The Holocaust Educational Trust is deeply saddened to learn of the passing of Holocaust survivor Sabina Miller BEM.
Sabina was born on 20 June 1922 in Warsaw. She survived the Warsaw Ghetto, where both of her parents died of typhus, before escaping to the nearby town of Sokołów, where she was forced to work as a slave labourer on a local farm. Sabina then had another miraculous escape when the Polish farm manager warned her and the other Jewish workers that deportations to Treblinka extermination camp were imminent. She spent the next few months hiding in local forests, living in a hole during the day and coming out at night to beg for food from farmers. Eventually, she accepted a proposal from a Polish famer’s family to take on the identity of their daughter, who had been called up for forced labour in Germany: Sabina would go instead of her, hoping to survive the war by pretending to be Polish. Because Sabina was so unwell, the Germans declared her unfit to work but she then swapped identities with another Polish woman who did not want to be sent to work in Germany. Although she was briefly arrested and interrogated on suspicion of being Jewish, Sabina eventually made her way to Germany, where she survived the rest of the war, still using the identity of the Polish woman.
Sabina remained in Germany in the immediate aftermath of the war before coming in 1947, where she married and built a family. She was the only member of her immediate family to survive the Holocaust, although she never learned the exact fates of her siblings.
Karen Pollock MBE, Chief Executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust, said:
“Sabina Miller BEM was a remarkable woman. It is sad to hear the news of her passing. It is up to us to ensure her legacy and testimony lives on for future generations to understand the Holocaust for years to come.”