Sharing htis with you.It is touching.
----- Original Message -----
From: Daphne Burchell
Sent: Monday, May 31, 2010 6:24 AM
Subject: A Lovely story of Survivors,
A Lovely Story of Survivors.
Lilly Friedman doesn't remember the last name of the woman who designed
and sewed the wedding gown she wore when she walked down the aisle over 60
years ago. But the grandmother of seven does recall that when she first told
her fiancé Ludwig that she had always dreamed of being married in a white gown
he realized he had his work cut out for him.
For the tall, lanky 21-year-old who had survived hunger, disease and
torture this was a different kind of challenge. How was he ever going to find
such a dress in the Bergen Belsen Displaced Person's camp where they felt
grateful for the clothes on their backs?
Fate would intervene in the guise of a former German pilot who walked
into the food distribution center where Ludwig worked, eager to make a trade
for his worthless parachute. In exchange for two pounds of coffee beans and a
couple of packs of cigarettes Lilly would have her wedding gown.
For two weeks Miriam the seamstress worked under the curious eyes of her
fellow DPs, carefully fashioning the six parachute panels into a simple, long
sleeved gown with a rolled collar and a fitted waist that tied in the back with
a bow. When the dress was completed she sewed the leftover material into a
matching shirt for the groom.
A white wedding gown may have seemed like a frivolous request in the
surreal environment of the camps, but for Lilly the dress symbolized the
innocent, normal life she and her family had once led before the world
descended into madness.
Lilly and her siblings were raised in a Torah observant home in the small
town of Zarica, Czechoslovakia where her father was a melamed, respected and
well liked by the young yeshiva students he taught in nearby Irsheva.
He and his two sons were marked for extermination immediately upon
arriving at Auschwitz . For Lilly and her sisters it was only their first stop
on their long journey of persecution, which included Plashof, Neustadt, Gross
Rosen and finally Bergen Belsen .
Lilly Friedman and her parachute dress on display in the Bergen Belsen
Museum
Four hundred people marched 15 miles in the snow to the town of Celle on
January 27, 1946 to attend Lilly and Ludwig's wedding. The town
synagogue, damaged and desecrated, had been lovingly renovated by the DPs with
the meager materials available to them. When a Sefer Torah arrived from
England they converted an old kitchen cabinet into a makeshift Aron Kodesh.
"My sisters and I lost everything - our parents, our two brothers, our
homes. The most important thing was to build a new home."
Six months later, Lilly's sister Ilona wore the dress when she married
Max Traeger. After that came Cousin Rosie. How many brides wore Lilly's
dress? "I stopped counting after 17." With the camps experiencing the highest
marriage rate in the world, Lilly's gown was in great demand.
In 1948, when President Harry Truman finally permitted the 100,000 Jews
who had been languishing in DP camps since the end of the war to emigrate, the
gown accompanied Lilly across the ocean to America. Unable to part with her
dress, it lay at the bottom of her bedroom closet for the next 50 years, "not
even good enough for a garage sale. I was happy when it found such a good
home."
Home was the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. When
Lily's niece, a volunteer, told museum officials about her aunt's dress, they
immediately recognized its historical significance and displayed the gown in a
specially designed showcase, guaranteed to preserve it for 500 years.
But Lilly Friedman's dress had one more journey to make. Bergen Belsen,
the museum, opened its doors on October 28, 2007. The German government
invited Lilly and her sisters to be their guests for the grand opening. They
initially declined, but finally traveled to Hanover the following year with
their children, their grandchildren and extended families to view the
extraordinary exhibit created for the wedding dress made from a parachute.
Lilly's family, who were all familiar with the stories about the wedding
in Celle, were eager to visit the synagogue. They found the building had been
completely renovated and modernized. But when they pulled aside the handsome
curtain they were astounded to find that the Aron Kodesh, made from a kitchen
cabinet, had remained untouched as a testament to the profound faith of the
survivors. As Lilly stood on the bimah once again she beckoned to her
granddaughter, Jackie, to stand beside her where she was once a kallah. "It
was an emotional trip. We cried a lot."
Two weeks later, the woman who had once stood trembling before the
selective eyes of the infamous Dr. Josef Mengele returned home and witnessed
the marriage of her granddaughter.
The three Lax sisters - Lilly, Ilona and Eva, who together survived
Auschwitz, a forced labor camp, a death march and Bergen Belsen - have remained
close and today live within walking distance of each other in Brooklyn. As
mere teenagers, they managed to outwit and outlive a monstrous killing machine,
then went on to marry, have children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren and
were ultimately honored by the country that had earmarked them for extinction.
As young brides, they had stood underneath the chuppah and recited the
blessings that their ancestors had been saying for thousands of years. In
doing so, they chose to honor the legacy of those who had perished by choosing
life.
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In Memorium
In MEMORIAM - 63 YEARS LATER
It is now more than 60 years after the Second World War in Europe ended
This e-mail is being sent as a memorial chain, in memory of the six million
Jews, 20 million Russians, 10 million Christians and 1,900 Catholic priests who
were murdered, massacred, raped, burned, starved and humiliated with the German
and Russian peoples looking the other way!
Now, more than ever, with Iran and others, claiming the Holocaust to be
'a myth,' it's imperative to make sure the world never forgets, because there
are others who would like to do it again.
Love and blessings,
Daphne
Walkingtogetherinlov.multiply.com
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