Holocaust and Auschwitz survivor visits St Paul’s High School

Posted: 05/05/2022

One of the last remaining survivors of the Holocaust and Auschwitz shared his personal experiences of World War II with students at St Paul’s High School in Wythenshawe.

Father-of-two Ike Alterman (93) who lives in Manchester, was just 11 years old when war broke out. Separated from his mother and two younger siblings in a brutal selection process in the Jewish ghettoes, he was detained in two concentration camps including Auschwitz-Birkenau, where he was then separated from his father.

He survived a death march in 1945, missing liberation by just one day before the war finally came to an end.

The only member of his immediate family to survive the atrocities of World War II, Ike came to Britain as a refugee – one of a group of 300 children offered shelter and a new life in the Lake District who became known as the Windermere Boys. He later settled in Manchester, married, and established a successful trade as a jeweller. 

Ike visited St Paul’s via a live video event, to share his personal experiences of the war with 200 Year 7 pupils and staff.

Asked by the students what he thinks people should learn about Auschwitz, Ike said: “It should be kept open as long as possible so that people will learn what happened there, and hopefully it will give them some things to think about what can happen if we don’t look around and try and live a better life in the future."

After the event, St Paul’s pupil Lev (12) said: “It helped me understand the dire circumstances that the people faced in the concentration camps. I would have never properly understood the magnitude of the situation. I am grateful that we had the opportunity to listen to Mr Alterman and his memories.”

Pupil Olivia (12) said: “It was nice to hear it from an actual person not from a book or a film. The Holocaust survivor was very emotional and raw.”

The event was set up in collaboration with The Fed, a leading social welfare charity for the Greater Manchester Jewish community, as part of the My Voice Project.

Jocelyne Elton, My Voice communications and development officer at The Fed said: “Our project records and shares the personal stories of Holocaust survivors and refugees who fled Nazi persecution who are now living in Greater Manchester.  

“With the support of a dedicated team of award-winning volunteers, the project produces individual life story books, embracing each survivor’s entire life and capturing their true voice, not just their war experiences. To date 32 books have been published."  

Ms Laura Fannon, deputy head of English at St Paul’s, said: “First-hand testimony is a most powerful educational tool, allowing pupils to put a human face to history and enabling students to explore its lessons in a more personal way.”

Ike was born in May 1928 in Ożarów, a small town in Poland to a large Jewish family. When he was a small boy, the family moved to his fathers’ hometown of Ostrowiec. After the occupation of Poland, in April 1941, the Germans established a ghetto in Ostrowiec with terrible living conditions.

Asked by pupils what food he was given in the concentration camps, Ike said: “They dictated what you could have and quite often people started to starve with the rations that had been given to us and you could not say ‘no, no, no it’s not a lot’ or that sort of thing.

“You had to be thankful for whatever you got, or you got nothing at all, but they didn’t care. They would starve everybody, especially Jewish people.

“Sometimes you’d get a piece of black bread and coffee made out of coal. Have you ever heard of that? No margarine or anything like that. You were hungry and you were grateful for that and that was it. You never got anything else.”

Asked by pupils how he held onto hope during this time, Ike replied: “We couldn’t say, because of some of the things that had happened especially in Auschwitz Birkenau, the extermination of people going straight to the gas chambers if you weren’t picked to do some hard labour in there.

“Every day we survived was a miracle because a lot of people were being exterminated and different transports that came from Hungary, from Poland, from other cities and we saw the chimneys from the extermination camp. The chimneys were glowing 24 hours a day and night.

“At times they were getting so many transports coming through to exterminate people that they had to dig big graves and were dropping people in and burning the bodies because they couldn’t cope. It was a terrible time.”

After the war ended Ike was freed and in August 1945, with the help of the Jewish Refugees Committee, he was transported from Prague to Windermere for rest and recuperation. From there, Ike moved to Manchester and began a successful career in the jewellery trade. He was married to wife Myra for many years until she passed away in 1991. They have two daughters, Elaine and Fione, and two grandchildren.

Find out more by listening to Ike’s podcast.