D.C. honoring the Reverend Waitstill Sharp and his wife. Martha. as they became the second and third Americans to be added to the honor roll of 21.000 "righteous" gentiles. or nonJews. whose efforts saved countless lives during the Holocaust. Also. on September 14. the Washington Post wrote an article about the Sharps. calling them "The Couple Who Fought Genocide." and I would like to share with my colleagues excerpts from that article: As the Nazis marched across Europe in 1939 and 1940. a Unitarian minister from Massachusetts and his wife rushed into the coming Holocaust to save Jews and other refugees. including scores of children. When they set out for Europe in January 1939. Germany had seized the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia and refugees were flowing across the continent. The American Unitarian Association asked numerous ministers to go to Europe before Waitstill. 37. and his social worker wife. Martha. 33. agreed. Prague. Czechoslovakia was home to one of the worlds largest Unitarian congregations. which was helping refugees of all stripesJews. trade unionists. political dissenters. and others. The Sharps arrived to lend a hand in February 1939. and one month later. the city was occupied by the Nazis. On March 15. 1939. the day the Germans took Prague.
Keywords matched
refugees