Prof. Dr. Rudolf VRBA
formerly: Walter Rosenberg
born 11. Sep. 1924 Nitrinsky, Slovakia
died 27. March 2006 Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Deceased Name: Rudolf Vrba: Concentration camp escapee who described Nazi cruelty to a horrified world dies at 81
Rudolf Vrba, who described the horrors of Nazi death camps after escaping from Auschwitz, has died. He was 81.
The Globe and Mail and Ottawa Sun reported that Vrba died of cancer in Vancouver on March 27.
Vrba was sent with other Jews from Czechoslovakia to the Majdanker extermination camp in the early 1940s. He was later transferred to Auschwitz and assigned the job of removing from freight trains the bodies of Jews who had not survived the journey, according to Canadian media reports.
In Auschwitz, Vrba befriended Alfred Wetzler, a Hungarian Jewish leader. The two escaped in 1944 by hiding for three days in a woodpile and covering themselves with tobacco and gasoline to disguise their scent from guard dogs.
Once away from the camp, the men made their way to a Czech safe house. There, they dictated a report that became known as the Auschwitz Protocols, a seminal Holocaust document containing eyewitness accounts of the atrocities.
"The strength of the Final Solution was its secrecy, its impossibility," Vrba told the Ottawa Citizen last spring. "I escaped to break the belief that it was not possible. And to stop more killings."
His firsthand account of what went on inside the walls along with reports of other escaped Jewish inmates has been credited with raising the alarm and helping to save tens of thousands of Jews who would have been shipped off to their deaths.
Vrba's escape and his determination to tell the world about the atrocities in the camps were highlighted in French director Claude Lanzmann's 1985 documentary Shoah.
"Sadly they were very, very slow to act," Bernie Farber of the Canadian Jewish Congress, told the CBC, referring to actions by Hungary's political leaders in ending the deportation of Jews to the death camps. "But it's calculated as a result of Rudolf Vrba's escaping Auschwitz and getting this information to the allies that possibly upward of 200,000 Jews were saved."
Following his escape, Vrba fought with the Czechoslovak Partisan Units until the end of the war, receiving several honors.
When the war was over, he won a degree in chemistry and emigrated to Canada, where he served on the Medical Research Council of Canada between 1967 and 1973.
In 1963 he published a memoir entitled, "I Cannot Forget," which was eventually released in six languages.
The book was critical about the role of Hungarian Jewish councils, a view made the author a contentious figure within the canon of Holocaust literature. It was not until 1998 that the book was published in Hebrew and Vrba received an honorary doctorate from the University of Haifa.
Vrba is survived by his wife, Robin Vrba, his daughter Zuza, his grandchildren Hannah and Jan and nephews Stefan and Jan.
Another source of info on him .https://www.cs.mcgill.ca/~rwest/wikispeedia/wpcd/wp/r/Rudolf_Vrba.htm
Contributor: Aurorae Little♥UE (48644964)
∼April 10, 1944
Escape From Auschwitz
Transports carrying thousands of Jews destined for the gas chambers are arriving daily at the Auschwitz concentration camp in German-occupied Poland. Determined to alert the world to the atrocities being committed, prisoners Rudolf Vrba and Alfréd Wetzler mount a daring escape from Auschwitz three weeks after Germany invades Hungary.
With the help of two other prisoners, Vrba and Wetzler hide in a pile of wood between the inner and outer perimeter fences, sprinkling the area with tobacco soaked in gasoline to fool the guards' dogs. They make their way to Slovakia, where they present a detailed report on the concentration camp to Jewish officials.
Distribution of the report is credited with having halted the mass deportation of Hungary's Jews to Auschwitz in July 1944, saving more than 200,000 lives. The first full English translation of the Vrba-Wetzler report is published in November 1944 by the United States War Refugee Board.
After the war Vrba works as a biochemist, primarily in England and Canada. He dies in 2006.
Wetzler works as a farmer and editor in Czechoslovakia. He dies in 1988.
Prof. Dr. Rudolf VRBA
formerly: Walter Rosenberg
born 11. Sep. 1924 Nitrinsky, Slovakia
died 27. March 2006 Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Deceased Name: Rudolf Vrba: Concentration camp escapee who described Nazi cruelty to a horrified world dies at 81
Rudolf Vrba, who described the horrors of Nazi death camps after escaping from Auschwitz, has died. He was 81.
The Globe and Mail and Ottawa Sun reported that Vrba died of cancer in Vancouver on March 27.
Vrba was sent with other Jews from Czechoslovakia to the Majdanker extermination camp in the early 1940s. He was later transferred to Auschwitz and assigned the job of removing from freight trains the bodies of Jews who had not survived the journey, according to Canadian media reports.
In Auschwitz, Vrba befriended Alfred Wetzler, a Hungarian Jewish leader. The two escaped in 1944 by hiding for three days in a woodpile and covering themselves with tobacco and gasoline to disguise their scent from guard dogs.
Once away from the camp, the men made their way to a Czech safe house. There, they dictated a report that became known as the Auschwitz Protocols, a seminal Holocaust document containing eyewitness accounts of the atrocities.
"The strength of the Final Solution was its secrecy, its impossibility," Vrba told the Ottawa Citizen last spring. "I escaped to break the belief that it was not possible. And to stop more killings."
His firsthand account of what went on inside the walls along with reports of other escaped Jewish inmates has been credited with raising the alarm and helping to save tens of thousands of Jews who would have been shipped off to their deaths.
Vrba's escape and his determination to tell the world about the atrocities in the camps were highlighted in French director Claude Lanzmann's 1985 documentary Shoah.
"Sadly they were very, very slow to act," Bernie Farber of the Canadian Jewish Congress, told the CBC, referring to actions by Hungary's political leaders in ending the deportation of Jews to the death camps. "But it's calculated as a result of Rudolf Vrba's escaping Auschwitz and getting this information to the allies that possibly upward of 200,000 Jews were saved."
Following his escape, Vrba fought with the Czechoslovak Partisan Units until the end of the war, receiving several honors.
When the war was over, he won a degree in chemistry and emigrated to Canada, where he served on the Medical Research Council of Canada between 1967 and 1973.
In 1963 he published a memoir entitled, "I Cannot Forget," which was eventually released in six languages.
The book was critical about the role of Hungarian Jewish councils, a view made the author a contentious figure within the canon of Holocaust literature. It was not until 1998 that the book was published in Hebrew and Vrba received an honorary doctorate from the University of Haifa.
Vrba is survived by his wife, Robin Vrba, his daughter Zuza, his grandchildren Hannah and Jan and nephews Stefan and Jan.
Another source of info on him .https://www.cs.mcgill.ca/~rwest/wikispeedia/wpcd/wp/r/Rudolf_Vrba.htm
Contributor: Aurorae Little♥UE (48644964)
∼April 10, 1944
Escape From Auschwitz
Transports carrying thousands of Jews destined for the gas chambers are arriving daily at the Auschwitz concentration camp in German-occupied Poland. Determined to alert the world to the atrocities being committed, prisoners Rudolf Vrba and Alfréd Wetzler mount a daring escape from Auschwitz three weeks after Germany invades Hungary.
With the help of two other prisoners, Vrba and Wetzler hide in a pile of wood between the inner and outer perimeter fences, sprinkling the area with tobacco soaked in gasoline to fool the guards' dogs. They make their way to Slovakia, where they present a detailed report on the concentration camp to Jewish officials.
Distribution of the report is credited with having halted the mass deportation of Hungary's Jews to Auschwitz in July 1944, saving more than 200,000 lives. The first full English translation of the Vrba-Wetzler report is published in November 1944 by the United States War Refugee Board.
After the war Vrba works as a biochemist, primarily in England and Canada. He dies in 2006.
Wetzler works as a farmer and editor in Czechoslovakia. He dies in 1988.
