"Habs opened my eyes to new worlds and unimagined opportunities."
Professor Peter Parham FRS, Stanford University School of Medicine, USA.
Theresienstadt Exhibition, Bourne Hall - 21st to 30th April 2010
At the end of April 2010, Haberdashers’ will host an exhibition devoted to the part played by Theresienstadt in the Holocaust.
Theresienstadt (Terezin) was originally a fortress town near Prague. During the Second World War, it was a transit camp for thousands of Czech, Austrian and other Jews. It is known in western Europe mainly because in 1944 it was used by the Nazis to convince the International Red Cross that the Jews were being well looked after; this involved the creation of an elaborate pretence, “Hitler gives a town to the Jews”. In reality, it was a concentration camp – or a ghetto, as some historians describe it – which saw much suffering and death, claiming over 30,000 lives and sending on many more to die in Auschwitz and other extermination camps.
In 2004, Hannelore Brenner wrote The Girls of Room 28, the story of the 13- and 14-year-old girls who were housed in Room 28, a dormitory in Theresienstadt. It tells a remarkable story of ordinary life – the friendships and difficulties of adolescence – and an extraordinary education. These young people were taught by members of Czechoslovakia’s cultural élite – fellow-prisoners – and the art and music created by both children and adults in the camp is celebrated today as a symbol of the triumph of good over evil.
Although the vast majority died – out of some 12,000 children who passed through the camp, only a few hundred survived – many of the Room 28 girls are still alive and healthy today.
The book was made into an exhibition which was taken to many parts of Germany and the Czech Republic. Haberdashers’ will host the English-language version of this exhibition. It will open with a lecture from David Cesarani, one of Britain’s leading historians of the Holocaust, and it
closes with an evening event when two survivors of Theresienstadt, Eva Weiss and Helga Pollak (pictured, left), relate their experience as young prisoners in the camp. The author of The Girls of Room 28, Hannelore Brenner, will also speak. Afterwards, the exhibition will be sent on to a number of other schools, extending awareness of Theresienstadt and its victims to thousands of students.
The exhibition will be held in the foyer of the Bourne Hall from 21st April – the first day of the Summer term – until Friday 30th April. The wider Habs community – parents and other guests, as well as senior pupils – will be invited to the main event, featuring Eva Weiss and Helga Pollak, on the evening of Thursday 29th April. Please note this date in your diaries. A letter of invitation will be despatched later this term.
Please address all enquiries to Dr Roy Sloan, Head of History.
