In the final weeks of World War II, as Allied forces advanced deep into Germany, the SS frantically evacuated concentration camps to hide evidence of their atrocities. Between April 6 and 10, 1945, three trains carrying roughly 2,500 Jewish prisoners each were sent away from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. Their intended destination was the Theresienstadt ghetto in occupied Czechoslovakia.
Many passengers on this specific train belonged to Bergen-Belsen’s “exchange” section. They were prisoners holding foreign papers or citizenship with neutral countries, kept alive by the SS as potential bargaining chips for German prisoners of war. Because of this status, they wore civilian clothes rather than striped camp uniforms.
After a grueling six-day journey with little food, water, or sanitation, the train became trapped between advancing front lines near Magdeburg. Fearing the approaching American military, the Nazi SS guards abandoned the train and fled into the night.
On Friday, April 13, 1945, a scouting mission consisting of two American tanks from the 743rd Tank Battalion and troops from the 30th Infantry Division encountered the stalled train.
The photograph, taken by US Army photographer Major Clarence L. Benjamin, captures the raw, overwhelming rush of emotions as the prisoners realized they were finally safe. In the foreground, a 35-year-old Jewish mother from Makó, Hungary, clutches the hand of her 5-year-old daughter. Her face portrays a powerful, complex mixture of relief, joy, and the lingering trauma of what they had endured. Behind them, other survivors stream up the embankment away from the train cars, smiling and weeping as they run toward their liberators.
For decades, the photograph remained a famous but anonymous symbol of Holocaust liberation. It wasn’t until 2017 that researchers and journalists from Haaretz officially confirmed the identities of the mother and daughter. The little girl survived the war, returned to Hungary, and was tracked down as an elderly woman still living there.
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