First Letters After the Holocaust
Reading at the Jewish Community of Frankfurt

“I am alive.” These words capture the central message of many of the first letters Holocaust survivors wrote to family and friends after their liberation. They were personal signs of life, filled with urgent questions: Who had survived? Where were the people they were searching for? Who would still be able to respond? Many of those writing did not know whether the people they were trying to reach were still alive.

The volume “After So Much Pain and Anguish – First Letters After the Holocaust” brings together such testimonies from the period immediately following liberation. Unlike memoirs written later, these letters were not intended for a public audience. The writers themselves decided what they wanted to share at that moment: that they had survived, whom they were missing, and whom they were still searching for.

A Reading Connecting Past and Present

During the evening, Clemens Schick and Bibiana Beglau read selected letters from the volume, bringing the personal stories of their authors closer to the audience. Clarinetist Nur Ben Shalom and violinist Francesca Zappa provided musical accompaniment.

Among the guests was Holocaust survivor Eva Szepesi, one of approximately 400 children who survived imprisonment in Auschwitz.

Marc Grünbaum, Chairman of the Jewish Community of Frankfurt and the son of Holocaust survivors, spoke about how the persecution and murder of European Jews continued to affect subsequent generations. He reflected on his parents’ resilience, on what was discussed within his family, and on what remained unspoken.

In her keynote address, Dr. Melody Sucharewicz turned to the present. She recalled the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and its consequences for Jewish people. Sucharewicz described how the attack rekindled deeply rooted fears among many Jews. At the same time, she explicitly distinguished between the two events in historical terms, emphasizing that the Shoah and October 7 must not be equated.

In the discussion that followed, she spoke with Yad Vashem historian and co-editor of the volume Dr. Robert Rozett about the possibilities and limitations of Holocaust education. Their conversation also explored why historical knowledge alone does not protect against antisemitic attitudes and what responsibilities this places on society in confronting antisemitism today.

The Significance of the Letters for Holocaust Remembrance

For the Alfred Landecker Foundation, the publication of these letters also holds particular personal and institutional significance.

Lena Altman, CEO of the Foundation, explained why the Alfred Landecker Foundation supports the project: The letters preserve the voices of survivors while also reminding us of those who were denied the chance to send any further sign of life. In 1942, Alfred Landecker was deported from Mannheim to the Izbica transit ghetto in German-occupied Poland. His last surviving message comes from there: a letter to his children asking them to send him food. He never had the chance to write a letter after liberation.

Alfred Landecker’s story also serves as a mandate for the Foundation to keep remembrance alive and convey its relevance to the present. This commitment includes educational trips to Poland organized by the Foundation together with whatmatters and the World Jewish Congress (WJC). These bring decision-makers from the German Bundestag, public administration, and the police to historical sites of Nazi persecution and mass murder, including Izbica. Visiting these sites is intended to deepen awareness of the responsibility to protect Jewish life and confront antisemitism today.

The evening in Frankfurt demonstrated the significance and impact these personal testimonies continue to hold more than 80 years after the end of the Holocaust. They make individual lives and experiences tangible while opening up space to reflect on Jewish remembrance, trauma, and resilience and their relevance to the present day.