Memoir

  • Types

  • Genres

My Heart in a Suitcase

by Fox, Anne (1996); Published by Edgware, England: Vallentine Michell

Anne Fox’s Kindertransport memoir.

My Knees Were Jumping: Remembering the Kindertransports

by Hacker, Melissa (1996); Published by Bee's Knees Productions

Award-winning documentary film directed by the daughter of a Kind from Vienna.

For more information, and to purchase dvds or to arrange a screening, contact melissa@kindertransport.org

My Train to Freedom: A Jewish Boy’s Journey from Nazi Europe to a Life of Activism

by Backer, Ivan (2016); Published by Skyhorse

The breathtaking memoir by a member of “Nicky’s family,” a group of 669 Czechoslovakian children who escaped the Holocaust through Sir Nicholas Winton’s Kindertransport project, My Train to Freedom relates the trials and achievements of award-winning humanitarian and former Episcopal priest, Ivan Backer. Now an eighty-six-year-old who remains an activist for peace and justice. He has been influenced by his Jewish heritage, his Christian boarding school education in England, and the always present question “For what purpose was I spared the Holocaust?”.

Nightmare’s Fairy Tale: A Young Refugee’s Home Fronts, 1938-1948

by Korman, Gerd (2005); Published by University of Wisconsin Press

Korman movingly recounts his childhood years as a refugee in war-ravaged Europe…. The young adult who emerged was a collage of disjointed personas: an American Jew eager to embrace his new home, an immigrant who never shed the traces of his foreign accent, and a historian eager to tell the story that defines him, his family, and his people.—Publishers Weekly The Korman family scattered from a Polish refugee camp just before WWII. The father sailed to Cuba on the ill-fated St. Louis; the mother left for the United States after sending her two sons on a Kindertransport.

Non Frangimur: My First Six Decades

by Bowers, Klaus D. (2005); Published by Bloomington, Indiana: AuthorHouse

Kind Klaus D. Bowers recounts his comfortable early childhood in Germany, the tough transition to refugee life in England, his outstanding academic career at Oxford, and his thirty-three years with AT&T’s Bell Labs during its glory days.

Not With Silver Spoon

by Avrays, Harry (1989); Published by Sharon Press

Harry Avray’s Kindertransport memoir. May be out of print. Try your local library or Holocaust Memorial Center.

Nuremberg and Beyond: The Memoirs of Sigfried Ramler from 20th Century Europe to Hawaii

by Ramler, Sigfried (2009); Published by Ahuna Press

The book begins with Sig’s childhood in Vienna and follows him at age 14 on the Kindertransport to London, where he experienced the Blitz as well as V-1 and V-2 rocket attacks. After the war, his facility with languages brought him to one of the defining moments of his life: the Nuremberg trials. Working in the new field of simultaneous translation, Sig came face to face with the war’s criminals: Göring, Hess, Höss, and Hitler’s architect, Speer. A meeting with a pretty Hawaiian-Chinese court reporter, Piilani Ahuna, led to marriage and a journey to Hawaii. May be out of print. Try your local library or Holocaust Memorial Center.

On My Own: Decoding the Conspiracy of Silence

by Schulhof Rybeck, Erika (2013); Published by Summit Crossroads Press

Erika Schulhof Rybeck tells her story as a tribute to the parents who shielded her from the Nazi hor­rors swirling around her, horrors that led to their deportation and disappear­ance. After being a teacher, mother and volunteer, she looks back at age 84 at rare experiences – living in castles and cottages, being sheltered by Catholics, discov­ering her Jewish heritage, and learning of her illustrious family.

Paul Heimann, A Kind from Vienna, speaks

by Heimann, Paul (2016); Published by Crestwood School

Paul Heimann was born in Austria in 1923. When the Anschluss took place, Paul and his parents found themselves at the centre of Hitler’s ambitions, and they felt the full weight of Nazism with the Kristallnacht. Their synagogue was burned, and the stormtroopers prevented the fire department from taking action. Paul’s parents saw the writing on the wall, and they arranged to have Paul evacuated, and Paul was fortunate to join the kindertransport. Paul was interviewed by a group of students at Baycrest in September 2016, where he shared his story, and even played a few tunes for them.

Pearls of Childhood: The Poignant True Wartime Story of a Young Girl Growing Up in an Adopted Land

by Gissing, Vera (1988); Published by New York: St. Martin's Press

Vera Gissing’s account of her life in Prague and in England, where she was one of the Kinder. May be out of print. Try your local library or Holocaust Memorial Center.

Postcards to a Little Boy. A Kindertransport Story

by Foner, Henry (2013); Published by Yad Vashem Publications

Henry Foner (Heinz Lichtwitz), who had lost his mother at a young age, was sent from Berlin to Wales and lived there with a Jewish couple, who provided him with a warm, loving home. From the moment they parted, Henry’s father sent him colorful illustrated postcards written in German and later on in English. This authentic and moving document presents the postcards and letters that Henry received from his father and other relatives and friends, along with their translation. May be out of print. Try your local library or Holocaust Memorial Center.

Ralph and Suzanne Samuel StoryCorps

by Samuel, Ralph and Suzanne (2018)

Kindertransport Survivor Ralph Samuel shares his life history with his daughter.

Robert and Eva

by Suchmann, Mike (2012)

KT3 Mike Suchmann has made this short film about his Grandparens, both Kindertransport Survivors, their childhoods, how they met, and their 62 year marriage.

Runaway Waltz, A Memoir from Vienna to New York

by Morton, Frederic (2010); Published by Simon and Schuster

One of the most revered essayists and novelists of his generation, Frederic Morton has captured with matchless immediacy the glamour of Vienna before World War I in his bestselling and award-winning works. Now, in his first book in more than fifteen years, he delivers a luminous look at his own unique pursuit of the American dream. Like many Austrian boys in 1936, the author idolizes Fritz Austerlitz, the Austrian American who went to Hollywood and emerged as Fred Astaire. When his family is forced to flee Vienna, Fritz Mandelbaum becomes Fred Morton and immigrates to New York City. May be out of print. Try your local library or Holocaust Memorial Center.

Ruth, A Little Girl’s Big Journey

by Westheimer, Ruth (2020); Published by USC Shoah Foundation

An animated short film for primary school students follows Dr. Ruth’s Holocaust story of survival as a young girl to explore universal themes; fear, loss and lonliness, as well as resilience, bravery and hope.

Salt of the Earth: An intergenerational journey of a family’s life, heartbreak and triumph before, during and after the Holocaust

by Pfeffer Vignola, Janet & Pfeffer Pfaff, Margaret; Published by CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

An intergenerational journey of a family’s life, heartbreak and triumph before, during and after the Holocaust. Written by two KT2s.

Shedding Skins

by Wolff, Marion (2004); Published by San Luis Obispo, California: Central Coast Press

Through short memoirs, essays, and poetry, “Marion Wolff takes us through her fascinating life from childhood in Nazi Germany to the crazy, complicated life of retirement” (cover of book).

https://www.abebooks.com/9781930401273/Shedding-Skins-Marion-Wolff-1930401272/plp

Still Alive: A Holocaust Girlhood Remembered

by Segal, Lore and Kluger, Ruth (2003); Published by Feminist Press

Stunning contemplation of human relationships, power, and the creation of history through the prism of one woman’s Holocaust survival… Kluger dives in and out of her narrative to consider such topics as her imperfect relationship with her family, her creation of herself as a social being, and the encounters and relationships she’s had with Germans since the war… A work of such nuance, intelligence, and force that it leaps the bounds of genre. – Kirkus

Sunday’s Child? A Memoir

by Brent, Leslie Baruch (2009); Published by Bank House Books

“Professor Leslie Baruch Brent (known in the scientific world as Leslie Brent) arrived in England late in 1938 in the first of the many Kindertransports. His German-Jewish family was among millions who were murdered by the Nazi regime. In 1943, at the tender age of eighteen, he volunteered for the armed forces. Having studied zoology at the University of Birmingham he became an eminent immunologist in the field of tissue and organ transplantation. May be out of print. Try your local library or Holocaust Memorial Center.

Tehran Children: A Holocaust Refugee Odyssey

by Dekel, Mikhal (2019); Published by W. W. Norton & Company

Beginning with the death of the inscrutable Tehran Child who was her father, Dekel fuses memoir with extensive archival research to recover this astonishing story, with the help of travel companions and interlocutors including an Iranian colleague, a Polish PiS politician, a Russian oligarch, and an Uzbek descendent of Korean deportees. With literary grace, Tehran Children presents a unique narrative of the Holocaust, whose focus is not the concentration camp, but the refugee, and whose center is not Europe, but Central Asia and the Middle East.