VOLUME 20 NO.4 APRIL 2020 JOURNAL The Association of Jewish Refugees

EXTRAORDINARY How should we TIMES As the AJR Journal went to press the country seemed to be on the verge of total lockdown and all our celebrate VE Day? own events and activities have been cancelled - please read the letter from Next month we should be celebrating the 75th anniversary of the our Chairman and Chief Executive on page 3. end of World War II in Europe. The May Day Bank Holiday has We hope that you and all our readers been moved from Monday 4 May to Friday 8 May, only the second are staying well and positive during this difficult period. Keeping in time ever that the early May Bank Holiday has been moved – the touch with one another is even more first was in 1995 to mark the 50th anniversary of VE Day. But with important than ever and we would love to hear your stories of how you the country currently in crisis, can we actually celebrate? are coping, especially if you have any suggestions for other AJR members who might be affected.

Wishing you a happy, kosher and above all healthy Pesach.

Coronavirus: the AJR response...... 3 From Leopoldstadt to Loudwater...... 4 The hostel in Lebanon Park...... 5 Letters to the Editor...... 6 Looking For...... 7 Art Notes...... 8 Hardly a holiday!...... 9 Holocaust Memorial Day Reflections.....10-11 Safe Haven...... 12 “Have a good day”...... 13 Around the AJR...... 14 Notice from the Claims Conference...... 15 Reviews...... 16-17 Obituaries...... 18 - 19 Letter from Israel...... 20

Please note that the views expressed throughout this publication are not necessarily the views of the AJR. The Queen, The Queen Mother and Princess Margaret watch a procession of vintage planes fly over Buckingham Palace during VE Day commemorations in 1995 (PA) AJR Team Chief Executive Michael Newman Finance Director David Kaye Original plans included commemorative Churchill. A special gala event should Heads of Department Community & Volunteer Services Carol Hart events across the country to honour the be being broadcast live from the Royal HR & Administration Karen Markham sacrifice so many men and women made Albert Hall. Educational Grants & Projects Alex Maws during the Second World War, including Social Work Nicole Valens church bells ringing across the country, Some of this may sound familiar. In AJR Journal local street parties across the three-day 2005, to mark the 60th anniversary of Editor Jo Briggs weekend, the playing of popular songs the end of World War II in Europe, the Editorial Assistant Lilian Levy from the war and speeches by Winston Continued on page 2 Contributing Editor David Herman

1 AJR Journal | April 2020

How should we kind of story from the one traditionally Soviet security forces started to fill them celebrated on VE Day. There is a growing with new inmates. The new histories of celebrate VE Day (cont.) gap between the popular British memory the war are a moral grey zone. of the war, with its cherished myths, Queen and the Prime Minister, Tony and the most interesting new historical Sir Antony Beevor has introduced a new Blair, attended a ‘memorial show’ on research. The tectonic plates are shifting: generation of readers to the savagery Horse Guards Parade. In his book, from the western front to east Europe, and scale of the battles in the east from Europe at War, 1939-1945: No Simple from books on diplomacy (AJP Taylor’s Stalingrad to the fall of Berlin in 1945. Victory (2006), Norman Davies describes famous The Origins of the Second World Jan T Gross has told us about how this show: “It took the form of a series War), battles involving the British (the antisemitic Poles slaughtered their Jewish of musical and comic items from the Battle of Britain, North Africa, the Pacific neighbours during and after the war. wartime repertoire linked by a historical to D-Day) and famous British figures to After the fall of Communism, archives narrative. The latter was read by the the very different experience of the war opened up in eastern Europe and the actor Simon Callow and was interspersed in central and east Europe. former Soviet Union, and historians like with a selection of Churchill’s speeches… Gross, Norman Davies and Timothy Hence ‘Bluebirds over the White Cliffs As Norman Davies writes in Europe Snyder, who read Polish, Russian and of Dover’ alternated with ‘We shall fight at War, ‘the open-minded observer Ukrainian, revealed the scale of atrocities on the beaches!’, and Flanagan and will be tempted to view the war effort in the east, by local collaborators and Allen numbers were followed by the of the Western powers as something by Stalin’s NKVD as well as by the theme tune from Schindler’s List, by “A of a sideshow.’ 4,650 were killed at Nazis. Stalin’s crimes against civilians in Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square” El Alamein. Nearly a million died at Ukraine, Belarus, Poland and the Baltic and, in the grand finale, by “We’ll meet Stalingrad. Another 900,000 died in Republics were fully exposed. again, don’t know where, don’t know the Siege of Leningrad. A few hundred when.” died in the bombing of Coventry or The Second World War seems darker Rotterdam; 90,000 died in the bombing and more morally complex than ever Fifteen years on, I imagine BBC of Warsaw in September 1939. before. The war films of Jack Hawkins, programmes would still be full of all too John Mills and Anthony Quayle and the familiar images of young service men In his book, Bloodlands (2010), Timothy cosy comedy of Dad’s Army and Allo and women dancing and hugging in Snyder shows that the centre of gravity ‘Allo all seem a long way away, more Piccadilly Circus, of Churchill and King of the war in Europe was not the than thirty years on. During the 1980s George VI waving to huge crowds from western front but Poland, Byelorussia and ‘90s the Holocaust and the Eastern the balcony at Buckingham Palace, (now Belarus) and Ukraine. They saw Front took centre stage, both in terms all intercut with popular songs from the most intense warfare and the worst of morality and in terms of the sheer Vera Lynn. These would portray a very civilian horrors from the very beginning scale of the violence. This is the lesson nostalgic vision of Britain, a frozen vision of the war in September 1939 to the of the histories of the Second World War of the past. last Soviet battles against Germany in and the Holocaust written over the past 1945. Belarus lost a higher proportion thirty years. The current health crisis aside, there is of its civilian population than any other still an excuse to celebrate VE Day. But country in Europe. Ukraine lost the Our popular memories of the war, also much to mourn. Almost 400,000 highest absolute number. however, remain out of step. The 75th servicemen and women were killed, anniversary of VE-Day is a chance for wounded or missing in action (including The new histories of the Second World us to catch up. Yes, there is much to deaths from the colonies). Nearly 70,000 War have moved from the centres to celebrate. There is also much to mourn British civilians were killed, including the peripheries of Europe, from Paris and much to learn. 43,000 who died in London during the and London to the Baltic and Soviet Blitz. On 8 May many will be thinking borders. Myths have collapsed under David Herman of those they have lost. And of homes their scrutiny. The myths of Austria they have lost. There were 30 million as the “first victim”, of the “decent refugees in Europe when the war ended. Wehrmacht” and of “Uncle Joe”. There Many never returned to their homes. has been much debate about the war EU Passport Refugees who came to Britain will be crimes committed by the allies: the fire- thinking of the people and the world bombing of Dresden and Hamburg, Applications they lost. When I think of VE-Day I the deportation of Cossacks by Britain think of an image of my father, a Jewish to the Soviet Union to face certain The Jewish Historical Society of refugee from Warsaw who lost his entire death, the atrocities against German England invites anyone in Britain family during the Holocaust. As others civilians by the Red Army. It was not with Jewish ancestry through celebrated around him on 8 May 1945, until Gorbachev that we finally learned which they and/or their children he stood alone, silent, lost in his own of the war crime against Polish officers are seeking an EU27 citizenship to thoughts. at Katyn. We betrayed the Czechs but participate in an online survey. More Prague survived. We stood by the Poles information on https://jhse.org/ Recent histories of the Second World but Warsaw was destroyed. As the inner-passport-system/ War have started to tell a very different concentration camps were liberated,

2 AJR Journal | April 2020

Coronavirus: the AJR response

Dear Friend

At this challenging time when your everyday lives will be impacted by the spread of the coronavirus, we are writing to assure you that the AJR will do everything possible to continue to support you, our members. At the time of going to press, the government had just announced advice for the over-70s to self-isolate, a decision that we recognise will profoundly affect you.

In response, the way we deliver our frontline services has been altered. Rather than home visits in person from our social workers and volunteer befrienders, we have started to make contact with members by telephone. Initially, and as a priority, this will be with our most vulnerable members with the greatest needs. Above all, the call will be made to establish what that member’s situation is, what needs they might have – be it food, medical or social – and whether there are relatives, carers, neighbours or another communal organisation who can also assist. We know that for some of our members who were already isolated we remain their primary point of contact and that being alone can itself have a detrimental effect on a person’s mental health.

While we cannot plan for every eventuality, any member of staff who contacts you will do so with the aim of trying to help.

To confirm what you might also have heard by now, for the time being all AJR regional group meetings and social events have been cancelled. This includes the Second Generation conference planned for later this month and the members’ holiday to the Cotswolds in May. Bookings for holidays for later this year have also been suspended.

Although all AJR staff are now working remotely rather than from the AJR offices, we remain open for business and contactable on 020 8385 3070 and by email at [email protected]

As we will also in all likelihood be providing updates and guidance by email, please ensure we have your email address so we can stay in touch. If you do not already receive correspondence from us by email or have recently changed your email address, please send an email to [email protected] to establish contact. Updates will also be provided on our website at www.ajr.org.uk

Your wellbeing remains our over-riding priority so if you display any of the symptoms associated with the coronavirus, or have underlying health issues, please follow the official updated guidance at https://111.nhs.uk/COVID-19

Wishing you and your loved ones much strength as we manage this unprecedented situation, and our very best wishes for Pesach.

Andrew Kaufman Michael Newman Chairman Chief Executive

3 AJR Journal | April 2020 From Leopoldstadt to Loudwater © Mark Brenner

Sir Tom Stoppard’s magnificent My parents came to Vienna from Galicia (played well by Jenny Augen) had come new play, Leopoldstadt, could just before World War 1 – early in 1914. over from America for the ceremony, My father, Marcus Pfeffer, like nearly all providing the first mention of the have been written for me. It’s Ostjuden, settled in Leopoldstadt. My United States and the possibility of Jews my family’s story – almost. The mother, Betti Schmarak, moved in with emigrating there. My mother’s brother, play starts in 1899 at the home the Demants. Josef Demant had left Bernard Schmarak, did just that, Galicia twenty years earlier. He married becoming rich. of the Merz family. They had my mother’s sister and now lived in the done well in life, particularly up-market Ringstrasse, like Hermann. Now it is 1938. The Anschluss had My mother moved in with them. She happened in March. This is November, Hermann, the head of the family mixed with people much posher than possibly after Kristallnacht. The two played by Adrian Scarborough. those in Leopoldstadt – just as Hermann families are together in a crowded did, compared to mathematician Ludwig room. They knew what was happening They had moved away from Jakobovic. (Ludwig is acted sensitively by to their fellow Jews. One of the Leopoldstadt, the area of Vienna in Ed Stoppard, Tom’s son). relatives had been sent to Dachau. which Jews had settled since 1782, Many were learning how to be after being allowed back to Austria by The second scene takes place in 1924. domestic servants because they had Josef the Second. No more ghetto living Again, a coincidence. This was the year heard that England was taking in for Hermann. He had renounced his my parents married. The Merz family are butlers and housekeepers. Judaism and converted to Christianity. still successful but there is now overt talk He even married a Christian. (This is of antisemitism, of going to America, of My father was due to be sent to where the story differs from mine. None Zionism and Theodore Herzl. Dachau. He was going to be arrested of my family converted. Some, though, by a gestapo leader because he was an did marry out). It is Christmas time at My parents were also doing well. My “eminent Jew” and Hitler did not want the Merz home. Their relatives, the father was a doctor, and had a surgery “eminent Jews” in Vienna. The wife Jakobovicz family, are invited. There is and apartment in Leopoldstadt, near the of the gestapo leader, a patient of my a Christmas tree. And suddenly Jacob, Prater. father’s, tipped him off. He went into Hermann’s son, decides to put a Star of hiding and avoided Dachau. David on top of the tree. Strangely, however, though swearing allegiance to Austria, my father started We are in the crowded room with the This action is the theme of the play. to follow Herzl and the Zionists. In the Merz and Jakobovicz families. A Nazi Leopoldstadt is about identity. Jewish play Jacob, Hermann’s son, is starting to bursts in, wearing an armband with identity. What makes a Jew? Is it true notice Zionism too and showing a definite a swastika. He knows every member to say that “once a Jew always a Jew”? interest in the movement. (Jacob is played of both families. He speaks to each Hermann tries very hard to be different. by Sebastian Armesto, surely an award- individually. He orders them to pack He wants to join the antisemitic winning performance). just one suitcase and be outside the Jockey Club. He looks down upon the apartment by 10 the next morning. See Jakobovicz family. They have a Yiddish There is a circumcision. Or should it have the play to learn what happens. accent, they use Yiddish words, they been a baptism? Stoppard gives us a dress as though they were still in a shtetl light pause here for what could even be In my family’s case, my father managed in Galicia. described as slapstick. Rosa Jakobovicz continued on next page

4 AJR Journal | April 2020 The hostel in Lebanon Park AJR members might enjoy reading this report recently received from Andrew Lawrence, Head of History at Hampton School, about some research he and his pupils are currently conducting.

Some Year 9 pupils, none of whom Armed with this, we wrote to the Wiener and the terror of Kristallnacht. Five days is Jewish, were working on an extra- Holocaust Library. They told us the details later his father was taken to a concentration curricular history research project to matched those of a boy called Günter Ruf camp. On 19 April 1939 his mother and help them design foundation stones for from the town of Herne in Germany. siblings took him to Dortmund station the proposed Holocaust Memorial in to travel to Holland. It was the last time Westminster. They came across a map We placed a search notice in the AJR George saw his mother. of their home area which included a Journal and, in response, were delighted to reference to a “Kinderhostel” in Lebanon be contacted by Helen Levy, whose step- Eventually he ended up living in 52 Park, a road in Twickenham close to our mother, Margot Brauer, helped to look after Lebanon Park and went to St Mary’s school. the boys in Lebanon Park. Primary School – the school some of our own pupils attended before coming to No one locally knew about the house We then wrote to the Kindertransport Hampton School. In all ten refugee boys or its inhabitants but we had one lead: Association in New York and in response lived at the house in Lebanon Park. the AJR’s Kindertransport database had received an email from Günter, who was listings for two, unnamed, boys who lived renamed George in Britain. George found out that after he left Herne in the house in 1939. We had no names his mother and siblings were all sent to for them, just dates of birth and arrival in George told us about his life in Herne, the concentration camps. Sadly, his mother Britain. persecution that Jewish people faced there died on a death march in Poland in 1945. George’s father managed to escape, fighting for the British army against the Nazis in Africa before reaching England and finding George in 1946.

With Helen Levy’s help we also got in touch with Michael Popper, the son of another boy who lived at Lebanon Park. It was great to hear about his dad, Freddy. The refugee boys in the garden of We know very little about the other boys Lebanon Park hostel who lived at Lebanon Park. Our research continues! continued from previous page Sonia Friedman who was instrumental in ever seen. Luke Thallon plays Leo who to get a cousin to sponsor us in London encouraging Sir Tom to write it. has been anglicised. He is as English in and Bernard Schmarak to sponsor us 1955 as Hermann was Austrian in 1899. in Chicago. We arrived safely from I think the only actor I have not yet He had even changed his name so as Leopoldstadt to London on 21 February mentioned and would like to praise is Faye not to sound foreign. 1939. Castelow. She plays Hermann’s Catholic wife, Gretl, with wonderful finesse. I was Peter Pfeffer. I haven’t seen a play as thought- provoking as Leopoldstadt for a long I must admit that the final scene, in 1955, Peter Phillips time. I became totally involved with the made me cry and I thought that the three Loudwater characters. Sir Tom Stoppard is a genius. actors, Sebastian Armesto, Jenny Augen It was superbly directed by Patrick and Luke Thallon were all terrific. For me, Leopoldstadt is at the Wyndham Marber, and I pay tribute to producer it is one of the most moving endings I’d Theatre

5 AJR Journal | April 2020 Letters to the Editor The Editor reserves the right to shorten correspondence submitted for publication and respectfully points out that the views expressed in the letters published are not necessarily the views of the AJR.

WHAT WE FORGOT ON HMD Holocaust Museum and Memorial Centre down our street and our beautiful David Herman’s article (March) was does in Nottinghamshire. Most days Synagogue was set alight and gutted. a thoughtful piece and raised some school children arrive to see the powerful Furthermore, my father and grandfather important questions about how we exhibitions about the Holocaust and hear were arrested and detained for nearly should remember such appalling the testimony of a ‘survivor’. I am one a week, their business was stolen from atrocities. of the regular speakers and talk to about them, as was their newly built villa and 100 secondary school pupils and the most of their savings and possessions. However, I have to take issue with his public present that day; the title of my We never saw any of our immediate including the showing of The Boy in the testimony is Born a Hidden Child. I hope family again although some of our more Striped Pyjamas in his list of examples that, in future, AJR articles will include distant relatives managed to escape to of the BBC “at its best”. Surely, this film this important educational venue dealing USA, Israel, New Zealand etc. We arrived is another piece of “Holocaust porn”: with the Holocaust. in Harwich on 2 July 1939 just 2 months a lachrymose confection of overfed Hanneke Dye, Skipton before Hitler invaded Poland. concentration-camp slaves and two sweet little boys – one a prisoner and the other How can I possibly compare the son of the camp commandant – who SURVIVOR OR REFUGEE? myself to those who suffered the die together in the gas chamber. Peter Seglow’s letter (March) expresses an inconceivable miseries of incarceration in issue that has exercised my thoughts also. ghettos and extermination camps? One The focus of the film is on the I have come to the conclusion that this of my close friends and her twin brother commandant’s family and the audience is a matter of the meaning of the word survived Dr Mengele. She is indeed a is invited to empathise with a German “survive”, and the meaning depends survivor and rightly so. I see myself as a boy who apparently knows nothing of on its perception. The strict semantic refugee and fortunate to have been one. antisemitism (when he would, in fact, meaning of the word is “continue to Peter Briess, London NW3 have been fully indoctrinated in the Hitler live or exist despite an ordeal or mortal Youth), while the Jewish boy is presented event”. as merely a characterless (but reasonably The Holocaust Survivors’ Centre in well-fed!) victim. The emotional meaning of the word Hendon defines a survivor as one would influence the perception of it, who was in Austria or Germany on And what are we meant to make of the insofar that a survivor of the camps Kristallnacht. ending? That it was a tragic “mistake” would consider an individual who sought Freddy Berdach, Harrow Middx for a German boy to be killed along refuge from the Nazi regime, and thus with his Jewish friend? That we should avoided the camps, as a refugee. sympathise with the horror and grief of Whether people are termed refugees or the commandant’s wife? I, as one of the latter, can’t help survivors is surely unimportant. I lived considering myself as a refugee, not under Nazi rule in Sudetenland (northern Perhaps the worst thing about it is we wishing to diminish the incomparable Czechoslovakia) and again in Prague after are asked to believe that it was possible suffering of the camps. That Yad Vashem the Nazi Invasion. I therefore consider for the commandant’s son to live on the considers both as survivors is academic myself as a survivor. edge of a death camp and not know and, in my view, unjustified. R. J. Norton, Notts. anything about what was happening Emil Landes, London N6 on the other side of the wire which, of course, is the very defence of those SOUTH HAMPSTEAD SYNAGOGUE Germans after the war who chose to Frankly I was a little surprised that The article on South Hampstead deny their complicity. according to both Yad Vashem and the Synagogue (March) co-written by US Holocaust Museum I am considered Stephen Lawson struck me quite The film is not as distasteful as the a ‘survivor’. I have always considered unexpectedly. It was a geographic and execrable Life is Beautiful, but it is down myself to be a ‘refugee’ since I came to historic description of the area I have there in the same gutter. this country age 7 with my parents and lived in for most of my life and I have Michael Johnson, London NW3 sister and was saved from the horrors of known Stephen since he was a little boy, Terezin and Auschwitz. as he went to the same kindergarten as my eldest son. I am not a member I read David Herman’s article with We were among the lucky ones who of that Synagogue but attended one great interest. In his first paragraph, got out even though we were present in Shabbat last year and Stephen came mentioning education, he omitted Olomouc, Czechoslovakia on 15 March over to greet me which I appreciated the excellent work that the National 1939 when the Nazi troops marched greatly.

6 AJR Journal | April 2020 LOOKING FOR? Concerning Peter Seglow’s query as to The AJR regularly receives messages from our members and what we should be called, I think we could all of us be defined as “B. F.s” others looking for people or for help in particular subjects. Here (Bloody Foreigners!) are some of the most recent requests – please get in touch directly Margarete Stern, London, NW3 with the person concerned if you can help.

THE CONUNDRUM OF HS2 MAINZ AND FREIBURG new book and all contributors would After several years of consideration, the British-German family historian Sandra be acknowledged. government has decided to accept the Lipner is hoping to find someone who [email protected] or recommendations of the high-speed knew Mainz and/or Freiburg, Germany, call 07816 196517 rail network, known as HS2. There before 1945 and would be happy to were as many for as against that a new talk to her about it. She is working on a network was necessary. In the absence research project about the families Ganz DESCENDANTS OF GIZELLA of a common agreement, regarding (Ludwig Ganz AG) and Brenzinger DOERNER (EVA ALTON & ERIC) the infrastructure of a hitherto untried (Brenzinger & Cie). Does anyone know of surviving British multi-billion-pound project, the [email protected] descendants of Gizella Doerner of main question remains whether there Northend Road W14 who died on is a need for a new system at all. In the 1st September 1970? Cremated at circumstance, as there was no agreement, ESCAPE FROM PARIS Mortlake Crematorium on 3.9.1970? the project should have been abandoned. Graeme Fife is preparing a radio She had a daughter, Eva Alton, and a There should be a minimum agreement programme for the BBC about Adolfo grandson, Eric. requiring a majority of 75% for a project Kaminsky who forged ID cards and [email protected] of that magnitude. papers for Jewish children in Paris during the War. It is impossible to The problem lies squarely with the fact link with certainty any individual who KINDERTRANSPORTEES FROM that all roads and rails lead to London. survived with papers he forged but it CHEMNITZ, DRESDEN, LEIPZIG HS2 would increase this imbalance out would help the programme enormously The children and staff of the of all proportion. London became the if we could talk to someone who did Montessori School in Chemnitz centre of industry, commerce and finance escape from Paris with false papers. are undertaking a Kindertransport at an increasing, unstoppable pace since fifegraeme@bbc.co.uk research project funded by the the end of WW1. HS2 would strangulate state of Saxony. The school wishes progress rather than increase it. to make contact with former HUNGARY IN WW2 Kindertransport children or their Many European countries have diversified Author Agnes Grunwald-Spier seeks descendants, especially those their centres of business. Thus, traffic information on the Budapest Ghetto in originating from Chemnitz, Dresden, congestion is minimised and transport which her mother was incarcerated with Leipzig or other places in Saxony. comfort is not compromised. Centres baby Agnes. Agnes would also like [email protected] of specialised activities create common information on the Hungarian Forced interests and understanding in the Labourers into which her father was population. conscripted and, as a result of which, he HACHSHARA SETTLEMENT IN Fred Stern, Wembley, Middx. committed suicide. Agnes is writing a NIEDERSCHOENHAUSEN (near BERLIN) This settlement, founded by Hechalutz in 1934, was led by Write Your Life Story JACKMAN . Leopold and Ruth Kuh (later Kew). Record a Family History In 1938/39 a large group of former SILVERMAN Whether you have begun writing, trainees from Niederschoenhausen researched your ancestors, or COMMERCIAL PROPERTY CONSULTANTS went to Kitchener Camp and some never put pen to paper, we offer were sent on to Australia. A book a personalised service to help is to be written about these former you preserve your precious Niederschoenhausen trainees and memories for future generations. we are seeking their descendants in www.wordsbydesign.co.uk Telephone: 020 7209 5532 Australia or in Britain. [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] or 01869 327548 [email protected]

7 AJR Journal | April 2020 ART NOTES: by Gloria Tessler

There may be more fun in Olivia Coleman’s portrayal of a libidinous Queen Anne in The Favourite than in Tate Britain’s British Baroque: Power and Illusion. But in its first-time focus on baroque culture the Tate also explores the wavering links between the Stuart crown and politics.

Britain was not the natural home Another portrait of Charles by the same élite were waiting in the wings. John of baroque. All those cherubs and Italian artist is a sulky semi profile, a James Baker’s The Whig Junto 1710, an ornamental images are European – fragment from the ceiling of the king’s ideologically tight group of political peers notably reflecting the court of Louis XIV, withdrawing room at Windsor Castle, developing their ideas of democracy, then extolled in England as the sun king. where he could gaze up at himself from almost anticipates the Chequers summits The French king was the envy of Charles his bedchamber. Then you have the of our own time. The weirdly named II, epitomising glamour and aspiration. flamboyant bust by the French artist Whig Kit Kat Club, portrayed by Kneller, Antonio Verrio’s The Sea Triumph of Honoré Pelle who never visited England indicates how the artist ennobled royals, Charles II, (1674), presents the English and probably based it on painted aristocrats and politicians alike. monarch naked beneath his flowing ruby images. Most of the art of this period robes, and curly black wig, atop a sea is full of swirling satins and silks, more Further aspects of this period were the of lesser mortals beneath the heavenly reflective of pomp and power than decorative, emotional altarpieces, such seraphim. Here is the Stuart king artistic integrity. as Benedetto Gennari’s portrait of The asserting his regal rights after his father’s Holy Family hung in the private Catholic execution and all that Cromwellian But it was also the time of the Samuel chapels of Queen Catherine of Braganza, abstinence. The new Restoration Pepys diaries and Christopher Wren’s wife of Charles II, and Mary of Modena, England had hardly a puritan thought in architecture. As Surveyor-General the Italian wife of the future James II. its head. of the King’s Works Wren followed After Puritan attacks on church art, the mathematical principles of geometric use of Catholic images for worship was perfection, such as in Chatsworth House. still highly controversial. But even his ideas were inspired by French architecture. One of the most exciting developments of the period was the art of trompe One room is totally devoted to l’oeil – painted optical illusions of aristocratic court beauties, known as the grand colonnades and staircases by Petworth Beauties, by artists like Michael Flemish painters such as Samuel van Dahl and Godfrey Kneller. But despite all Hoogstraten or Jan van der Vaart, the glitz of the gowns, the pale, effete whose violin appears to hang solidly on faces share the same hypnotic formality. a door. It is an apt metaphor for all this pomp and periwinkled power - which John Closterman’s Portrait of a Lord eventually became an illusion, too. Mayor of London presents him berobed and bewigged, bejewelled sword aloft, Until April 19 astride a horse still more ornamented than he is: one can only chuckle at the thought of our own Sadiq Kahn in that pose! Annely Juda Fine Art To commemorate Holocaust Memorial 23 Dering Street Day, the Ben Uri Gallery has acquired From the Restoration of Charles II in (off New Bond Street) this stained-glass portrait of Swedish 1660 to the death of Queen Anne Tel: 020 7629 7578 diplomat and Holocaust hero Raoul in 1714, courtly power may have Fax: 020 7491 2139 Wallenberg by the late artist and child dominated art, but things were about CONTEMPORARY survivor Moshe Galili. to change. With the monarchy engulfed PAINTING AND SCULPTURE in self-aggrandisement, the political

8 AJR Journal | April 2020

Irona, Syd & Margot, Hardly a holiday! together with an unknown friend, in 1938

In August 1938 my father Sydney Grant, then a 25-year-old furrier living in London, took a bizarre trip to Berlin. Nominally this was a six- week holiday, an opportunity to spend time with his mother’s extended family. In reality, it was more of a rescue mission. He wanted to help them leave Germany if he could. To achieve that he was considering marrying one of his second cousins, Irona Bernhard, then nineteen.

He never wanted to talk about that used Yiddish to get around, despite some to follow. Margot sent Syd a letter visit in any detail. I did learn that he’d odd looks. decorated with six photos of herself, enjoyed himself: he spent time with smiling. “We will be together!” she Irona and her younger first cousin On 10 August he wrote home to wrote. But war intervened. Margot Grodzinsky, aged 13, as well as Hackney, saying the journey from their parents and other relatives who Ostend to Berlin took 15 hours. What Thanks to the cousins’ work, Irona’s lived elsewhere in Germany. he didn’t say was that, at the German family did get visas. They eventually border, a woman passenger advised him reached Buffalo, via Portugal, in 1943. Photos and letters I found after my to hide the sandwiches his mother had father’s death, locked up in his bureau, carefully wrapped in a Bonn’s matzo bag. Leo was interned and sent to Australia, gave me a far better sense of that odd Personally, I think that a passport for while his family were sent to the holiday. They show how the family Solomon Ginsberg would have been the camps. In 1942 Margot and her mother welcomed my Dad and celebrated real giveaway. Gertrude died in Theresienstadt, along his birthday on 8 August. The cousins with her grandparents. swam together in the Berlin lakes Sifting through the papers I realised that and even sneaked into the Olympic the visit came about after a long series of I am now reading the letters properly for pool where Jews were banned. Syd letters, starting in 1935. When the first the first time. They are more important, visited an exhibition highlighting Nazi letter arrived my grandmother, Fanny was I think, than the visit itself. From this achievements in radio and television. He unimpressed as the German branch of the distance in time, they give a vivid and family was far wealthier than those in the upsetting picture of how life was closing East End. “Why should we help them – in on the Berlin Jews, from the mid- they’ve never helped us?” thirties into the War itself.

But the younger cousins started writing And while some family members did to each other. Irona was learning English anything they could, these letters and became the main voice of her family, show that others had a very different trying to obtain visas for the USA and join attitude. The process of finding money, other relatives there, with the help of an getting affidavits, obtaining visas, could American cousin, Dorothy Hork. Failing be like snakes and ladders. Though it that, the family saw England as a potential was life or death for those in Germany, safe haven for Irona and Margot – hence some family members in safe countries my father’s 1938 visit. were unwilling to help. It’s quite shaming. Irona’s letters describe how life became increasingly constrained as she became The papers and the story deserve more more and more desperate. “You must recognition. I wonder too about other marry me!!” she wrote to Syd in families’ rescue efforts, which perhaps December 1938. In early 1939 Margot’s even now remain unknown. The letter that Margot sent Syd in father Leo managed to get a visa to 1939 England for himself. The family planned Francine Berg

9 AJR Journal | April 2020 HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL DAY REFLECTIONS Where Were They Then? My mother was in Auschwitz. The industrial mass murder of six million Jews, survivors among us, I apologise on behalf the worst crime in the history of humanity, of the government for the actions of the My father was in Flossenbürg it was committed by my countrymen.” And government at the time. Too many people Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in government institutions at the time and Dachau. Both were slave proclaimed: “Auschwitz is more than the simply followed German orders without labourers. They returned to the ultimate symbol of evil, its ultimate symbol of realising the consequences”. And French Jewish powerless (sic) …… today we have a President Emmanuel Macron marked the few survivors in their remaining voice, a land and shield.” Day by inaugurating a renovated memorial wall in Paris naming around 76,000 French families. They met and married. Also present at Yad Vashem were Russian Jews deported to Nazi death camps. President Putin, USA Vice-President Mike During their after-war lives, Pence, and kings, presidents and prime So the great and good and powerful all ministers from over 30 countries. How did queued up to pay tribute to the victims. nobody had wanted to know. they fit in so many VIPs? Why had they Yet, one must ask, how many leaders They carried their burdens in not come so many years ago? of these very same countries offered to take in threatened Jews at the Evian silence. Life was hard. These days At the UK’s national HMD commemoration Conference back in 1938? in London, Prime Minister Boris Johnson they would have been offered stated: “I feel a deep sense of shame that Today in my synagogue it is so different. here in Britain in 2020 we seem to be Fellow-member and survivor of several help – but not then. Their needs dealing with a resurgence of the virus of camps Sam Freiman died very recently. antisemitism.” And then HRH the Duke He was one of the ‘Boys’. He had been were great. of Cambridge read from a letter about his honoured as a survivor for some time, grandmother, Princess Alice, who had saved his face even gracing the synagogue’s They passed away before HMD was a Jewish family from the Nazis in 1943. website home page. They had taken the inaugurated. Before IWM had opened time and trouble to make a DVD of his its exhibition. Before all those films were HRH the Duchess of Cambridge had taken life and testimony. He had willingly talked made. Before the Holocaust became photographs of Holocaust survivors and about his life to local school children. And ‘fashionable’. No-one had asked, no- their families to be shown at a forthcoming now they are publicising a special tribute one knew or acknowledged what they exhibition, and commented: “I wanted afternoon to be put on in his honour. had endured. Not even their synagogue. to make the portraits deeply personal.” They struggled alone until they died. Her photograph of Theresienstadt The Synagogue was completely full No-one mentioned the Holocaust. survivor Steven Frank and his two young for its own HMD event involving two grandchildren graced the Jewish News’ survivor-speakers. The local mayor, MPs, And yet today, the great and the front page of its special 80-page HMD councillors, leaders of local faith groups all powerful are queuing up to attend edition of 27 January 2020. attended. And the synagogue’s separate commemorations and give their thoughts. HMD education programme for visiting What would my parents have thought? London Mayor Sadiq Kahn, attending school pupils is expanding year on year. a ceremony in Krakow, declared that At the HMD ceremony in Yad Vashem, City Hall’s £300,000 donation to the But where were they all back then? HRH the Prince of Wales stated: “The Auschwitz-Birkenau memorial was partly How many decades did it take? Yes, the Holocaust must never be allowed to to address the “rewriting of history”. government has now set aside £100 million become simply a fact of history. We Polish Ambassador to the UK Arkady of public money for a national Holocaust must never cease to be appalled, not Rzegocki added to the discussion by Memorial. But as refugees to this country moved by the testimony of those who stating: “Poland was the war’s first victim, my parents could not even afford to buy lived through it.” German President the first country to experience the armed themselves a small fan heater to keep us Frank-Walter Steinmeier announced aggression of the two ruthless totalitarian warm. There are now so many Holocaust- “The perpetrators were human beings. regimes, and the first country that fought related organisations, all with pretty logos They were Germans. Those who to defend free Europe.” and salaried staff, I could not name them murdered, those who planned and all. But where were they all back then? helped in the murdering, the many who Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte marked silently toed the line: They were Germans. the day by stating: “With the last remaining David Wirth

10 AJR Journal | April 2020 HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL DAY REFLECTIONS Education and Commemoration There were noticeably more superb is denial on a massive scale that creates Since 1948 we have international laws the toxic legacy in which we are trapped to prevent genocide. We cannot use events for Holocaust Memorial Day today. It is time to work together to create them effectively because ‘sovereign the support and pressure to enable the immunity’ protects genocidal leaders this year than in any previous year. UN to organise an ‘amnesty’ in which we of countries. We need sharper Yet there is fear that the Holocaust all acknowledge the truth of our own and international laws. Myanmar is getting each other’s shameful histories, in order away with mass murder by claiming will become history with no jointly to aim for a better, more truthful that there was no intent. If you can’t world. A line could then be drawn, after prove intent to murder in domestic law, eyewitnesses able to give testimony. which sovereign immunity would no it becomes the crime of ‘manslaughter’. longer protect abusive leaders being held Failure to prove intent to annihilate a The two main aims are far from to account in the International Criminal whole people could at least become the Court. To quote Rahima Mahmut (a crime of ‘failing to protect a minority of achieved: antisemitism is increasing, Uyghur) “No oppressor should be able to citizens’. not decreasing, and “Never Again” hide from the public gaze”. Change is not likely to come from is still “Again and Again” The exclusion of the Ottoman policy of the top without ordinary people like annihilating its Christian and other non- you and me, in tens, thousands and I have no fear that the Holocaust will be Muslim citizens over the period 1900- millions, ‘Standing Together’ and relegated to history. We have excellent 1923 is deeply concerning. The Ottoman pledging to do something towards teaching/learning material now and it is Genocide is still totally denied by modern making “Never Again” a reality. improving all the time. The 2G network Turkey and by those governments and G2G (generation to generation) who prioritise trade with Turkey over Ruth Barnett MBE already give talks about their parents’ truth, ethics and the security of peoples stories through their own experience of worldwide. growing up with survivors. Survivors of the Cambodian, Bosnian, Rwandan and An Armenian survivor gave his personal Darfur genocides are already speaking testimony at the Wiener Library event at their testimonies, and there is at least one the first HMD in 2001. I was shocked at Uyghur survivor of the current identity my ignorance of the Armenian Genocide. genocide in China speaking prolifically. It was immediately obvious to me that there was a clear link with the Holocaust. The fear is more likely to be due to denial Raphael Lemkin’s word ‘genocide’ was and political implications. Genocide is coined in relation to the Ottoman policy still allowed to run its course out of fear of ethnic cleansing. Impunity, created by of standing up to abusive leaders who total lack of justice for the Armenians, has know they can get away with mass been followed by lack of justice, too little murder. The current Holocaust narrative and too late, with each genocide, ensuring is truncated at both ends; genocide the steady increase of impunity. Two books prior to the Holocaust and currently by Stefan Ihrig, “Turkey in the Imagination active genocides are avoided for political of the Nazis” and “Justifying Genocide” expediency. How can the main aims be make it very clear that Turkey ‘getting away fulfilled without pressure on the whole with genocide’ created impunity for more political establishment for the necessary genocide. Mustafa Kemal was adulated changes in attitude and behaviour to and called “The most brilliant Führer” in the prevent genocide? Resistance, which has German press. This aroused envy in Weimar been very much under-represented in the Germany to the point of wanting their own Rahima Mahmut from the World Holocaust narrative, perhaps also adds to ‘Führer’ to overturn the Treaty of Versailles, Uyghur Congress speaking at the political fear. just as Mustafa Kemal (later Ataturk) had British Board of Deputies’ HMD over-ridden the Treaty of Sèvres and created event on 31 January in a House of Most, if not all, countries create myths a free modern Turkey. The scene was set for Commons Committee Room to hide their own shameful history. This Hitler to become that ‘Führer’.

11 AJR Journal | April 2020

SAFE HAVEN

“Well there’s the farm where the Jewish children lived during the Second World War,” the organiser of my trip to Northern Ireland to speak on Holocaust Memorial Day 2020 said, when I asked about points of interest in the area. Eve Kugler and Charlotte Balasz looking at the farm’s records

The last thing I expected to learn when chaired by Ards and Down Mayor Bill Kerry. ones would pull unwelcome weeds from I agreed to speak at the Ards and North Three young girls from Millisle primary the soil. Up to 80 children lived on the Down Borough commemoration in school who looked far younger than their farm at any one time, first earning a January was that this remote community 11 years read excerpts from Faraway shilling, and later a half crown a week. on the eastern shore of Northern Ireland Home, Marilyn Taylor’s fictional account where there is no Jewish presence of the Kindertransport children, my first Many attended the local school where was a safe haven for hundreds of sign that the Kindertransport had not been each was paired with a local pupil to help Kindertransport children during WW2. I forgotten here. the Kindertransportees learn English. wanted to know more. Mrs. Patterson showed us large ledgers I spoke about me and my family’s survival from the 1940s and pointed to the So now my two-day trip had a dual in Germany and France and said we must handwritten entries of foreign children purpose. On 27 January I flew to Belfast learn from the past. I asked the audience registered there. accompanied by AJR member and to join me in the fight against rising Holocaust Educational Trust volunteer antisemitism so that history would not A change occurred at the farm in 1946 Charlotte Balazs, who supported me repeat itself. I was overwhelmed by the when 39 teenagers, all camp survivors, wonderfully during the visit. On landing appreciation and kindness many of the 100 came to live on the farm. One of many we were met by borough executive guests expressed to me. who returned to visit the farm years Donna Mackey who looked after us later, Rachel Levy, told Mrs Patterson throughout our stay. She drove us to the The next morning, following a further she relished the beautiful view the fields beautiful Belfast City Hall where we had a Holocaust talk to several hundred high provided and said “we started to feel quick look at the huge lobby with its walls school students in the presence of the ourselves again.” of marble and art works important to the Northern Ireland Education minister, we county’s history. Next, I was interviewed visited the Holocaust Memorial Garden on Today the buildings where the children by BBC NI. Our two-day visit was also the grounds of the Millisle Primary School. lived are gone and there is no sign on extensively covered by the local press. The garden is dominated by a beautiful the farm itself where hundreds of Kinder sculptured glass Magen David which, found refuge. But their history is kept The Holocaust Memorial Day according to a plaque, “commemorates the alive by the Safe Haven garden, the book commemoration that evening was safe haven which the farm and our school Faraway Home, the Ards and Down offered to hundreds of Jewish refugees Council’s annual HMD commemoration from 1939 to 1949.” and, especially, by Mrs. Patterson who Kindertransport teaches her Year 7 pupils about the farm memorial at Millisle Inside we were welcomed by head teacher and talks to the many visitors who peruse School Linda Patterson who explained that early the school registers and visit the garden. in 1939 members of the Belfast Jewish community purchased a 70-acre farm “’Don’t Stand By’ is a phrase which plays and with the help of the local community a pivotal role in my life,” Mrs. Paterson renovated its derelict buildings to shelter said. “I take the opportunity every day Kindertransport children from Germany, to keep the legacy of the Millisle farm Austria and Czechoslovakia. alive”. She will continue to give talks around Northern Ireland after she retires From the summer of 1939 until its closure this June “reminding people about the in 1948 life on the farm was modelled on wonderful welcome given to hundreds a Kibbutz. Helped by local adults, children of Jewish refugees by the Millisle grew vegetables and grains. There were also community over 70 years ago.” cows and many chickens. Even the youngest children were required to work. The little Eve Kugler

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Max Schnabl in his later “HAVE A years GOOD DAY” Max Otto Schnabl was an Austrian lawyer who, like many AJR members, sacrificed much to bring his family to Britain. His daughter Hedi Schnabl-Argent takes up the story.

The Insiders/Outsiders programme rightly father’s nose was nearly sliced off and had would not paint “Jude” on shop windows celebrates the lives of Jewish refugees who to be sewn back – he bore the scar for the nor slap the face of a fellow Jew when came to the UK from Nazi Europe before rest of his life. ordered to do so. WW2 and contributed so much to this country. In WW1 Max willingly joined the Austro- 18 months later my mother, father and I Hungarian army and served briefly as a arrived in England, complete with visas, But 35 years after his death, I celebrate the lieutenant in the cavalry. He was taken guarantees and my father’s certificate to story of my father who was one of those prisoner by the Russians in 1916, relieved prove that he had completed a course to unsung refugees from Central Europe, a not to have killed anyone. Conditions in become an English butler. Max took pride lawyer, who lived two thirds of his life as the prison camp were harsh and brutal: in being a perfect butler in the Hertfordshire a loyal British citizen, without complaint Max survived smallpox, learned English manor where my mother cooked English about his loss of status and, finally, without from a Berlitz pocketbook, and played food and I was barely tolerated - my keep bitterness against the people who had chess on a makeshift board with makeshift was deducted from their salary. caused it. pieces. My father was interned as an enemy alien Doctor Max Otto Schnabl was born in Prisoners were freed during the Russian but he remained optimistic that the good Moravia in 1892, in a small town where Revolution in 1917, but had to find their British people would realise their mistake, Jews and Christians lived alongside each own way home. It took Max eighteen and he played a lot of chess while he other in almost equal numbers and resolved months to return to Austria; he was waited. As soon as possible, he enlisted in difficulties by electing “twin mayors”, seriously ill and a third of his stomach had the Pioneer Corps. At 49 he was too old for one from each community, who worked to be removed. He was warned that he active service, but proud to serve even in amicably together. would never be able to eat normally again, a menial capacity, while well aware of the but I remember a father with a large, irony of serving on opposing sides in two Max studied law in Vienna. He played healthy appetite. world wars. football and chess for Jewish teams and gave lectures on Judaism and Jewish history Back at University, Max met my mother As lawyers cannot practice in England to fellow students, one of whom was Teddy and they married after he qualified. He without an English law degree, my father Kollek, (later the Mayor of Jerusalem). maintained himself during his studies by found a job as a clerk with a firm of working as a parliamentary stenographer solicitors and began to study by post. He When Max was called “a dirty Jew” he and by joining the “claque” at the opera passed the exam to start on a degree but challenged the offending student to an - students who were paid to stand at the was already over 50 and had a family illegal duel. Both men survived, but my back of the stalls to lead the applause. to support. So, he gave up all hope of becoming a lawyer again. But he went After the Anschluss my on playing chess. In time he came to be father, the optimist, revered as a kind of “eminence grise”, quickly turned into always ready to support and advise young a realist, and began lawyers. The partners did him the honour the long pursuit of referring to him, and addressing him for guarantors and as Doctor Schnabl, which pleased him affidavits needed immensely. He retired after 30 years at to gain entry into the edge of the profession he loved and another country. By continued playing chess until he was nearly day he worked at 92. a law firm and at Max Schnabl night he submitted to His family was with him when he was during his scrubbing pavements dying, and just before the end, he raised his Cavalry days and cleaning public head, waved his hand, and said very faintly: lavatories, but he “Have a good day”.

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BRISTOL In March AJR’s Bristol group enjoyed lunch Around and a talk by David Mendelsohn. He spoke CONTACTS about his mother’s life, and in particular how therapeutic it was for her to be able to Susan Harrod write her story and publish it, raising money Events and Outreach Manager the AJR for charity. AJR member Hazel Rank- 020 8385 3070 [email protected] Broadley also reported welcoming a new As explained in the letter from our Kindertransport guest. Wendy Bott Chairman and Chief Executive, which Northern Outreach Co-ordinator appears on page 3, all AJR regional 07908 156 365 [email protected] group meetings and social events have GLASGOW been cancelled. This includes the Second Agnes Isaacs Generation conference planned for later this Northern Outreach Co-ordinator month and the members’ holiday to the 07908 156 361 [email protected] Cotswolds in May. Bookings for holidays for later this year have also been suspended. Ros Hart Southern Outreach Co-ordinator We apologise therefore for the absence 07966 969 951 [email protected] of our normal event listings on this page. We will reintroduce our activities and the Karen Diamond information about them as soon as the Southern Outreach Co-ordinator national situation allows. 07966 631 778 AJR regional co-ordinator Agnes Isaacs [email protected] In the meantime we are delighted to bring reports that there were “smiles all round” at you these few photos from events that the Glasgow Lunch and Film afternoon. KT-AJR (Kindertransport) happened last month. We’d also love to Susan Harrod receive any suggestions from AJR members 020 8385 3070 [email protected] about how to keep ourselves busy and LEEDS happy while our social lives are restricted. Child Survivors’ Association-AJR Henri Obstfeld FILM CLUB 020 8954 5298 [email protected]

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A sizeable audience appreciated a screening From L-R, Peter Kurer, Robin Gilmore,  Entertainment of Stan & Ollie, the Laurel & Hardy biopic. Arek Hersch and Trudy Silman  Activities One member who particularly enjoyed it was  Stress Free Living Gordon Spencer of Barnet who, together Peter Kurer talked about how the Quakers  24 House Staffing Excellent Cuisine with his wife Elizabeth, was judged “runner- saved his life. Peter, originally from  Full En-Suite Facilities up” in the Daily Mirror’s 1976 national Vienna, was among 7,000 Jews brought Call for more information or a personal tour contest to imitate the famous comedy duo. to England with the help of the Quakers. 020 8446 2117 or 020 7794 4455 They helped his father set up a dental [email protected] practice in south Manchester and obtain guarantees for the rest of his family. Peter and his brother attended a Quaker boarding school. www.fishburnbooks.com Jonathan Fishburn buys and sells Jewish and Hebrew books, ephemera and items of switch on electrics Jewish interest. Rewires and all household He is a member of the Antiquarian electrical work Booksellers Association. PHONE PAUL: 020 8200 3518 Contact Jonathan on 020 8455 9139 Mobile: 0795 614 8566 or 07813 803 889 for more information

14 AJR Journal | April 2020

15 AJR Journal | April 2020

enough to work despite inhuman living it centres on the Villa Russo, built REVIEWS conditions and a starvation diet. by Moritz Russo at the end of the nineteenth century in the small town SURVIVAL AND LOVE: DOUBLE Meanwhile Jerzy was captured and of Wernigerode in Sachsen-Anhalt. ESCAPE FROM THE NAZIS became a prisoner of war in Russia but Julia Nelki’s great-uncle Benno Ted Bailey being sent back to Germany probably Russo and his wife Clara, who ran Grosvenor House Publishing Ltd saved his life in the face of Soviet the family factory adjacent to the purges. Geneva Convention conditions splendid villa, were dispossessed by This fascinating double biography were ignored but his chance came the Nazis, deported and murdered; tells the extraordinary story of a working in Aachen near the railway the property passed to a Nazi. After couple from different countries and and he boldly escaped with three 1945, it was used by a consumer backgrounds who survived the war colleagues. There followed a dangerous cooperative and then as a school for in the most unimaginably difficult and complicated journey of over 2,200 young people with special needs. circumstances and later married. miles through Belgium and France with the help of brave resistance workers. After 1989, Wolf Nelki, a convinced The two protagonists could not They took the difficult Freedom Trail socialist, was content to leave the have been more different. Lizzy over the Pyrenees to Spain and finally property in communal hands; but Schwarz was a Czechoslovakian reached safety in Gibraltar and England. when the heirs of the former Nazi Jew and Jerzy Dyszkiewicz a Polish owner attempted to reclaim it, he Roman Catholic officer cadet. But After the war the couple met through launched a counterclaim. Much both were repeatedly blessed with Jerzy’s Polish friends. They married in of the book is taken up with the extraordinarily lucky escapes. Lizzy 1955 and had two daughters. Lizzie legal complexities and political survived terrible ordeals in camps gradually spoke about her parents obstacles that he and his family and Jerzy was taken prisoner of and wartime history and they visited then encountered. The tale of war, eventually escaped and, after Czechoslovakia a few times and Poland dormant prejudice and bureaucratic many close shaves, made his way to once, Jerzy feeling a stranger in his obstructionism makes for dispiriting England. native land. He did not go back to reading, though it has a happy re-visit his escape route but always ending: thanks to the tireless efforts Lizzy had a carefree, happy childhood regretted not making contact with a of the author and her supporters, the with her older sister Kitty in Boskovice brave family who helped him in Liège. villa returned to its rightful ownership in the Moravian highlands. Her and now serves as a musical and parents, Moric and Hilda, were shop Author Ted Bailey came across the cultural centre. owners living in a big house in the basic facts of Lizzy and Jerzy’s wartime main square above the delicatessen. experiences by sheer chance. Based Wolf Nelki was the son of Hermann But all changed with Germany’s on recorded interviews, he has pieced Nelki and Ernestine Russo. The first sudden occupation of Czechoslovakia together their stories, putting them part of the book is largely taken in March 1939. At 13 she was into an informed historical context. up with the family histories of the banned from attending the local This fairly short book is illustrated by Ashkenazi Nelkis, German Jews who school, then the family property was personal photos, maps and a timeline worked their way up from poverty commandeered, forcing them to with direct quotes about Jerzy’s to prosperity as entrepreneurs and move to the backstreet ghetto. experiences which help capture the professional men, and the Sephardi atmosphere of the time. Russos, the Ladino-speaking In March 1942 the Schwarz family Janet Weston descendants of Spanish Jews who had was transported to Theresienstadt been forced to flee to the Ottoman where her mother’s health declined Empire after 1492. We learn about after cruel treatment and she died VILLA RUSSO: EINE DEUTSCHE the branches of the Nelki family: in June. Tragically Lizzy was left GESCHICHTE one went to Hungary and integrated alone in the world after Kitty and By Julia Nelki into the Catholic population, another later Moric were transported to Offizin-Verlag became circus-owners and ended up perish in Auschwitz. In October in Mexico, and a third entered the 1944 she was sent there herself but This absorbing and moving book German aristocracy, marrying into somehow survived privations and details the efforts undertaken after the family of Ernst Heydebrand und selections before being deemed fit 1989 by a family of German-Jewish von der Lasa, leader of the arch- enough to work in Dresden. After the refugees now resident in Britain to reactionary Conservative Party before devastating bombing of the city she reclaim a property that had been 1918. reached Mauthausen before liberation ‘aryanised’ after 1933 and then, after by the Americans as war ended. 1945, taken over by the East German There are some slips. All the state. Based on the exceptionally money raised from the sale of Lizzie thought later she probably diligent research carried out by the heirless, formerly Jewish property survived as she was young and strong author and her father, Wolf Nelki, in Germany does not go to Israel;

16 AJR Journal | April 2020

the Claims Conference, based in New This is a gripping novel, from which women. She is then forced to marry York, distributes that money to many we learn much of the lives of ordinary Paltiel, a man in his sixties much countries, including the UK. Nelki’s people, rich and poor, and of their older than herself, but eventually is depiction of West Germany in the reactions to Nazism. The novelty is that won over by his kindness, sensitivity 1950s and 1960s sometimes seems we also see it reflected in the lives of and gentleness and is greatly troubled unduly negative, for it was during thoughtful children. If we want to learn when, at some point later, she is those years that a strong and stable what really happened in Germany at forced to remarry the king. democracy was established there. But that time, this is the book to read. overall the book is thoroughly to be Thea Valman Abigail, a widow some years older recommended. The appearance of this than David, is another of his wives German translation will, one hopes, and is faced with the discomfort lead to the publication of the original in THE ANOINTED that, when David arrives, ostensibly English. By Michael Arditti to woo her, he seduces her beautiful Anthony Grenville Arcadia Ltd maidservant Achinoam, whom he impregnates. Later, in the king’s This is a truly fascinating book. household and in the harem, the two MANJA Based on Bible stories from the book women form a close bond. Two of the by Anna Gmeyner of Samuel, the content is delivered book’s sections are in Abigail’s words. Persephone Books Ltd 2010 through the voices of three of King David’s ten wives, with comments from The remaining section is told by The author of this outstanding but some of the others quoted from time to Bathsheba, a young woman barely little-known novel is Anna Gmeyner, an time. out of her teens who is married to Austrian refugee, who came to London Uriah, a Hittite, who has acquainted with her daughter in 1935. Anna’s David is introduced as the young himself fully with Israelite law and is a daughter, Eva Ibbotson, who has shepherd boy whose music drives captain in the king’s army. When she written the introduction, remembers her away the evil spirit with which King is forced to marry David, she is greatly mother writing her book on the sofa of Saul is from time to time afflicted. distraught and, all the more so, when their Belsize Park boarding house. He is noticed by the king’s daughter, David forces Uriah to lead his army Michal, who is immediately enchanted in another battle in which he is soon The novel takes place in a German by him. Another person whom David killed. Bathsheba clearly enchants town between 1920 and 1933. It tells comes across while in the king’s service the king who has no desire to lose the story of five children, four boys is Michal’s brother, Jonathan, who, her, and it is her son, Solomon, who and one girl, all born in the same as anyone familiar with the Bible will eventually accedes to the throne. hospital, who become close friends. know, inspired David to reflect on Their backgrounds are Jewish, half- a love ‘passing the love of women’, Arditti’s skilful retelling of biblical Jewish and (probably) Christian but words within the lament he wrote after content merits a very wide readership Communist. All that is happening his beloved friend’s death in battle. and I feel privileged to have had this politically at that time is reflected in the opportunity to read it. lives of the children. Manja, a Polish- What Arditti accomplishes most Emma Klein Jewish refugee, is ironically the most skilfully, through the women’s voices, optimistic and binds them all together is the way the modest, kind shepherd with her positive attitude until the boy and later hero on the battlefield, inevitably tragic climax. is transformed, firstly through his ambition to succeed Saul as king, and This book will be particularly interesting later as king himself, into a conceited, to anyone who watched the recent domineering man, convinced of his own BBC series on the rise of Nazism, righteousness and that he is serving the as it helps to explain how a whole Lord, rather than the will of men. He nation of seemingly normal people is also an inveterate womaniser, with a became so infected with the poison harem of concubines in addition to his of antisemitism. On the other hand, many wives. we learn that Max Hartung, a rich business man – the Kommerzienrat of Michal is his first wife and three out whom everyone is in awe – is really of the six sections of the book are in a Jew, married to a Christian woman. her words. While delighted to wed With the rise of Nazism he strives to the young man she was so enchanted aryanise his family, and forces his son, by, it is not long before she becomes a sensitive child and one of the group disabused. She is also distressed by her of five children, to attend Hitler Youth inability to bear any offspring and is activities and learn boxing. not too upset when replaced by other

17 AJR Journal | April 2020

OBITUARIES

FRANK (FRANZ) BECK

Born: 28 December 1930, Vienna. Died: 3 February 2020, London

Dr Frank Beck was a British computer scientist who Central Electricity Generating Board, Beck began post-graduate performing engineering calculations on studies at the Université Louis- pioneered the application their English Electric DEUCE computer. Pasteur in Strasbourg, France. His of user-interface hardware doctoral thesis was presented in 1976. including the touchscreen, the In 1958 he married Margaret Louise In 1983 he moved back to Illinois for Hammel, (1934–2003). Their sons Simon two years to work at the Fermilab in the computer-controlled knob and and Stephen, who were born in 1961 field of particle physics before returning the video wall. and 1962, married and each had two once more to CERN. sons. His parents were Friedrich and Edith His autobiography ‘Grandpa’s book’, Beck. At the age of 8, shortly before In 1962 he was invited to apply for a published in 2013, relates the story the outbreak of WW2 he escaped position as a mathematician at CERN of his life from childhood in Vienna to London with his mother. His father in Geneva, Switzerland, and the family to his early adulthood in England, via had already fled to France, where he moved there. In 1967 Beck was invited persecution, emigration, evacuation, survived for three years before being to work at the Argonne National adventure and a slow return to sent to Auschwitz and killed. Laboratory near Chicago in the United normality. States, and the family moved to La In England, having been on the list for Grange, Illinois. He retired in the early 1990s and he and the Kindertransport, Franz was put into Louise returned to London, where he hostels with other refugee children, In 1972 Frank was asked to return to continued to lecture and study at the while his mother went into domestic Europe to design and build the SPS U3A. He died of natural causes aged service. Franz anglicised his name to control room in the environment of a 89. He was interviewed about his life in Frank and, like thousands of other revolutionary multicomputer control 2013, which can be found in YouTube children, was evacuated from London system. In 1973 he and a colleague under the title: The last witnesses of the during hostilities. published a CERN document, outlining time - Frank (Franz) Beck. the concept for a prototype touchscreen, After school he worked as a wireless which can be found in YouTube under Frank was a true genius who will mechanic in the Royal Air Force, then the title: The Power of the Touchscreen - be remembered for his scientific while studying maths at King’s College How We Invented The World (Discovery contribution of the touchscreen to the and Birkbeck College he worked at the Channel), as well as a multi-function world and, on a personal level, for his GEC research laboratory. His interest computer-configurable knob, both of kindness and generosity. in the emerging science of computer which found their way onto the consoles programming led to a position at the of the finished control room. Freddy Berdach

HENRY JACKSON (HEINZ JOSEF ISAACSOHN) Born: 9 November 1929, Berlin Died: 2 February 2020, Manchester

During the Revolution Henry’s mother’s family fled Russia for under the Nazi regime. He remembered His mother was able to negotiate his seeing torchlit Hitler Youth parades and father’s release from Sachsenhausen Germany, where she met her wondering why he could not join in; he partly because the local Gestapo did husband Oscar and they had also experienced his father being arrested not think that she was Jewish as a result their only child, Henry. and taken to Sachsenhausen on the night of her blonde hair and blue eyes. The of his ninth birthday on 9 November family left Germany for Amsterdam and Henry’s early childhood was spent 1938 – Kristallnacht. continued on next page

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arrived in England just before war broke recently celebrated his 90th birthday. man” in the truest sense. His life was out. During the war they were used by transformed when he met his wife-to- General Montgomery to plan the be, Kathrine, in 1968. They found that Henry remained painfully aware that Normandy landings and to present the they had much in common, being from millions of others were not as fortunate. final invasion plan to General Eisenhower, similar backgrounds. They married one His uncle Alfred and aunt Edith were both Winston Churchill and King George VI year later and in 1970 had one son, murdered at Theresienstadt; their son on 15 May 1944 – a fact which greatly Anthony. Henry remained deeply in love Hansi, of whom he was particularly fond, impressed the young Henry. with Kathrine, and she with him, for the was murdered at Mauthausen just days rest of his life and, although seriously before the end of the war. He studied accountancy, coming ill in hospital, was still able recently to top of the country in his qualifying celebrate his 50th wedding anniversary These experiences shaped the rest of examinations. Yet, even then, surrounded by his family. his life. He retained a strong hatred antisemitism played a role. He received of injustice as well as gratitude to no offers of work as ‘Henry Isaacsohn’, Henry was also an outstanding family Britain. He left those feelings indelibly only to obtain many offers when he man. He and Kathrine developed a printed on subsequent generations – it subsequently changed his large circle of friends, with whom they is no coincidence that his only son has name to Henry Jackson. shared their passions of Judaism, current worked for the past two decades at the affairs and the arts. Henry also shared European Court of Human Rights and the Drawn to stockbroking, he left his first with them his interest in finance, his International Criminal Court, established firm when told he would never be made great sense of humour and wonderful as a direct result of the Holocaust and the a partner because he was Jewish. He ability as an after-dinner speaker and Nuremberg Tribunal respectively. subsequently enjoyed a stellar career story-teller. He will be sorely missed by (including as a partner!) Kathrine, Anthony, his daughter-in-law Henry loved his schooldays at The Hall at Simon & Coates, Chase Manhattan Torill and granddaughters Evina and School, Hampstead, and at St Paul’s and Tilney & Co. Eliana. School. The school’s Hammersmith premises are now a hotel where he Henry was often described as a “gentle Kathrine Jackson and Anthony Jackson

CARING FOR OUR CAREGIVERS

AJR has launched a new example, AJR can assist carers in support service especially obtaining financial and statutory benefits aimed at helping family carers, and also provide training and even alternative therapies to help them cope i.e. people who care for or with challenging situations. assist family members who are Caryn Bentley Holocaust survivors or refugees. Caryn Bentley is the co-ordinator of AJR’s Carer Support Service. She Offering both practical assistance and explains: “Some family carers only coordination of care and other tasks information and emotional support, identify as such if they are providing that can take their toll physically and the service is tailored to individual hands-on, round the clock care for emotionally”. needs and will help carers understand their relative. Yet being a family carer is both their own rights and those of not always about day to day tasks and Caryn can be directly contacted on the person they are caring for. For practicalities of care. It often includes 020 3928 7797 or via [email protected].

WHY NOT CONVERT JOSEPH PEREIRA YOUR OLD CINE (ex-AJR caretaker over 22 years) Books Bought FILMS is now available for DIY repairs Modern and Old AND PUT THEM and general maintenance. Eric Levene ON DVDS No job too small, FREE OF CHARGE? very reasonable rates. 020 8364 3554 / 07855387574 [email protected] Contact Alf Buechler at [email protected] Please telephone 07966 887 485. or tel 020 8554 5635 or 07488 774 414

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LETTER FROM ISRAEL BY DOROTHEA SHEFER-VANSON

LOCKDOWN anywhere and everywhere, and Ben Gurion and be kissed by any of my relatives. I airport became a virtual desert. felt terrible but explained it by pointing NATION out that I’m in a high-risk group. At the recent general election special Henceforth I will agree only to touch Nowhere in isolation polling booths were set up in elbows. the world is various parts of the country, manned by now free of the people in protective suits. Special double At two recent concerts we attended we Coronavirus, with envelopes were provided into which the didn’t see anyone wearing a mask. At the the reactions to it affected individuals were supposed to performance of the ‘Barber of Seville’ the varying in intensity insert their ballot slips. How they could be reference to someone having been ill was and severity. removed without risk of infection beats changed to read that he should have been me, but it appears to have been done, to in isolation. That brought forth smiles and At first the authorities in Israel thought everyone’s satisfaction. Whether it has chuckles. they could keep the virus out, but a helped stop the spread of the virus or group of tourists from South Korea who brought about a solution to the current We haven’t seen fist-fights breaking out in had visited various holy sites in Israel political impasse is debatable. supermarkets over packets of toilet paper, were found to be infected on their return but people do seem to be stocking up on to Korea. Unfortunately, several classes Initially quarantine was restricted to essentials. No one knows how long the of middle-school pupils happened to just those who were on the same flight situation will last, but functions, sports have been visiting those sites just then, as someone subsequently found to be events, celebrations have been curtailed, and several hundred of them were then infected. But on 9 March the order came and flights to and from Israel more or less placed in isolation in their own homes. that all Israelis who have returned from stopped, constituting a dreadful blow Initially, Israelis returning from certain abroad must remain in isolation at home for to the tourist industry, with knock-on countries in Europe and the Far East a fortnight. effects and economic hardship for many were told to remain in isolation in their thousands. homes for two weeks following their At a recent family celebration to arrival. Many people cancelled flights to welcome a new baby I declined to kiss What the future holds is anyone’s guess.

LOOK AFTER YOUR MENTAL HEALTH

In these stressful and uncertain • Concentrate on areas of your life • Get some fresh air – if you’re not self- times, when so many things are you can control. Plan a routine isolating, go for a walk and clear your head. outside your control, you need for a week at a time including If you are self-isolating, open the windows meal plans and shopping lists and let some air in to make sure you look after your own mental health. • Find activities that will help you • Exercise – if you can’t get out for a walk, do relax, such as reading a book, some exercise inside, maybe even following Here are some ideas from Jami, the doing a jigsaw or watching a film some type of workout video online specialist provider of mental health services in the Jewish community: • Limit your watching, reading • Create a positive ‘to do’ list – books/ and listening to news or movies/recipes you haven’t had a chance to • Remember that social distancing social media if you find it is read/watch/try does not mean emotional distancing. making you more anxious. Establish a network and stay Avoid speculation and look up If you’re looking after other people, having connected. See people online reputable news sources, maybe a routine is essential. Set some boundaries through video chat, or talk on the checking for updates a couple of so you all have some ‘me’ time, and remind phone set times a day yourself this won’t last forever.

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 e-mail [email protected] AssociationofJewishRefugees @TheAJR_ For the latest AJR news, including details of forthcoming events and information about our services, visit www.ajr.org.uk Printed by FBprinters, Unit 5, St Albans House, St Albans Lane, London NW11 7QB Tel: 020 8458 3220 Email: [email protected] The AJR Journal is printed on 100% recycled material and posted out in fully recyclable plastic mailing envelopes.

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