Dionys Lenard

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Vrba-Wetzler report timeline
Main railroad track into Auschwitz II-Birkenau.
Timeline 1942 13 April Alfred Wetzler taken to Auschwitz. Summer Dionys Lenard from Slovakia escapes from Majdanek with news of what happened to Slovakian Jews. 20 June Kazimierz Piechowski, a Polish prisoner, and three or four others escape; they pass information to the Polish Home Army (AK). 30 June Rudolf Vrba taken to Auschwitz. 2 November Kazimirez Halori, a Polish prisoner, escapes and passes information to the Polish Socialist Party. December Report entitled "Auschwitz–Camp of Death" published by Natalia Zarembina, another Polish escapee; it is later published in English in 1943 (London) and March 1944 (New York). 1943 27 April Witold Pilecki, a Polish soldier, escapes. Witold's report is filed away by the British government with a note saying there was no indication as to the source's reliability. Jan Redzej and Edward Ciesielski escape with Pilecki and each compiles a separate report for the Polish Home Army. May Stanislaw Chybinski, a member of the Polish Home Army, escapes and compiles the report "Snapshots of Auschwitz". 19 November Jerzy Tabeau (or Tabau) and Roman Cieliczko escape. They write a report in December 1943 and January 1944 that becomes known as the "Polish Major's report". March 1944 19 March Germany invades Hungary. 22 March The Washington Post and the New York Herald Tribune report the existence of gas chambers and crematoria at Auschwitz. April 1944 5 April Siegfried Lederer escapes to warn Jews in Theresienstadt and the Red Cross about the mass murder inside the camp. 7–11 April Vrba and Wetzler escape. 22 / 23 April Vrba and Wetzler arrive in Žilina, Slovakia. 24 April Vrba and Wetzler meet Dr Oscar Neumann of the Slovakian Jewish Council. 27 April Oscar Krasniansky completes a German translation of the Vrba-Wetzler report. 28 April A copy of the report is handed to Rudolf Kastner of the Budapest Aid and Rescue Committee. The first trainload of Hungarian Jews leaves for Auschwitz (preceding the mass deportations). c. 28 April Kastner gives a copy of the report to Geza Soos, Hungarian Foreign Ministry official; Soos gives it to Joszef Elias; Elias's secretary translates it into Hungarian and prepares six copies for Hungarian officials. May 1944 15 May Mass transports begin of Hungary's Jews to Auschwitz, at a rate of 12,000 a day. 27 May Arnost Rosin, a Slovakian Jew, and Czesław Mordowicz, a Polish Jew, escape from Auschwitz. They write a report about the killing of Hungarian Jews. June 1944 4 June The New York Times reports that a young Pole who escaped from Auschwitz described the gas chambers and said that Jews were being executed. 6 June Allied invasion of Normandy, France. mid June The Vrba-Wetzler report reaches the British and US governments. 15 June The BBC World Service reports that 4,000 Jews from the Theresienstadt concentration camp were killed in gas chambers at Auschwitz during March 1944. Rosin and Mordowicz (see 27 May) tell Oscar Krasniansky (see 27 April) that around 100,000 Hungarian Jews were killed on arrival at Auschwitz-Birkenau between 15 and 27 May, apparently with no knowledge of what was about to happen to them. 16 June The New York World Telegram repeats the BBC's information. Allen Dulles, Swiss director of the US Office of Strategic Services, sends the Vrba-Wetzler report to the US State Department. 17 June The Los Angeles Times repeats the BBC's information. 20 June 'The Washington Times Herald reports the same, courtesy of Reuters, while The New York Times offers further details. In Bratislava, Vrba discusses his report with Vatican legate Monsignor Mario Martilotti, who then sends a copy to the Vatican via Switzerland. 25 June The New York Times reports that "new mass executions" recently took place in Auschwitz. 30 June The Kastner train, carrying 1,684 Jews, leaves Hungary for Switzerland via Bergen-Belsen. July 1944 1–10 July Several newspapers report that, between April 1942 and April 1944, 1.5 to 1.7 million Jews were killed at Auschwitz (from the Vrba-Wetzler report). 7 July Hungarian government orders a halt to the deportations. 9 July Mass deportations end.
Key figures Rudolf Vrba Alfred Wetzler Witold Pilecki
Historians Yehuda Bauer Randolph L. Braham John S. Conway Raul Hilberg Miroslav Karny Ruth Linn
"Blood for goods" Kurt Becher Joel Brand Adolf Eichmann Malchiel Gruenwald Heinrich Himmler Rudolf Kastner Kastner train Chaim Michael Dov Weissmandl
Background Auschwitz concentration camp Holocaust History of the Jews in Hungary Hungary during World War II
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Daniel Dionys Lenard (דני לנארד, Žilina ? - ?) was a Slovakian Jew who managed to escape from Majdanek concentration camp. He brought the first confirmed report of the killings back to the Jewish community in Slovakia.^[1][2][3]

Lenard, his sister and his parents entered Palestine before the Holocaust but were caught by the British as illegal immigrants and returned to Slovakia. Rachel Lenard, Lenard's sister, joined an agricultural hachshara in Denmark in 1939 from where she went to Sweden and survived. Lenard and his parents remained and were deported to separate camps in the spring of 1942. His parents perished. Lenard managed to escape back to Slovakia in July 1942, where he gave an extensive account of the high mortality at the Majdanek concentration camp.^[4][5][6]

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