A SILENT few turned out to hold a candlelit vigil at Clifford's Tower to mark Holocaust Memorial Day.

The vigil was organised at the tower last night because of its role in one of York's darkest periods of history when about 150 Jews died there after being trapped by a baying mob in 1190.

Some killed themselves while others where massacred and the day went down in history as one of the most horrific anti-semitic events in the history of English Jewry.

Organiser Ben Drake, of York Unity, the York branch of Unite Against Fascism, said the vigil was also to remember other victims of the Nazis not just Jews.

At 6.30pm the gathering headed off as part of a torchlit procession across Castle Mills Bridge and up Fishergate and Heslington Road to the University of York where a meeting was held.

Updated: 09:54 Friday, January 27, 2006