A Holocaust survivor has paid tribute to the “high risks” people took to help Jews during the Second World War.
Jacques Weisser, 83, was born in Antwerp during the war and subsequently hidden when his parents were taken to Auschwitz concentration camp.
He was one of 22 Holocaust survivors and Second World War refugees who attended a VE Day tea party organised by the Association of Jewish Refugees at the Royal Air Force (RAF) Museum in north London on Tuesday.
Survivors and their descendants were given a tour of wartime RAF fighter planes and listened to a swing band perform.
Mr Weisser said: “My father survived Auschwitz. My mother did not.
“It’s all luck. We are the lucky ones. We have a lot to be thankful for.
“People took such high risks with their own lives and their families. We owe them so much. Sadly, there weren’t enough of them.”
Mr Weisser’s father Jacob was initially sent as a slave labourer to build the Atlantic Wall during the war before being sent to several camps.
His mother Martha was sent to Mechelen, Antwerp and from there to Auschwitz.
Before he was even a year old, Mr Weisser was brought to a children’s home in 1942 after his mother’s deportation and was later hidden in Sint Erasmus hospital.
His father was eventually reunited with Jacques in the Ardennes forest, his latest hiding place, at the end of the war.
Henny Franks, 101, escaped to the UK in 1939 via a Kindertransport with her younger sister.
She said: “I’ve lived a happy life. I was lucky enough that when I came to England, my father’s first cousin from Poland took me in.
“I’ve been brought up to be happy. I am in contact with some others (refugees) but I’m about one of the oldest.”
Mrs Franks, who trained in the Auxiliary Territorial Service in the British Army when she was 19, added: “I love England very much. I felt so proud to be in the army. I did my bit.
“I met all these lovely, lovely people. And in the army I met all my Jewish friends.”
Mrs Franks was awarded the Defence Medal, the War Medal 1939-45 and the HM Armed Forces Veteran Badge in 2023 when she turned 100, and said she was surprised because “I didn’t know I was eligible”.
Maurice Peltz was four years old when his family escaped Poland.
He said he was a keen dancer growing up and danced with the Princess of Wales at a survivors’ ceremony at the Guildhall in January.
The 98-year-old said: “She’s a charming person. I said: ‘I shall dance with you,’ and she said: ‘That would be nice.’”
