Between the years of 1939 and 1945 more than 11 million people were killed by the Nazis in World War II. More than two-thirds of all the Jewish people in Europe were killed during this time. Almost 2 million children were taken from their families, their homes, and then after being transported to concentration camps, were separated from their parents and loved ones and then gassed to death and their bodies burned in furnaces.
After the Allied forces invaded Germany and Poland they found the remnants of lost lives and childhoods- Toys, dolls and teddy bears left behind, diaries drawings and letters of hope and ultimately fear. These are children who would never have a chance to experience even the simple pleasures of life we often take for granted. For these terrified young children, as they wept at night in cold bunkers of work camps, they would never see their mothers or fathers again, there would never be a high school dance, a date, a baseball game, school and the chance to have a family and children of their own. Many of these children of the holocaust would still be alive today.
