SCOTTISH trade unionists left for Auschwitz yesterday – to commemorate a Scottish missionary who died in the nazi concentration camp.

Jane Haining moved to Budapest in 1932 to become matron of the girls' home at the Church of Scotland mission school in the city – where many Jewish girls were educated.

As anti-semitism rose across Europe, the Church of Scotland repeatedly urged Ms Haining to come home.

She refused, writing back: "If these children needed me in days of sunshine, how much more do they need me in these days of darkness?”

In 1944, she was arrested by the Gestapo, accused of spying for Britain. She died after two months of incarceration at Auschwitz – where 12,000 Hungarian Jews were being sent to their deaths every day by 1944.

The delegation from Unison Scotland has been accompanied by Ms Haining’s niece Dierdre McDowell.

Unison Renfrewshire branch secretary Mark Ferguson said: “Observing first-hand the atrocities that took place instils a responsibility on us all to ensure future generations do not repeat these murderous acts.”

The activists will attend a memorial service in Birkenau, where Ms McDowell will lay a wreath.