Warwick and Leamington to mark Holocaust Memorial Day with poetry, art, musical performances and school projects

At a service of remembrance at the Warwick War Memorial, pupils from King’s High will read a poem they have composed themselves on this year’s theme, ‘Ordinary People’, and there will be more readings by pupils from Myton School and Warwick School.

Aylesford School pupils will talk about their involvement in the ‘Lessons from Auschwitz’ project organised by the Holocaust Educational Trust.

Children from All Saints School and Coten End School will be walking up to the event in the morning, joining the MP for Warwick and Leamington, Matt Western, the Mayor of Warwick, Cllr Parminder Singh Birdi, civic leaders from the wider area, and community groups, for the act of remembrance at 11am.

Organiser Dave Sternberg said: “It is important that we never forget the Holocaust and other genocides such as those in Rwanda, Bosnia, Cambodia and Darfur.

"A vital part of this remembering is to talk to the younger generations about the horrors of the past and the terrible things we humans can do to each other if we are not vigilant in ensuring we are always respectful and kind to others.”

Other events marking the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz will be a talk at King’s High School by Jane Curzon, the daughter of Stella Curzon who managed to escape the Nazis in Vienna as a child to be taken in by three women in England – she said their kindness saved her life.

Coten End School will have a Year Six assembly with a visiting speaker on the ‘Kindertransport’, when the UK managed to get 10,000 Jewish children out of Germany and Austria just before the outbreak of war.

And on January 30, there will be a guest speaker at King’s High.

In 1943 Mindu Hornick MBE was sent to Auschwitz aged 13, and survived terrible conditions for two years before being liberated and travelling to Birmingham.

She said talking to schoolchildren is “a mission to reinforce the lessons that should have been learnt years ago about the horrors of war but have not. Humanity seems incapable of learning from the past.”

Leamington music is also involved in this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day.

At the Royal Pump Rooms, the internationally acclaimed ‘Piatti Quartet’ will be performing works by two Czech composers who wrote the music while in the Terezin ghetto near Prague, before being transported to the Auschwitz extermination camp.

At 1pm on January 27 at Leamington Art Gallery, The Festival Director of Leamington Music, Richard Phillips, will talk about Terezin and its significance in music.

He will be joined by Jane Williams, Leamington Music’s Artist in residence.

She will introduce art works by herself, Sheila Millward, and Lis Mann who was forced to leave Vienna and came to live in England.

At the Visitor Centre in the Warwick Court House, there will be a small exhibition to commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day during the week starting January 23.

Tickets for all Leamington Music concerts are available at the Warwick Visitor Information Centre, or by calling 01926 334418.

The event at the memorial in Church Street, Warwick, on January 27 is free and open to everyone.