CHILDHOOD LEFT AT THE STATION
Jill Brown, LA Museum of the Holocaust
LOS ANGELES MUSEUM OF THE HOLOCAUST COMMEMORATES 80TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE KINDERTRANSPORT
On December 1, 1938, a train left Berlin for Great Britain carrying 200 Jewish children whose parents had made the heartbreaking decision to send them away in the face of mounting persecution and violence against Jews in Nazi Germany. It was the first Kindertransport (children’s transport), a rescue effort that transported approximately 10,000 children in Germany and other Nazi-occupied territories to safety in Great Britain and other western European countries in 1938-1939.
Great Britain and the other countries participating in the humanitarian effort agreed to accept the children, 17 years old or younger, on temporary travel visas, so long as private citizens guaranteed payment for each child’s care. No adults were permitted to accompany them. The children lived with foster families or at hostels, schools and farms.
Many of the children would never see their parents again.
KDave Lux's ID card. All images in the article: LA Museum of the Holocaust
Dr. Ruth Westheimer holding the washcloth she carried with her on the Kindertransport, August 2018