Bidwell John - Shores beyond shores: from Holocaust to hope: my true story

Young Reni, a girl on the precipice of adolescence, takes us through the darkest days of the Holocaust and her budding understanding of the human spirit. What I found was heart, courage, tenderness, and hope. Not since the Diary of Anne Frank, have I been so touched by a book that grapples with the dark abyss of the human condition during the Holocaust. This book is a revelation about what sustains the human spirit, what is far stronger than hate.

J ACQUELINE S HEEHAN

NYTimes bestselling author

In this striking memoir, Irene Butter gives us the sweep of catastrophic history through her child eyes. Taking the reader from black zigzags to cattle cars, from Berlin to Amsterdam to Westerbork to Bergen-Belsen to Algeria, and finally to the United States, young Reni shares the ordinary and the unimaginable with stunning detail, with generosity, with hope. Irene Butters beliefs that one should never be an enemy and never be a bystander are important lessons for us to understand the past and to act in the world of today.

E LLEN M EEROPOL

Author of Kinship of Clover, named One of the best books from Indie Publishers in 2017 by PBS

Irene Butter paints a gripping picture of a girls sense of self in the Holocaust. German-Jewish through birth and heritage, stateless through persecution, and Dutch and American through refuge, Butter invites us to walk with her on the vulnerable journey of forging her young identity. In a time of resurging racism and xenophobia, the book forces the reader to consider what happens when adult dehumanization shapes the real life of a real child. The book bears witness to pre-war Germany, occupied Amsterdam, and the Bergen-Belsen of Anne Frank, and shares the warning of the Diary of Anne Frank: we lose our humanity when children are forced to normalize hatred.

A NNEMARIE T OEBOSCH

Director of Dutch and Flemish Studies, Lecturer of Anne Frank in Context

University of Michigan

As Holocaust memory moves into an uncertain future, Irene Butters memoir will play an important role in keeping memory of the event alive. It also serves as a testament to one persons ability to build a life of meaning and hope in the wake of this horrible event.

J AMIE L. W RAIGHT , P H D

Director, The Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

University of Michigan-Dearborn

Dr. Irene Butter is a remarkable woman who made a conscious decision to be a survivor, not a victim of the Holocaust. Her story has an inestimable impact on students. They witness her dedication to live a meaningful life of activism based on her belief that we can make the world a better place.

S UZANNE H OPKINS

Saline Middle School, retired educator

Saline, Michigan

For many years Irene Hasenberg Butter did not speak of her own experience of the Holocaust but like her brother, Werner, got on with the headlong rush of making a new life in the United States. After the treachery and horror of the Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp, learning to live as Holocaust survivors was work enough. With this book, Irene has given the world a deeply personal account of her own familys experience that bravely reveals how much all the terrible losses of the Holocaust meant not just in World War II but, sadly, today as well.

J AN J ARBOE R USSELL

Author, The Train To Crystal City

Across these eloquent pages, Irene keeps readers by her side as we follow her childhood journey from Berlin to the shadow of German occupation in Amsterdam and into the darkness of the Holocaust. All will be riveted by the voice of Irene, whose love for her parents and brother, Werner, becomes the steady light for her courage. Unlike her friend Anne Frank, whom she sees for the last time in Bergen-Belsen, Reni survives evil and at age fifteen sails into Baltimores harbor aboard a Liberty ship on Christmas Eve, 1945, with a resilience that still guides her important work with students in the 21st century.

L OUISE B ORDEN

Author, His Name Was Raoul Wallenberg

Refusing to be an enemy is a choice we must make. Few people understand that stance with as much conviction as Irene Butter, who shares her incredible life story in this powerful and lyrically written memoir. Butter has faced a lifetime of choices, from her childhood during the depths of Holocaust to today. Reading Shores Beyond Shores reminds me yet again of Irenes indomitable spirit and her gift of seeking light amidst lifes darkest hours.

R OBIN A XELROD , LMSW, JD

Director of Education

Holocaust Memorial Center, Zekelman Family Campus

Distances of time, circumstance, age, and background disappeared every time Irene spoke with groups of three hundred students over eighteen years at our middle school. Irenes thoughtful answers to intimate questions revealed new aspects and insights each year. Eyes of innocence and bravery describing her past then become heartfelt gazes of young people looking deep into themselves and finding compassion, tolerance, and perseverance. Inspiration to always fill the world with love and hope.

J ONATHAN B ERGER

English Language Arts Teacher

Discovery Middle School

Canton, Michigan

SHORES BEYOND SHORES

SHORES BEYOND SHORES

from Holocaust to Hope

My True Story

Irene Butter

with John D. Bidwell and Kris Holloway

White River Press

Amherst, Massachusetts

Shores Beyond Shores: From Holocaust to Hope, My True Story

2018 Irene Butter, John D. Bidwell, and Kris Holloway

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced or used in any form, or by any means, without prior written permission of the publisher.

First published 2018

White River Press

P.O. Box 3561

Amherst, MA 01004

whiteriverpress.com

Book and cover design: John D. Bidwell

Cover photo finishing: Jim Gipe/Pivot Media

Photo credits: Irene Butter and John D. Bidwell

ISBN: 978-1-935052-70-8 (paperback)

978-1-887043-36-6 (ebook)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Butter, Irene H. (Irene Hasenberg), 1930- author. | Bidwell, John, author. | Holloway, Kris, author.

Title: Shores beyond shores : from Holocaust to hope : my true story / Irene Butter, John D. Bidwell, and Kris Holloway.

Description: Amherst, Massachusetts : White River Press, 2018 |

Identifiers: LCCN 2017043082 (print) | LCCN 2017043622 (ebook) | ISBN 9781887043366 () | ISBN 9781935052708 (pbk. : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: Butter, Irene H. (Irene Hasenberg), 1930- | Jews--Germany--Berlin--Biography. | Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)--Germany--Berlin--Personal narratives. | Jewish children in the Holocaust. | Berlin (Germany)--Biography.

Classification: LCC DS134.42 (ebook) | LCC DS134.42 .B88 2018 (print) | DDC 940.53/18092 [B] --dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017043082

In memory of my Pappi, my hero, my idol,

who did everything possible to save his family.

His life was taken when I was a child, only fourteen years old.

With awe I have felt his presence, his protection,

and his loving guidance throughout my life.

Contents

When I got off the ship that brought me to the United States in 1945, the American relatives who took me in urged me to forget everything that had happened to my familyand to mein the Holocaust. They told me to never think or speak of it again. I was fifteen years old and they were adults, so I listened to them. For forty years I was quiet. I was not truly free until I started to tell what happened to me as a child. Here is my story.