to the Holocaust. We expected it to be a very dark, gloomy, quiet place with not much to see. We very surprised that this wasn’t exactly the case. It was much more museum like than I ever expected and there were a lot of other visitors. Our leader took us around the camp and showed us inside many of the buildings including ‘The Road to War’ and ‘Prison within the Prison’. In block 11 (Prison within Prison) we saw the starvation cells and the standing blocks. It was disgusting to see the way some people had been treated. There doesn’t seem to be any words that are right to describe the camp and some of the things that we saw there. The worst part for me has to be the personal artefact building block which included things that were seized from the prisoner as they entered. Here we saw masses of human hair, shoes, pots, brushes, cases, clothes, artificial limbs and more. It was overwhelming. We have never seen or felt anything like it before. It was clear were everyone in the group was speechless and we all walked around in silence.
We then got on the bus and drove the short distance to Auschwitz 2 of Birkenau which was the main death camp. The gate and watch tower there is the famous symbol of the Holocaust. We climbed to the top of the watch tower where, for the first time, we saw the enormity of Birkenau. It was here that we realised that it wasn’t just 6 million Jews that died during the Holocaust; it was individual people, families, friends, communities and cultures. Hundreds of barracks held more than a thousand people each and each barrack would be not bigger than a tennis court. We knew Auschwitz-Birkenau was the biggest concentration camp but I never had grasped its real size and magnitude until I saw it in front of me. We also went inside one of the toilet blocks. Prisoners were only allowed to use the toilet twice a day; in the morning and at night. However there were thousands of prisoners per toilet and they were only holes in concrete. We then walked to the Crematoria. We saw another gas chamber and thousands of photos of Jewish prisoners pre-war. All the students, teachers and educators involved in the visit then sat on the floor of the chamber and listened to Rabbi Marcus speak. He also sang to us which was simply mesmerising. He told us that the perpetrators of the Holocaust were human beings just like us and it is our generation’s task to make sure this inhumanity never reoccurs. We were all given a candle and stood in silence for a minute to remember those lost to man kind’s darkest hour. That moment of contemplation really awoke me to the scale of what happened during those six years in Europe. This concluded our visit to Poland and we then travelled back to Scotland.
On Sunday the 18th of September, we attended the follow-up seminar. We spent most of the day in our smaller groups, discussing the trip. For the first half, we reminisced the trip to Poland and spoke about our thoughts and feelings. For the next half of the seminar, we discussed how to pass on the message of what we learnt.
The Lessons from Auschwitz Project is one we are immensely proud and grateful to have taken part in. What we learnt will never be forgotten by either of us and we are very thankful to the Holocaust Educational Trust for allowing us to participate in this opportunity. We plan to pass on knowledge we gained to those in our schools through lessons and presentations. We recommend to everyone who reads this report to go to Auschwitz and pay their respects to those who died because our words cannot possibly describe what the place is like. Rest in peace all those who died under Nazi occupation, your memory will never be forgotten.
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