The world Helen left behind

Helen Edel at age 5 (in white dress) surrounded by family members (circa 1930), most of whom perished in the Holocaust. From left: Hela Schipper (killed in late 1942) and her husband, Herman (Helen’s uncle); Matylda Schipper, Helen’s grandmother, killed in 1942; Aunt Klara Losberg (standing), killed in 1942 with her infant daughter; Yitzhak Schipper, Helen’s grandfather, who died in mid-1942 in the Jewish ghetto; Motus, Helen’s younger brother, who died of meningitis in 1940; her father Abraham (standing), who likely died in early 1943 with her mother, Regina (far right).

Abraham Edel, Martin Regg Cohn’s grandfather, in uniform as an officer drafted into the army of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire at age 27 (c. 1917). Between the wars, he headed a Jewish development office that provided interestfree loans to local...

Regina (Schipper) Edel, Cohn’s grandmother (and the inspiration for his middle name, Regg), posing for a formal portrait at age 19 (c. 1922). In her last letter to Helen she wrote, “You miss us, but . . . soon you’ll get used to the loneliness . . ....