NYMC Highlights the Powerful Intersection of Holocaust Remembrance and Black History

Marie T. Ascher, M.S., M.P.H., third from left, the Lillian Hetrick Huber Endowed director of the Phillip Capozzi, M.D., Library, led the opening remarks with the lighting candle ceremony in memory of the victims of the Holocaust and to honor those who perished. “We honor the dead by remembering and making sure that no one ever forgets. By telling the very real stories of the Holocaust,” she said. “This year, it is appropriate that we celebrate in conjunction with Black History Month, not only because of the many parallels between Nazism and white supremacism in our own country, but because of the stories you will hear today."

Setting the stage for the speakers' stories within a historical framework, Edward C. Halperin, M.D., M.A., second from left, chancellor and chief executive officer, provided an overview of racial segregation and desegregation in the U.S. military and abroad, highlighting connections to NYMC. He spoke about Susan Smith McKinney Steward, M.D., Class of 1870—the first Black woman to earn a medical degree in New York and the third in the nation—who married Theophilus Gould Steward, chaplain of the all-Black U.S. cavalry and a Buffalo Soldier. He also highlighted Clarence Sumner Janifer Sr., M.D., Class of 1915, who volunteered for service in the U.S. Army Medical Corps in 1917, was awarded the Croix de Guerre by the French government for his service, and became the first Black member of the Medical Society of New Jersey.

To bring history to life, Withers shared the story his father told him growing up, his unlikely and profound friendship with two Holocaust survivors that shaped the rest of his life.

In the spring of 1945, as Germany surrendered, Lieutenant John L. Withers, Ph.D., and his 150 all-Black army unit, Truck Company 3511, received an urgent order: transport supplies to the newly liberated Dachau concentration camp. At a time when the U.S. military was still segregated, these soldiers—most from the American South—witnessed firsthand the horrors left behind.

Amid the devastation, two teenage Holocaust survivors, Shlomo Joskowicz and Mieczysław Wajgenszperg, approached the camp’s gates, pleading for help in German and broken English. Though military regulations forbade contact with displaced persons—fearing the spread of disease—the Black soldiers made a choice. Risking court-martial and the loss of their GI Bill benefits, they secretly sheltered the two boys in their barracks outside Stuttgart for more than one year, hiding them from military police and inspectors.

For Withers’ father, this act of defiance was not just about compassion—it was about having humanity. For their time together, the all-Black army unit clothed, fed, and nursed the boys back to heath, incorporating them into the unit in the kitchen and trained them in vehicle maintenance, all while developing a brotherhood. The soldiers, who struggled with pronouncing the boys' Polish names with their Southern accents, affectionately called them Salomon and Pee Wee.

Through conversations with Dr. Lt. Withers, the survivors—who had heard tales of the bustling cities of the United States—saw the country as a symbol of their ideal life, a new hope. Despite growing up in the Jim Crow era and facing segregation from his white army brothers, Dr. Lt. Withers nurtured their hope after they escaped the concentration camp. 

Despite the risks of helping the boys, he went on to earn his doctorate, a dream that could have been derailed had their secret been discovered. 

In 2000, when Dr. Lt. Withers was diagnosed with cancer and suffered from depression, his son began searching for Solomon and Pee Wee to show his father how much he had impacted others' lives. He was able to connect his father with Pee Wee, who had Americanized his name to Martin Weigen. Weigen told Dr. Lt. Withers that Salomon moved to Israel and had a fruit and vegetable business. He had passed away in 1993 before Withers could reach him. However, Withers connected with Salomon’s widow, who told him of the great impact Dr. Lt. Withers had on his life.

“Pee Wee, Salomon, and Lt. John were about as different from each other as it was possible to be in race, in creed, in cultural experience, and yet they shared one remarkable trait in common,” said Withers who documented his father’s story in the book Balm in Gilead: A Story from the War. “They had the ability to look into the eyes of another human being and seeing the humanity and in seeing that humanity, draw a human response from within that manifest itself in sympathy compassion and understanding.”
 
Mill Etienne, M.D. ’02, M.P.H., second from right, vice chancellor of diversity and inclusion, associate dean for student affairs, and associate professor of neurology and of medicine, reflected on Wither’s talk and hosted the question-and-answer session that followed.

“Today, I feel immense pride in the legacy of those soldiers who made Double V, victory abroad from the Axis powers and victory at home against racism, segregation and discrimination in the U.S., possible,” said Dr. Etienne. “Despite being marginalized, segregated, and undervalued, they displayed extraordinary courage and humanity in fighting against tyranny and oppression. Their actions proved that Black Americans were vital to the fight for justice and freedom both on the battlefield and in the broader fight for civil rights.”

Anne Bayefsky, M.A., LLB, third from right, director of Touro Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust, went on to tell the story of her father Flight-Lieutenant Aba Bayefsky, a Canadian war artist whose work is displayed in the Canadian War Museum. When Lt. Bayefsky, was 19 years old, he enrolled in the Canadian Air Force. He was stationed at the MacDonald Bombing and Gunnery School, where he was able to paint. Lt. Bayefsky entered a commonwealth Air Force art competition, his entry was awarded first place. He was later commissioned as a flying officer in the war art division before being trained to become an official war artist, joining Air Force artists and his former high school art teachers. On duty, he toured the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp alone for weeks after their liberation and captured photos of the atrocities that took place. 
 
“Bayefsky found solace and sentence in art, in figurative art to speak directly and cogently about the truths and horrors he saw and experienced at an early age,” said Bayefsky about her father. “For Bayefsky, life and the life he saw had an urgency to it. An urgency he expressed as art. The project lasted a lifetime.”

Rabbi Baruch Fogel, M.A., left, of Touro University, concluded the event with a reflection about his maternal grandmother who was transferred to the Dachau concentration camp, where one of the desegregated U.S. military units liberated a subcamp of the Dachau concentration camp. The event concluded with the Prayer for the Dead.

This event was made possible by the support and sponsorship of the NYMC Office of the Chancellor, Phillip Capozzi, M.D., Library, and Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, along with co-sponsors The Center for Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights Education of North Carolina, Holocaust and Human Rights Education Center.

The video from the International Holocaust Remembrance Day and Black History Month and other NYMC events are available on the NYMC YouTube Channel.