The rail entry to Auschwitz taken by editor Margaret Graham in 2015

Today , 27th January, marks Holocaust Memorial Day, on which we  remember the horror that was the Holocaust. On this day I would like to tell you all about a man call Frank Foley.

Major Francis (Frank) Edward Foley was born on 24 November 1884 in my hometown of Highbridge, Somerset.

But who was he and why is he a hero ? Well he was a British Secret Intelligence Service officer. And as a passport control officer for the British embassy in Berlin, Foley helped over ten thousand Jewish individuals flee from Nazi Germany. 

At the 1961 trial of former ranking Nazi Adolf Eichmann, Frank Foley was described as a “Scarlet Pimpernel” for the way he risked his own life to save Jews threatened with death by the Nazis. This courage was sustained day after day despite the fact he had no diplomatic immunity and could be discovered and arrested at any time, Foley would bend the rules when stamping passports and issuing visas, to allow Jews to escape to Britain or Palestine, which at the time was controlled by the British.

Occasionally he went even further and went to internment camps himself in order to get Jews out, hiding them in his home, and helping them obtain forged passports. One Jewish aid worker estimated that he saved “tens of thousands” of people from the ravages of the Holocaust.

I can not imagine the amount of courage it must have taken him to do this time and time again under the Nazis noses.

Frank Foley is a national treasure, his story is taught at the school that my children attend and they are blown away with how many people he saved, as am I. He is a inspiration to us all. Highbridge remembers him and this is evident by a main road in the town called Frank Foley Parkway and having a beautiful statue of Foley stamping a passport whilst being embraced by a child.

We will never forget the Holocaust and may we never forget heroes like Frank Foley November 1884 – May 1958. May he rest in peace.