On July 31, 1944, the last major deportation transport – Convoy 77 – left Drancy camp for Bobigny station, north of Paris, the final stop on the journey to the Auschwitz-Birkenau killing center. The Allies, who had landed on the Normandy beaches on June 6, were steadily advancing towards Paris, which they liberated three weeks later, on August 19. In France, and all over Europe, the Nazis were retreating on all fronts… However, for SS officer Aloïs Brunner, the commandant of Drancy camp, there was no question of giving up the race to exterminate the entire Jewish population. He managed to organize one last major convoy, but as he did not have enough “deportable” Jews to fill the train, he had his collaborators round up more than 300 children who were being held in UGIF homes in and around Paris. When the convoy finally arrived in Auschwitz on August 3, after crossing France, Germany and part of Poland, 836 men, women and children were sent straight to the gas chambers and murdered. Of the deportees who were selected to stay in the camp to “work”, only 250 survived the hell of Auschwitz.

Anti-Semitism has not gone away… It is more widespread and more brazen than ever, sadly. As the saying goes, history does not repeat itself, but sometimes it rhymes… We must therefore remain vigilant and refuse to tolerate any attempt to marginalize or demonize people in a manner reminiscent of the darkest hours of the Second World War. It is vital not only to commemorate, but never to allow ourselves to forget the men, women and children who were persecuted and murdered simply because they were Jews. Perhaps even more importantly, we must safeguard and reinforce democracy, and encourage people to live together in harmony and mutual acceptance. And give our children and grandchildren grounds for hope. This was what motivated us to found the Convoy 77 European project, which has already given thousands of young Europeans the opportunity to carry out historical research and retrace the lives of hundreds of deportees.

🇬🇧 You can join in the commemoration by:
• Browsing the list of deportees and reading some of the already published biographies
• Searching for information on a specific person
• Lighting a candle in memory of the deportees
• Sharing your thoughts and feelings