By Myriam Brenner, Education Program Coordinator

On April 15, 2025, the world will mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in northern Germany, one of the most notorious sites of Nazi-inflicted suffering during the Holocaust. While the British Army officially liberated the camp, Canadian troops played a crucial role in helping evacuate the survivors.

On arrival at Bergen-Belsen in 1945, British troops found approximately 60,000 prisoners, including Jews and other persecuted groups, living in horrific conditions, suffering from severe malnutrition, untreated diseases like typhus, and the trauma of years of forced labour and violence. Around 35,000 people were killed in the camp under the Nazis' cruel regime. Among those was Anne Frank, whose published diary is one of the best-known accounts of life in hiding during the Holocaust.

More than 1,000 Canadians were also involved in the camp’s liberation, delivering medical supplies, providing aid and evacuating the survivors to safety. Private 1st Class Sol Goldberg, a Canadian soldier, made a particular impact through his acts of compassion and defiance. Coming from a poor immigrant family in Hamilton, Ontario, Goldberg had been conscripted into the Canadian Army in 1944. He was deployed as part of the First Canadian Army through the battlefields of Europe, including Belgium and Holland, before he reached Bergen-Belsen.

Officially assigned to a mobile shower and laundry unit, Goldberg found the official channels for delivering essential supplies to the survivors far too slow. Through a network of Jewish soldiers and airmen, he smuggled essential supplies into the camp, including blankets, clothing, boots, crackers and even cigarettes. These items were passed through a hole in the camp's fence, helping to alleviate the immediate suffering of the prisoners.

Smuggling supplies into the camp violated military protocol, putting Goldberg at great personal risk. In a heart-warming act of support, however, his commanding officer, after discovering this, chose to look the other way and even helped gather more supplies.

Perhaps the most notable and controversial of Goldberg’s actions was his support for survivors seeking to escape to British Mandate Palestine, present-day Israel. At the time, Canada supported Britain’s policy of restricting Jewish immigration to Palestine. However, Goldberg, defiantly provided backpacks (which were military property) to groups of Holocaust survivors fleeing to Palestine.

After the war, Goldberg returned to Canada rather than remain in Europe. In August 1946, he retired from the Canadian Army. The United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA) offered him a position working with Holocaust survivors in the displaced persons camps, but Goldberg, wanting to distance himself from the brutalities he had witnessed, chose to return home.

His story, however, remains a testament to the capacity for humanity and compassion in times of unimaginable hardship.

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