Alicia After the War
During the war, Alicia saved two groups of Russian partisans and was awarded a medal for heroism by the Russians. The war was now over. The Holocaust was over. The few Jewish people who had survived tried to reconnect with the world. In her book, Alicia: My Story, Alicia continues to tell, how as an adolescent girl, out of sheer determination to help save the remnants of her people, she began caring for Jewish orphans who had survived the death camps. Alicia also began to work with the underground organization “Breecha”, which smuggled Jews across borders to the West and, for many, the “Eretz Israel”. After an illness and stay at an UNRR displaced persons camp and a school for orphans in Belgium, she embarked on an “illegal” ship from Marseilles to Haifa, was captured and interned in a British camp in Cyprus. She eventually arrived in the new State of Israel – but only to find herself once more in a war – the Israeli War of Independence , this time as a soldier.
Alicia Today
Alicia’s story, thank God, has a happy ending. Alicia met an American, Gabriel Appleman in Israel and they were married. Gabriel and Alicia now live happily in California and have 3 grown children. She, with her husband’s support, spends her energy today memorializing what happened to the Jews of Europe during the Holocaust.
Alicia’s autobiography, Alicia: My Story, was first published by Bantam Books in 1988 and is still in print. The book won the 1989 Christopher Award for works, which affirm the high values of the human spirit. The book also won the French LICRA award for Heroism, given by the Ministry of Human Action. It was a featured alternate of the Literary Guild and has been published in foreign language editions in Sweden, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Holland and Switzerland
In this book, Alicia tells of her family and friends who are representative of over one million people who did not die in camps, but were murdered at open graves, in their homes or on the streets or died as partisans fighting the Germans and their collaborators. Alicia tells of very heroic children in the ghettos of Buczacz and Kopechince in what was then Poland. Their bravery and sacrifices serving as shining examples for the youth of today the millions of her people who did not survive compel her to tell the story. Her book, Alicia: My Story is used as a textbook in many schools in the United States and Canada. Alicia, herself, travels throughout the United States and Canada to tell her story. She does not ask a fee for her lectures. Hosts are only requested to provide transportation, lodging and meals.
Alicia wants her audiences to know that Jews, adults, teenagers and even small children did fight the Germans murderers, some actively, others by saving lives. She fights hatred, bigotry and anti-Semitism.
In the conclusion of her book, Alicia writes:
Through the story of ‘Alicia’, I wish to reach out, not only to survivors like myself, but also to all people. I hope that it will help strengthen today’s youth by imparting a better understanding of the true history of my entire generation. I believe my book can teach young people what enormous reserves of strength they possess within themselves. I pray that it’s readers, Jew and non-Jew alike, may unite in the resolve that evil forces will never again be permitted to set one people against another
The world depends on people like Alicia…who still today, are heroes and survivors…for they march-on, telling the story of the Holocaust. They must help all of us to never forget what was done – what happened. Alicia Appleman-Jurman is a person who we can all look to and through tearful eyes, we say to her “Thank You, Alicia” for telling us what happened. Thank you for bearing witness. Thank you for refusing to let the Jewish people of Europe is forgotten. Alicia not only deserves our admiration and respect…but she deserves the deepest empathetic love we are capable of giving.
Ms. Appleman-Jurman presently tours appropriate institutions on invitation in the U.S. Through her speaking engagements and her book, Alicia memorializes the victims of the Holocaust, yet simultaneously, Alicia is able, through her vitality and love, to impart the message of the power and victory of the human spirit when placed against adversity.
To inquire about engaging Ms. Appleman-Jurman to speak at your institution or group, feel free to email her husband, Gabriel Appleman.