Kricioner, Shmuel (Mali)

Son of Leah and Carl. He was born on the 8th of Sivan (23.5.1923) in the village of Oberlatersdorf in Austria, the fourth son of the only Jewish family in the village, and his parents gave their children a traditional Jewish education and sent them to religious studies and synagogue two hours’ walk from their home. He joined the Zionist youth movement in 1939. He joined the “Aliyat Hanoar” youth movement in Eretz Israel and joined the Zionist youth movement in 1938. After the outbreak of World War II, he felt compelled to participate actively in the war against the Nazis, and was drafted into the British army in 1941. He was sent to Egypt and participated in battles in Africa in 1941. In late April 1943, ships were sent to Europe in order to participate in the planned invasion of Europe. One of the ships, the Aryanpura, was bombed by a German plane. One hundred and forty of the company’s soldiers drowned with their ship. Shmuel was an excellent swimmer and apparently aided his drowning friends, but in the course of his efforts to save them he found his death. He left three brothers and a sister. His name is mentioned in “The Soldier’s Handbook”, in the “Journalist’s Book”, in “The Book of Volunteerism” and in the book “Yizkor” published by the Jabotinsky Institute. In the military cemetery on Mount Herzl in Jerusalem, a ship-shaped monument was erected in memory of the “Aryanpora” and next to it is a water pool with the names of the fallen engraved on the bottom.