Prince William Hears 96-Year-Old Auschwitz Survivor’s Astonishing Story — and Sees the Badge That Saved His Life

Prince William recalled his visit to a Nazi concentration camp earlier this year as “eye-opening” and “very sobering” when he met an Auschwitz survivor on Thursday.

Visiting the Imperial War Museum in London, William met 96-year-old Freddie Knoller, who survived the Nazi concentration camps at Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen.

Freddie (centre) told The Duke how he was arrested in October 1943 and sent to Auschwitz, the German Nazi concentration camp. http://pic.twitter.com/57KpoCNCsV

— Kensington Palace (@KensingtonRoyal) September 28, 2017

William told Knoller and WWII veterans Ted Cordery and John Harrison, “Catherine and I were in Poland earlier this year, we had a very eye-opening tour around Stutthof camp. It was very sobering.”

William, 35, has just been made President of the Imperial War Museum Foundation and visited on Thursday to view the progress on the second phase of their $45 million renovation project, which is set to open in 2020.

Read more about The Duke of Cambridge's visit to @I_W_M and these three incredible stories here: http://bit.ly/2ftPhfn http://pic.twitter.com/rtYjwvk4g6

— Kensington Palace (@KensingtonRoyal) September 28, 2017

Knoller showed William a badge that he used to escape death in early 1945 while on a death March from Auschwitz.

He replaced the yellow star that all Jews were forced to wear by the Nazis with the badge from the uniform of a dead French prisoner. As a result, he was sent to Dora concentration camp for slave labor before ending up in Bergen-Belsen, where he was liberated by the British.

The prince looked at the badge, which now forms part of the museum’s exhibition, asking Knoller, “How did you get it off, you tore it off?”

Knoller later told reporters, “I showed him my striped uniform. This saved my life because it doesn’t show the number of a Jew, but of a French political prisoner. When I put it on, they thought I was a French political prisoner.

“I don’t want the world to forget that six million Jews were murdered by the Nazis. This is why I tell the story. I showed him my patch, he was amazed actually.”

Knoller  also pointed out his wife Freda, 88, in the crowd and William beckoned her over. After they had met, Knoller told William, “I love her” to which the prince smiled. “Me and my wife, we’ve been married for 67 years and I’m still in love with her,” he said.

The museum in south London remained open to the public today, and excited school children waved to the prince as he arrived to look around. As William met the veterans and survivor, crowds gathered on the stairs behind him to capture the visit on their camera phones.

The new galleries will draw on the personal stories in the museum’s collection to reflect the horrors of the Holocaust and the realities of fighting in WWII.