Sol

Birthdate: 21 Dec 1922

Place: Brzozow, Poland

Sol was helping his parents in their village bakery when Poland was invaded from both sides by German and Russian armies. Requisitioned to bake 400 loaves of bread for the invaders, Sol was unable to escape across the border as he was planning to do, not that those who did manage to escape fared any better.

Sol was sent from one concentration camp to another, including Plaszów (near Kraków), Jawisowice (part of Auschwitz-Birkenau), and Buchenwald. He survived those camps and was in Theresienstadt (Terezin) at the time of liberation. After four years in a displaced persons camp he emigrated to Sydney and after meeting another survivor who was visiting Sydney from New Zealand in 1951 they came to Auckland a year later to get married and settle.

Antisemitism

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Explore this theme further: Early history

The history of the Jewish peoples’ migration into Europe can be traced back to the original diaspora from biblical Israel, There were Jews in Europe from the days of pagan Rome. By the year 1000, they were recorded as engaging in agriculture and viticulture throughout the Rhineland area. Chaim Potok in his History of the Jews says that many were “ respected international merchants able to travel with ease across the lines that now divided the world into two warring powers, Christianity and Islam because…Christians and Muslims trusted them more than they trusted each other”.. >> more