I was 11 when my mum started crying at the TV then I learned her past

Posted on January 28, 2025

Howard Winik in Vienna retracing his mums family history

A Liverpool man only found out about his mum’s heartbreaking past when she “burst into tears” watching television. You knew it was a Sunday in the Winik household when Howard and his family where gathered around the TV to watch the 1970s BBC show That’s Life.

The 66-year-old, from Garston, along with his sister Cynthia, dad Arnold, and mum Mina, would tune in to see which pressing topic presenter Esther Rantzen would be covering. But one episode particularly resonated with Howard’s mum, as it delved into the Holocaust, prompting Howard to finally understand something that had long puzzled him.

He told the ECHO: “Esther had arranged for people who had come to the UK on the Kindertransport trains to be in the studio, and they stood up to thank the man who had organised the transport and saved their lives.

“My mum’s situation was similar to those children, and we were just sitting watching it when she burst out in tears. She was obviously quite upset about it. I remember still sitting in the front room in our family in Garston when it happened.”

At just 11 years old, Mina Hecht Winik had endured more than most could imagine. After Vienna fell to Nazi control and having lost her dad to Hitler’s regime, she was among the many children who escaped on the Kindertransport trains in March 1939, seeking a new life free from fear in Britain.

Alone and frightened, Mina navigated through Nazi-occupied territories before finding refuge in Liverpool. She spent several months residing in a Harwich hostel before a pivotal encounter at Liverpool Street Station with her future adoptive parents – a childless Jewish couple from Liverpool.

A family photo of the Winik's taken in their home in Ryegate Road, Garston, in the mid 1960s
A family photo of the Winik’s taken in their home in Ryegate Road, Garston, in the mid 1960s -Credit:Howard Winik

Integrating into the city’s community under their care, Mina remained unaware of her family’s fate back in Vienna for many years. As she grew older, Mina tied the knot and, together with her husband Arnold, who she met at a local dance, had two children, Howard Winik and Cynthia Blake.

The traumatic experiences of her youth were left unspoken; however, her son Howard stumbled upon a startling revelation one summer while temping at the Greenbank Synagogue office.

Unearthing a letter sent to his mother’s maiden name, he said: “I found out everything by accident. I was working at the Greenbank Synagogue office one summer in a temporary position. I was looking through some files and found a letter addressed to my mum’s birth name.

Mina Winick, aged 27 in Liverpool
Mina Winick, aged 27 in Liverpool -Credit:Cynthia Blake and Howard Winik

“At the time, I didn’t raise it with my mum; I was only a teenager, but I always wondered about it. It wasn’t discussed for a long time. I had a lot of questions, but I rationalised because I was afraid of what I might hear. I was curious for a long time because there were never any photos of my mum as a child.

“When we asked our adoptive grandmum, the question was always brushed off. We knew there was something strange, but we could never have guessed that she had come over from Austria because she didn’t have a strong accent.”

After Mina died, Howard and Cynthia embarked on an emotional journey to Vienna, where they discovered their granddad’s ashes were buried in the Jewish section of a cemetery. Mina’s mum, Taube, and three brothers, Abraham, Robert and Jacob, were interned in the camps during WW2.

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