Name of Scottish missionary added to memorial wall at Auschwitz

The name of a Scottish missionary who was murdered by the Nazis after caring for Jewish schoolgirls in Budapest has been added to a special memorial wall at Auschwitz.

Jane Haining is recognised in a section devoted to hundreds of prisoners for whom no registration photographs were taken.

Miss Haining, who grew up near Dunscore in Dumfries and Galloway, was the matron at a Church of Scotland school in Budapest, Hungary, from 1932 to 1944, and cared for both Jewish and Christian girls.

She helped keep children safe until she was arrested in 1944 and was jailed in Budapest before being transported along with Hungarian Jews to the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp in Nazi-occupied Poland on May 14, 1944.

She died there on July 17, 1944, aged 47, around six months before the camp was liberated in 1945.

Her name has now been added to a section of the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum’s main exhibition.

A spokesman for the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum said, “The corridor has two important purposes.

“It restores individual names and identities to people who were imprisoned and killed in Auschwitz, but it also helps visitors understand the complexity of the prisoner population.

“Prisoners came from many different countries, communities, backgrounds and groups.

“By presenting hundreds of individual names together, the exhibition shows both the scale of persecution and the diversity of the people who experienced the camp.”

Members of Miss Haining’s family welcomed her inclusion on the wall.

Deirdre MacDowell, Miss Haining’s niece, said: “To see Jane’s name on a permanent memorial wall makes one ask how is it that she came to be in Auschwitz?

“And that’s the beginning of her story, and it can be told to all who ask about her.

“Her story is humbling, full of compassion and kindness, and makes us think about how we live our own lives – it is a legacy for us all.”

Other relatives of Miss Haining – her nephew Kevin O’Brien and nieces Liz Harrigan and Patricia Audis – visited the exhibition this week during a study tour to Auschwitz, which was organised by the Renfrewshire branch of the Unison trade union.

On Thursday, they took part in a memorial service at Auschwitz-Birkenau to commemorate Miss Haining’s sacrifice outside block nine, where she was held prisoner before her death.

A Church of Scotland spokesman said: “It is very moving to see that Jane Haining’s name has been added to the corridor wall at Auschwitz and will help keep her memory alive for generations to come.

“It is more important than ever that people learn the lessons of history and do not make the mistakes of the past.

“Jane was simultaneously an ordinary and extraordinary woman, and her story is one of courage, heroism, decency and personal sacrifice, reminding us that when we feel powerless, there is always something that we can do.

“Her life is a fine example of service over self-interest.”

Last November, a brass Stolperstein, “stumbling block”, in memory of Miss Haining was installed outside the former St Stephen’s Church building in Edinburgh.

Miss Haining is the only Scot to be recognised as “Righteous Among the Nations” at Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Centre in Jerusalem, for taking great risks to save Jews.