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| Holocaust Memorial Dedication at Stockholm’s Northern Cemetery model by baMba - Justyna Bamba |
Preliminary Program
- Rabbi Ute Steyer of the Jewish Congregation says a Kaddish prayer at Viola Horvath’s makeshift gravestone
- Secretary General of the Swedish Holocaust Memorial Association, researcher Victoria Martínez, welcomes
- Roman Wasserman Wroblewski talks about the Liberation of Bergen-Belsen and about the “White Boats”
- Reading of Viola Horvath’s poems in Swedish and English
- Closing and guided tour of the individual graves, where the victims’ fates during the Holocaust will be described.
In remembrance of those who came to Sweden with the “White Boats” in June-July 1945, and who died shortly thereafter.
At the Liberation of Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in April 1945, British troops were confronted by an unimaginable number of corpses and countless souls who appeared to be the living dead. Tens of thousands of Nazi prisoners had died in Bergen-Belsen before the Liberation, and tens of thousands more died in the weeks after.
A large hospital was built just outside the concentration camp which had nearly 12,000 beds. In addition to tuberculosis, typhoid and other diseases, patients also shared the terrible reality that their families and homes had been destroyed, transformed to ashes.
It was at this time that the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) turned to Sweden for help in caring for patients. Some 10,000 former concentration camp prisoners, mainly from Bergen-Belsen, were duly transported from Lübeck, Germany to several Swedish ports via Swedish vessels which had been painted white with prominent red crosses on the sides.
Some patients selected for transportation died before the journey at yhe “Swedish hospital” in Lübeck. Others died during the journey. More than 600 arrived safely to Frihamnen port in Stockholm, though some of those lost their battles to live after only a few days. Among the first of these was Vera Kremér, who died just four days after arriving in Stockholm. She was buried at The Northern Jewish Cemetery on July 19, 1945.
In the days and weeks that followed, funerals for the Holocaust victims at The Northern Jewish Cemetery became more frequent. In August 1945, up to five Holocaust victims a day were buried there. Soon, the Jewish congregation decided to arrange for a new burial ground. This was quickly filled.
The youngest Holocaust victim buried there was 15. The average age of those buried at the site was around 25 to 30 years.
The Swedish state paid for the funeral of Holocaust victims, but over the years the site and the graves have been left largely untended. As the gravestones sunk into the ground and became covered with overgrowth, so the victims of the Holocaust buried in Swedish soil were all but forgotten.
In 1995, Roman Wassermann Wroblewski, then Associate Professor with Karolinska Hospital, received a question from an Israeli Research colleague searching for the grave of Frymeta Einhorn (Ajnhorn). Frymeta left Lübeck on July 11, 1945 on a White Boat. From Frihamnen port in Stockholm, she was transported by ambulance to Sigtuna, where she died only three weeks later. She was one of the four Holocaust victims buried at The Northern Jewish Cemetery on August 8, 1945. She was only 17 years old. It took Wroblewski several days of searching to find the totally buried and overgrown gravestone.
Years later, in 2018, Wroblewski participated in a funeral at The Northern Cemetery. Afterwards, he looked again for Frymeta Einhorn's gravestone. Again, it was nearly invisible, covered in overgrowth and buried more than 10 centimeters below the ground. Only a grave number indicated its existence.
This was the prelude to extensive recovery work in and research related to the area covered by the grave fields K and J. In time, Wroblewski found 100 similarly-overgrown and almost invisible graves. Together with the artist Justyna Bamba, he began a systematic project of recovery and restoration, often with the help of a number of volunteers. These efforts were warmly supported by the head of Stockholm’s four Jewish cemeteries, journalist Anna Nachman.
In time, Wroblewski discovered six empty burial plots among those of the Holocaust victims; a finding confirmed by Nachman. The number 6 has a deeply symbolic connection to the Holocaust: 6 million Jews were murdered; there were 6 extermination camps. Wroblewski, realizing that the site of the graves was nearly invisible to passers-by, began to imagine the possibility of placing in these empty spaces 6 memorial stones, each with the same dimensions, to render the site a memorial to the victims and the Holocaust in general.
Today, this vision has been realized. The six stones, designed by Bamba and Wroblewski and brought to fruition by the company Ateljé Bamba, are set in place, thanks in large part to generous donations from the Heckscherska Foundation, the Jewish congregation, and the Nasiell and Wroblewskis families.
Wroblewski believes that the monument and burial site should form an important part of Holocaust education. Many of the victims buried there were between the ages of 9 and 14 when the Second World War began. Their lives, which had only begun, were taken from them even before they died, far from home, in Sweden.
Their newly-restored graves tell not only of their births and deaths and where they occurred – Poland, Hungary, Romania, Czachslovakia, Germany, Austria – but also of the realities of this terrible period of history and that the Holocaust spread its terrible reach throughout Europe, ultimately reaching even to Sweden.
The dedication ceremony will be held on October 6 at The Northern Jewish Cemetery, starting at 10:00 a.m.
Preliminary Program (see also above)
Rabbi Ute Steyer of the Jewish Congregation says a Kaddish prayer at Viola Horvath’s makeshift gravestone
Secretary General of the Swedish Holocaust Memorial Association, researcher Victoria Martínez, welcomes
Roman Wasserman Wroblewski talks about the Liberation of Bergen-Belsen and about the “White Boats”
Reading of Viola Horvath’s poems in Swedish and English
Closing and guided tour of the individual graves, where the victims’ fates during the Holocaust will be described.
Following the dedication, volunteers from Paideia – The European Institute for Jewish Studies in Sweden / Students of One Year Programwill continue to work restoring the graves and surrounding area.
See also the following links: http://jimbaotoday.blogspot.com/2019/09/rosh-hashana-5706-judiskt-nytt-ar-i.htmland in English - https://www.thelocal.se/20190127/how-stockholm-is-restoring-dignity-to-the-neglected-graves-of-100-holocaust-victims
More info:
Victoria Martinez thillvo@gmail.com
or
Roman Wasserman Wroblewski romwro@gmail.com (0704158610).
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| Vera Kremer´s grave in Spring 2019 (1 feet under). |
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On January 21st, the first model of the Memorial was placed among the Holocaust victims graves.
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Between future memorial stones of Treblinka and Auschwitz. Most of the Holocaust victims buried at the Stockholm´s Northern Jewish Cemetery lost their relatives in Auschwitz and Treblinka according to Roman Wasserman Wroblewskis research. Here standing together with the artist Justyna Bamba (baMba). |
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| September 6 memorial stones |
