Ashley Hanson

The British Saved 10,000 Children from the Holocaust Using Kindertransport Children boarding the Kindertransport via Getty Images The ​Kristallnacht ​was the peak of pre-war open violence against the Jewish people in Germany, and Great Britain was so disturbed by it that they opened their doors to provide refuge for Jewish children. The British used airplanes and trains to set up the ​Kindertransport ​(children’s transport) to help evacuate non-Aryan and Jewish children from the Nazi regime. In the end, this system would save nearly 10,000 lives. Britain's Response to the Kristallnacht On November 9th, 1938, the Nazis began on a two-day destruction spree. Called the Kristallnacht​ or the Night of Broken Glass, this act set the precedent for the Holocaust. The Nazis destroyed Jewish businesses and homes during these two days, and they killed or beat their owners. In just 48 hours, around 100 German Jews died. Horrified by these actions, concerned British citizens went before the British Parliament on November 21st, 1938, to request that the children in Austria, Czechoslovakia, Germany, and Poland gain temporary asylum. This group of people were prominent British Jewish leaders, members of the Central British Fund for German Jewry (CFB), and members of non-Jewish religious organizations. But British politicians were leery of accepting refugees into Britain due to the potential for backlash since jobs were few and far between. However, they agreed to provide refuge for the children brought in at no cost to the British people. It fell to the non-Jewish and Jewish organizations to pay for the operation. The British government allowed unaccompanied children aged 17 and under to enter the country, provided that they didn’t add any excess burden on the state. There was also a stipulation saying each child had to have a 50-pound bond to be accepted, and charitable organizations, private individuals, and the CBF covered the cost. Britain hoped the US would offer aid after they saw Britain’s refugee efforts. Establishing the Kindertransport This evacuation effort earned the name “Kindertransport.” You can translate this into “children’s transport.” Volunteers on the ground throughout Europe organized it. They wrote lists of the children they thought were at the highest risk of deportation, and British radio appeals sought to find these children foster homes. Hundreds answered, and those volunteers had their homes inspected and were vetted themselves before granting them the ability to foster one of these children. The German Movement for the Care of Children or Refugee Children’s Movement (RCM), as it was later called, was responsible for picking up and moving the children. In some cases, they met the children at the train with hot chocolate. The first transport train left Berlin on December 1st, 1938. It left from an orphanage that the Nazis later destroyed, and the train arrived the following day in Harwich, Great Britain. Older children tended to infants, and anything the children wanted to bring had to fit in a single suitcase. It was against the rules to bring valuables with them, but some parents hid them in their clothes anyway. For the parents, the Kindertransport announcement was a bittersweet moment. As heartbreaking as it was to send their children away, the only alternative they had was sentencing them to almost certain death if they stayed. Every parent who put their child or children on the Kindertransport faced the realization that while they were saving their children, they may never see them again. Heart-Wrenching Departures Alfred Traum​ was 10-years-old when his parents put him and his sister on the train. His father was a WWI veteran, and he knew that he and his wife didn’t have any chance of escaping Vienna. However, his children did thanks to this British rescue train. Alfred talked about how his mother clung to his hand through the train’s window until the train began to pull away. She lost her grip but continued to run alongside the train until the train outpaced her. That was the last time he saw her. Alfred’s mother, father, aunt, uncle, grandmother, and cousin were all deported from their native Vienna and transported to the Trostenets extermination camp. When they arrived, they were shot before being tossed into a mass grave. Kindertransport Refugees Begin Life in England Many of the foster families welcomed the children with open arms. Children who didn’t have a foster placement upon arrival went to boarding schools, repurposed summer camps, and hostels supported by charities and private donations. For a lot of the children, they lost a great deal of their heritage when they got new identities, names, and religions. The Kindertransport was initially a​ ​traumatic experience​ due to the fact that the children were taken from their parents to a country where many didn’t speak the language. Many children had positive experiences while in Britain. They loved their adopted country, and roughly 1,000 of these children joined the British Army, giving their lives to fight the evil that had forced them to flee their homelands. The Aftermath of the Kindertransport The rescue trains ran until the last possible moment. The last Kindertransport pulled out of the station in Germany on September 1st, 1939. This was the day Hitler invaded Poland, and two days before Great Britain declared war on Germany. People in the Netherlands kept organizing evacuations until the Nazis invaded in May of 1940. In 10 short months, the Kindertransport brought almost 10,000 children to England. It was remarkable not only because it saved so many, but because it was a network of people from a broad range of backgrounds who wanted to protect the vulnerable from a very real threat.