VOLume 16 NO.8 AUGUST 2016 journal The Association of Jewish Refugees

Modernists in exile n 19 May 2016, a conference was held einer Zwangsgemeinschaft (Theresienstadt 1941- Filkins, the American translator of Adler’s at the University of London’s Senate 1945: The Face of an Enforced Community) prose works, the novels are at last becoming House with the title ‘A Modernist (1955), still the most detailed account of any known in the Anglophone world. A Journey, inO Exile: The International Reception of H. single concentration camp ever written. His Filkins’s translation of Eine Reise (originally G. Adler’, convened by Professor Jeremy published in 1962), appeared in 2008, Adler (King’s College London), H. G. Adler’s that of Panorama (written in 1948, but not son, and Professor Elinor Shaffer (School published until 1968) in 2011, and that of Advanced Study, University of London). of Die unsichtbare Wand (1989) (The Wall) Adler, one of that special breed of Central in 2014. These are ambitious attempts to European polymaths whose oeuvre extended convey the experience of the Nazi persecution from scholarly studies to poems and novels, of the Jews and the concentration camps was a close friend of the anthropologist by means of the techniques of the modern and poet Franz Baermann Steiner (see the novel; the unconventional innovations report on the stone-setting in his memory and disjunctions that characterise them are in our January 2015 issue) and a friend of profoundly unsettling to the reader. Panorama Elias Canetti, winner of the Nobel Prize employs a stream-of-consciousness style for literature in 1981; both the latter were to encompass the stages in the life of Josef refugees from Nazism who settled in Britain Kramer, a boy in Prague, a victim of the camps before 1939. The three men are sometimes and finally a refugee in Britain, seen in a series referred to as ‘das Dreigestirn’, which translates of scenes resembling the views in the ‘wonder rather weakly as ‘the triumvirate’, though the cabinets’ (the ‘panorama’ of the title) that German word literally means ‘three-stars’, toured country towns in the 1930s. Eine Reise, described in the New Yorker as a conveying more aptly the stellar nature of their H. G. Adler, 1910-1988 contributions to literature and scholarship. (photo by Josef Rast, 1969) modernist masterpiece worthy of comparison The May conference was a historic with Kafka or Robert Musil, chronicles the landmark: the first conference to be dedicated study of the deportation of the Jews from surreal and incomprehensible nightmare in his adopted homeland to the full range of Germany, Der verwaltete Mensch – Studien of deprivation, deportation and death that works by a major refugee intellectual. H. G. zur Deportation der Juden aus Deutschland overwhelms and destroys the Lustig family, Adler – he stopped using his given names, (The Administered Human Being – Studies on leaving only the son Paul as a survivor; the Hans Günther, because that was the name the Deportation of the Jews from Germany), novel has been called a work of ‘Holocaust of the SS officer in charge of the deportation was published in 1974. Neither book has modernism’, and it stands as a living refutation of Jews from the Czech lands – was born been translated into English, though they of Theodor Adorno’s oft-cited adage that there in 1910 into a German-speaking Jewish are acknowledged as foundational works can be no poetry after Auschwitz. Through the family in Prague, where he studied at Charles of Holocaust scholarship and though their figure of Arthur Landau, the main voice and central consciousness of Die unsichtbare Wand, University. In February 1942 he was sent to author spent 40 years of his life in Britain. Adler depicts, often with elements of fantasy Theresienstadt (Terezin) with his first wife, The conference held in May aimed to and the grotesque, a trajectory similar to his Gertrud; in October 1944, they were deported restore the balance between these historical/ own, in which Landau lives out in London what to Auschwitz, where Gertrud opted not to anthropological studies and Adler’s innovative the novelist Cynthia Ozick describes in her let her mother go to the gas chambers alone. and experimental novels and poems. review of the book in the New York Times as ‘the Adler was sent to work in labour camps and Thanks to the devoted efforts of Peter forlorn displacements of a melancholic exile’. was liberated at Langenstein, a satellite camp Of these three modernists in British exile, of Buchenwald, in April 1945. He returned to only Elias Canetti, born in Bulgaria in 1905, Prague but left for Britain in 1947 to escape RELOCATION OF AJR who had already made his name in interwar the looming Communist takeover. He died in HEAD OFFICE Austria with his novel Die Blendung, written London in 1988. Adler was the product of an The AJR’s Head Office has moved to in Vienna and published there in 1935, extraordinarily highly cultured environment; received the recognition that his achievements he took a doctorate in musicology, but Winston House merited. Die Blendung was translated into was later to emerge as a scholar across a 2 Dollis Park English in 1946 under the title Auto-da-Fé, variety of disciplines, combining historical, London N3 1HF by the distinguished historian Dame Veronica ethnographical and sociological approaches in The new address is close to Finchley (C. V.) Wedgwood. Canetti moved away from his studies of the concentration camps, as well works of literature to pursue his interest in the as writing major modernist novels and poems Central Tube Station, Northern Line, and is on a number of bus routes. phenomenon of the crowd that inspired his that drew on his experiences. study Masse und Macht (Crowds and Power) Adler became known principally for his The AJR’s telephone number (1960), though in his later years he published study Theresienstadt 1941-1945: Das Antlitz remains 020 8385 3070. continued on page 2  journal AUGUST 2016

Modernists in exile  continued his celebrated autobiographical trilogy Die gerettete Zunge (The Tongue Set Free) (1977), Die Fackel im Ohr (The Torch in My Ear) Visit to Air Transport Auxiliary Museum (1980) and Das Augenspiel (The Play of the Eyes) Tour led by Paul Lang (1990). Franz Baermann Steiner died in 1952, 5 September 2016 aged only 43; only later did his study Taboo, published posthumously in 1956, become a FLY A SPITFIRE STIMULATOR standard work on its subject. Steiner is known Join us for a visit to the Air Transport Auxiliary Exhibition. Listen to a forgotten story of in Britain mostly to academic specialists, courage, skill and sacrifice. 70 years on, it is difficult to believe that Britain was so desperate that the amateur pilots of Air Transport Auxiliary (men and women) were employed to fly while Canetti, despite his Nobel Prize, has dozens of different types of war plane between factories and front-line squadrons. never achieved widespread recognition in You will have the opportunity to fly a Spitfire Stimulator and we will have lunch in a this country. local restaurant before our return. It is therefore all the more pleasing to be For an application form, please call Head Office able to welcome a novel that introduces the on 020 8385 3070 or email [email protected] reader to the refugee milieu in which these three formidably erudite and creative men lived. Jeremy Adler’s novel, The Magus of Portobello Road (London: Alphabox Press, 2015, price AJR CARD AND GAMES CLUB £12.95), is an ambitious attempt to rework Please join us at our new Card and Games Club the Faust legend, familiar from Goethe’s on Tuesday 30 August at 1.00 pm drama, against the background of the London at North Western Reform Synagogue, of the post-war decades that played host to a Alyth Gardens, Temple Fortune, London NW11 7EN Card games including Bridge, Backgammon, Scrabble – you decide. struggling and marginalised group of refugees Games are dependent on numbers being sufficient. from Hitler. The figure of Faust, the vastly A sandwich lunch with tea, coffee and Danish pastries will be served on arrival. knowledgeable scholar who, dissatisfied with £7.00 per person his life, enters into a pact with the devil, has Booking is essential – when you book please let us know your choice of game. natural associations with the scholarly refugee Please call Susan Harrod on 020 8385 3070 or email [email protected] intellectuals at the heart of the novel, in which magus-like figures are transported from their Central European intellectual habitats to North Kensington’s landmarks, from Portobello Kensington and Hampstead. Market to Henekey’s pub on Portobello Road; It is with pleasurable pangs of recognition pubs, including the King of Bohemia on that one reads the novel’s vivid re-creation Hampstead High Street, play a considerable AJR Lunch of post-war London, in particular the drab, part in the depiction of London as it swings genteelly impoverished neighbourhood into the Sixties. The figure of the Hampstead- where North Kensington shades over into dwelling writer Zachariah Stubbs (Starobinski) Sunday Wormwood Scrubs. This is where Gabriel is loosely based on Canetti and the figure of Prince, a somewhat otherworldly intellectual Johnnie Prince’s ‘Uncle’ Frank on Steiner. 25 SEPTEMBER 2016 who has survived the camps, has settled with But the novel is far more than a realistic If you would like to attend, his wife Beatrice and his young son Johnnie, roman à clef. It is strikingly experimental, not please complete the enclosed from whose perspective as a child and teenager least in the self-referential scenes that present the in the 1950s and 1960s much of the novel writing of a novel. Indeed, it is punctuated from form and return it to us ASAP is observed. It is not difficult to recognise the very start by characters protesting against some features of H. G. Adler in Gabriel; the other characters’ attempts to write novels. real counterpart to Jeremy Adler’s fictional Johnnie’s interest in Faust is kindled by Uncle Trafalgar Gardens is Dalgarno Gardens, Frank’s reading from a life of the Renaissance AJR FILM CLUB W10, from where his father wrote to AJR occultist Johannes Trithemius, and he then goes Information in October 1956 requesting on to work on a joint project with Zachariah, Please join us at our next Film Club. readers to send him material for a revised which fails in a characteristically bizarre manner Our film showing will be at edition of his Theresienstadt study. A good to see the light of day. Fantasy and elements Sha’arei Tsedek North London Reform Synagogue part of the novel’s action takes place in North of the grotesque are woven into the texture 120 Oakleigh Road North, Whetstone N20 9EZ of the novel, as in the futuristic machines and on AJR Chief Executive robots (named after the letters of the Hebrew Thursday 8 September 2016 at 12.30 pm Michael Newman alphabet) invented, the reader is invited to A lunch of smoked salmon bagels, Danish Finance Director believe, by ‘Uncle’ Anton. When at the novel’s pastries and tea or coffee will be served first. David Kaye end the devil comes to claim his man, it is the We will be joined by Maurice Kanareck, who Heads of Department acne-ridden, child-molesting publisher Jason will give a short talk before showing the film Karen Markham Human Resources & Administration Sue Kurlander Social Services Seymour-Hackles, who had rejected Gabriel’s Prisoners of Conscience Carol Hart Community & Volunteer Services manuscript, who is incinerated by a bolt of The story of Russian ‘refuseniks’ AJR Journal lightning in Chepstow Villas; after which the and their fight for freedom Dr Anthony Grenville Consultant Editor assembled literati and intellectuals ‘repaired Dr Howard Spier Executive Editor £7.00 per person Karin Pereira Secretarial/Advertisements to Henekeys for a drink’. A rollicking good read, which wears its learning and literary BOOKING IS ESSENTIAL Views expressed in the AJR Journal are not necessarily those of the Association of Jewish sophistication lightly. Please call Susan Harrod on 020 8385 3070 Refugees and should not be regarded as such. Anthony Grenville or email [email protected]

2 AUGUST 2016 journal Misha’s story y paternal grandfather, Georg at Arnhem, five years Falck, was a distinguished after seeing his family MGerman-Jewish architect with for the last time and a flourishing practice in Cologne. three months before Seeing the writing on the wall early I was born in London on, he emigrated with his non-Jewish to my English mother, wife and three children to Amsterdam Pauline. My pre- within a year of Hitler’s accession history, then, was such to power, safe at least until the that I was predisposed occupation caught up with them, to be fascinated by the when he was effectively confined to great tragic upheaval the house for five years. He was never which was Europe in able to work again. My father, Rudolf the 1930s-40s. Julius, was sent to Balliol College, My father’s Oxford, in 1937 at the age of 17 and, background was after graduating in law in 1940, joined doubtless what led me to read German actual events and to the suffering the Pioneer Corps. Later he enrolled in for my undergraduate degree and and heroism – an overworked word the Parachute Regiment and was killed later to undertake a research degree perhaps but not when applied to in 20th-century German literature, Korczak and his co-workers – of concentrating on the fascist mentality those who perished. But I couldn’t as portrayed by certain modern let my main character die: this was, novelists. By this time I was married after all, a children’s book and the with two small boys and enjoying a death of 199 other souls was quite Cutting break from my then career as a social enough for young readers. Hope had Up the worker, mainly with children. While I to flicker. So 14-year-old Misha, after was conducting research for my thesis, facing numerous challenges while Clouds the various strands in my background living with Korczak in the orphanage, converged when I came across a manages to escape through the by Ella Kaut-Howson reference to the remarkable Janusz sewers, which was entirely feasible as Ella, 14, the granddaughter of AJR Korczak, Polish-Jewish paediatrician, it was the route taken by a number member Helena Kaut-Howson, is social worker, author and broadcaster, of survivors. I didn’t rescue him in a pupil at Bolton School in Greater who ran an orphanage for some 200 order to write a sequel as at that Manchester. children and was forced to take his point I had no intention of doing so charges into the Warsaw Ghetto when but the book was successful – being Here I stand Cutting up the clouds the Nazis sealed it off in 1940. He published in America, where it won Thinking that I’ll never struggled desperately to give them an award, and being translated into Get over this. some quality of life as well as to save several languages – so my publisher them from starvation. When he and asked me to continue Misha’s story. Here I stand That is how Misha came to be a Tearing apart the clouds the children were eventually taken to Wondering at the evil the train destined for Treblinka he was partisan in the Polish forest, a courier Of us. asked if he wanted to save himself. for the resistance in Warsaw up to the ‘Desertion’, he is reputed to have time of the Warsaw (as opposed to Here I hear replied, ‘is not in my vocabulary.’ As the Ghetto) Uprising, and a prisoner The trees whisper And the songs of someone who had always wanted to of war in Germany. Finally, having lost Silence. write fiction – an ambition inherited everyone dear to him and knowing Here I hear the gulls laughing from my mother this time – the no one here, he became a refugee And the cries of words ignited a spark that led to trying to make a new life for himself in The dead. my first novel, Shadow of the Wall, England under the Polish Resettlement Here I see published initially in 1989. It seemed Programme (perhaps treating the A loyal world only right that the story should be entry criteria with a little fictional Bursting with hope directed at young people, Korczak’s licence!). This sequel, Beyond the Wall And death. (in the first edition entitled But Can Here I see absolute raison d’être, though I An anxious human race never consciously set out to write a the Phoenix Sing?,1993) is told partly Filled with hatred for children’s book. In my four published from the viewpoint of Misha’s stepson One another. books it has always been the story as I wanted to highlight the gulf in rather than the potential readership understanding between members Here I watch The sky turn black which has motivated me. of a new generation and those of And the stars I did a great deal of research and the previous one which has known Gather up. in those pre-internet days I was appalling suffering. The contemporary lucky enough to live in Oxford with plight of refugees, desperate to reach Here I watch The clouds disperse easy access to a wealth of material a safe haven and make new lives for And I close my eyes such as journals and memoirs as themselves, unfortunately means that And think. well as histories. I was aware it was Misha’s story is as relevant today as it possible that survivors might read the was in the 1940s. And then I cry. book and I wanted to be true to the Christa Laird (née Falck)

3 journal AUGUST 2016 Land of hope and worry istory is always interesting, the Sarajevo and the outside world past is full of surprises, and was provided by radio between the the future is hard to predict. Jewish communities in Sarajevo and H By the time this article is I write this sitting in Jerusalem on Zagreb – I was once shown the room the day the EU referendum results published the initial excitement in Zagreb where in desperate have been published. With no will have settled down – I hope. The times this communication was desire to stimulate more angry country, having split almost evenly on this maintained. readers’ letters than necessary Of course, we would not (and as one who has been issue of national identity and international expect the same degree of an expatriate for so long, I commitments, will be trying to work out what brutal enmity in a less-than- was not myself even able to comes next and how to make the best of it. That Great Britain – I trust! It is, vote), let me just say that after all, a while now since from outside Britain it looks has always been the challenge. It is usually the the Battle of Culloden or the like an historic error has been Jews who – based on experience – have to Highland Clearances – but made – but the future may tell. take these matters most seriously of all. the whole renewed political Jerusalem is a city of so many We live in interesting times. But at isolation outside the Union would nationalities living and dead it is mean the creation of new barriers almost impossible to count. Yesterday least we live. where previously barriers had been I was at Tzemach, at the southern removed and could lead to increased end of Lake Tiberias. Here there is a complications. For Jews, a people who plaque at the restored railway station been born a German before he was have been mobile either voluntarily to the Australian soldiers who fell in ‘ausgebürgert’ as a refugee in 1939 or involuntarily since the time of the September 1918 in a battle against and later naturalised in Britain as an Exodus, who have been in Exile or Ottoman Turkish forces. Ironically, immigrant. in Diaspora for millennia, who have it seems that most of the 100 or so The mood in the world is changing settled or stayed in countries that soldiers who were killed and those and neither refugees nor immigrants were Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, others taken prisoner were actually are as tolerated as they once were – Muslim or Atheist, the existence of not Turks but Germans, fighting which is not saying much anyway – and barriers and borders has often been for the defence of Ottoman Turkish no one can tell what sort of lives our a major problem, and the removal of interests. Nowadays, Turkey’s leader, children or grandchildren may have such barriers was always a blessing. so keen to dwell selectively on the and what papers may be the best for As a youth I wandered across Europe past, is becoming aggressive towards them to possess. This journal is read visiting Jewish communities, taking Germany for not opening up to Turkey mainly by those who were fortunate part in Europe-wide Jewish student and her citizens. It seems that it was a enough to become British (or by their or youth activities, and was always fear of Turkey entering the EU which descendants, who were therefore born aware of the essential futility and may have influenced many Britons British) and who became loyal British stupidity of extreme nationalisms. against it, whereas anyone reading citizens, adopting a new nationality (After all, I had two grandfathers newspapers published outside Britain as a means of surviving. But there is who had both fought in the First would have known that the chance of no divine law that states that matters World War – but on different sides!) this happening is actually small and cannot change, that the enemy of I grew up a proud Yorkshireman, a dwindling! There is also no gratitude one generation may be the friend Bradfordian, a graduate of the British for the sacrifices Germans made ‘back of the next – and vice versa. There university system, and I carried my then’. is a continuum between Gratitude, British passport with me wherever I Yesterday I also visited Afule, Loyalty, Patriotism, Nationalism – and went – and still do – in the certainty where a plaque on the restored old Xenophobia. that Her Majesty's Government would station states that in November 1942 The future is still very unclear but fulfil its promise to take care of me in 69 Palestinian Jews were welcomed already strains are visible, that could times of need. But ... here after their return by train from theoretically lead to the political By the time this article is published Nazi-occupied lands, having been breakup of the United Kingdom. the initial excitement will have settled exchanged for German Templars, who What would happen then to the down – I hope. The country, having were considered dangerous potential Jewish communities in Glasgow, split almost evenly on this issue of collaborators! Cardiff, Belfast? Would the ‘Board of national identity and international I have just been reading a book Deputies of British Jews’ continue in commitments, will be trying to work concerning the increasingly desperate its current form? I recall that when out what comes next and how to efforts of citizens of Germany and Yugoslavia broke up, the Jewish make the best of it. That has always Czechoslovakia to get papers – community became in effect the ‘last been the challenge. It is usually the any papers: a visa, a passport, a Yugoslavs‘ – everyone else had split Jews who – based on experience guarantee, a job offer, a work permit, into mutually antagonistic Serbs, – have to take these matters most anything – to enable them to get Croatians, Slovenians, Bosnians, but seriously of all. We live in interesting out and continue their lives in a the Jewish Federation still organised times. But at least we live. less threatening environment. This youth camps for children from all the Walter Rothschild morning I and other members of my communities of what had once been a Rabbi Dr Walter Rothschild was born family were seriously considering united country, still retained links with in Bradford, UK, was ordained by Leo whether the time might have come to their fellow Jews in what had suddenly Baeck College, and has lived in Berlin apply for German citizenship, based become separate, even enemy states. since 1998 serving mainly communities on the irony that my late father had For a period the only link between around Germany and Austria.

4 AUGUST 2016 journal ‘Schubert Park’ – Memories of ‘Continental’ Jo’burg he Polish food stores that have found a ‘monstrous carbuncle’. sprung up in Britain remind One émigré I remember reasonably Tme of the delicatessen shops well is the subject of a Security Service of my childhood. When I see the file at the National Archives in Kew. delikatesy here with their counters full The dossier on her says she had been of kielbasa I recall the large variety of married to, among others, Fred Prager, meat sausage we used to call polony a left-wing photographer from Vienna in South Africa. At those generally who would become active in the anti- small, overstocked grocer shops the Apartheid movement. When I knew standard loaf was made of sourdough her, she was Ilse Dadoo, blonde, her rye with caraway seeds. Sometimes hair cropped short, and the lively wife pickled cucumber and rollmops of an amiable Indian doctor, Yusuf came out of large wooden barrels. Dadoo. Both were Communists. They You might well hear Yiddish for the lived together, openly but discreetly, stores had been set up to serve the in a cottage at the back of someone’s large East European community that house in Parktown or Rosebank. They preceded those immigrants who in the had a daughter, Shireen, who played 1930s came to bustling, cosmopolitan with my sister. Dadoo would become but charmless Johannesburg from an anti-Apartheid hero; his grave is a Germany and the former Austro- few yards from that of Karl Marx in Hungarian Empire. ‘Charismatic goldsmith’ Kurt Jobst Highgate. In the early years the émigrés Ilse would follow Doris Lessing as inevitably kept much to themselves. modestly in flats and small houses in the wife of Gottfried Lessing, an East Several consulted Dr Hilde Donath areas near the centre such as Yeoville, German diplomat who had been a about medical problems or called on Berea and Hillbrow. They might refugee in Southern Rhodesia. Ilse Dr Joseph to look after their teeth. go for a Sunday stroll in the small had left South Africa for East Berlin Ladies might acquire smart clothes Joubert Park, which inevitably became after the Nationalists came to power from Paula Ritterband’s boutique. A ‘Schubert Park’. As they and the in 1948. That sensational victory Mr Froehlich developed and printed country prospered – especially during (seats, but not votes) of Boer over their photographs. An émigré whose the war, when South Africa began to Briton soon had the émigrés, with name I don’t remember repaired their manufacture the goods it had hitherto their Central European black humour, watches. Hugh and Emmy Wilkens imported – the émigrés moved into circulating a Witz: ‘Have you heard? (I believe he had been a painter in larger homes with gardens, and Katz and Lourie (to this day a leading Ascona) kept bees and provided sometimes a pool, in the affluent jewelers) is changing its name – to honey. Gottschalks was the favourite ‘Northern Suburbs’. Coetzee and Leroux!’ (two common butcher. Some became well-known figures: Afrikaner names). It was a turning For fine jewellery one looked to Peter Rosenberg, a highly cultivated point and, of course, no laughing Else Wongtschowski or her mentor, lawyer from Berlin, quickly rose to matter. The Jeckes reacted in different Kurt Jobst. The charismatic goldsmith become general manager of O. K. ways to Apartheid. Some packed (he was also a great chef) was later Bazaars, a retail giant that would have their bags and emigrated yet again, befriended by Nadine Gordimer, who 100 stores around the country. Ernst back to Europe or to North America would marry a refugee from Berlin, Ullmann, who had designed Lufthansa or Australia. I would say many who the art connoisseur Reinhold Cassirer. posters before emigrating in 1935, stayed turned to a form of ‘innere Some commercial premises were on received many commissions for South Emigration’. My impression is that upper floors of office buildings. That African exhibition pavilions, murals they would not be nearly as active in was true of the bookshop where Alfred and sculpture. the struggle against Apartheid as were Futran (right-wing extremists had Many of the newly prosperous those with roots in Eastern Europe killed his father in Berlin in 1920) sold aspired to have their houses designed but, of course, they were far fewer German-language publications. And by the highly successful Steffen in number. the two cafés where the ‘Continentals’ Ahrends. Way out of town, his own That question, as well as their could meet their friends and enjoy an home stood in majestic isolation contribution to South Africa’s outdoor Kaffee mit Schlag were also at the top of a wild, rocky koppie, economic and cultural development, above street level: Florian’s in Hillbrow some 6,000 feet above sea level, merits research. I was therefore and Gusti’s downtown. The sparkling that today overlooks urbanised pleased to note, in the May issue of Gusti Hecht, who hailed from Brünn, Northcliff. Ahrends’s father Bruno the AJR Journal, that academics in the had qualified as an architect before was a renowned Berlin architect and field will be holding a conference in becoming a left-wing journalist in his home in leafy Dahlem has become London next year on those who fled Berlin. Resolved to take advantage of the official residence of the Bundestag Hitler and found refuge in what was Johannesburg's sunny climate, Gusti president. As for Ahrends’s son Peter, the British Empire. opened her café on a large terrace on who left South Africa as a young Martin Uli Mauthner what I suppose was the third or fourth man to practise the same profession Martin Mauthner is the author of two floor of Anstey's, a modern step-like in London, he has a link of sorts books: German Writers in French Exile skyscraper that had a department with British royalty: his partnership 1933-1940 (2007) and Otto Abetz and store below. submitted the plan for the National His Paris Acolytes – French Writers At first, most ‘Hitler émigrés’ lived Gallery extension that Prince Charles who Flirted with Fascism (2016).

5 journal AUGUST 2016

which the US Navy did not accept during the war but which eventually appeared in US warships in the 1960s. After she had lived in the USA for over 60 years she arranged for her ashes to be taken back to Austria and spread in the Vienna Woods. She also has an Ehrengrab in Vienna’s Central Cemetery (though for the life of me I can’t imagine what lies in it). Francis Steiner, Deddington, Oxfordshire The Editor reserves the right to shorten correspondence Sir – Surely Hedy Lamarr, featured with submitted for publication photo in Anthony Grenville’s very interesting June article, was vastly more admired for her beauty, and her development of a radio ‘HELPFUL INFORMATION AND GUIDANCE’ guidance system using spread spectrum and frequency-hopping technology, than Sir – I never thought to see a copy of Ehrenbürger or a British Empire Medal – her acting ability? the accursed, patronising, two-language if I have achieved some good, that was Joyce and George Schlesinger, Durham copy of the Helpful Information and sufficient. Guidance for Every Refugee booklet Ernest G. Kolman, COMBATTING ANTISEMITISM in readable condition again (insert Greenford, Middlesex Sir – I refer to your contributor, John Mann by Wiener Library in July issue of AJR MP, on the very important subject of Journal)! I still have an original copy. Sir – Many thanks for the July ‘16 issue ‘Combatting antisemitism’ (June). I refer in particular to pages 22- of the Journal, making very interesting As a longstanding member of the 23: the ‘training of young persons’ reading as usual. Also for the inclusion of Labour Party and of a British trade union, (Kindertransportees) to prepare them for the Wiener Library pamphlets – not least I have never come across a single instance their future (OVERSEAS – my capitals) – the booklet on how we should behave, of antisemitism in either organisation. By which makes it clear that we were never which I certainly do not remember being antisemitism I mean the kind of aggressive intended to have a permanent home in passed to me on arrival by Kindertransport and fanatical hostility encouraged by the this country. in June 1939. I do, however, remember civil authorities in Nazi Germany and meted On arriving in this country without being excluded from the local Boy Scout out to me with enthusiasm by the upright parents, we became de facto orphans, group for speaking German at a meeting! citizens (if we can call them that) of the with most of us never to see our parents Keep up the good work! Reich. The solecisms of a few Labour Party again. Werner Conn, Lytham St Annes members are simply not in the same league Training for boys was to be in and to cast them as such is to belittle the Agriculture or Handicrafts; for girls it suffering of our people. was to be in Nursing or Domestic Service. SECOND GENERATION MEMORIES As Mr Mann is – or should be – aware, God forbid that any academic instruction Sir – Anthony Grenville’s June piece ‘Second Labour and antisemitism don’t mix. Jews was given to us! generation memories’ resonates with me as have always been prominent and welcome Palestine was cited as to what manual it must with most of the offspring of those on the left. This cannot be said of the labour could achieve – shades of Zionist who succeeded in fleeing the German and Tories, who seldom miss an opportunity propaganda! Austrian threat. for snide antisemitic attacks such as the On arrival in London, we were billeted I was six years old in September 1938 unfortunate Mr Miliband suffered with his in a former private house six or seven when my parents and I fled Vienna and, bacon sandwich. Their sympathies have boys to a room and life was ordained by in all the years until my parents died in always been with right-wing demagogues a strictly Jewish Orthodox regime, akin the eighties, not one word was spoken and fascists. No uproar there! to a penal institution; release therefrom between us of the life my parents and our There is no denying the fact that only came shortly before the start of the family had led in Vienna. In retrospect, it identifying Israel with Judaism does give war, when we were evacuated. is as if we materialised as refugees in the rise to confusion and this is deliberately We were dumped on non-Jews in UK in 1938 out of thin air. promoted by the Israeli government. places we knew not, with people who It was not as if the subject was declared People are justifiably angry at the illegal had never met a Jew. Some foster taboo: it must have been subconsciously activities perpetrated by Israel against the parents were kind, others brutal. suppressed – the suppression infused in me Palestinians, on whom it has inflicted so More kindness and compassion was because I do not remember a willingness much suffering. The most effective way shown to me by non-Jews than by the or need to ask questions, a circumstance to combat any hostility is for Israel to act Jewish community, who by and large which I will forever regret. legally and humanely and not use the wanted to be rid of us. It is ironic that my knowledge of what suffering of Jews under the Nazis as a ‘get- I could write a book on attaining 90 my parents suffered in Vienna in the thirties out-of jail-free’ card. years of age, when I was specially invited after the Anschluss and even before is Heinz Grünewald, Pinner, Middlesex by my former German home town to be derived from my reading of George Clare’s invested as an Ehrenbürger, the highest REFUGEES IN THE TEXTILE/ CLOTHING Last Waltz in Vienna. honour the city can bestow as agreed INDUSTRY Dr Emil Landes, Highgate, London by mayor, town council and leaders of Sir – I am researching the contribution the local political parties, for my work in Sir – In his relatively short reference to made by refugees who came to the UK in talking to children, students and adults Hedy Lamarr (June issue), Tony Grenville the 1930s and worked in any capacity in over a period of 28 years and seeing that mentions her first career on the screen but the textile or clothing industry here. I would a memorial to seven German soldiers makes no reference to her second career be interested to hear about anyone readers was replaced with due military ceremony as an inventor. The most interesting of know of: where they came from, under from the First World War. her patented ideas was a jam-proof radio- what circumstances, who they worked for I did not need the honour of controlled guidance system for torpedoes, here and back home, how they got the job,

6 AUGUST 2016 journal what happened in the war and after … I managed to locate ten people who controversial – but surely never ’bland’. Dr Anna Nyburg, were part of the evacuation and, after Now, the AJR Journal serves an excellent Centre for Languages, Culture and carrying out further research, I produced function with historical facts relating to the Communication, Imperial College London a publication in 2004. Holocaust era with personal stories often [email protected] This gave the entire list of the 430 of a sad and even depressing nature. It is evacuees – of whom 50 stayed behind therefore a delight to turn to the back page SCHOOL TRACING REFUGEES in Palestine, while the remainder were of the Journal to enjoy ‘Letter from Israel’ Sir – Did you attend Forest School, shipped to Tanganyika and Nyasaland. with its interesting snippets of family life Walthamstow, London E17 when arriving June 12 this year was the 75th anniversary in Israel. In fact, it is the first article I read in the United Kingdom before and at the of the evacuation. If there is anybody, or a before moving on to the more serious and start of the Second World War? relative of somebody, who was part of this often depressing subjects. We are trying to trace refugees who evacuation, please contact me. I would not for one moment wish to arrived in the UK, including some of the Joe Gellert, Netanya, compare these ‘Letters’ to those of Mr boys from the Kindertransports who Israel [email protected] Cooke but occasionally, with so much attended the school before moving on to tel 09 833 1373 or 0528 595 242 unpleasant news at every turn, we need an other places, including the USA. oasis of positive news and calm to relieve If you know anyone who attended the ‘THE HOUSE THAT SAVED US’ our frayed nerves. Long may the ‘Letters school can you please contact me? I am Sir – Thank you for your kind review of from Israel’ be sent! updating our archives and will arrange my family memoir in your June issue. Marcel Ladenheim, Surbiton, Surrey to keep you informed of old scholars’ May I explain that the reason I wrote the Sir – I find the AJR Journal one of the best reunions etc. book was for the benefit of my family produced and interesting magazines that [email protected] and cousins round the world. I am the I read and always look forward to the next tel 44 (0)20 8989 5699 only person who still remembers what happened to the family and hence felt the copy. I do enjoy the ‘Letter from Israel’, ‘MEMORIES OF A GERMAN need to put down a record. especially as Caroline and I have recently CHILDHOOD’ This is the reason why I mention in made aliya. Sir – I remember all the sayings Meta detail some of the more distant family and However, I was rather astounded that Roseneil mentions in her letter (June). My their fate. They might otherwise remain Dorothea Shefer-Vanson should state in mother too knew the whole of Schiller’s forgotten. her June article that ‘The Israel I live in is ‘Die Glocke’ by heart. Also, she had funny May I also correct you in that whilst I one in which people enjoy a comfortable versions for many of the lines, e.g, ‘Raum ist was sent to a boarding school in Sussex it standard of living ... and on the whole are der kleinsten Hütte für ein glücklich liebend only lasted a short time. not beset by financial worries.’ Parr, aber was geschieht, ich bitte, mit der In fact, my father’s two nieces, whose It is sad that she has forgotten the very lieben Kinderschar.’ parents were left behind, joined us in many thousands of citizens, including Another was ‘Der Wahn ist kurz. Die Reu Harpenden and we four all grew up many Holocaust survivors, who live well ist lang.’ This was supposed to be at the together during the war. below the poverty line and, though she bottom of a cartoon showing a lot of people The need to keep the book to a limited and her family may not move in that sitting around a long table, each holding a length prevented me from going into detail society, it would be entirely false to allow glass, and one small wine bottle on the table about post-war travels with my French the impression that everyone here has a – i.e. Der Wein ist kurz. Die Reih’ ist lang. girlfriend and parents! comfortable financial life. Rachel Mendel, Leeds Peter Briess, London NW3 Freddie Ingram, Ra’anana, Israel ISRAEL AND ITS NEIGHBOURHOOD AFTER BREXIT ‘RESORTING TO PERSONAL ABUSE’ Sir – Your contributor Jenny Manson must Sir – Readers of the AJR Journal may like Sir – As soon as your opponent in debate has be focused purely on Israel for she avoids to be reminded that German-born victims to resort to personal abuse, you know that commenting on the calamitous state of the of National Socialism have the right to victory is yours. In her letter in the July issue, immediate neighbourhood, which surely is a German passport. This applies to their commenting on my May letter, Margarete worthy of mention. children and probably grandchildren as Stern accuses me of writing ‘incoherent It is important to stress that this is the real well. Holding a German passport would not rubbish’ and ‘utter drivel’ and showing reason for the plight of the Arabs in Area C. affect their British nationality or, therefore, ‘malicious distortion’ and ‘ignorance’. Tut, The rest of the world would like to see their having a British passport as well. tut, Margarete. Calm down, dear. a resolution of their problem but, in the Peter Seglow, Le Tignet, France Also, I am really sorry that she believes absence of properly elected representatives wives don’t want to sit next to their – the Palestinian Authority president was last 75TH ANNIVERSARY OF CYPRUS husbands in shul. Mine does, and I want elected ten years ago – and Hamas, there is EVACUATION to sit next to her. We are happy together. no one the Israelis can discuss peace with – Sir – After the war the British government Does Mrs Stern agree with Israel’s Religious if, that is, the Arabs want a fair resolution. brought back all Jewish evacuees from Affairs Minister, David Azoulay of the ultra- Many want to push the Jews into the sea Nyasaland (Malawi) and Tanganyika Orthodox Shas party, that Reform Jews are and overrun or plunder the achievements (Tanzania) to Cyprus, many of whom went a ‘disaster’, and with Moshe Gafni, of the of the Jews since they were given the from there to Britain and some of them ultra-Orthodox United Torah Judaism party, opportunity to form a state after the flight maybe members of the AJR. that ‘Reform Jews stab the Holy Torah in the of the British. The Arabs’ education system On 12 June 1941 the entire Jewish back’? Surely not! persists in teaching them to hate the Jews community in Cyprus, who were Holocaust Peter Phillips, Loudwater, Herts and their geography books show maps of refugees from Europe – 80 per cent Austrian the region without the State of Israel. ‘LETTER FROM ISRAEL’ DELIGHTFUL … and German Jews – was evacuated by the The Arabs last had an opportunity AND FORGETFUL British government on board the steamer when Gaza was evacuated in 2005 – but Sir – Alistair Cooke presented ‘Letter from SS Hanna, initially to Palestine and from no such luck. America’ for many years. In fact, there there to Tanganyika and Nyasaland. My Previously they were given the chance by were over 2,800 broadcasts testifying to parents and I were part of this transport. the UN in 1948 but they refused and five the popularity of this style of reportage. It Following letters I sent to the Jerusalem Arab countries attacked the nascent Jewish Post and the Jewish Chronicle in 2003, was gentle, sensitive and not usually too continued on page 16 

7 journal AUGUST 2016

The Pianist of Willesden Lane The story of Kindertransportee Lisa Jura returns to London’s West End: REVIEWS St. James Theatre, Looking backwards 7 September to 16 October 2016 ART THE JEWISH JOURNEY: A PASSAGE tel 0844 264 2140 THROUGH EUROPEAN HISTORY NOTES by Edward Gelles GLORIA TESSLER London: I. B. Tauris, 2016, 359 pp. camera at its peak, relaying footage to a hardcover, ISBN 978 1 78453 453 0 screen on the RA’s building. It’s impossible his is a very personal book and t’s that time of the year again when the not to be aware of the threatening, military therefore a hard one to review for Royal Academy (RL) presents its much implications of Arad’s rather deadly looking Tany comments will automatically affect the author. The book seems anticipated Summer Exhibition and, installation. effectively self-published as a compilation Ias ever, finds innovative ways to present the Inside, the softer mystique of the oriental of essays, articles and pamphlets, some nation’s art. magic carpet is imaginatively supplied previously published, some not, now This time, the theme is ‘Artistic Duos’, by Turkish artist and film-maker Kutlug brought together into one compendium. in which curator Richard Wilson has Ataman. He has made a multi–image It is a fascinating, irritating and ultimately introduced more than 20 such couplings to video installation to honour the late Turkish frustrating – and indeed rather depressing showcase their divergent styles. They could businessman and philanthropist Sakip – work. be siblings, lovers or friends but, of course, Sabanci. It makes clever use of a multitude The author explains how genetic the most obvious couple are Gilbert & of tiny mobile screens, each a portrait of research works and presents the fruits George, whose massive new wall painting, the thousands of individuals associated of a lifetime of such Beard Aware, comments on hirsute ways to with him. Why magic carpet? Well, it is research (and, since disguise. The Chapman Brothers are other suspended across the ceiling of Gallery 1 and he was born in vividly suggests that 1927, this is indeed mythological object almost a post- biblical lifetime of in shape, harmony four score years and and colour. ten). There is much Everyone will find repetition since the Edward Gelles something else to various essays often dazzle them in the have to cover the same introductory Summer Exhibition. periods and incorporate overlapping Look out for Kenneth information. Most start with an absolutely Draper’s Reflections brilliant and concise overview of a on a Quiet Place and period of Jewish history, explaining how David Nash’s award- individuals, families and whole groups winning Big Black. moved from one part of the world to Gilbert & George Beard Aware 2016 Using wood that has another – amazing journeys, amazing been felled or fallen migrations, amazing achievements of noted participants in this new concept. You naturally, his entry is a tall California settling in new environments or relating could say it was just another device to catch redwood, which he has charred to form to new rulers. These are the best parts of the book. Then comes each time a your eye but the most effective device may deep black, velvety surfaces. Anthony detailed listing of who was married to be smaller in concept and perhaps more Eyton RA, a true painter’s painter, offers a whom, occasionally why (this referring, poignant in imagery. The Small Weston truncated view in his Mantelpiece, with its however, only to commercial reasons or Room, used to exhibit exquisite miniatures bric-a-brac. No cleverness here, just delicate the linking of rabbinic dynasties), and in the past, this year contains images by and intelligent brushwork. there follows a very loaded and rather Bernd and Hilla Becher to reflect on Lulu Manasseh, a former Royal Society portentous listing of all the ways in which disintegrating industrial architecture such of Arts’ Young Designer of the Year who uses the author is descended from these as gas tanks and cooling towers, dinosaurs ancient scripts to give a fluid and slightly people. He describes this (p.17) as ‘The of the 21st Century. oriental feel to her work, is showing two fascinating field of genetic anthropology’. Political or geographical events like the exhibits. She used her winning bursary to It is clearly fascinating for some people Japan earthquake of 2011 are noted by study the art of India, Asia and South America, but it makes each entry little more than Japanese artist Aono Fumiaki in a moving which has clearly motivated her direction. the sum of their genetic inheritance and tribute to that seismic event. He has created allows little space for individual personal sculptures out of broken objects he has development or responsibility. One salvaged from those who suffered or died, in example – on p.193: ‘It is my contention that the outstanding intellectual gifts of a gesture to memory, reconciliation, healing, Annely Juda Fine Art Hirsch Perez Chajes and of his grandfather survival and rebirth. Zwi Hirsch of Zolkiew might be ascribed But one of the most powerful exhibits 23 Dering Street in part to immediately preceding Chajes stands alone in the RA courtyard. Spyre, (off New Bond Street) marriages that reinforced the genetic by architect/sculptor Ron Arad RA, is a Tel: 020 7629 7578 inheritance.’ This comes dangerously 16-metre-high corten steel oval rust-coloured close to defining people purely by their cone involving complex technologies and Fax: 020 7491 2139 ancestry and we know what can happen enabling the huge installation to rotate at CONTEMPORARY when this is taken too far, If one descends different speeds into acrobatic variations. PAINTING AND SCULPTURE so far how low can one get? Should one And, if that’s not enough, it contains a trace back to Cain?

8 AUGUST 2016 journal

It is said that descendants are often from Spain to Poland to Turkey to England Belfast for quite a long time. Leah would proud of their ancestors but how often and back again (how did this networking have to be called ‘a difficult person’: she are ancestors equally proud of their work?), and that the author has proven to is emotionally very distant from both her descendants? Did all these people marry his own satisfaction that he is descended mother and her daughter and is hardly just in order to make themselves a from many people who in their own lives on speaking terms with either of them, footnote on future connections? Is there achieved a degree of fame and left famous while her daughter Rebecca is close to no love at all? descendants. But one is nevertheless left her grandmother Irma (‘Oma’). Although Repeatedly stressed is the idea of with a feeling of ‘So what?’ Leah herself has not suffered under the the author’s being of Davidic lineage – For he does not speak so much of Nazis because she was born after the war though why this should be so important his own descendants. Is this glorious and in the UK, she is fiercely anti-German. is unclear: after all, being descended from line about to die out? Checking internet When her daughter Rebecca falls in love David does not necessarily make one a references to confirm my suspicions, with a German student, who attended Nice Chap – several of David’s sons were I find that there is never any mention the university in Dublin for a year, and anything but pleasant and civilised. And of a spouse or children. Is the ‘missing the pair agree that Rebecca will visit him David himself had usurped the crown link’ in fact the next link in the chain of in Hamburg after his return there, she from Saul! As early as p.13 (and repeated his family history? If so – and the chart doesn’t tell her mother that she has a on p.164) Rashi appears, both as the on p.23 would indicate this – then it is German boyfriend – let alone that she is author’s ancestor and as a descendant essentially a rather sad book, looking planning to visit him in Germany. of David through Shepatiah, the son of only backwards and not forwards. Irma kept a diary as a child and large Athalia. All is rather indirect and, since Naturally one cannot tell who one’s sections of it are reproduced when she David was famous for spreading his great-grandchildren will ever be or is re-reading it in her old age. She never seed widely outside marriage, whereas become, but the first step has to be to talked about her childhood or her feelings another son, Solomon, is famous for continue the possibility ... and Gelles has when she came to the UK without her having many wives and spreading his devoted his life to researching the Jewish parents, who, she learns eventually, were seed widely within marriage, it must past rather than creating a Jewish future. deported to Theresienstadt in 1942 and be hard to find someone who by now Psalm 1 begins with ‘Happy is the man murdered in Auschwitz in 1944. is not somehow linked to these potent who walks in the way of the Lord.’ One Irma had a very close friend, Lea, before potentates. (Not mentioned by the could say ‘Happy is the man who knows she emigrated and they swore they would author, Shepatiah appears in I. Chronicles who he is, and where he comes from.’ always keep in touch and help each other. 3:3; he is the fifth son of David (himself One could even add: ‘And who knows Irma felt guilty permanently – that she was the seventh son of Jesse). In Ezra 2:4 and where he is going!’ For God, ‘I am who I unable to say ‘good-bye’ to Lea before she Nehemiah 7:9 his family, returning from am’ (Exodus 3:14) was enough. left Germany because her departure was exile, now comprise 372 persons! But This book is indeed a fascinating so sudden. When Rebecca is in Hamburg why stop at David? In I. Chronicles 2:9- Jewish journey through European history. she tries to find out what happened to 15 we have David’s genealogy and could But what is the destination and what is Lea and succeeds in establishing that she theoretically go much further back ...) the destiny? survived the war, which she immediately Edward Gelles is very proud of his Walter Rothschild tells her grandmother. But following ancestors, all of whom – at least, all those prolonged research it turns out that mentioned – seem to have been learned, A page-turner Lea died about ten years earlier, which pious and successful in their times. The naturally saddens Irma as it shatters her lists fill many pages. Somewhere there DAS GERETTETE KIND (THE SAVED hopes of being in touch again with her must be a rabbi or chief rabbi or Av Beit CHILD) old friend. Irma admits that she gave her Din of some obscure village somewhere by Renate Ahrens daughter the same name (anglicised by in Europe or north Africa to whom he Munich: Droemer Verlag, 2016, 352 adding an ‘h’ at the end) in order never is not related but this reviewer has not pp. hardback, €19,99 (E-Book €17.99), to forget her friend. found them. In pp. 182-85 for example, ISBN 978-3-426-28114-7 Rebecca’s researches have the he demonstrates in acribic detail how he his is a German novel, which has, I surprising result of improving Leah’s is related to Karl Marx, Yehudi Menuhin believe, not so far been translated relationship with her mother and her and Martin Buber respectively! Tinto English. It tells the daughter and the three women But where does all this lead? The Tree story of a 12-year-old girl, can now talk to each other more of Knowledge seems less important to Irma, who comes to England easily and feel closer to each him than the Family Tree. He has a degree from her home in Hamburg other. in Pedigrees. He preaches the dogma of on a Kindertransport in June For somebody like me, who endogamy, demonstrating demography 1939; of her daughter Leah; didn’t keep ‘up to date’ with demonically and dogmatically with a and Leah’s daughter Rebecca. his knowledge of the German superimposed theory of relationships At the time of the story all language, this book reveals some and through pregnancies and progenies three are living in Dublin (as it new words: when somebody the relativity of each individual. He never happens, the author too lives in Renate Ahrens ‘checks in online’ before going to forbears to mention his forebears and Dublin and Hamburg!). the airport he will say ‘Ich habe follows every conceivable route to his The manner of telling the story differs online eingecheckt’, while ‘to skype’ roots by showing who conceived whom. from that of other novels: the three becomes ‘skypen’. There are, of course, But to believe that people are just the women address the reader directly many other ‘new’ words – often English result of conceptions is a misconception. in sections of varying lengths, which terms ‘Germanised’, especially when At the end of the book, with its always have the name of their narrator they are connected with the use of a detailed charts and footnotes (the later as a heading. So it occasionally happens computer. There is a lot of conversation, chapters include much detailed scientific that one reads about the same event which presumably represents the current information on how DNA tests work), more than once but told from different use of the German language. one feels one has learned a great deal viewpoints. The book is a ‘page-turner’ – the about the varying stages of Jewish Irma is sent to Northern Ireland after reader is curious to know what happens history in Europe, the interconnections, she arrives in London and, after a very next and, in my view, the way the story the enormous amount of travel and unhappy period with a childless Jewish is told increases its readability. networking that led to rabbis moving couple, lives and works on a farm near Fritz Lustig

9 journal AUGUST 2016 Great stirrings in Berlin - and a nostalgic visit to Koszalin/Koslin: he director of the Cajewitz-Stiftung She had allies in Dartington School in Berlin-Pankow, Professor P-A. and in A. S. Neill’s Summerhill school TAlbrecht, invited me to take part in in Suffolk, but in Germany her child- a public reading from my autobiography orientated methods were regarded as Sunday’s Child? – A Memoir) on 16 revolutionary. June this year. The other protagonist And so I was invited to give the was a Polish Jew, Dr Anatole Godfryd, crowded audience on the re-naming who together with his young wife day and, among great festivities, a had survived the war years in Poland speech (in German of course) describing in the most dire circumstances and Anna Essinger, with a few warts and had published his autobiography, Der all, to a very enthusiastic audience Himmel in den Pfuetzen (Heaven in of teachers, parents and children, Puddles – mine had been translated who then subjected me to a lengthy into German in 2009), more recently. interview and a question-and-answer The non-Jewish Cajewitz-Stiftung, session, with many pertinent questions which provides superior housing for about my escape from Germany and elderly people in Pankow, not far from In front of the former Jewish Boys’ Bunce Court School. My coup de théâtre the former Jewish Boys’ Orphanage, Orphanage Carol and Leslie Brent, during my speech was to present the had acquired the imposing orphanage daughters Jenny and Sue, grandson Milo school with a small silver bell, which building from the Jewish community in had been a birthday present from the a pretty derelict state in the late 1990s artists and intellectuals and he became staff to Anna Essinger (generally known and, under the careful supervision of something of a patron of the arts in as Tante Anna or T.A.) with the word Professor Albrecht, it was restored to Berlin. A very happy ending indeed. ‘pleeeeease’ engraved on it. When its former glory. The ground floor is I had planned to leave Berlin after a the noise at mealtimes had exceeded now a public library and the remainder few days to re-visit Koszalin (formerly acceptable limits she had frequently of the building a school. The former Köslin, the town in which I was born) in called out ‘Silence, pleeeease!’ and Betsaal with its lovingly restored ornate what used to be called Hinterpommern, this bell was given to me by her family ceiling, in which I had my barmitzvah almost on the Baltic Sea, which became after her death. It was enthusiastically shortly before escaping to England in Polish in 1945 and has virtually no received. the first Kindertransport to leave Berlin, Jewish vestiges other than a few that Now a few words about my curtailed is now regularly used for lectures, have emerged since I have visited visit to Koszalin. Accompanied by discussions and recitals. It is in this room the hugely enlarged town since the Professor Albrecht, who wanted to that the readings and discussions took beginning of this century. However, our stay for just one day to get to know place, with Professor Albrecht as the visit there – I was accompanied by my my Polish friends, we travelled by train moderator. wife Carol and two of my daughters and from Berlin to Koszalin, a journey that The room was pretty full – around one grandson, for whom this was their took more than six hours with two 150 people had turned up – and the first visit to Koszalin and therefore of changes. (I last made this journey in the readings were well received. Godfryd’s great emotional significance – had to be reverse direction by fast train, when I story was in part gruesome (he and his curtailed by one day because I had been was taken by my parents to the Jewish family had escaped from a cattle wagon invited to take part in an extraordinary Boys’ Orphanage in the winter of 1936, on its way to a concentration camp festive ceremony in a school in Berlin- by which time I was no longer able to by filing through the bars of a small Zehlendorf on the day of our return to attend my school thanks to physical window and throwing themselves out, London. persecution and attacks.) I was struck one by one, from the slowly moving This secondary school had decided by the vast and largely uninhabited area train …). The discussion centred to a to merge with a primary school and that was given to the Poles after the large extent on the question of why it the schools were therefore faced war to compensate them for the loss was that Godfryd, who had suffered with the challenge of finding a of their eastern provinces to the Soviet so badly at the hands of the Germans, commonly agreed name. Among the Union – vast forests and great tracts of had decided to move to Berlin soon 70 suggestions made, Anna Essinger largely uncultivated land. after the war, when the Nazis had not eventually emerged as the winner. She On arrival in Koszalin, we were yet been rooted out, whereas I had not had been the headmistress of Bunce greeted on the platform by two Polish found it emotionally possible to visit Court School in Kent, a co-educational couples who had become good friends Germany and especially Berlin, from avant-garde boarding school she had over the years, and each one of us (all which my whole family were sent to transferred from near Ulm (Herrlingen) six!) was presented with a bouquet their deaths, until many years later. in 1933, together with many pupils and of lovely flowers. It was almost like a Godfryd had become a dental surgeon teachers, and to which I was admitted homecoming and during our stay (we who succeeded in establishing a large soon after my arrival in England. (On the had booked into a very pleasant hotel and well-regarded practice in Berlin day she was required to fly the swastika on the outskirts) we were treated like and was greatly bound up, even in his flag from her building she decided she celebrities and old friends and shown all youth, with German culture. (He and his could no longer educate Jewish children the former Jewish sites – the impressive wife were hidden on a small Polish farm in Germany and made up her mind to memorial at the site of the Technical for the last 18 months of the war and leave.) She is well known in Germany for University and the ‘old’ cemetery that, he kept the impoverished and almost her work for the Quakers after the First thanks to my visits and the dedicated starving farmer and his wife on his side World War (she had spent the war years efforts of my friends Zdzislaw Pacholski by telling them the stories of operas in the USA) helping to feed children in and the Catholic priest Henryk Romanik, …) I am not sure that the question a starving country and for her advocacy was re-dedicated some years ago. The was satisfactorily resolved! There can of the educational system of Reform- only gravestone in it is that of my great- be no doubt that Godfryd’s dental Paedagogik, which was in stark contrast uncle David Baruch – the only surviving services were in great demand among to the rigid German educational system. continued on page 11 

10 AUGUST 2016 journal Celebrating 250 Years of Jewish life in Hull hen thinking about the be sponsored to the tune of £50 city of Hull, I don’t believe in order to be admitted to the UK, Wthe first fact that would a large sum in those days. Money come to mind is that it is home was raised by both the Jewish to the longest established and and Christian communities and continuous community of Jews in 22 children were welcomed into the country, if not in the world! people’s homes. Adoptive parents This was the theory put forward at took in all the children; no hostels the Jews of Hull Conference which were required. took place in June this year at the Vellins read snippets from a diary Hull History Centre. The conference written by a young Kindertransport was an all-day event, organised by refugee describing how he was the Hull Jewish Archives. On a very unable to ask for the toilet in hot day, a number of speakers gave Hull Hebrew Girls School Class 2, c 1930s English. He crept about the house lectures on many aspects of Jewish (c DJC/1/10/12/7) at night in search of the bathroom life and legacy in the city, enthralling Hull welcomed its Jewish immigrants but was unable to turn on the the packed hall. The conference was and allowed them to integrate fully into lights because the switches worked a celebration of Hull’s 250-year-old society. There was no ghetto, as was differently from those in Austria. Jewish community, which has lived seen in Manchester and Leeds, as Jewish After three days of misery the child peacefully among its fellow citizens, families were dispersed throughout developed a temperature and became rarely being troubled by antisemitism the city. The Jewish community was quite ill and a German-speaking doctor and giving back a great deal through responsible for providing huge amounts was sent for. Following a quick chat charity and public service. of charitable funding in order to help and translation and a visit down the Dr Nicholas Evans discussed the migrants move on to other cities and, hall, the problem was soon resolved! early arrival of Jews in the city. Some for the few who remained, to provide The young refugees of Hull went on of those immigrating were doing so the means for them to earn their own to lead fulfilled lives, pursuing careers in order to escape persecution in the living. in such fields as the law and university Pale of Settlement of Eastern Europe. Hull had a particularly good record lecturing. Several refugees joined Prior to the pogroms though, Jewish in its support of children arriving on the British armed forces once they people arrived in Hull to further their the Kindertransport. Dr Ian Vellins read were old enough and made heroic businesses and to expand their trades. out a number of heartbreaking letters contributions to the Allied war effort. Many immigrants arrived at the port, sent to members of the Hull community The day was filled with fascinating in transit to other destinations, notably from Jews in Germany and Austria insights into the Jewish contribution America, but also bound for other begging for their children to be taken made to the city, not least by its English cities. Evans described how in. Hull responded under the leadership Kindertransport children. Jews regularly arrived, moved to cities of people such as Philip Bloom of B’nai Fran Horwich such as Liverpool and Manchester, and B’rith, by sponsoring children to come Fran Horwich is the AJR Northern returned to Hull only to leave again. and live in their city. Each child had to Volunteers Co-ordinator

Great stirrings in Berlin – and a nostalgic visit to Koszalin/Köslin  continued gravestone that had been found lying in known to me from my childhood, symbolic of the new, deeply divided a small stream alongside the cemetery climbed the 40m tower on top of the and xenophobic Britain to which we – all others having been used for road hill, from which one gets a 360 degree returned: the BA flight was seriously building long ago. The cemetery is view for many miles around, including delayed and Terminal 5 was in such surrounded by a small fence, with a the Baltic Sea, spent an afternoon on a state of chaos that our luggage gate bearing the Star of David, and, the beach, even managing a nostalgic appeared three hours after landing, apart from my great-uncle’s gravestone, swim, and admired the stork nests without explanation. We arrived home, contains a large commemorative rock that are so characteristic of that part hungry and exhausted, at 3.30 am. with a plaque in Hebrew and a cypress of Poland and that reminded me of my Leslie Baruch Brent that had shot up from a couple of feet childhood. to well over 20! Our Polish friends were charming Other nostalgic visits were to the and hugely hospitable and it was a spring grove large commemorative rock placed memorable visit, especially for my London’s Most Luxurious near the site of the former huge daughters and grandson, for whom this RETIREMENT HOME synagogue, burnt to the ground during was the first visit to the town in which 214 Finchley Road Kristallnacht, by a group of pilgrims I had spent the first 11 years of my life. London NW3 who had followed the route taken in Our trip was an extraordinary 1938 by the dissident priest Bonhoeffer experience. In Berlin too we were  Entertainment on his visit to that part of Pomerania; treated with the utmost consideration  Activities and to the block of flats near the station and affection – taken to the opera  Stress Free Living where my family had lived and which and wined and dined and generally  24 House Staffing Excellent Cuisine for many years has carried a large slate mollycoddled. We heard of the UK  Full En-Suite Facilities plaque which, in three languages, referendum result on the morning of Call for more information or a personal tour explains that the famous immunologist our last day there and our German 020 8446 2117 Leslie Baruch Brent once lived there … friends were as upset as we were. or 020 7794 4455 My family walked in the woods Maybe our flight to Heathrow was [email protected]

11 journal AUGUST 2016 PINNER The Cairo Genizah the Allies. A sombre talk of very great An enthusiastic expert told us about interest. Fritz Starer the Cairo Genizah, the world’s largest HULL CF Hull’s Jewish History and most important collection of We enjoyed a visit from Michael mediaeval Jewish manuscripts, which is Westerman, who, among many now housed at Cambridge University. It other things, is President of the Hull consists of some 200,000 items, which Jewish Community and instrumental INSIDE are slowly being restored, deciphered, in organising the 250th anniversary translated and correlated. It brings to the celebration of the first Jewish settlement life the Cairo community as it includes in Hull. We listened intently to his not only religious texts but also such AJR description of Hull’s Jewish history mundane things as bills and personal and he painted a vivid picture of the letters. Henri Obstfeld many things he himself remembered EU REFERENDUM: IN OR OUT? PRESTWICH ‘Brexit’, Lunch and while growing up in the area – all most We met at the North Western Reform Good Company interesting. Wendy Bott Synagogue in London’s Temple Meeting at Louise’s lovely home, we CAMBRIDGE Women in Jewish Fortune area. Mike Freer elegantly discussed ‘Brexit’ over a delicious lunch Religious Life explained the case for remaining in the and enjoyed each other’s company Louise Heilbron told us that the first EU: All recent terrorists were home- immensely! Wendy Bott grown and not recent immigrants. women rabbi, Regina Jonas, was The risk to the economy was greater EALING A Source of Inspiration ordained in Germany in 1935. Forty by leaving. We were only 8% of the Eva Clarke, who was born in a years later, Jackie Tabick was ordained EU’s exports but the EU was 44% of concentration camp towards the end as the first woman rabbi in the UK. our exports. Norway wasn’t in the EU of the war, talked about her family Being ordained was one thing, but but had arrangements to allow the and, in particular, her amazing mother. finding a pulpit another. There remained free movement of EU citizens. Her mother, who survived three camps, resistance to appointing women to the Sir Bernard Zissman emphasised overcoming terrible situations, came job of rabbi as the role was deemed that the most important thing the to England in the late 40s and lived incompatible with a woman’s family EU had produced was peace among to a great age, being a source of duties. By the 70s much had changed, nations that had fought wars against inspiration to Eva and her children and women rabbis having become accepted each other over centuries. We would grandchildren. Leslie Sommer and respected. Eva Stellman be stronger and more stable in the BRIGHTON Jews in the Arab World EU, which would benefit our children KINDERTRANSPORT LUNCH ‘Harif’ founder Lynn Julius showed a and grandchildren. We stood a better ‘Stay in the EU!’ film about Jews in Muslim countries chance of reforming the EU from Our June speaker, the Austrian over the centuries. She highlighted the within, he added. Ambassador, Dr Martin Eichtinger, violent dispossession in Iraq and the A lively Q&A session followed. has been in the Austrian Diplomatic loss of life in many pogroms, especially Edgar Ring Service for 30 years, his appointment during and after the Holocaust. No as Ambassador in London dating acknowledgement of guilt had been CHESHIRE CF ‘Stay in the EU!’ from January 2015. Austrians would made or reparations paid to the survivors, Over 20 members graced the beautiful prefer the UK to remain in the EU Lynn said. Ceska Abrahams home of our host Peter Kurer. In a (the referendum result wasn’t known MARLOW Painful Memories discussion of ‘Brexit’, the overall view at the time), he said, but the current Meeting at the home of Alan Kaye, was that we should ‘stay in’ the EU! immigration situation was a major we exchanged reminiscences about We then watched a lovely film showing challenge for his country. our families’ backgrounds. Many of Peter’s granddaughter, aged 14, talking David Lang us regretted not asking our parents/ part in a piano recital in her home city of grandparents about their history – Jerusalem – we were all duly impressed! ESSEX (WESTCLIFF) A Stimulating Day and most of them didn’t want to Wendy Bott Southchurch Hall was most interesting disclose the painful memories of their and the guide gave us lots of history ILFORD A Very Happy Day refugee experiences anyway. It was about the hall and some English also interesting to find out how we Michelle Mandel explained how the medieval explanations. A stimulating Six Point Foundation was in a position all ended up in deepest Berkshire/ day in great company. Thank you, AJR. Buckinghamshire! Dennis Dell to give AJR members the benefit of a Helen Grunberg computer and showed us how it would work. There were many untutored but RADLETT Jews in the Arab World KENWOOD HOUSE JOY eager faces keen to learn this modern Little is known of the fate of the Jewish The history and individuals behind way of making contact with all and population in North Africa at the time Kenwood House came to life vividly sundry. A very happy day for us all. of the Holocaust. Lynn Julius told us thanks to Mark King, a Blue Badge Meta Roseneil that anti-Jewish feelings were fanned by guide and second generation Nazi propaganda and heightened by the AJR member. We so admired all LEEDS CF Smiles, Tapping Feet and Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and the rise the priceless paintings by world- Clapping Hands of the Muslim Brotherhood. Jews in the renowned artists. Kenwood is a great The superb Orthodox Chazan Alby Chait Middle East and North Africa suffered treasure in its lovely setting beside sang songs in Hebrew and English, greatly. More than 100 concentration Hampstead Heath. Afterwards we accompanied on the piano by Phil camps were set up, where many died. enjoyed a very welcome cream tea! Cammerman. The room was filled with Thousands of Jews were sent to Europe Janet Weston smiles, tapping feet and clapping hands. as slave labourers. Things would have And all this was followed by yet another been much worse but for the British KENT ‘We’ll Meet Again …’ amazing afternoon tea with Barbara’s victory at El Alamein and the expulsion We met for lunch at the Nutmeg incredible baking! Wendy Bott of German troops from North Africa by Restaurant to discuss the future of this

12 AUGUST 2016 journal

CONTACTS AUGUST GROUP eventS Ealing 2 Aug Nick Dobson Susan Harrod Lead Outreach & Events Norfolk 2 Aug Peter Beschorner: ‘My Father Hans: The Music Survives’ Co-ordinator 020 8385 3070 [email protected] Book Club 3 Aug Social Ilford 3 Aug The Sturgeon Queen (video) Wendy Bott Northern Outreach Co-ordinator Pinner 4 Aug Annual Garden Party 07908 156 365 [email protected] Cambridge 9 Aug (on Tuesday, earlier than normal) Susan Shaw JP: Agnes Isaacs ‘Justice of the Peace, Not Jewish Princess’ Northern Outreach Co-ordinator Essex (Westcliff) 9 Aug Godfrey Gould: ‘How the Railways Changed Our Lives’ 07908 156 361 [email protected] Brighton 15 Aug Lesley Urbach: ‘The Life of Isaac Shoenberg’ Kathryn Prevezer Edgware 16 Aug Eva Clarke: ‘Born Survivors: The Extraordinary Story of Southern Outreach Co-ordinator 07966 969 951 [email protected] My Mother’s Survival and My Birth’ Leeds 18 Aug Summer Garden Party at home of Pippa Landey. Guest Esther Rinkoff speaker: Geoff Kamil QC Southern Outreach Co-ordinator 07966 631 778 [email protected] Welwyn GC 18 Aug Annual Summer Luncheon Eva Stellman Birmingham 21 Aug Garden Party and presentation of bench by AJR to Southern Outreach Co-ordinator Andrew Cohen House 07904 489 515 [email protected] Cheshire 22 Aug Social KT-AJR (Kindertransport) North West London 22 Aug tba Susan Harrod 020 8385 3070 [email protected] Prestwich 23 Aug Social North London 25 Aug Annual Lunch Child Survivors’ Association-AJR Henri Obstfeld Wembley 31 Aug David Barnett: ‘The most Famous Jewish Victorian 020 8954 5298 [email protected] Business – E. Moses and Sons’ Pinner 1 Sept Julian Romain: ‘History of Words and Phrases’ small group. It was amazing to hear Ealing 6 Sept tba from Inge Hack how, after her struggle Book Club 7 Sept Social to come here from Nuremberg, her son Ilford 7 Sept Peter Hedderley: ‘The Winton Train 2009’ had been successful in obtaining a First from Cambridge. ‘We'll meet again, don’t know where, don’t know when, but I know we'll meet again some sunny day …!’ Esther Rinkoff SCOTTISH REGIONAL: MEETING UP WITH FRIENDS OLD AND NEW he Scottish Regional is a focal (HMDT), entitled ‘Football, Cement and WELWYN GC Helping Members to point in the AJR calendar. This a Wooden Spoon’. It was good to hear Use Computers year it attracted almost 50 people, the HMDT had a record 5,590 activities We were welcomed once again in T including a good number of for Holocaust Memorial Day Monica’s lovely home and treated to her second generation members in 2016, with events taking generous hospitality. On this occasion, from Glasgow, Edinburgh, place in such diverse locations we were joined by Claude Vecht-Wolf, Montrose, St Andrews, as schools and prisons. the AJR’s Computer Co-ordinator, as Newcastle and Cumbernauld. Educating young people is well as by a lovely sixth-form pupil An overview by Sue extremely important but the from JCoSS, Danielle, who was on a Kurlander, the AJR’s Head of parents need to learn too! week’s work experience with the AJR. Social Services, was followed Everyone was most Sam Ostro told her how he came to be by group discussions on the impressed with Micha a refugee in WGC and Claude explained topics ‘Are Today’s Refugees Cooper’s film My Dearest … how the SPF Connect Programme was Yesterday’s Refugees?’; ‘Will – his first film, which he made designed to help survivors and refugees Brexit Adversely Affect Jewish at the age of 12! Micha, who find using computers difficult. Communities in Europe?’; now 14, is a budding third Eva Stellman and ‘Looking Ahead’. All generation filmmaker. He EDGWARE Women Rabbis these resulted in intense debate. The interviewed his grandparents about We very much enjoyed Louise Heilbron’s overall conclusion was that Britain is their experiences and talks of his great- talk tracing the history of women rabbis a stable democratic anchor in Europe. grandfather’s time spent as an internee from the very first, Fraulein Rabiner There were differing opinions about on the Isle of Man as an ‘enemy alien’. Regina Jonas, ordained in Germany the status of the refugees but it was The inspiration for producing the film some 80 years ago. There had been generally felt that there was a need to came from a number of war-time many female Bible scholars, Jewish help the children. letters and correspondence between as well as Anglican, who wanted to Deborah Haase of the Scottish his great-grandparents over the worry become rabbis and vicars respectively Jewish Archives Centre reported on the of deportation to a distant land. Micha but couldn’t be ordained. There was progress of the Holocaust Study Centre, has now produced 14 films and is a discrimination and exclusion until the a major project which is supported by most talented young man with a great 20th Century and the first woman the AJR. future. rabbi’s ordination in the UK in 1975 The delicious three-course lunch As always, the Scottish Regional was preceded the first Anglican ordination was followed by a superb talk by Olivia a great opportunity to meet up with by 20 years. Alice Fraser Marks Woldman, Chief Executive of friends old and new. the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust Agnes Isaacs continued on page 14 

13 journal AUGUST 2016  INSIDE THE AJR GUIDED TOUR OF Psychoanalytic continued from page 13 HOOP LANE Psychotherapist UKCP NORTH WEST LONDON IDF Volunteer JEWISH CEMETERY Registered and BACP (Accred) Michael Myers told us about his time by Rachel Kosky, Blue Badge Guide I offer a safe and confidential with the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). He Monday 8 August 2016 setting where you can talk about volunteered to spend two weeks last year This tour highlights the history of the Hoop Lane your thoughts and feelings and in Israel on a scheme organised by Sar-El cemeteries in Golders Green. Opened in 1897 for things that are worrying you (Service for Israel), under the direction such as depression, anxiety, both the Reform and Sephardi Jewish communities, of the Israeli Army Logistics corps. Only bereavement, anger, relationships. 2.5 per cent of the volunteers for this they contain an array of fascinating personalities for whom this is their final resting place. Rebecca Aharon tel 07904 115 795 very worthwhile task come from the UK. email [email protected] Michael has volunteered again to return They include those of religious leaders such as later this year. David Lang Hugo Gryn and Albert Friedlander, actor Sydney Tafler, philanthropist and youth leader Sir Basil Henriques, HARROGATE/YORK CF A Leisurely Stroll writer Jack Rosenthal, the parents of Maurice and We enjoyed a leisurely stroll around the Charles Saatchi, and ‘agony aunt’ Marjorie Proops. Books Bought beautiful RHS Harlow Carr Gardens, Modern and Old after which we enjoyed refreshments Following the tour we will have lunch at a local and convivial banter at Betty’s Café as restaurant in Golders Green and the opportunity well as celebrating the forthcoming to speak with Rachel. birthdays of Edith Jayne and March Transport between the Cemetery Schatzberger. Wendy Bott and the restaurant will be provided. Eric Levene BIRMINGHAM Bright Company and For further details, please speak to 020 8364 3554 / 07855387574 Delicious Food Susan Harrod on 020 8385 3070 [email protected] We met on a grey wet June day but or email [email protected] I also purchase ephemera the company was bright and the food, as always, delicious – compliments to the catering staff at Andrew Cohen LEO BAECK HOUSING ASSOCIATION House and to Lesser’s for keeping us all together. Esther Rinkoff KT LUNCH CLARA NEHAB HOUSE Wednesday 10 August 2016 RESIDENTIAL CARE HOME BOOK CLUB A Lovely Afternoon at Alyth Gardens Synagogue, 12.30 pm Quite spontaneously we came to talk Small caring residential home with large attractive gardens about how each of us came to this country We are delighted to be joined by Danny Stone, close to local shops and public transport and our experiences from then on. Serious Director of the Parliamentary Committee Against 25 single rooms with full en suite facilities. but also funny stories. A lovely afternoon. Antisemitism Foundation (PCAAF). 24 hour Permanent and Respite Care Hortense Gordon Entertainment & Activities provided. The PCAAF provides secretariat support for the Ground Floor Lounge and Dining Room NORTH LONDON Herbert Morrison All-Party Parliamentary Group Against Antisemitism • Lift access to all floors. and the Jews and is a registered charity, whose work is centred For further information please contact: We appreciated Lesley Urbach’s polished, on the principle that the struggle against prejudice The Manager, Clara Nehab House, well researched and original talk on and discrimination is not just the responsibility of 13-19 Leeside Crescent, London NW11 0DA Telephone: 020 8455 2286 the attitude of Labour leader Herbert the victims. Morrison to Nazi antisemitism and the fascists in the UK in the 1930s. His The PCAAF’s mission is to make antisemitism a favourable attitude to Jews was not, she societal concern and, in doing so, help create a more told us, matched by any wartime actions tolerant society. on behalf of Jews. Henry Cohn PillarCare Danny works closely with John Mann MP, who Quality support and care at home recently wrote an article in the AJR Journal about the  Hourly Care from 4 hours – 24 hours switch on electrics Conference on Antisemitism in Berlin earlier this year.  Live-In/Night Duty/Sleepover Care For details and booking, please contact  Convalescent and Personal Health Care Rewires and all household  Susan Harrod at AJR on 020 8385 3070 Compassionate and Affordable Service  electrical work or email [email protected] Professional, Qualified, Kind Care Staff  Registered with the CQC and UKHCA PHONE PAUL: 020 8200 3518 We look forward to seeing you Mobile: 0795 614 8566 Call us on Freephone 0800 028 4645 PILLARCARE THE BUSINESS CENTRE · 36 GLOUCESTER AVENUE · LONDON NW1 7BB PHONE: 020 7482 2188 · FAX: 020 7900 2308 www.pillarcare.co.uk www.fishburnbooks.com CLASSIFIED Jonathan Fishburn buys and sells Joseph Pereira (ex-AJR Jewish and Hebrew books, caretaker over 22 years) is now JACKMAN . ephemera and items of available for DIY repairs and Jewish interest. general maintenance. SILVERMAN He is a member of the Antiquarian No job too small, Booksellers Association. very reasonable rates. COMMERCIAL PROPERTY CONSULTANTS Contact Jonathan on 020 8455 9139 Please telephone Telephone: 020 7209 5532 or 07813 803 889 07966 887 485 [email protected] for more information

14 AUGUST 2016 journal ObituarIES Andrew Herxheimer, born Berlin 4 November 1925, died London 21 February 2016 ndrew Herxheimer, eminent clinical 30 years. He was renowned for his editorial to a massive scale and currently covers pharmacologist and champion of skills and a compulsion for wordplay: around 100 health-related issues. Now evidence-based medicine, has died he punned adeptly in four languages, called Healthtalk Online (based at the Ain London following a stroke. French and Dutch as well as Department of Primary Born in Berlin, Andrew came to English and German. Health Care in Oxford), England in 1938 aged 12 with his mother Andrew’s other activities the website www. Ilse (née Koenig) and sister Eva. His father included chairing the healthtalk.org received Herbert (‘Hx’), also a pioneering physician, Health Working Group five million visits in 2015. had been invited to London by A. V. Hill of IOCU (International The global reach of this on behalf of the Society for the Protection Organization of Consumers delighted Andrew, an of Science and Learning. Unions) and ISDB ardent internationalist not Andrew won a bursary to Highgate (International Society of least due to his negative School and subsequently a scholarship Drug Bulletins). He was childhood experiences in to St Thomas’s Hospital Medical School a consultant for WHO, Nazi Germany. (London), graduating in 1949. Following travelling to countries such as Syria, Egypt, In 1961-74 Andrew was married to service with the British Armed Forces in Nepal and the Philippines to support textile designer Susan Collier, with whom Germany, he began his career in clinical government programmes for essential he had two daughters, Charlotte and pharmacology. From 1960 he worked at medicines. In 1968–77 he was Extraordinary Sophie. In 1983 he married Christine (née the London Hospital and, from 1976 to Professor at the Clinical Pharmacology Bernecker), a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst 1991, at Charing Cross and Westminster Department, University of Groningen, from Germany. Medical School as senior lecturer and Netherlands. He was always full of ideas, continuing consultant. Following retirement from the Charing to think about the interests of patients In 1962, aware of the need for Cross, Andrew joined Health Service until he died. He had been planning a independent advice for doctors regarding researcher Iain Chalmers in Oxford, where series of workshops with the University drugs and treatments in the interest in 1993 he helped to establish the Cochrane of the Third Age to help people better of patients, he founded the Drug and Collaboration, a network of researchers understand the medicines they take. He Therapeutics Bulletin (DTB). Published reviewing and analysing clinical trials also wanted to build a database of peoples’ by the Consumers’ Association and worldwide free of commercial sponsorship. multi-language biographies, which he subsequently distributed by the Weeks before his 90th birthday, he spoke nicknamed ‘autobiolingos’. As a colleague Department of Health to all NHS doctors at a Cochrane conference in Vienna about tweeted, ‘[S]ince Andrew died the planet in England, the DTB gave prescribers adverse effects, warning that unwanted has already become a less interesting place!’ accurate and impartial information for effects of medicines should be taken more Andrew Herxheimer MB BS FRCP, the first time. It had a lasting influence on seriously. HonFBPhS is survived by his wife prescribing habits and was a forerunner of In 1999 Andrew and Dr Ann McPherson Christine, his daughters, Charlotte and the National Institute for Health and Care founded DIPEx (Database of Individual Sophie, and four grandchildren, Lola, Excellence (NICE). It was widely praised Patients’ Experiences), where patients can Brodie, Rosa and Conrad. for its willingness to challenge big pharma watch videos of other people talking about Christine, Charlotte and its quality. Andrew edited the DTB for their experiences of illness. It developed and Sophie Herxheimer

Ruth Ingeborg Renfield, born Hamburg 25 November 1919, died London 5 March 2016 y mother, Ruth Ingeborg 1938 on the Kindertransport. In February Corps, the Royal Engineers and then the Renfield (née Mehrgut), died 1939 she was able to obtain work permits Intelligence Corps. They divorced in 1969. on 5 March this year aged 96. via an aunt who lived in England for her In 1950-65 she ran her own kindergarten HerM ashes were interred with those of her mother, a long-time friend (Eva Oppenheim, or worked in other kindergartens. From mother, Alice Mehrgut (née Cohen), in with whom she kept in close contact until 1965 to her retirement in 1982 she was a Edgwarebury Cemetery, her death) and herself, which receptionist at the Oxford Street branch of London, on 20 April. She enabled them to escape to an international school of languages. left a son and grandson. England. Her father, who was During her retirement she helped for My mother was born in unable to escape, died a natural many years with the AJR Luncheon Club Hamburg on 25 November death shortly afterwards. at Hannah Karminski House in Swiss 1919. After leaving school After a period in domestic Cottage, London. Lunch was £1.25, with she took a one-year domestic service and of internment in ‘an extra-large’ portion at £1.50. She also science course then trained the Isle of Man, she served undertook home-visiting through the AJR for four years as a nursery in the Auxiliary Territorial and went regularly to Heinrich Stahl House school teacher, partly in an Service, being demobbed in as a volunteer. orphanage. 1946. She left her beloved flat in London Through the orphanage In 1946 she married Henry in 2010 and moved to a care home in she arranged for her younger Julian Renfield, who was from Gloucestershire, where she died peacefully. brother, Heinz, to escape to England in Berlin and had served in the Pioneer Herbert Renfield

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race and her art but was unable to find a haven of tranquility in pre-State Jerusalem, where insularity and provinciality prevailed Dorothea Shefer-Vanson in daily life as in the arts. Today her work is recognised internationally and monuments have been erected to her in Germany and ‘My Blue Piano’ Israel. n evening to mark the 70th of 28, may have served to upset her mental Else Lasker-Schüler’s oeuvre demonstrates anniversary of the death in Jerusalem balance, or even to generate depression verging her fascination with the Orient, and the of the German-born Expressionist on insanity, though no medical diagnosis of few pictures painted or sketched by her Apoet Else Lasker-Schüler was held at the her condition was made. that were projected onto a screen above Music Conservatory in Tel Aviv in June. The The musicians at the evening performance the musicians show her undoubted talent event took place under the joint auspices of in Tel Aviv, all young people from Germany and originality, as do many of her poems. the Leo Baeck Institute and the Association and Israel, met several years ago as students at Her drawing of a camel with an Arab rider, of Former Residents of Central Europe (now the Jerusalem Music Academy and today are under which she has scrawled ‘Yusuf riding mainly composed of descendants of those members of various European orchestras. They through the desert’, is a marvel of physical former residents), and consisted of readings played music by Hindemith, Mendelssohn, representation combined with deep insight from Lasker-Schüler’s poetry and letters (in Bach and others with sensitivity and into the rider’s emotions – and all this with German and in Hebrew translation) and understanding, and one of their number consummate economy of line and form. slides showing some of her pictures, as well informed the audience that they had decided Other slides showed her drawings of scenes as music performed by members of the Else to take Else Lasker-Schüler’s name for their in an Arab coffee house and individual Ensemble. ensemble in order to strengthen the ties characters whom she encountered (let’s not ‘My Blue Piano’, the title of one of Lasker- between Israel and Germany as well as to forget that under the British Mandate there Schüler’s poems, was also the title of a BBC emphasise the role of creative women, and was no separation between east and west radio play by the Scottish playwright Marty women composers in particular. Jerusalem). Ross which was broadcast on Radio 4 in After some introductory remarks by Reuven Else also drew extensively on the Bible for 2007. The play combined the facts of her Merhav, the Chairman of the Association her imagery: Biblical characters are portrayed last days with the fantasies of her inner of Former Residents of Central Europe, as flesh-and-blood contemporaries in many life. The last ten years of Else’s life were Professor Itta Shedletzky, a world-renowned of her poems, as well as symbolising more spent in Mandatory Jerusalem, where she expert on the work of Else Lasker-Schüler, general currents and events. She also seems to was penniless and endured great physical gave an analysis of one of Else’s poems, using have imagined that she could converse with hardship, being unable to work and living her own Hebrew translation to illustrate the them and her ‘dialogue’ with King David on the charity of a few friends. As she grew originality and significance of the text, as assumed a prominent role in her work and older the bohemian lifestyle of her youth well as Else’s ability to create neologisms. Else life. Evidently, the events in Europe leading was transmuted into an eccentric way of was one of the few women exponents of the up to and during the Second World War and life and dress that didn’t find acceptance or Expressionist school and as such occupies a the Holocaust affected her deeply: in one of understanding among the wider population unique place in the development and history her poems she asks ‘God, where art thou?’ of the city. Her objective situation, as well of German art and literature. She was able to And that is certainly a sentiment which many as the death of her son in 1927 at the age escape persecution by the Nazis for both her of us can share.

 letters to the editor cont. from p.7 state. The Jews had no option but to beat in Israeli hospitals, where many Arabs too which they have peace treaties. the Arabs or suffer the same fate as their are treated. Even supermarkets employ Remember the history of all those brethren in Germany and Poland. Arabs also. Arabs who have managed to involved in the conflict; the terrorism; I am sure that once the EU, USA and cross the border in the north are treated the camps of Jews interned during the Russia have resolved the problems of as well. The BBC – not always a supporter war in the Isle of Man and Cyprus; the Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Lebanon, where of Israel – produced a documentary about concentration camps in Europe; the hundreds of thousands have died, and a Syrian who had his jaw replaced by a Holocaust; and the formidable efforts of where Lebanon and Jordan house more new technique using a 3D printer. The our brethren to stay alive at all costs. than four million refugees, as well as the man was treated and, when asked whether Might I suggest that on her next visit Ms Arabs pouring into Europe, they will be in he wanted to return to Israel, replied ‘Of Manson widens her tour of the Middle East a position to encourage the Israelis to make course. I am going back to have my new and perhaps we will have her comments a deal with the leaders of the local Arabs. teeth fitted.’ on her treatment in the Arab countries she In the meantime, steps have been taken Instead of spreading evil stories about visited. She should, however, be wary of to integrate Arabs into Israeli society. how the Jews are looking after these visits to IS/Daish-occupied territories as the Members of the Knesset are voted for by stateless people, remember the positive authorities there are not quite so tolerant Arabs who qualify. I believe even Israel’s side of the Israelis and that technically of inquisitive ladies. Supreme Court is led by an Arab. Many Israel is still at war with its enemies, with Laurence Freeman, Arabs are working as nurses and doctors the exception of Egypt and Jordan, with Luton, Bedfordshire

Published by The Association of Jewish Refugees (AJR), a company limited by guarantee. Registered office: Winston House, 2 Dollis Park, Finchley, London N3 1HF Registered in England and Wales with charity number: 1149882 and company number: 8220991 Telephone 020 8385 3070 Fax 020 8385 3080 e-mail [email protected] For the latest AJR news, including details of forthcoming events and information about our services, visit www.ajr.org.uk Printed by FBprinters LLP, 26 St Albans Lane, London NW11 7QB Tel: 020 8458 3220 Email: [email protected]

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