Holocaust Survivor Reads From Same Torah Scroll at 100 Years Old in London
In a poignant ceremony at a North London synagogue, Kurt Marks, a 100-year-old Holocaust survivor, read from the very same Torah scroll he read during his bar mitzvah in Cologne, Germany, nearly 88 years earlier in September 1938, just two months before Kristallnacht. "It was beyond anything I imagined possible," Marks said tearfully. "Reading the same verses I read as a child before my life was turned upside down felt like the years in between vanished for a moment."
Born in August 1925 in Cologne to Sigmund and Irma Marks, Kurt had a happy childhood surrounded by a large extended family. His mother was a dress designer and his father ran a men’s clothing store. However, life changed drastically with the rise of the Nazi regime. His father was forced to open an independent wholesale business, and his mother began teaching sewing to women preparing to emigrate.
Kurt celebrated his bar mitzvah at the Orthodox "Adat Jeshurun" synagogue in Cologne. Two months later, during the November 9, 1938 Kristallnacht pogrom, he witnessed his synagogue set ablaze. Amid the flames, someone bravely rescued the Torah scrolls and brought them to the nearby Jewish school where Kurt studied. The school principal, Erich Klebanski, quickly organized the children’s immigration to England, with the "Walem Lane" synagogue in London agreeing to support and host the group. In January 1939, Kurt parted from his parents, believing they would reunite in England once immigration papers were secured. The children traveled via the Kindertransport, carrying the rescued Torah scroll with them.
Kurt rebuilt his life in Britain, marrying Auschwitz survivor Ingrid in 1948. They moved to Tanzania in 1955 for his diamond industry work, later returning to London. Despite years of searching, Kurt only learned decades later that his parents were deported to Minsk and murdered in the Maly Trostenets forest camp in Belarus, leaving him the sole survivor of his maternal family.
The emotional reunion with the Torah scroll happened almost by chance when Kurt found an old document recording the scroll’s arrival at the Walem Lane synagogue in February 1939. With the help of the Association of Jewish Refugees and the United Synagogue in Britain, the historic scroll was located at the Brondesbury Park synagogue in London. Standing before the scroll at 100, Kurt called it "more than finding a precious object; it was restoring a living connection to my family, community, and a world the Holocaust tried to destroy."
Today, Kurt expresses concern over rising antisemitism worldwide and believes education and remembrance are vital to combating hatred. He hopes people learn to live together peacefully and with tolerance, emphasizing "we are all the same, human beings."
