Students at Holocaust Day event

Students at Holocaust Day event

12 February 2020

TWO students from Downpatrick’s St Mary’s High School visited the Holocaust Memorial Day commemoration at Belfast City Hall recently. 

Senior prefect, Morgan Fitzpatrick and head girl, Roise Byrne, met with 85 year-old holocaust survivor, Tomi Reichental.

Tomi gave a heart-rending talk on his experience of the death camp at Bergen-Belsen where he was imprisoned as a young boy. 

St Mary’s was honoured to host Tomi during a visit to the school last October when he shared his experience of being a child prisoner.

The St Mary’s students were invited to speak at the event last week in which Paul Clark was master of ceremonies.

School principal, Ms Rosemary McLaughlin, said students were invited to speak at the Belfast event as St Mary’s was one of the partnership schools in the Holocaust Education Programme. 

“This was a humbling experience for all the young people involved,” she continued. “Tomi’s aim is to educate people about what happened during the Holocaust so we can remember the people who died and to take action so it will never happen again.”

Ms McLaughlin added: “After all the horror, I am doing my best to keep the memory of those lost ones alive. We all must never forget.”