Has Anyone Ever Heard of a Man Named Walter Wolff ?

[cjd]

I was invited today to a Sons of Italy Hall where they had a Holocaust survivor speak. He was a German Jew who after being sent to Dachau managed to gain release to come to America for schooling however  due to quotas was refused admittance into the U.S at the last minute.
He ended up in Italy where he and many other Jews survived the war due to the help of the Italian people. He claimed that he and many other Jews were taken to a  camp in Italy called Campagna in the Provence of Salerno where it was possible to live an almost normal existence thanks to the help of the local people and some ingenuity on his part.
A very interesting old man who spoke for about an hour in the most articulate fashion despite the fact he is now over 90. I bought an interesting book written by him  Bad Times Good People   A Holocaust Survivor Recounts His Life in Italy During WWII By Walter Wolff
I will try to scan some of the more interesting material if anyone is interested and post it however I have never tried to do that yet and would have to go by trial and error. I found a clip on the web from a while back on this man that gives an overview.
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It may not be clear from the article below, but according to the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles, NONE of the approximately 40,000 Jews that were Italian CITIZENS were ever detained or interred.
Hundreds of thousands of REFUGEE Jews mostly from Germany/Austria chose a hospitable Trieste, Italy, as an escape route. Italy was so hospitable that thousands choose not to flee, but to stay in Italy. When Italy became an ally of the Germans, the Germans insisted that Germans/Austrian citizens be returned to Germany. The Italians balked at returning the German/Austrian Refugees, and compromised by promising to Intern them, which was done in halfhearted measures.
Not a single Jewish Refugee was returned to Germany from Italy, UNTIL Italy surrendered and the Germans occupied Italy. Then, sadly the Germans deported  6,815 Jews from Italy, of whom only 799 survived.
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Thanks to Larry Giantomas of Marquette University  Milwaukee Wis. via H-ITAM

HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR  CREDITS COMPASSIONATE ITALIANS

Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel
By Don Behn
July 22,  2002

Walter Wolff, A German Jew now living in New York came to Festa Italiana on
Sunday to tell Americans that he and his family survived the Holocaust only
because they were allowed to enter Italy, where citizens later hid them from
Nazi soldiers.

Though Italy's resistance to Hitler's persecution of Jews is not widely
known, Wolff insisted that the Holocaust's death toll would have been higher
if that nation had agreed to deport Jew to German concentration camps early
in the war.

Wolff, 85, speaks publicly about the role of Italians in saving the lives of
Jews because he hopes the stories will help prevent a future Holocaust.

"We have to combat discrimination when it starts" Wolff told a late afternoon
group of about 50.

"If we don't, it will ultimately involve us".

Wolff and his older brother had been imprisoned in separate concentration
camps in Germany in late 1938 but were released about a year later - likely
because Wolff had been accepted at a Hebrew College in Illinois. The release
came with the condition that the family leave Germany.

Even so, the U.S. Embassy in Germany denied the family's request for visas,
Wolff recalled. But Italy allowed them in just before the start of World War II.

In June 1940 when Italian Dictator Benito Mussolini joined the war, Jews
living in Italy were taken to Internment camps but not shipped to Germany.

At camp they were allowed to stay together as families and even leave the camps,
Wolff said. But shortly after the Italian army surrendered to the U.S. and it allies
in 1943, Hitler's armies invaded Italy.

Nazi's ordered the arrest of Jews but few Italians complied, Wolff said.
He describes the Italians he met as "the good people" who lived by the creed
"to love thy neighbor as thyself".

One night, an Italian police officer warned his family that they were
scheduled to be arrested the next morning. With the help of their landlord
and others, the Wolff's fled to the mountains.

A Catholic priest and local Italian officials risked their lives to help
Wolff gain false identification papers.  He assumed the identity of an
Italian soldier. began working for an oil company in Milan and was never
turned over to the Nazis.

Wolff published a book on his experience - "Bad Times, Good People"  - in
1999. An Italian language edition of the book was release last week