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Auschwitz: disappearance of a memory smuggler
Claude Bloch was the last Lyon survivor of the Auschwitz camp. He died on the night of Sunday December 31 to Monday January 1, at the age of 95. – (France 2)
Claude Bloch was the last Lyon survivor of the Auschwitz camp. He died on the night of Sunday December 31 to Monday January 1, at the age of 95.
“Here it’s me. I was arrested on June 29, 1944 and deported from Drancy on July 31 by convoy 77”, confides Claude Bloch, deported to Auschwitz at the age of 15 with his mother and grandfather, who did not return. Survivor of the death camps, Claude Bloch will dedicate his life to memory. In Montluc prison, where he was detained before his deportation, he testified tirelessly. In middle and high schools, he says, humbly.
“Fight against fanaticism”
“He often said: ‘I testify not to tell a story, I testify to learn lessons from my history’. For him, it was precisely to fight against fanaticism which did not disappear in 1945, but which still remain alive, that the reminder of the past was something important”, confides Jean-Olivier Viout, former magistrate, president of the orientation council of the Montluc memorial. Until his last breath, Claude Bloch denounced the horrors of which men are capable.
