Memories of Holocaust sting but endure
Few survivors left of WWII atrocities
Some held back tears, others let them fall, as Stephan B. Ross, founder of Boston's Holocaust memorial, recounted the torture and humiliation he suffered in Nazi death camps over five years.
As difficult as the story was to hear for many of the 400 participants in the Holocaust remembrance at Faneuil Hall yesterday afternoon, organizers said his journey, along with those of other survivors, needs to be remembered.
"The generation of survivors is dwindling," said Rabbi Moshe Waldoks, chairman of the Jewish Community Relations Council's commemoration organizing committee. "The memory should not be taken away because the witnesses are no longer here."
The annual ceremony carried a sense of urgency, with speakers noting there are fewer eye-witnesses to the Holocaust - today's survivors experienced it as children or as teenagers. They recognized one prominent Holocaust survivor, the late California Congressman Tom Lantos, who died in February, as the only survivor of the Nazi campaign to have served in the US Congress. His widow and daughter spoke and lit a candle in his honor.
At the same time, speakers voiced concerns over recent remarks by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran calling genocide against Jews "a myth," and offered pleas for support of Israel.
The ceremony this year also fell in the same month in which the state of Israel marks its 60th anniversary.
"Each year we move closer to the moment when the Holocaust will cease to be a living memory and become history," said Nadav Tamir, consul general of Israel to New England. "We should be the torchbearers of 'never again.' "
Emphasizing the importance of passing on accounts of the Holocaust to a younger generation, organizers had two Boston teenagers read from diaries of children who were believed to have been their ages when they died in concentration camps.
But it was the forceful, personal story of Ross that elicited the most seat-shifting among listeners.
His son, City Councilor Michael P. Ross, stood with him as he talked about being sustained by the hope of seeing his family, only to learn upon his release that his parents and six of his siblings had been killed.
Stephan Ross and his family were rounded up from their homeland in Poland and separated in 1940 when he was 8 years old. Ross would be transferred to about 10 prison camps, including Auschwitz, where he was subjected to slavery, abused by pedophile guards, and witnessed cannibalism.
"It was hard for me to go on living, and I prayed for God to stop punishing me," he said.
He finally pointed to a small American flag hanging from the lectern at Faneuil Hall, which he said an American soldier handed him to dry his tears during his camp's liberation in April 1945.
"I cherished this flag for 63 years. It is my greatest treasure," he said. "May the tragedy of the Holocaust be a lesson to mankind to speak out against racism."
John C. Drake can be reached at jdrake@globe.com
