Shoes of the lost souls
QUESTION Why are there 60 pairs of cast-iron shoes on the banks of the Danube in Budapest?
This is a timely and heart-breaking reminder of what can happen when anti-semitism goes unchecked.
in 1944, with the Red Army advancing from the East, the hungarian government collapsed and the Nazis invaded, installing a pro-fascist puppet regime.
This was spearheaded by the Jewhating Arrow Cross party. Together with Adolf Eichmann and the ss in Budapest, round-ups and deportations of the last relatively unscathed Jewish population in occupied Europe began.
Within a few months, hundreds of thousands were sent to their deaths in Auschwitz. The Arrow Cross also beat, robbed, tortured and murdered their victims in the streets.
A particularly brutal method was pushing Jews into the Danube, bound together so they could not swim, or shooting them on the river bank. The cast-iron shoes are a memorial to these poor souls and a stark warning from history.
Dr Jerome Hart, Edgware, Middlesex. This moving memorial of 60 pairs of rusted period shoes cast out of iron was created by sculptors Gyula Pauer and Can Togay.
Different sizes and styles depicting children, women, businessmen and sportsmen are a powerful reminder that no one was spared from the brutality of the Arrow Cross militia.
Behind the sculpture is a 130 ft-long stone bench where, at three points, are cast iron signs with this text in hungarian, English and hebrew: ‘To the memory of the victims shot into the Danube by Arrow Cross militiamen in 1944- 45. Erected 16 April, 2005.’ Janine Lewis, Poole, Dorset.
QUESTION Which Royal Navy ships depicted HMS Compass Rose and HMS Saltash in the 1953 war film The Cruel Sea?
THE Flower-class corvette HMS compass rose was portrayed by HMS Coreopsis, pennant number K32, one of 269 Flowers (141 Royal Navy, 109 Royal Canadian Navy, four French and 15 U.s. Navy) that served with the Allied navies during World War ii.
Oddly, a further four, built in French yards in 1940, were operated by the Kriegsmarine, the German navy.
Coreopsis was built by A&J inglis of Glasgow and was commissioned on August 17, 1940. she served in the Battle of the Atlantic until November 1, 1943, when she was transferred to the Royal hellenic Navy, being renamed Kriezis.
she was an Atlantic escort and escort for D-Day convoys, until October 1944, when she joined the Mediterranean Fleet.
By 1952, very few Flowers remained, and Coreopsis — having been returned to the Royal Navy on June 1, 1952 — was at Malta awaiting disposal when she was acquired by Ealing studios to play the part of Compass Rose.
in the film, she carried the pennant number, K49, of her sister vessel, HMS Crocus.
After filming, she made her last voyage to Thomas Young & sons’ breakers yard in sunderland, arriving on July 22, 1952.
Flowers were involved in sinking 51 German and italian submarines in World War ii. One such valiant little warship survives: HMCS sackville, restored
to her 1944 condition, is a museum ship at halifax, Nova scotia. HMS saltash was portrayed by the Castle-class corvette HMS Portchester Castle, F362, built by swan hunter of Wallsend in 1943. she helped sink two Uboats and was decommissioned in 1947. Before being broken up at Troon in 1958, Portchester Castle appeared in films The Man Who Never Was and The Navy Lark.
Geoff Hewitt, Preston, Lancs.
QUESTION Who invented the electronic hearing aid?
FURTHER to the earlier answer, Alabama engineer Miller Reese hutchison’s 1898 Akouphone wasn’t his only sound-based invention. he also invented the Klaxon horn with its iconic ‘ah-oo-gah’ sound.
The name klaxon came from the Ancient Greek verb klazo, which means ‘i shriek’. it was standard on General Motors cars for a time and was used as the diving alarm on U.s. Navy submarines.
his other inventions included an early version of traffic lights and the Mota-Vito oxygen sensor that let pilots adjust the air-fuel ratio for better efficiency and fewer noxious carbon monoxide emissions.
he invented this after his son died in an plane crash, which made him want to make air travel safer.
Roger Coleman, Bury, Lancs.