As a child, Elizabeth Connolly discovered a hidden history in her father’s dresser. She found toy soldiers alongside an intriguing envelope of photos. These pictures documented scenes far removed from her life in Upstate New York. One photo, in particular, captured a mother holding her child’s hand, reminding Connolly of stories from World War II.
Connolly’s father, Carrol Walsh, served as a U.S. Army sergeant during the war. He held onto those photos, gifts from a fellow tank commander. Connolly recalled asking her father about them, but he was reserved, simply noting they were people he encountered on a train.
I think a lot of the soldiers during that time, they came home and they held a lot of those stories in,she explained.
Her son’s teacher, Matt Rozell, initiated a project to record veterans’ oral histories. In 2001, while interviewing Walsh, Rozell stumbled upon an extraordinary account. Walsh described a day in April 1945 when they discovered a train loaded with Holocaust survivors. The train carried 2,500 Jewish prisoners from Bergen-Belsen, meant for another concentration camp. American soldiers found it halted near Magdeburg, Germany, and aided the distressed people aboard.
Rozell, a history enthusiast, captured this revelation online, connecting with survivors and liberators. It inspired his book, “A Train Near Magdeburg,” which emphasizes the importance of these untold stories. He organized reunions, uniting soldiers with those they saved, including Peter Lantos, a celebrated neuroscientist.
Lantos, who was just five during his liberation, recalls his father’s death in the Holocaust. Though reluctant to revisit those memories, he acknowledges a moral duty to share them. “We’re the last survivors,” he admits, underscoring the urgency.
James Bulgin, from London’s Imperial War Museum, notes the dire situation on that train. It was a chaotic era, he explained, with plans changing violently. Bulgin, who curated Holocaust galleries featuring the train’s story, emphasizes these vivid traces of history.
Filmmaker Mike Edwards dedicated years to a documentary on the train’s story. He uncovered photos from April 1945, depicting refugees post-liberation. His work aims to illustrate human compassion in dire times.
Matt Rozell reflects on his teaching journey and the importance of such stories. “They didn’t have to help,” he says. Yet they did. This underscores the profound role of education and the necessity of learning history. “‘Never forget’ is vital,” Rozell stresses, “but what if we never learned it to begin with?”