Kindertransport (also Refugee Children Movement) is the name given to the rescue mission that took place nine months prior to the outbreak of World War II. The United Kingdom took in nearly 10,000 predominantly Jewish children from Nazi Germany, and the occupied territories of Austria, Czechoslovakia, and the Free City of Danzig. The children were placed in British foster homes, hostels, and farms. Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tōjō Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000... National Socialism redirects here. ... Flag of Danzig The Free City of Danzig refers to either of two short-lived city-states which were centered on the present-day Baltic port known as Gdańsk (German: Danzig). ...

In November, 1938, a few days after "Kristallnacht", a delegation of British Jewish leaders appealed in person to the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Neville Chamberlain. Among other measures, they requested that the British government permit the temporary admission of Jewish children and teenagers who would later re-emigrate. The Jewish community promised to pay guarantees for the refugee children. Look up November in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Year 1938 (MCMXXXVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will take you to calendar). ... Kristallnacht, also known as Reichskristallnacht, Pogromnacht, Crystal Night and the Night of Broken Glass, was a pogrom[1] against Jews throughout Germany and parts of Austria on November 9–10, 1938. ... The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is, in practice, the political leader of the United Kingdom. ... Arthur Neville Chamberlain (18 March 1869 – 9 November 1940), known as Neville Chamberlain, was a British Conservative politician and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1937 to 1940. ...

The British Cabinet debated the issue the next day and subsequently decided that the nation would accept unaccompanied children ranging from infants up to teenagers under the age of 17. No limit to the number of refugees was ever publicly announced. A comparable U.S. effort to absorb up to 10,000 refugee children by relaxing restrictive immigration statutes failed to even make it out of Congressional committees debating the issue. In British politics, the Cabinet is comprised of the most senior government ministers, most of them heads of government departments with the title Secretary of State. The Cabinet is actually a committee of the Privy Council and all Cabinet members are also Privy Councillors and therefore have the prefix of...

The rescue operation is, in general, considered a success as most of the Kinder survived the war. A small percentage were reunited with parents who had either spent the war in hiding or survived the Nazi camps. The majority of children, however, lost home and family forever. The end of the war brought confirmation of the worst: their parents were dead. In the years since the Kinder had left the European mainland, the Nazis and their collaborators had killed nearly six million European Jews, including nearly 1.5 million children.

A much less organized similar effort took mostly Jewish unaccompanied children directly to the USA, anytime between Nov 1934 and May 1945. That effort has come to be known as "The One Thousand Children." One Thousand Children refers to approximately 1400 mostly Jewish children who were rescued from Nazi Germany and Nazi-occupied or threatened countries by entities and individuals within the United States of America. ...

Organization and management

On the eve of a major House of Commons debate on refugees on November 21, 1935, Home Secretary Sir Samuel Hoare met a large delegation reproducing various Jewish and non-Jewish groups working on behalf of refugees. The groups were allied under a nondenominational organisation called the Movement for the Care of Children from Germany. The Home Secretary agreed that to speed up the immigration process, travel documents would be issued on the basis of group lists rather than individual applications. But strict conditions were placed upon the entry of the children. The agencies promised to fund the operation and to ensure that none of the refugees would become a financial burden on the public. Every child would have a guarantee of £50 (approximately US$4000 in today's currency) to finance his or her eventual re-emigration, as it was expected the children would stay in the country only temporarily. The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. ... November 21 is the 325th day of the year (326th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1935 (MCMXXXV) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display full calendar). ... The Secretary of State for the Home Department, commonly known as the Home Secretary, is the minister in charge of the United Kingdom Home Office and is responsible for internal affairs in England and Wales, and for immigration and citizenship for the whole United Kingdom (including Scotland and Northern Ireland). ... Samuel John Gurney Hoare, 1st Viscount Templewood (1880-1959), more commonly known as Sir Samuel Hoare, was a British Conservative politician who served in various capacities in the Conservative and National governments of the 1920s and 1930s. ...

Within a very short time, the Movement for the Care of Children from Germany, later known as the Refugee Children's Movement (RCM), sent representatives to Germany and Austria to establish the systems for choosing, organising, and transporting the children. On November 25, British citizens heard an appeal for foster homes on the BBC Home Service radio station. Soon there were 500 offers, and RCM volunteers started visiting these possible foster homes and reporting on conditions. They did not insist that prospective homes for Jewish children should be Jewish homes. Nor did they probe too carefully into the motives and character of the families: it was sufficient for the houses to look clean and the families to seem respectable. November 25 is the 329th (in leap years the 330th) day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... The BBC Home Service was the original name for Radio 4 and was on the air from 1939 until 30 September 1967. ...

In Germany, a network of organizers was established, and these volunteers worked around the clock to make priority lists of those most imperiled: teenagers who were in concentration camps or in danger of arrest, Polish children or teenagers threatened with deportation, children in Jewish orphanages, children whose parents were too impoverished to keep them, or children with a parent in a concentration camp. Once the children were identified or grouped by list, their guardians or parents were issued a travel date and departure details.

Upon arrival at port in Great Britain, Kinder without prearranged foster families were sheltered at temporary holding centers located at summer holiday camps such as Dover Court and Pakefield. Finding foster families was not always easy, and being chosen for a home was not necessarily the end of the discomfort or distress. Although many children were well-treated and grew up to develop close ties to their British hosts, some were mistreated or abused. Some families took in teenage girls as a way of acquiring a maid. There was little sensitivity toward the cultural and religious needs of the children and, for some, their heritage was all but erased.

Transports

The first Kindertransport from Berlin departed on December 1, 1938, and the first from Vienna on December 10. For the first three months, the children came mainly from Germany, then the emphasis shifted to Austria. In March 1939, after the German army entered Czechoslovakia, transports from Prague were hastily organized. Trains of Polish Jewish children were also arranged in February and August 1939. Berlin is the capital city and one of the sixteen states of the Federal Republic of Germany. ... December 1 is the 335th (in leap years the 336th) day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1938 (MCMXXXVIII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will take you to calendar). ... Vienna (German: , see also other names) is the capital of Austria, and also one of the nine States of Austria. ... December 10 is the 344th day (345th in leap years) of the year in the Gregorian calendar, 21 days before the next year. ...

Since the German government decreed that the evacuations must not block ports in Germany, the trains crossed from German territory into the Netherlands and arrived at port at the Hook of Holland. From there, the children traveled by ferry to the British ports of Harwich or Southampton. Arms of Harwich Town Council Harwich (IPA, /hɑːˈɹɪtʃ/) is a town in Essex, England, located on the coast with the North Sea to the east. ... Southampton is a city, unitary authority and major port situated on the south coast of England. ...

The last group of children from Germany departed on September 1, 1939, the day the German army invaded Poland and provoked Great Britain, France, and other countries to declare war. The last known transport of Kinder from the Netherlands left on May 14, 1940, the day the Dutch army surrendered to Germany. Tragically, hundreds of Kinder were caught in Belgium and the Netherlands during the German invasion, making them subject once more to the Nazi regime and its collaborators. September 1 is the 244th day of the year (245th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... 1939 (MCMXXXIX) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display full year calendar). ... May 14 is the 134th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (135th in leap years). ... This article does not cite its references or sources. ...

Internment and war service

In 1940, the British government ordered the internment of 16- to 70-year old refugees from enemy countries — so-called "enemy aliens." Consequently, approximately 1,000 of the older Kinder were held in makeshift internment camps, and around 400 were transported overseas to Canada and Australia. The young men among the interned Kinder, in particular, were offered the chance to do war work or to enter the Auxiliary Pioneer Corps. About 1,000 German and Austrian teenagers served in the British armed forces, including combat units. Several dozen joined elite formations such as the Special Forces, where their language skills could be put to good use.

Audio-visual presentations

The first documentary film made on the subject of the Kindertransport was My Knees Were Jumping: Remembering the Kindertransports which was shown in the Sundance Film Festival in 1996 and released theatrically in 1998. The director, Melissa Hacker, is the daughter of a Kind, the costume designer Ruth Morley.

Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport, narrated by Judi Dench and released by Warner Bros. Pictures, won the Academy Award in 2001 for best documentary feature. There is also a companion book by the same name. The film's producer, Deborah Oppenheimer, is the ''''daughter'''' of a Kindertransport survivor. The director, Mark Jonathan Harris, is a three-time Oscar winner. Dame Judith Olivia Dench, CH, DBE, FRSA, (born 9 December 1934), usually known as Dame Judi Dench, is an Academy Award, Golden Globe, Tony, three-time BAFTA, and six-time Laurence Olivier Award-winning English actress. ... Warner Bros. ... Academy Award The Academy Awards, popularly known as the Oscars, are the most prominent and most watched film awards ceremony in the world. ... Mark Jonathan Harris is a U.S. documentary filmmaker probably best known for his films Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport and The Long Way Home. ...

The Children Who Cheated the Nazis, narrated by Richard Attenborough is a British documentary film by Sue Read and Jim Goulding, first shown on Channel 4 in 2000. The Children Who Cheated the Nazis is a documentary about the Kindertransport, by the director Sue Read and producer Jim Goulding. ... Sir Richard Samuel Attenborough, Baron Attenborough, CBE (born August 29, 1923) is a prolific English film and stage actor, and Academy Award, BAFTA and three-time Golden Globe winning director, producer and entrepreneur. ... It has been suggested that Channel Four Television Corporation be merged into this article or section. ...

Kindertransport is the name of a play by Diane Samuels, which examines life, during World War II and afterwards, of a Kindertransport child. Though fictitious, it is based upon many real kinder stories. It was first performed by the Soho Theatre Company at the Cockpit Theatre in London on April 13, 1993. April 13 is the 103rd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (104th in leap years). ... 1993 (MCMXCIII) was a common year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar and marked the Beginning of the International Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination (1993-2003). ...

Personal accounts

• Bob Rosner (2005) One of the Lucky Ones: rescued by the Kindertransport.Beth Shalom, Newark (England). ISBN 0-9543001-9-X.

An account of a 9-year-old Robert from Vienna and his 13-year-old sister Renate, who stayed throughout the war with Leo Schultz in Hull and attended Kingston High School. Their parents survived the war and Renate returned to Vienna.

• David, Ruth. Child of our Time: A Young Girl's Flight from the Holocaust, I.B. Tauris.
• Golabek, Mona and Lee Cohen. "The Children of Willesden Lane." --account of a young Jewish pianist who escaped the Nazis by the Kindertransport.
• Segal, Lore. "Other People's Houses." --the author’s life as a Kindertransport girl from Vienna, told in the voice of a child. The New Press, New York 1994.
• Smith, Lyn. "Remembering: Voices of the Holocaust." Ebury Press, Great Britain, 2005, Carroll & Graf Publishers, New York, 2006. ISBN 0-7867-1640-1.
• Whiteman, Dorit. "The Uprooted: A Hitler Legacy: Voices of Those Who Escaped Before the "Final Solution." by Perseus Books, Cambridge, MA 1993.
• Oppenheimer, Deborah. "Into the Arms of Strangers; Stories of the Kindertransport".

Beth Shalom is a Holocaust memorial center in Nottinghamshire in England. ... Newark-on-Trent the Market Place Newark (also Newark-on-Trent) is a market town in Nottinghamshire (in 1216 it was in Lincolnshire) in the East Midlands region of England, located on the River Trent, the River Devon also runs through the town. ... Vienna (German: , see also other names) is the capital of Austria, and also one of the nine States of Austria. ... Hull or Kingston upon Hull is a British city situated on the north bank of the Humber estuary. ... Kingston High School is the name of a high school in several places: Australia Kingston High School, Kingston, Tasmania England Kingston High School, Hull, East Yorkshire America Kingston High School, Kingston, Michigan Kingston High School, Cadet, Washington County, Missouri Kingston High School, Kingston, Ulster County, New York Kingston High School... I.B. Tauris is a publishing house based in London and specializing in non-fiction. ...

See also

• The Holocaust
• Nicholas Winton
• One Thousand Children

“Shoah” redirects here. ... Sir Nicholas Winton MBE (born May 19, 1909) is a Briton who organized the rescue of 669 Jewish Czech children from their doomed fate in the Nazi death camps prior to the outbreak of World War II in an operation known as the Czech Kindertransport. ... One Thousand Children refers to approximately 1400 mostly Jewish children who were rescued from Nazi Germany and Nazi-occupied or threatened countries by entities and individuals within the United States of America. ...

External links

• http://www.kindertransport.org/ Kindertransport Association of North America - an association of children rescued in the Kindertransport who have settled in North America.
• http://www.ajr.org.uk/ and http://www.ajr.org.uk/kindertransport These two are WWW pages maintained by the Association of Jewish Refugees in London, England, with links to the Kindertransport Association of the United Kingdom.
• [1] - Link to information about the film "My Knees Were Jumping: Remembering the Kindertransports" (1996)
• [2] - Link to information about the Oscar winning film "Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport" (2000)
• [3] - Link to information about the British documentary "The Children Who Cheated the Nazis" (2000)
• [4] – World Jewish Relief (formally known as The British Jewish Refugee Committee)
• [5] - Wiener Library in London (holds documents, books, pamphlets, video interviews on the Kindertransport)