Holocaust hero swapped places with Jew

PRIME Minister Gordon Brown yesterday met a remarkable Holocaust survivor, who exchanged places with a Jewish inmate at Auschwitz to find out what was happening in the death camp.

Denis Avey, 91, was a prisoner of war at Auschwitz-Birkenau when he twice swapped clothes with the inmate to smuggle himself into the Jewish part of the camp on a fact-finding mission.

While the Jewish prisoner received food and rest in the British camp, Mr Avey befriended another inmate, Ernst Lobethall, and provided him with cigarettes and chocolates. These contributed to his survival, though he never knew the name of the British soldier who helped him to live.

After meeting Mr Avey at 10 Downing Street at an event to mark the 65th anniversary of the liberation of the extermination camp, Mr Brown said: "As we approach Holocaust Memorial Day, it is people like Denis Avey and his extraordinary acts of kindness that give us hope for the future."