NARRATOR They were men and women who came together
from all across the United States, from Canada, and from as far away as Israel. For several,
it was their first face-to-face meeting with each other in more than sixty years.
CARROL “RED” WALSH How could a young guy like me be 88 years
old! I’m not sure how many more reunions I’m going to go to. I never thought I would
see anybody on that train again. It’s amazing. Just amazing.
NARRATOR The occasion was to commemorate an event that
occurred on April 13, 1945, as American armies rolled across Europe, liberating millions
from the dominion of the Third Reich. On that day, the Army’s 743rd Tank Division came
upon a sight near Magdeburg, Germany, they never expected to see. Freight train cars
alone on a track, and filled wall to wall with over two thousand men, women, and children,
all of them Jews.
CARROL “RED” WALSH, TANK COMMANDER, U.S. ARMY 743RD TANK BATTALION
I remember the moment I remembered seeing this long freight train, long string of boxcars,
and I can remember pulling the tank to the right and driving along the side of the train
and seeing all these people that were on these boxcars. It was totally unexpected and when
I saw their condition I was overwhelmed, I can remember thinking “What are we going
to do with all these people and for all these people?”
NARRATOR This fateful wartime incident might have remained
known only to those who were directly part of it, had it not been for a Web site created
and managed by Matthew Rozell. A high school history teacher in Hudson Falls, New York,
and a teacher fellow with the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Rozell conducted
several interviews with men and women whose lives were directly caught up in the events
of the Holocaust. It was during an interview with Carrol “Red” Walsh, a tank commander
with the 743rd, that the story of the train car outside Magdeburg came to light.
MATTHEW ROZELL, HISTORY TEACHER, HUDSON FALLS HIGH SCHOOL
And at the tail end of a two hour discussion, taped conversations I had with him in his
daughter’s living room, his daughter chimed in and said “Dad, did you tell Mr. Rozell
about that train that stopped, that you had to go and investigate?” He said “Oh, that’s
right, that train.” And he launched into about how it was a beautiful April day. He
and another tank commander went down and investigated this train stopped by the side of the tracks.
They found it full of Jewish refugees. The other tank commander, he told me, was still
alive in California, and actually had photographs that he took of the liberation. And this Dr.
Gross allowed me to place the photographs on the Internet. We put those on our school
Web site, and they sat there, not a lot of Web traffic. But all of a sudden, I got an
e-mail from a grandmother in Australia who had been a 7-year-old girl on that train.
And she said that she clicked on the Web link, the photographs opened, and this was the day
of her liberation in 1945. She said she fell out of her chair.
It was very organic the way it all unfolded. I would open up my e-mail inbox and there
would be another message from a new survivor, somebody that I wasn’t aware of before.
These people are coming to me individually. They’re not aware of each other for the
most part before finding my Web site on the Internet, for example. So it’s just kind
of unfolding.
RENE ROBERGE, DRAMA TEACHER, HUDSON FALLS HIGH SCHOOL
At this time, I would like to call to the stage the rest of our soldiers and survivors,
beginning with Mr. Francis Currie. [Applause]
NARRATOR The surviving veterans of the 743rd are modest
about their accomplishments, but this did not prevent the audience of students, teachers,
town residents, and Holocaust survivors from honoring them at a special reunion event held
at Hudson Falls high school in September 2009.
WILLIAM GAST, U.S. ARMY 743RD TANK BATTALION It’s a gratifying and emotional experience
to reunite with some of the survivors, to meet them face to face, and to call them my
friends.
LESLIE MEISELS, SURVIVOR, TRAIN AT MAGDEBURG Those brave American soldiers, they were saying
that they didn’t do anything heroic, they just did their job. But with that job, they
gave us back our life, and for that I thank you from the bottom of my heart. [Applause]
NARRATOR It was a heady four days for the guests of
honor and their families, a time to reminisce and reconnect, a time to enjoy each other’s
company, and reflect upon what brought them together.
BUSTER SIMMONS, CHAPLAIN, 30TH INFANTRY DIVISION We were there. But it’s still tough to wrap
your mind around the situation that presented itself when those people were liberated on
that train.
ELIZABETH SEAMAN, SURVIVOR, TRAIN AT MAGDEBURG None of them put themselves up as being something
special, and they have a great sense of humility, and also a great sense of love. I feel that
love just emanating from them to me and the others, and I think the sense of love that
they have I think is also what has kept them going and giving all their lives.
DIANE SAWYER “And so we choose history teacher Matt Rozell,
the Holocaust survivors on that train, and those American soldiers who kept them and
their story alive.” [Cheers, applause]
NARRATOR Matt Rozell’s spotlight as ABC News Charles
Gibson’s person of the week was a fitting conclusion to this special event. At the farewell
banquet following the broadcast, Rene Roberge, the Hudson Falls high school teacher who served
as the program’s master of ceremonies, told liberators and survivors alike what he had
learned from them.
RENE ROBERGE Share the truth. The moral responsibility
you had as a liberator to free a people from harm at a moment’s notice, and, as a survivor,
to save a generation from becoming complacent. You were heroes then. You are my heroes now.
MATTHEW ROZELL I think we were in the right place at the
right time, in the sense that we had people who are now at the stage in their life where
they really wanted to send a message before they leave this earth. To see how it touched
these students so deeply, that is where the real gratification is for me, and that’s
what this whole week was all about. Don’t forget the past. You have to remember what
happened. You can’t just be a bystander.
FRANK TOWERS, PRESIDENT, 30TH INFANTRY DIVISION VETERANS of WWII
You know, I bid those people goodbye and thought I’d never see them again. So now here we
are 65 years later, to come this full 65 years and, we’re coming together, and it’s a
rewarding experience.