Holocaust Memorial Day has been held in the UK since 2001 and the United Nations declared this an International event in November 2005. 27 January was chosen as the date for HMD because it was on this date in 1945 that the largest Nazi killing camp Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated. The theme for 2011’s Holocaust Memorial Day is Untold Stories.

The British Library holds several key oral history collections documenting Jewish experiences in Britain, including testimonies of pre-Second World War Jewish refugees to Britain, those fleeing from Nazi persecution during the Second World War, and Holocaust survivors and their children.   

All of the collections are available to listen to onsite at the British Library.  In addition, 66 of the personal testimonies from The Living Memory of the Jewish Community have been made available online via the Jewish Survivors of the Holocaust package on Archival Sound Recordings.  An online education resource, Voices of the Holocaust, is also based on the collection.