British liberator
to the horrors they experienced. Renee, who had just turned 15, and her mother were allowed to live but she never saw her father again. “He went without a kiss, without a goodbye, he just disappeared.
“It gives me sleepless nights but I feel I have an obligation.
“I keep coming back to remind myself because life goes on and it’s easy to forget. I won’t forget.”
They were later moved to Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, where her mother died 12 days after it was liberated.
The grandmother of five, who now lives in north London, did not know him then but among the liberators was a military policeman, Charles Salt, a British Jew she met in Paris four years later and married.
THE Duke and Duchess of Cambridge joined Holocaust survivors yesterday as the world marked International Holocaust Remembrance Day.
William and Kate took part in the service at the Methodist Central Hall inWestminster to remember those who died as well as victims of genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Sudan’s Darfur.
During the ceremony Prince William read from a letter written by a friend of his great-grandmother Princess Alice, who hid the Cohen family in her Athens home in 1943 after the Nazis invaded.
Message
William read: “The princess put a small two-room apartment on the third floor at the disposal of Mrs Cohen and her daughter.
“The members of the Cohen family left the residence three weeks after liberation, aware that by virtue of the princess’s generosity and bravery had spared them from the Nazis.”
Alice’s bravery was recognised by Israel which posthumously bestowed the title of “Righteous Among the Nations” on her in 1993.
Last week the Prince ofWales visited Jerusalem and laid flowers on Princess Alice’s tomb on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem.
Earlier the royal couple were greeted by Olivia Marks-Woldman, chief executive of the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, Sir Ben Helfgott, its honorary president.
Prince William told them: “We were talking this morning about how you carry on this message for future generations.We will do our best.”
The Duke and Duchess also helped survivors light six candles which were shared around until 75 were lit to mark the anniversary of the liberation of the notorious death camp in 1945.