Occupation hero gives keynote address at Holocaust memorial service

Saturday 28 January 2017

A 96-year-old Occupation hero, and leading human rights campaigner, who gave the keynote speech at this year’s Jersey Holocaust Memorial Service says futile as it might seem, individuals who stand up to tyranny can make a difference.

Holocaust Memorial Day is a world-wide annual event to remember the millions of Jews who were killed during the Second World War, and takes place on 27th January to coincide with the Soviet Army’s liberation of the most infamous of the concentration camps – Auschwitz.

Locally the day is also used to remember the 21 Islanders who died in German camps and prisons during the war, and whose names are engraved on the lighthouse memorial outside the Occupation Tapestry Gallery on the New North Quay.

Jerseyman Bob Le Sueur was one of a handful of Islanders who risked their lives hiding escaped slave workers during the Occupation. He was later honoured by the Soviet Government, and given an MBE by the UK Government for his bravery.

After the war he helped found a Jersey branch of the human rights campaign group Amnesty International, and has financed the education of many youngsters in Africa.

Addressing a packed audience representing a vast cross-section of Islanders in the Occupation Tapestry Gallery Mr Le Sueur said it is very easy to throw your hands up in the air in despair over injustice and not do anything because you think it’s futile.

But, he went on to say how even small acts can make a difference. To prove his point he mentioned how letters written by people in Jersey had helped secure the release of a student who’d been imprisoned in Benin for five years for campaigning against the government.

He also mentioned how years later he met the student and he said how one of the letters of support had amazingly reached him, and although he’d never heard of Jersey and didn’t know where it was, the fact that someone somewhere was thinking of him brought him great hope.

Mr Le Sueur was also one of the representatives who later laid wreaths at the lighthouse memorial to remember those Islanders who died at the hands of the Germans.