Soldiers eating at Passover Seder

Held by

Montreal Holocaust Museum via Canadian Jewish Heritage Network (incl. Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives)

Dates

1942 (indexed as 1942)

Level

item

Extent

Photograph : paper : photography ; Ht: 8 cm x W: 13,3 cm

Scope & content

b&w, white border. Indoors. Group of Polish Army soldiers in training and a few civilians sharing Passover seder at U-shaped tables. In the front, second from right, is WIllie Glaser (wearing glasses). In the center, at the back table is Rabbi Major H. Melcer, the senior chaplain, wearing a white shawl. Second next to Melcer’s left is Captain Rabbi Heszel Klepfisz. Narrative: German-born Polish Jew Willie Glaser escaped Nazi Germany to be reunited with his sister in Belfast. His sister had been part of Kindertransport. In 1941, aged 20 years old, Willie enrolled in the Polish Army. In 1943, Willie Glaser was transferred to the First Polish Armoured division. On August 8, 1944, the First Polish Armoured division became an integral unit of the First Canadian Army and Willie Glaser landed along with Canadian soldiers in Normandy. From Juno beachhead they moved to Caen. Willie took part in the liberation of France, Belgium and the Netherlands. Rabbi Major H. Melcer, the senior chaplain, stayed behind in the United Kingdom. Heszel Klepfisz was born into a rabbinical family near Warsaw in 1910. He studied philosophy, history and literature at universities in Warsaw, Brussels and Zurich and earned a Ph.D. in Philosophy. By the age of 19, he began writing articles in the Jewish newspapers attacking anti-Semitism in Poland. He was one of the first to warn of the menace of fascism in 1933. During World War II, Dr. Klepfisz served as a military chaplain, with the rank of Major, in the First Polish Armoured division. He fought in the Netherlands, Belgium and France. After the war, Dr. Klepfisz became Chief Rabbi of Panama. There, he was appointed Professor of Judaic Studies and History at the University of Panama. He also helped negotiate the return of the Panama Canal Zone by the United States to Panama. Dr. Klepfisz died in Israel at the age of 95.

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Genre / form

graphic material

Format

Photograph

In the picture

BottleClergyDiningGroup PortraitIndoor EventInterior ViewJewish CommunityManMilitaryRabbiReligious CeremonySoldierTableUniformTagged automatically by a vision model; may contain mistakes.

Text in the image

cjhn.caRead automatically; may contain mistakes.

Harvested

2026-10-19T03:21:16Z · source datestamp n/a · andornot

Digital objects at the source

• imageOpen original at source ↗2010-12-07.jpg
• imageOpen original at source ↗2010-12-07b.jpg