|
 Lilly
Friedman doesn't remember the last name of the woman who designed and
sewed the wedding gown she wore when she walked down the aisle over 60
years ago. But the grandmother of seven does recall that when she first
told her fiancι Ludwig that she had always dreamed of being married in a
white gown he realized he had his work cut out for him.
For the tall, lanky 21-year-old who had survived
hunger, disease and torture this was a different kind of challenge. How
was he ever going to find such a dress in the Bergen Belsen Displaced
Person's camp where they felt grateful for the clothes on their backs?
Fate would intervene in the guise of a former German
pilot who walked into the food distribution center where Ludwig worked,
eager to make a trade for his worthless parachute. In exchange for two
pounds of coffee beans and a couple of packs of cigarettes Lilly would
have her wedding gown.
For two weeks Miriam the seamstress worked under the
curious eyes of her fellow DPs, carefully fashioning the six parachute
panels into a simple, long sleeved gown with a rolled collar and a fitted
waist that tied in the back with a bow. When the dress was completed she
sewed the leftover material into a matching shirt for the groom.
A white wedding gown may have seemed like a frivolous
request in the surreal environment of the camps, but for Lilly the dress
symbolized the innocent, normal life she and her family had once led
before the world descended into madness. Lilly and her siblings were
raised in a Torah observant home in the small town of Zarica,
Czechoslovakia where her father was a melamed, respected and well liked by
the young yeshiva students he taught in nearby Irsheva.
He and his two sons were marked for extermination
immediately upon arriving at Auschwitz. For Lilly and her sisters it was
only their first stop on their long journey of persecution, which included
Plashof, Neustadt, Gross Rosen and finally Bergen Belsen.
Lilly Friedman and her parachute dress on display
in the Bergen Belsen Museum |
Four hundred people marched 15 miles in the snow to the
town of Celle on January 27, 1946 to attend Lilly and Ludwig's wedding.
The town synagogue, damaged and desecrated, had been lovingly renovated by
the DPs with the meager materials available to them. When a Sefer Torah
arrived from England they converted an old kitchen cabinet into a
makeshift Aron Kodesh.
"My sisters and I lost everything -- our parents, our
two brothers, our homes. The most important thing was to build a new
home." Six months later, Lilly's sister Ilona wore the dress when she
married Max Traeger. After that came Cousin Rosie. How many brides wore
Lilly's dress? "I stopped counting after 17." With the camps experiencing
the highest marriage rate in the world, Lilly's gown was in great demand.
In 1948 when President Harry Truman finally permitted
the 100,000 Jews who had been languishing in DP camps since the end of the
war to emigrate, the gown accompanied Lilly across the ocean to America
Unable to part with her dress, it lay at the bottom of her bedroom closet
for the next 50 years, "not even good enough for a garage sale. I was
happy when it found such a good home."
Home was the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in
Washington, D.C. When Lily's niece, a volunteer, told museum officials
about her aunt's dress, they immediately recognized its historical
significance and displayed the gown in a specially designed showcase,
guaranteed to preserve it for 500 years.
But Lilly Friedman 's dress had one more journey to
make. Bergen Belsen, the museum, opened its doors on October 28, 2007. The
German government invited Lilly and her sisters to be their guests for the
grand opening. They initially declined, but finally traveled to Hanover
the following year with their children, their grandchildren and extended
families to view the extraordinary exhibit created for the wedding dress
made from a parachute.
Lilly's family, who were all familiar with the stories
about the wedding in Celle, were eager to visit the synagogue. They found
the building had been completely renovated and modernized. But when they
pulled aside the handsome curtain they were astounded to find that the
Aron Kodesh , made from a kitchen cabinet, had remained untouched as a
testament to the profound faith of the survivors. As Lilly stood on the
bimah once again she beckoned to her granddaughter, Jackie, to stand
beside her where she was once a kallah. "It was an emotional trip. We
cried a lot."
Two weeks later, the woman who had once stood trembling
before the selective eyes of the infamous Dr. Josef Mengele returned home
and witnessed the marriage of her granddaughter.
The three Lax sisters -- Lilly, Ilona, and Eva, who
together survived Auschwitz, a forced labor camp, a death march and Bergen
Belsen -- have remained close and today live within walking distance of
each other in Brooklyn. As mere teenagers, they managed to outwit and
outlive a monstrous killing machine, then went on to marry, have children,
grandchildren, and great-grandchildren and were ultimately honored by the
country that had earmarked them for extinction. As young brides, they had
stood underneath the chuppah and recited the blessings that their
ancestors had been saying for thousands of years. In doing so, they chose
to honor the legacy of those who had perished by choosing life.
Helen Zegerman
Schwimmer is the author of Like The Stars of The Heavens.
To contact her please visit: helenschwimmer.com.
IN MEMORIAM -- 63 YEARS LATER
 It is now more than 60 years after the Second
World War in Europe ended. This e-mail is being sent as a memorial chain,
in memory of the six million Jews, 20 million Russians, 10 million
Christians and 1,900 Catholic priests who were murdered, massacred, raped,
burned, starved and humiliated with the German and Russian peoples looking
the other way!
Now, more than ever, with Iraq, Iran, and others,
claiming the Holocaust to be "a myth," it is imperative to make sure the
world never forgets, because there are others who would like to do it
again.
[My sincere thanks to Myrna Blackwood for
sending me this wonderful article!] |
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