A Strong Man and a Warrior

Images of Holocaust survivors typically fall into two categories. Either as emaciated former concentration camp victims, or as wise elders, lighting candles, tattooed numbers on an outstretched arm. It’s unlikely to conjure the image of lithe muscle men, or battle-hardened Uzi-toting fighters. In our desire to remember the past, we forget that those who survived lived their own remarkable lives too. 

Sir Ben Helfgott, and Joshua Kaufman, both Holocaust survivors, died recently, days apart, on opposite sides of the globe. They had strikingly similar characteristics. Both had immense physical strength, but they were also gentle men who fought hard for humanity, leaving me to wonder how the world itself will survive without them.

It was not long after his bar mitzvah that lanky Hungarian teenager Joshua Kaufmann heard a sermon from his Hasidic Rabbi, warning of the dangers of Zionist youth movements. He was so intrigued that he sought out Hashomer Hatzair and began a secular Zionist adventure. There, he learned survival skills to prepare him for his aliyah to the Jewish homeland. He did not know how important those skills would be in the dark years of the Holocaust that lay ahead. He was the only one of his four siblings to survive. 

In the town of Piotrokow-Trybunalski, Poland, diminutive 12-year-old Ben Helfgott had volunteered to work, under the pretense of being a Polish Catholic, in the heat of the Hurtownia glass factory. This way he was able to avoid harsher ghetto work and deportation. The facility was still in operation in the mid 1990’s when Ben and I stood watching glass being blown in the exact spot where he had once toiled to survive. It was no place for a starving Jewish child. 

Joshua survived Auschwitz and Dachau, after which he made his way to Israeli in 1949 and volunteered for the Israeli Defense Forces.  “I was married to the IDF” he says, saluting me, as if he was still there. Joshua served for over 20 years. Photos of the six-foot-tall soldier in the desert show his Uzi was always by his side. He was a warrior until the day he died. 

Ben survived Buchenwald concentration camp and was liberated from Terezin on the last day of the war in Europe. He was one of 732 orphans who were taken to England for convalescence. Ben co-founded the UK Holocaust survivor association known as “The 45 Aid Society,” which he served as President for over seventy years. He also became an Olympic Weightlifter, lifting for England in Melbourne in 1956 and Rome in 1960.

I never quite understood how the undernourished child liberated from Terezin in May 1945 became a British champion weightlifter.

I never quite understood how the undernourished child liberated from Terezin in May 1945 became a British champion weightlifter, and captain of the British Olympic weightlifting team. What physical and mental resilience did that take?

Joshua left the IDF after the Yom Kippur War, visited his surviving father in Williamsburg then drove Route 66 to see America. Once in Los Angeles he met his wife Margaret during his first Shabbat. A few weeks later they were married. Before long, they had four beautiful daughters. The fighter had turned into Tevye the Dairyman! “This is my bank account!” he said, pointing to a photo of his daughters on his sparse apartment wall. When I interviewed him for USC Shoah Foundation in 2017, he and three of his daughters sat with him, intertwined like a living Havdalah candle. A family shining with love, despite the hate he had endured. One of Joshua’s priceless lines was, “Stop the hateness!”  He knew how to defeat hate with love. 

Sir Ben Helfgott, Olympian, was my mentor, friend and part-time personal coach. At his home gym in London, he taught me how to do an effective daily 20 minute fitness routine. “Look after your body, it’s all you’ve got,” he would chide me while doing 100 press ups, well into his 80’s. To this day, I feel guilty when I don’t exercise in the morning.  Ben is watching.

Their real power came from the many small things they did behind closed doors. The source of their spiritual strength, which was every bit as strong as their physical feats, was their families. 

Sir Ben and Joshua, the strong man and the warrior, had a profound impact on their communities. But their real power came from the many small things they did behind closed doors. The source of their spiritual strength, which was every bit as strong as their physical feats, was their families. 

We have seen the images of Holocaust survivors as surviving victims. We have come to listen to them as wise and insightful elders. But let’s not forget that for many decades they were alone in their struggle, strong men and women, who replaced their lost families with loving homes.  Not only do they overcome their past, they helped shape our future. 

On a recent night I passed by Holocaust Museum LA where Joshua’s twelve foot image hangs on a poster facing Pan Pacific Park. Joshua stands tall, his arm raised with a clenched fist. His words on the poster read: “WE SHOULD ONLY LOVE ONE ANOTHER, DON’T HATE!”  

I stood beneath the giant of a man, and I raised my fist too.

Stephen D. Smith is CEO of StoryFile and Executive Director Emeritus at USC Shoah Foundation.