Kate, Duchess of Cambridge, 38, and Prince William, 37, were among senior royals to attend events marking 75 years since the liberation of Auschwitz on Monday. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge attended a moving service at Central Hall, Westminster to commemorate victims of Nazi persecution and genocide.

The Holocaust Memorial Day service included a candle-lighting ceremony in which 75 candles were lit in the hall to signify the number of years since the Polish concentration camp Auschwitz was liberated.

Following the service, Kate and William met survivors of genocide and some of those who spoke during the service.

Among them were Holocaust survivors and well as those who had survived subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur.

Speaking to a group following the service, Kate revealed how it had moved her.

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She said: “It was so emotional, so many moving stories.”

Kate thanked another group for sharing their heartbreaking stories and said she was humbled by them.

She said: “It’s so humbling to hear the gratitude from people, despite what you have gone through. It’s heartbreaking to hear.”

Speaking to Stutthof camp survivor Manfred Goldberg, 89, Kate said: ”When you hear the stories of an individual it becomes easier to understand this better.”

“And it has taken a while for everybody to be able to speak.

She added: “It’s hard to stand up there and do that.

“I’m really interested in intergenerational trauma and how it affects a family. It’s so important.”

Addressing Mala Tribich, 89, who had spoken on stage of her experience of surviving Bergen-Belsen, Kate said how she had explained the Holocaust to her children.

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She said: “We were talking to the children about it earlier today.

“But we have to be, you know, for a six year old… the interpretation.”

She added: “You were fantastic.”

Asking about how she tells her story to schoolchildren, Kate asked: “Do your experiences resonate with them?”

“Do they feel they can do something for their generation?

“So many families are totally torn apart by the trauma and how that plays out over the generations.”

As patron of the Royal Photographic Society Kate up with the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust, and Jewish News for a special collaborative project.

The Duchess is a talented photographer and took striking portraits of Holocaust survivors Steven Frank, 84, and Yvonne Bernstein, 82, for a special exhibition to commemorate 75 years since the horrific event.

Kate described Yvonne and Steven as “two of the most life-affirming people that I have had the privilege to meet”.

She photographed Yvonne and Steven in Kensington Palace alongside their grandchildren.

The powerful portraits were inspired by 17th Dutch painter Vermeer and Kate position her subjects by an east-facing window, so they were position towards Israel.

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