UNDER CONSTRUCTION |
| On April 15 1945 numerous children in this classroom were inmates in the concentration Camp Bergen-Belsen. After the liberation, they spent 3 months at the hospital and DP-camp there. They arrived in Sweden from Lübeck in Germany during the last day of the UNRRA White Boat mission, July 26 1945. In the photo, the children are gathered at an orphanage/school in Lövsättra or Billesholm during their first winter (1945-1946) in Sweden. Teacher, Yehudit Bergmann, at the blackboard Mirjam Stern (born 1937 in Piotrków), the boy looking into the camera Sewek Goldhersz (born 1934 in Piotrków), the laughing girl Blanka Margulies (born 1934 in Warszawa). Miriam Stern was just 2 years old when the ghetto in Piotrków was created on October 8, 1939, shortly after the town was occupied by the Wehrmacht on September 5, 1939. It was the first Nazi ghetto in occupied Europe. |
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| DP-2 card of Mirjam Stern (born 1937 in Piotrków) mentioned in the previous photo. Her card issued in Lübeck is signed by her using three crosses. Mirjam was liberated in Bergen-Belsen together with her mother Nacha and her cousin Teodor Zajdman (Seidman) who was born 1933 or 1937 as stated in different documents. In December 1942 Teodor was, together with his father Abram sent from Piotrków to the concentration camp Buchenwald. Later he was transferred to Bergen-Belsen where he was liberated in April 1945. Teodor's mother was sent to Ravensbrück. |
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| DP-2 card of Sewek Goldhersz (born 1934 in Piotrków) "the boy looking into the camera" on the top picture. |
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| 724 days in Sweden Margolis Blanka again on the same ship S/S Kastelholm on the way to Calais. |
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| On November 5, 1947, SS Kedma קדמה sailed from Pellestrina (Italy), commanded by an Italian Captain and 8 Italian crew members, carrying 794 passengers, Holocaust Survivors. Among them numerous children from Kinderheim in Bergen-Belsen that were previously brought to Sweden by UNRRA mission White Boats. After 2 years in Sweden, the group of children and other Holocaust survivors left Sweden. It was planned to transfer the passengers from SS Kadema on another ship, Albertina before approaching Eretz Israel, but the plan was abandoned because there were problems with radio communication. |
724 days in Sweden.
It is of course about the group of small children and young people from Bergen-Belsen who came to Sweden with the very last White Boat from the "continent", from Lübeck. Among them were Mengele's twins from Auschwitz and children who knew nothing about themselves, what their parents' names were and where they were born.
A small part of the children was adopted in Sweden, some of the children with elder siblings left Sweden already in May 1946 using the same route for transfer to Eretz Israel. Only 6 months earlier, second big group of 650 persons left Sweden with the S/S Ulua ship (January 1947). 724-days group traveled almost in the same collective as they were in Bergen-Belsen, to Eretz Israel. The choice of the France as transit land was due to the fact that there was no boarders between Calais i north and Marseille in south. Another reason was that the chances to be spotted by the British Intelligence was smaller as in case of S/S Ulua.724-days group travel to Eretz Israel started on July 20, 1947. There are 96 names of children on the list from the Swedish authorities. Probably there is another document where accompanying persons are listed. Main part of children were born 1930-1933. That means 6-9 year old when WWII started. The group left Sweden for France actually on the same ship, S/S Kastelholm that was used in the UNRRA White Boat mission two years earlier. This time the boat was heading French port of Calais.
It is known that this particular group travelled further to Paris and thereafter south to the Chateaue Villete de Anton, run by Youth Aliya (a department of the World
Zionist Organization). Former group from Sweden that left Sweden in May 1946 was placed at this spot earlier.
Daily life at continued was similar to that in Sweden, however with increased emphasis to the study of Hebrew.
In March 1948 we were moved to a transit camp near Marseille and
from there we boarded the ship Kadema on her way to Haifa. We
arrived at our destination on April 3, six weeks before the Declaration of
the State of Israel on May 15, 1948.
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| The book, The Liberated 1945. White Boat Mission from Bergen-Belsen to Sweden (2020). |
Ship, HMS Venus sent a boarding party across, arrested the passengers, and escorted her to Haifa, where the passengers were transferred to Cyprus.
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| Fuchs, Ajsik. The right birth date: 14 Sep 1938; Birth place: Tuszyn, PolandSource: Registry of Names of the Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp Prisoners |
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| Fuchs, Ajsik. The right birth date: 14 Sep 1938; Birthplace: Tuszyn, Poland Source: Registry of Names of the Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp Prisoners |
As mentioned above some of the children in Kinderheim in Bergen-Belsen came from the Buchenwald concentration camp. However, hundreds of children stayed in Buchenwald. The Buchenwald children were a group of approximately 1,000 Jewish child survivors found by American troops when they liberated the Buchenwald concentration camp on April 11, 1945. Most of the children were originally from Poland, though others came from Hungary, Slovenia, and Ruthenia. Unsure of what to do with the child survivors, American army chaplains, Rabbi Herschel Schacter and Rabbi Robert Marcus, contacted the offices of the OSE (Oeuvre de Secours aux Enfants) Jewish children's relief organization in Geneva. They arranged to send 427 of the children to France, 280 to Switzerland, and 250 to England.After the liberation Group portrait of child survivors of the Buchenwald concentration camp. The boys are dressed in outfits of German Hitler Jugend uniforms due to a clothing shortage. Among those pictured are the first row (left to right): Lolek Blum, David Perlmutter, Birenbaum, Joseph Schleifstein, unidentified, and Israel Meir Lau (middle row, far right). Middle row: Nathan Szwarc, Jack Neeman, Berek Silber, Jacques Finkel, unidentified, Marek Milstein (Milsztajn), and Salek Finkelsztein. Back row: Elek Grinbaum [or Grinberg], Chaim Finkelstajn [or Charles Finkel], Romek Wekselman [or Wajsman], and Abram Czapnik. I wonder if it is Marek Milstein on that photo as brothers Milsztajn were sent to Bergen-Belsen prior to liberation.
Numerous of the children from Buchenwald were sent through France to Eretz Israel.
