Suzanne Rappaport Ripton obituary: Holocaust survivor who was saved by her neighbour and settled in Leeds dies aged 88

Suzanne was six when French police and the SS came to arrest her parents, Millie and Joseph Rappaport. They were Jewish but not religiously inclined. Nevertheless, they had to register at the local police station where they were issued yellow stars to identify themselves.

The story of their arrest was ingrained in her and informed her later involvement with Holocaust education, for which she was awarded the British Empire medal two years ago.

It was in July 1942 that they heard the bang at the door. “Everybody in the bedroom,” ordered her father and he locked all the doors as Millie pushed their daughter under the bed. When no-one answered the door, it was broken down with an axe.

In the commotion, the family’s neighbour, Madame Collomb, entered the apartment and said: “What’s my child doing here?” She took Suzanne’s hand and led her out of the apartment. The little girl never saw her mother or father again.

Madame Collomb hid Suzanne under her kitchen table covered with a tablecloth and told her not to make a sound. Eventually she was smuggled away to the village of Mondoubleau, deep in the French countryside. Still only six, her foster mother put her to work as a farm labourer, making her take on hard physical work in all weathers without proper clothes or regular meals.

When the war ended, the farm wanted to keep her, considering her “useful”, but the Red Cross decided to send her back to Paris and then to England, where she was housed with a family in Newcastle who treated her like a skivvy.

At age 15, she managed to find a job and saved enough to buy a train ticket to London, where she made her new life. She worked at Selfridges and Barkers department stores in the West End and later married and had two children.

Suzanne was a founder member of the Holocaust Survivors’ Friendship Association, which later became the Holocaust Centre North in Huddersfield. For her last 13 years she was a resident at the Leeds Jewish Housing Association.

Madame Collomb, who died in 1997, was recognized as one of the Righteous Among the Nations by the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem for her bravery in saving Suzanne.