HARWICH'S High Lighthouse will be bathed in purple light to pay tribute to those who lost their lives in the Holocaust.
Harwich Town Council will commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day at the Kindertransport memorial.
January 27 marks the date on which the Auschwitz concentration camp was liberated in 1945.
However, due to when Saturday, the Jewish sabbath, falls this year, the commemoration will take place on Friday January 26 at 11am at the Kindertransport memorial.
Harwich Town Council has also commissioned the illumination of the High Lighthouse to be purple - the colour of Holocaust Memorial Day (HMD) - over the nights of the January 26, 27, and 28.
Councillor Garry Calver, who revealed after last year's commemoration that he wanted the town to now mark the event every year, said: “Harwich’s involvement in the Kindertransport is a proud part of our town’s history and resulted in the wonderful memorial on Harwich Quay
“The memorial now offers us a fitting setting at which to commemorate Holocaust Memorial Day and we will welcome everyone who wishes to be part of that commemoration.”
Mr Calver also said that the council was grateful to the Harwich Society for its assistance in enabling the illumination of the lighthouse.
Harwich Kindertransport Memorial and Learning Trust, who are also arranging the ceremony, will be staging an exhibition about the Kindertransport at the Harwich Arts and Heritage centre from January 24 to 31.
The free-of-charge exhibition follows the extraordinary life story of Leslie Brent who arrived at Harwich on the very first Kindertransport on December 2 1938 and spent many weeks at the Warners’ Dovercourt Bay holiday camp.
The Kindertransport - German for children’s transport - was when nearly 10,000 children from Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, and the Free City of Danzig were rescued and moved to Britain in 1938 and 1939.
All are welcome to the commemoration at the Kindertransport memorial.
While opening times for the exhibition are as follows:
Wednesday 24: 11am – 15.45pm
Thursday 25: 10am-15.45pm
Friday 26: 10am-15.45pm
Saturday 27: 10am-15.00pm
Monday 29: 10am-15.45pm
Tuesday 30: 10am-15.45pm
Wednesday 31: 10am-15.30pm
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