The miraculous escape of Marion Miliband
Polish-born mother of David and Ed survived the Holocaust as many of those around her died, and arrived in England aged 12
London: Marion Miliband smiles for the camera while on holiday in Scotland. Her two beloved sons, David and Ed, the first brothers in Britain's Cabinet for more than 70 years and now leadership rivals for the Labour Party, are at her side along with her sister and her husband Ralph.
It is a photograph taken almost a quarter of a century ago that shows an ordinary family enjoying an everyday holiday. But the upbringing of both Marion and Ralph could not have been more different from the stable, loving home they gave their children. Both of them Jewish, they separately fled the Nazis.
Ralph, who would go on to become one of Britain's most celebrated Left-wing intellectuals, fled his home in 1940 accompanied by his father. They walked from Brussels to Ostend, where they caught the last boat to Britain before Belgium was overrun by Nazi Germany.
Marion's story has never been properly told, and she is reluctant to speak about it publicly. Her's is a journey of survival through occupied Poland that relied on help from a German factory boss, nuns in a convent and others.
As one source close to the family put it: "It is an extraordinary story and you can draw your own conclusions about how this has shaped David and Ed's lives. Their mum's background has given them a toughness but also a sense of fairness."
According to Polish records, Marion, now 75, was born Dobra Jenta Kozak in 1934, the daughter of wealthy Jewish parents, in the town of Czestochowa in Poland. For the first six years of her life Marion, along with her sister Hadassa, were secure and comfortable.
Marion's grandparents, Adela and Mosiek Kozak, moved into the family home for safety. Marion, her sister and her mother went into hiding, from that point on their lives in constant danger. Her father stayed behind to look after his parents who were too frail to flee. In July 1943, Adela was murdered by the Germans, she was probably shot, while Mosiek was almost certainly killed at the same time.
Marion's survival is all the more remarkable. Sigmund Rolat, now a wealthy New York philanthropist who heads the World Society of Czestochowa Jews, has told The Sunday Telegraph he is convinced Marion Kozak was in a party with him that had a miraculous escape in June 1943.
"I was the last one of some 30 children, standing in a line waiting to board the truck that would take us to the cemetery for execution," he said.
"At that point, Dr Litt, a German who ran a munitions factory, walked over and said, ‘I will take the children. One of those children who was saved that day was the mother of David Miliband."
On another occasion, nuns in a convent took the Kozaks in and hid them from the Nazis.
In 1947, Marion, aged 12, was sent to Britain through a Jewish organisation. She was very bright and gained entrance to university at the normal age, later meeting Ralph Miliband, whose classes she took while a student at the London School of Economics.
