Leo Bretholz – Sandy Rosenberg

Covering Their Tracks

January 25, 2024 | by delsandy | Uncategorized | No Comments

I don’t often listen to podcasts.

“Covering Their Tracks” will be an exception.

It tells the story of Leo Bretholz, who escaped from a train taking him to a Nazi death camp.

I learned about the podcast today from Raphael Prober, one of the lawyer/lobbyists I worked with on this issue.

My response to him follows:

Rafi,

It continues to be one of the greatest honors of my legislative career that you and Aaron [Greenfield] asked me to be the sponsor of the bill imposing responsibility on the French Railroad for its role in transporting to their death Jews and members of other minorities despised by the Nazis.

But not Leo Bretholz. A real hero.

Several months after our bill passed, I visited Nuremberg, site of the Nazi war crimes trial. At the end of a day of touring, my guide said, “You have wanted to come here for quite some time.”

“Only since I worked on this legislation this past winter,” I replied.

But I soon realized that I had wanted to come to Nuremberg ever since my Constitutional Law class taught by Telford Taylor, as you know, a chief prosecutor at Nuremberg.

I will listen to the podcast later today. https://www.tabletmag.com/podcasts/covering-their-tracks

Sandy

The stories Leo Bretholz told

March 11, 2014 | by delsandy | featured, Sandy's 2014 Legislative Diary | No Comments

Leo Bretholz leapt to freedom after bending two parallel bars on a railroad car headed to a Nazi concentration camp.

He spent much of the rest of his life telling his story.

I was honored that he was a witness for my 2011 legislation that required the French national railroad (SNCF), Leo’s transporter to the German border, to make its World War II archives available to the public.

The American and French governments are now in serious negotiations about reparations for Americans like Leo who were taken by SNCF to Germany.

The Rev. Robert E. Albright became a longtime friend of Leo.

Rev. Albright eulogized him today and “all those whose story Leo told.”

On the funeral home website, I wrote:

Leo was an extraordinary human being. His perseverance, commitment, and sense of humor never faltered.

He left us so close to achieving his life’s objective.

I’ll survive it.

March 3, 2011 | by delsandy | Sandy's 2011 Legislative Diary | No Comments

“There was one bucket in the middle of the cattle car for 50 people,” Leo Bretholz told me.

Leo was sitting next to me at the witness table today.

Seventy years ago, he was in a railroad car, heading from France to the Nazi death camps. Leo escaped, but thousands of others did not.

They were transported on cars owned by the Railroad of France. That business now owns a majority interest in a company that has bid to run the MARC train commuter line.

My legislation would require the company to disclose information in its records relating to the jewelry, books, family heirlooms, and other precious property, such as Leo’s stamp collection, that it confiscated from these people.

Leo testified that he was given a receipt when he surrendered his belongings. The company said it had no records of anyone’s possessions.

Committee members had many questions, far more than the norm at a hearing in Annapolis. They reflected a great understanding of and interest in the issues raised by my bill.

The chairman asked company officials, “Why don’t you make the investment that would make the information in your archives available to the people who are requesting it?”

Two hours after the hearing began, someone asked Leo if he was tired.

“I’ll survive it,” he responded.

March 3