Kindertransport

Kindertransport, German for "children's transport," was the name given to a coordinated series of efforts that rescued thousands of Jewish children from Germany and Nazi-controlled territory near the beginning of World War II (1939–45). The evacuations began in 1938 after a growing tide of anti-Jewish sentiment in Germany erupted into violence. Most of the transports ended after war was declared in 1939, but some successful rescues were accomplished into 1940. The children were relocated to the United Kingdom, where they were supposed to stay until they could be returned to their parents after the war. In reality, most families were never reunited because many of the children's parents became victims of the Holocaust.

Background

Instances of discrimination toward Jews date back centuries and are rooted primarily in religious conflicts from the early days of Christianity. In the mid-fourteenth century, a great plague known as the Black Death killed millions across Europe. As the illness spread, people were overcome with fear and desperately searched for the cause of their suffering. Some communities began blaming the Jews, claiming they had poisoned wells to spread the disease. In Germany and Austria, thousands of Jews were burned to death for supposedly spreading the plague.

Anti-Semitism lingered throughout Europe for centuries. In the years following World War I (1914–18), hostility toward Jews began to rise in Germany, which had suffered a humiliating defeat in the conflict. Germany was forced to give up much of its territory and was ordered to pay steep reparations for wartime damages. The German people suffered as the nation's economy was crippled and unemployment skyrocketed.

Political leaders tried to rally support by blaming the Jewish people for the problems besieging Germany. One of those leaders was Adolf Hitler, whose Nazi Party assumed power in 1933, partially on promises of ridding the country of Jews and restoring German ethnic pride. As Hitler instituted government-sponsored persecution of the Jews, thousands of Jews tried to flee Germany. Immigration laws and the reluctance of other countries to accept refugees prevented many from finding new homes.

In early November 1938, a Jewish teenager in Paris assassinated a German diplomat. Authorities in Germany used the incident to fan the flames of anti-Semitism in the country. On November 9, 1938, mobs of angry German citizens began a night-long campaign of violence against Jews in Germany and Austria. More than 260 synagogues were burned, and thousands of Jewish homes and businesses were destroyed and looted. At least ninety-one Jews were believed to have been killed. The incident was known as Kristallnacht, or "Night of Broken Glass," because of the shards of glass that littered the streets outside Jewish businesses.

Overview

In the days after the violence, refugee aid groups in the United Kingdom pushed the government to make it easier for Jewish refugees to enter the country. The United Kingdom had been reluctant to relax its immigration policies, but continued pressure from aid groups and the events of Kristallnacht prompted a shift in public opinion. The British government agreed to allow an unspecified number of children under the age of seventeen to enter the country. The German government agreed to the relocation as it was eager to remove as many Jews as possible from Germany and its territories.

The British government stipulated that children entering the county would be admitted on temporary visas and would not be granted citizenship. They could not be accompanied by their parents. Any infants who were involved in the program would be cared for by other children. Private citizens and aid organizations were to assume the costs of paying for the children's care and education. It was fully expected that when the impending war was over, the children would be sent back to their homelands to be reunited with their parents.

Representatives from a British aid organization traveled to Germany to determine criteria for selecting the children. They gave priority to children who were orphaned or homeless or whose parents were detained in concentration camps. In the United Kingdom, more than five hundred families volunteered to act as foster homes for the refugees.

The effort became informally known as the Kindertransport. On December 2, 1938, a group of about two hundred children were the first refugees to arrive in the United Kingdom. The children were from a Jewish orphanage in Berlin that had been destroyed by Nazis during Kristallnacht. For the first few months of the program, children were transported from Germany. Later, the focus of the operation shifted to Austria. When the German army entered Czechoslovakia in March 1939, transports were arranged for Jewish children from the capital of Prague. Efforts were also made to relocate children from Poland.

The Kindertransport children primarily traveled by train to cities in Belgium and the Netherlands. From there, they boarded a boat to Harwich, a port city on the eastern coast of England. Children with sponsoring families went to London, where they were introduced to their hosts. Those without sponsors were taken to summer camps near Harwich, where attempts were made to find host families. About half of the refugees were eventually placed with foster families. The others stayed in hostels, boarding schools, or farms throughout the United Kingdom.

The last Kindertransport departed Germany on September 1, 1939, two days before the United Kingdom and France declared war on Germany. The outbreak of war halted most of the rescue efforts. The final transport escaped from the Dutch port city of IJmuiden on May 14, 1940, days before the Netherlands fell to advancing German forces. In total, the Kindertransport rescued close to ten thousand children from Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, and Poland.

World War II raged for six years in Europe before ending in 1945. Initial hopes that the refugees would be reunited with their parents were dashed when the extent of German atrocities against the Jews was realized at war's end. More than six million people were killed in a systematic program of extermination known as the Holocaust. Most of the Kindertransport children never saw their parents again. Many stayed in the United Kingdom and became British citizens. Others moved to Israel, the United States, Canada, or Australia.

Bibliography

Berne, Emma Carlson. Escaping the Nazis on the Kindertransport. Capstone, 2017.

"Great Britain & the Holocaust: The Kindertransport." Jewish Virtual Library, www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/the-kindertransport. Accessed 17 Oct. 2017.

"Historical Timeline." Kindertransport Association, kindertransport.org/history/historical-timeline/. Accessed 17 Oct. 2024.

Hodge, Deborah. Rescuing the Children: The Story of the Kindertransport. Tundra Books, 2012.

Leyshon, Cressida. "Lore Segal Will Keep Talking Through Her Stories." The New Yorker, 13 Oct. 2024, www.newyorker.com/culture/postscript/lore-segal-will-keep-talking-through-her-stories. Accessed 16 Oct. 2024.

"Kindertransport, 1938–1940." Holocaust Encyclopedia, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 30 Sept. 2021, encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/kindertransport-1938-40. Accessed 17 Oct. 2024.

"Kristallnacht." Holocaust Encyclopedia, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 18 Oct. 2019, encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/kristallnacht. Accessed 17 Oct. 2024.