Czech refugees came to live in Beaconsfield, Wendover, Berkhamsted and other places in the area. Some of these escaped through Poland or Hungary and came to England by various routes. Some were Czechoslovak Jewish children who came on Kindertransport organised by Sir Nicholas Winton.
The man who saved close to 700 children from the Nazis will be honoured next week on the first anniversary of a new Holocaust education centre in Yorkshire. Barbara Winton will pay tribute to her late father Sir Nicholas Winton, alongside one of the 669 children he saved, Lady Milena Grenfell-Baines.
Meg Waite Clayton knew she was writing a novel about the Kindertransports, but she didn’t know whether to focus on the transports out of Vienna or Prague. Clayton had made a research trip to Vienna but was not feeling connected to the city. Then she visited an exhibit there featuring the contents of suitcases taken by the children — items such as storybooks, doll clothes, family photos, Band-Aids and a hairbrush.
One school which came to Shropshire early in the war provided a safe haven for Jewish children who had escaped Nazi persecution. A blue plaque on Trench Hall at Tilley Green, near Wem, tells of its noble wartime role. It says: “This progressive Jewish boarding school was founded by Anna Essinger M.A. in Ulm, Germany, in 1926, and was brought to Kent, England, in 1933 and evacuated here to Trench Hall over the war years, 1940-1946.”
Raised in Kensington, west London, Urbach was the child of Jewish refugees who had fled to Britain from Germany in the Thirties. His mother, Eva, arrived as a teenager on the Kindertransport, the British rescue mission that saved almost 10,000 Jewish children from the hands of the Nazis. His family’s only physical connection with their past came in the form of three trunks, which Urbach remembers arriving at the family home when he was a young child.
Dame Stephanie Shirley was among thousands of mostly Jewish unaccompanied children, who were sent by their parents to safety in the UK fleeing the rise of the Nazis in Europe. She was just five years old when her mother put her on a train in Vienna bound for London, not knowing if they would ever meet again. Dame Stephanie tells Witness History about the lasting trauma left by her mother’s “fantastic act of love”
ARD Vienna|Southern Europe covers the Kindertransport Journey Trip. Radio and video as well as text. Journalist Andrea Beer interviewed travelers in Vienna.
Remembering the Helping Hands of a Hero Most people wouldn’t think about visiting a train station for any other reason than travel. But Prague’s Hlavní nádraží has an unexpected and important story to tell.
Dr Christopher Stephens, Head of Southlands College, Vera Schaufeld and, Professor Jean-Noël Ezingeard, Vice Chancellor of the University of Roehampton
A London university has awarded an honorary doctorate to a former Brent teacher who came to the UK on the Kindertransport and later established the Holocaust Centre and Museum.
A man of tremendous integrity, loyalty, determination and kindness, Alfred Cotton, 93, of Oakland, California, passed away peacefully at home on July 19, 2019, with his beloved wife of 63 years, Anita, by his side. Born in Hamburg, Germany, in 1925, the only child of Salomon and Amalia Baumwollspinner, his pleasant childhood was ended by the Nazis’ rise to power.
Kurt Marx, a Kind living in the UK, visits Berlin in the summer of 2019. Video report.
THe Kindertranspport Journey Trip met with students at the Kindertransport Memorial at Hook of Holland before boarding the ferry to Harwich, July 10, 2019
Before the Second World War broke out in the Netherlands, large parts of Europe were already ravaged by the Nazis. Jewish parents who feared for the lives of their children sent them to England by train. A number of children from that time came to the children’s monument in Hoek van Holland on Wednesday. Mark Burin (83) was three years old at the time and had no idea why his parents gave him up.
Just months before the outbreak of the Second World War, 10,000 mostly Jewish children were granted refuge in England. Eighty years later, survivors are retracing a painful journey that is still relevant today.
Uberlebende der Kindertransporte aus den USA besuchten das Berliner Abgeordnetenhaus Fünf Holocaust-Überlebende aus den USA waren in der vergangenen Woche zu Gast in Berlin. Am Freitag wurden sie gemeinsam mit ihren mitgereisten Angehörigen vom Präsidenten des Berliner Abgeordnetenhaus, Ralf Wieland (SPD), in den Räumen des Landesparlaments empfangen. Der Termin mit dem Parlamentspräsidenten war für die Zeitzeuginnen und Zeitzeugen Teil einer mehrtägigen Reise durch Europa.
Four Holocaust survivors and 14 descendants of other Jews rescued by “Kindertransporte” traveled to Berlin on Friday, 80 years later. In cities through which the transports passed. Vienna, Berlin, Amsterdam, then over to England. In Berlin, the group was received in the House of Representatives and in the Bundestag.
Überlebende der „Kindertransporte“ und Nachkommen auf dem Dach des Bundestags Foto: Michael Jänecke/ Babelphoto
Berlin – Die war genau ein Jahr zuvor in einen Zug gestiegen. Gerade elf Jahre alt. Von Berlin aus über Amsterdam, dann mit dem Schiff nach England. In die Sicherheit. Ilse Henry sollte ihre Mutter nicht wiedersehen. Die Jüdin wurde 1943 in Auschwitz ermordet.
Holocaust-Überlebende und ihre Angehörigen besuchen Berlin. Sie fahren die Strecke der Kindertransporte nach, durch die sie gerettet wurden.
Mit einem Kindertransport verließ Melamid Wien – mit einer von insgesamt 23 Rettungsfahrten für unter 18-jährige jüdische Kinder von Wien nach London. Juden, Quäker und Christen verschiedener Glaubensbekenntnisse hatten der nationalsozialistischen Zentralstelle für jüdische Auswanderung in Wien und ihren Leitern Adolf Eichmann und Alois Brunner die Fahrten gegen Geld abgerungen.
Der 83-jährige Mark Burin erzählt seine Geschichte – sie handelt von Flucht, Trauer, Schmerz, aber auch glücklichen Momenten.© Pfarrhofer
Wien –Mark wirkt für seine 83 Jahre noch topfit. Ob er Hunger habe, wird er gefragt. Mark braucht nichts, er habe sich seit gestern durch die österreichische Küche gegessen, sagt er lachend. Er und weitere jüdische Holocaust-Überlebende sitzen am Mittwochabend in einem Wiener Heurigen. Einen Tag später werden Mark und die anderen eine denkwürdige Reise antreten.