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Zachor


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Leon was born in London on 18th December 1910. When he was five

years old his family moved to Holland, settling in Rotterdam. In the early

1930’s Leon met his wife, Esther van Dam, who was Dutch but lived in

London. Leon decided to return to London and in 1935 they got

married. However after the wedding Leon and Esther returned to

Rotterdam to look after Esther’s grandmother.

In 1940 their son Barney was born and was registered at the British

embassy, so he too had British nationality. A few months after the birth

of their son the Nazis occupied Holland. Despite Leon’s British

citizenship he was registered as a Dutch Jew, and in October 1943 the

whole family was taken from their home and deported to Westerbork

and then to Auschwitz, where his wife and child perished.

Leon was the only Englishman in Auschwitz, and one of only two men to

survive this transport of 700 Jews from Westerbork in Holland to

Auschwitz.

Leon survived the war and six different concentration camps. During his

ordeals he made a promise to God that if he survived, he would let the

world know what happened in the camps. He started to speak in public

about his experiences in 1946, and in 1998 he received an OBE for his

services against racism. Leon never remarried and grieved for his wife

and child all his life.

A permanent gallery dedicated to his story was established at the

Jewish Museum in Finchley in 1995 and has been a huge success. Well

into his nineties, Leon himself visited the museum every Sunday to talk

to visitors, as well as talking to school groups throughout the week and

touring the country to take his story to as many people as possible. His

message will continue to live on through the new Holocaust Education

Gallery when the Jewish Museum reopens in Camden Town in June

2009.

“Looking through the eyes of a single victim is an immensely powerful

way to learn about the Holocaust. Leon sits quietly at the end of the

gallery, patiently answering visitors’ questions. The one I couldn’t ask,

because I could find no way of formulating it without sounding banal,

was where can a man find such reserves of courage?” Simon Calder,

The Independent

Witnessing responses: A New Generation's Perspective on the Holocaust - An International Student Conference to be held at Károli Gáspár University of the Hungarian Reformed Church