VOLUME 6 NO. 1 JANUARY 2006

f946-2006 The AJR Journal sixty years on A historical retrospective Anthony Grenville

Sixty years ago this month, AfR The Wiener Library and the AJR. Right to left: Information (the AfR fournal's Werner Rosenstock, predecessor) first appeared. That first General Secretary of AJR, issue, with its poor-quality paper and 1941-82, and editor of blurred print, now seems like a window AJR Information, onto a different world. But the grey and 1946-82, the historian Eva Reichmann, battered Britain of the post-war austerity Alfred Wiener, founder years was also the Britain in which the of the Library, Jewish refugees from Germany and Ilse Wolff, Chief Librarian, Austria settled - their adopted homeland. Hans Reichmann, Chairman of AJR, To read the early issues of the journal is 1953-63, to rediscover the history of the AJR's Susanne Rosenstock founding years. Courtesy of the Wiener Ubrary In its early years, AfR Information was only eight pages long. Its editors were naturalisation who had served in the pseudonym 'Narrator', could afford to Werner Rosenstock, who was to continue Forces, had contributed to the war effort treat the subject with humour, a sure sign in post until 1982, Herbert Freeden in a civilian capacity, or were contributing of anxieties defused. Surveying the (Friedenthal), who left for Israel in 1950, to the national economy. register of aliens naturalised in 1947, the and Ernst Lowenthal, who left for The journal followed the process of authors came across celebrities like the Gennany in 1946 to work for the Jewish naturalisation with close attention, pianist Franz Osborn and the actor Adolf Committee for Relief Abroad. The paths regularly informing its readers of the Wohlbriick, 'known as Anton Walbrook' taken by the original editors necessarily progress made. After a slow start in 1946, (famous for his roles in The Life and reflected the journal's principal areas of the official machine swung into action, Death of Colonel Blimp, The Red Shoes and concern: Britain, the land of settlement; and in 1947 over 10,000 applications for La Ronde), as well as a battery of Germany and Austria, the principal British citizenship from refugees from aristocratic 'vons', Bethmann-Hollweg, countries of origin; and the new Jewish Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia Neurath, Etzdorf, Westarp, and even, homeland in Palestine. were granted. Given that a single lurking 'von'-less among the commoners, application often covered several family a grandson of Kaiser Wilhelm II, The home front members, this meant that by the end of Friedrich Georg Wilhelm Christoph Dominating the AJR's domestic agenda 1948, when a further 7,000 applications Hohenzollern, 'known as George was its campaign to secure the right of its had been granted, the bulk of the Mansfield'. members to British citizenship. In refugees had become British. In 1949 the Commenting on the changes of name November 1945, shortly before the first number of applications granted to that often accompanied the acquisition of appearance of AfR Information, the refugees from Central Europe fell to British citizenship, the article chided, Home Secretary, James Chuter Ede, some 3,000, and thereafter to a mere tongue-in-cheek, those who took the made a statement in parliament opening trickle. The naturalisation of the former process of anglicisation to extremes: the way to the naturalisation of the refugees had been substantially 'Without wishing to hurt anybody's Jewish refugees, with certain classes of completed by 1950. sentiments, one feels tempted to ask, applicants for British citizenship being This was the cause of much satisfaction whether people do not overdo the given priority. The fi"ont page of the to the joumal, which strongly advocated expression of their gratitude to their new journal's first issue carried a prominent the integration of the refugees into country if they adopt names like Eden or welcome for the Home Secretary's British society. By March 1949, the Kipling, and whether names starting with statement, endorsing the principle that journal's column 'From My Diary', "Mac" should not rather be left to priority should be given to applicants for written by the editors under the Members ofthe Scottish Clans.' AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

In January 1950, the journal's regular from German Jews who had survived the just system of restitution for the Jews feature on legal matters, 'Law and Life', Holocaust were extremely moving. 'Dear from Germany down the decades. The could state with some finalitytha t 'every Colleagues from Breslau', read a letter journal also carried a fi-ont-page report on refugee who applied for it and had fi-om Hanover, 'I send all my love to those the proceedings at Nuremberg, whose not made himself personally of you who have worked together with sixtieth anniversary we also remember. objectionable to the authorities has me at the Jewish Hospital at Breslau. Up Characteristically, the journal's report become a British subject'. This was a to now, I am the only nurse from Breslau set the trial of the leading Nazi war notable success for the cause of the who has returned from the Camps. With criminals against the background of Jewish refugees in Britain. great difficulty I have gained my liberty, German Jewry's own history, in which it thanks to the British Army. Day by day, always took a special interest and pride. It Reporting on the Jews in Germany we fought for our lives, and unfortunately recalled Nuremberg's notoriety as the The plight of the surviving Jews in only very few have survived the fiefdom of Julius Streicher, editor of the Germany and, to a lesser extent, Austria, unspeakable horrors. I am the only pornographically antisemitic magazine and the conditions obtaining there survivor of a family of 9 members.' Der StUrmer, and as the site of the formed a principal focus of the journal's infamous Party rallies that had reports. 'I have just come from Berlin', culminated in the promulgation of the wrote 'Narrator' in the first issue. 'The This is the first edition of the anti-Jewish Nuremberg Laws in 1935. last time I saw her, she was a proud and Journal on which Dr Anthony The trials would, the journal hoped, arrogant city, her streets resounding with Grenville has worked in his remove the taint of Nazism that attached the steps of marching jackboots. I did not capacity of Consultant Editor. to the town's name: 'For all those who recognise her any more. Her glory has Following in the footsteps of have been spared, the days of Nuremberg crumbled to dust, her monuments are are indeed days of judgment, and the obliterated, her streets have been razed Richard Grunberger and utilising name of the town, soiled by the lowest to the ground and the faces of her people his specialised knowledge of the perfidy, will be cleansed and raised to an are grey and beaten.' A vivid picture, in refugee community, Dr Grenville emblem of justice.' The implication was those pre-television days, expressing looks at the principal issues the that the trials might begin the process of both satisfaction at the downfall of AJR dealt with in its early years. the decontamination of Germany as a Nazi Germany and concern for the In forthcoming editions, he will whole; it was, after all, the refugees' Jews surviving amidst such destruction former homeland, and the ties that bound and need. be focusing on historical, cultural and political topics of them to it often proved durable enough to The joumal carried regular reports on survive even the crimes of the special interest to our members. the Jews in German and Austrian towns Holocaust. and cities or in Displaced Persons camps like Deggendorf and Fohrenwald; in the From its first issue, the journal Crisis in Palestine British zone of occupation, a large contained a 'Missing Relatives' (later As the voice of a substantial section of number were still accommodated in the 'Missing Persons') column, through Jewry in Britain, AfR Information gave former concentration camp at Bergen- which subscribers could try to make vent to the grave concern of its members Belsen. A column in the journal entitled contact with family members who had about the situation in Palestine, where 'Those Who Survived' gave details about vanished in the Holocaust. Already from Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin the German-Jewish communities in the very first of these enquiries, for various towns, their deportation to the Marthe Herzog from Budapest, who had East, the fate that had awaited them been deported to Stutthof, a particularly there, and the pitifully small number who murderous camp near Danzig, it was JACKMAN • returned. Then, as now, AJR members clear that most would remain forever SILVERMAN demonstrated their concern for their less unanswered. Yet the column also allowed COMMERCIAL PROPERTY CONSULTANTS fortunate fellow Jews. In early 1945 the at least one survivor to display an AJR had set up its Clothing Collection indomitable will to live: 'Dr Kathe 26 Conduit Street, London WIR 9TA Department to bring relief, in the form of Laserstein wants to inform her relatives Telephone: 020 7409 0771 Fax: 020 7493 8017 donated garments, to the desperately and fiiends that she has survived. Her needy Jews on the Continent, principally present address is Berlin-Steglitz, in Germany. By February 1945, it had Immenweg 7.' AJR Heads of Department despatched more than 80,000 garments Two of the principal concerns of the Gordon Greenfield Finance to Europe and was appealing to AJR Carol Rossen Administration and Personnel Jews firomGerman y were restitution for Marcia Goodman Social Services members for at least 12,000 garments material losses inflicted by the Nazis and Michael Newman Media and per month. Ex-members of the Home just punishment for Nazi crimes. The Public Relations Guard and the Civil Defence first issue oi AfR Information contained a Susie Kaufman Organiser, Day Centre organisations were reminded that good weighty article by the lawyer and AJR AJR Journal use could be made of discarded uniforms, Dr Anthony Grenville Consultant Editor Board member Walter Breslauer, in Dr Howard Spier Executive Editor overcoats and boots. which he identified some of the obstacles Andrea Goodmaker Some of the reports reaching the AJR that would bedevil attempts to secure a Secretarial/Advertisements AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

maintained rigorous restrictions on account of the scene in the hall of the Jewish immigration, 'in spite of the Royal Empire Society in London, where overwhelming evidence of the tragic Rabbi Leo Baeck, speaking for the NEWTONS situation of the Jewish survivors in refugee community, 'made a forceful plea Leading Hampstead Solicitors Europe'. The establishment of a monthly for our people', the Jewish DPs, whose advise on immigration quota of 1,500, wholly sufferings would be ended only by Property, Wills, Family Trusts inadequate for the number of Jews admission to Palestine. He was and Charitable Trusts desperate to leave Europe for Palestine, accompanied by the Chairman ofthe AJR, was, the journal declared, 'a bitter blow to Adolf Schoyer, and its Vice-Chairman, French and German spoken thousands of men, women and children Salomon Adler-Rudel. Home visits arranged still in the camps on the Continent, who Leo Baeck clung to the hope of face, insufficiently clad, nourished and avoiding conflict, by creating a bi-national 22 Fitzjohn's Avenue, housed, the terrible hardships of a winter, state in Palestine where Jews and Arabs London NW3 SNB and whose primary hope was a speedy could co-exist: 'There may not be Tel: 020 7435 5351 immigration into Palestine.' friendship between Arab committees and Fax: 020 7435 8881 Consequently, the joumal welcomed Zionist committees but there is the recommendation of the 1946 Anglo- friendship between Arab villages and American Commission of Inquiry on Jewish villages, and in the end villages Palestine that 100,000 Jewish victims of are more important than committees.' At Nazi persecution be granted admission as this stage, the AJR was not committed to CONSULTANT rapidly as possible. Combined with the the creation of a Jewish state. Leo Baeck recommendation that the Land Transfer warned the Commission 'not to get to long established English Regulations of 1940 be rescinded, this confused by terms such as a Jewish state'. Solicitors (bi-lingual German) would have amounted to the cancellation A Jewish state should be an ethical rather would be happy to assist clients of the hated White Paper of 1939. The than a national entity: 'The idea of a with English, German and British government's refusal to accept Jewish state did not mean narrow Austrian problems. the Commission's recommendations nationalistic sovereignty but a significant Contact Henry Ebner contribution to humanity, it was a moral unconditionally 'came as a shock' to those Myers Ebner & Oeaner and a human task, every state being part who like the AJR had hoped for their 103 Shepherds Bush Road of the great community of the world and rapid implementation; despite the London W6 7LP journal's plea for co-operation between every nationality being a treasure house Telephone 020 7602 4631 the mandatory power, Britain, and the ofhumanity.' Jewish Agency, it became increasingly ALL LEGAL WORK Given this primacy of moral principle - UNDERTAKEN clear that conflict could not be avoided. unrealistic though it may now seem - The decision by the government to over the power-political demands of the incarcerate 'illegal' Jewish immigrants to sharpening conflict in Palestine, it was Palestine in camps in Cyprus and the logical that AfR Information should forcible prevention of 4,500 Jews aboard condemn terrorist acts such as the AUSTRIAN and GERMAN the vessel Exodus 1947 from landing - all bombing of the King David Hotel by PENSIONS powerfully reported in the journal in Jewish extremists: 'A policy based on 1946-47 - signalled the breakdown of violence is alien to Judaism, opposed to relations between Britain and the Jewish PROPERTY our ethical conception of a Jewish organisations in Palestine. RESTITUTION CLAIMS National Home and objectionable even EAST GERMANY-BERLIN I Always notable for its loyalty to Britain, from the point of view of practical the adopted homeland of its members, expediency.' Recalling the German and On instructions our office will the AJR consistently raised its voice in Austrian Jews' own experience of Nazi assist to deal with your fevour of a peaceful compromise solution terror, it declared: 'We know what applications and pursue the matter to the Palestine problem. The terror means. We condemn terror in with the authorities. Association was invited to give evidence whatever form it may appear and to the Commission of Inquiry; it whoever may exercise it. For us there is For further information submitted a memorandum no compromise with violence.' In the end, and an appointment recommending immigration to Palestine of course, the hopes of a peaceful please contact: compromise under British supervision on a wide scale as the only practical ICS CLAIMS proved illusory. When in 1948 the means of dealing with the thousands of 146-154 Kilburn High Road state of Israel was proclaimed, Jewish survivors rotting in Displaced London NWS 4JD AfR Information acclaimed it as a Persons camps in Europe. The AJR was historical development. The journal has also invited to appear at the Tel: 020 7328 7251 (Ext. 107) been a solid supporter of the Jewish state Commission's hearings. The AfR Fax: 020 7624 5002 ever since. Information of March 1946 gave a vivid AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

Making a New Life: Holocaust survivors and photographs' Brett Harrison Some years ago I was wandering around a with a sense of anger and disbehef.' junk shop in Ontario when I was brought This other level on which they are up with a start by a tray of old treated is as evidence of life before and photographs. They were nineteenth- after the Holocaust. For two Belsen century portraits of ladies in full-length survivors, writing to their newly dresses with bustles and hats, with discovered surviving sister in England in gentlemen in suits with a variety of then 1945, Anita and Renate Lasker pleaded: fashionable headgear and children ' ... we are longing for one thing. Please dressed like doUs. A label encouraged send us some photographs: of you and customers to 'Create your own your husband - and if it's possible of our ancestors!' I was shocked. What were parents and of home' (Anita Lasker- they doing? These were real people with Wallfisch, Inherit the Truth 1939-1945, startled elephant! The photograph above real identities. How dare they mislead 1996). Photographs gave them back an is of Iby, Trude her cousin and her brother and distort the truth. As time has passed, identity but also enabled them to locate Tony in the family car on a trip to another response has enveloped me. themselves in a life beyond. Schonbrunn Palace, Vienna in 1932. There were so many displaced people in Photographs accurately identified Our efforts have been towards this country, uprooted from their place of provide evidence of real lives altered by preserving the images linked to the birth, from their own families, from their the experience of the Holocaust. siUA^ivors, as far as possible accurately own heritage. The appeal was to Embedded in life histories, they eiuich identified and dated. The time vrill come, something deeper within the human the record. As post-memory, they as it is does for us all, when albums psyche. The need to be part of a family, to identify families, individuals, homes, inherited from parents or relations feel part of a continuum, to have a past homelands as a lasting record of include images that we have never seen and a futiu"e. Was there really something Nazi crimes. before of people and views with no labels, wrong in people creating a myth to The Making a New Life Project is unidentified, lost in an irretrievable past. sustain them in a foreign land? directed towards encouraging survivors We may fantasise about them but we will Now, this thought has come full circle in Yorkshire to allow access to treasured never know who or where they were. with the experience of Holocaust photographs of their lives. For some, it How much more valuable for posterity siurvivors. There are at least two levels has become more rather than less painful will it be to have these images intimately on which photographs can be treated. to look at them. For others, the loss of connected with the survivors, their lives One is identified by Marianne Hirsch photographs is seen as one of the most and their reality clearly identified and (Family Frames, Photography, Narrative painful aspects of their experiences. Arek located? Who can then invent another and Postmemory, 1997, pp. 252-56), by Hersch feels this acutely yet is comforted past for them? which the conventional nature of family by the fact that it is only when looking at *This is the fourth article in the series. photographs enables the viewer to relate his grandchild that he can recall what his to the individual images in displays. She mother looked like. Where photographs uses the example of the Tower of Faces in survive they serve to aid the memory to the United States Holocaust Memorial recall past events and family gatherings. Museum in Washington, in which For some survivors, they recall the numerous photographs of a Lithuanian activities of their fathers as active shtetl collected by a child survivor are photographers in the 1930s. Julius mounted. She hears people saying all Guggenheimer, father of Lorle Michaelis, around her 'Look, look, look, we have a was president of his local photographic picture just like that in our album.' society in Memmingen, Bavaria, and she This identification transcends ethnic treasures his studies of light and shade in identity and family history. It is at this the monastery of Ottobiiren and his level that unclaimed images might be photographs of the family and her fastened on to it in an attempt to claim a beloved nurse, Maria. The photograph mythical past. As Hirsch says, 'Like all opposite is of the votary in the room of family albums, the tower preserves and her Roman Catholic nurse which was creates memory: it is a site of completely wrecked during remembrance and commemoration. At a Kristallnacht. different level and with the knowledge One of Iby Knill's family stories that the tovm was destroyed by a mobile revolves around her father's efforts to killing unit in September 1941 the viewer take a photograph at the zoo, involving a is forced to confront the images anew camera, tripod, cloak and flashlight and a AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

'Making a Difference': Holocaust Memorial Day, January 2006 The final preparations for Holocaust request that Cardiff host the event, which Jewish community by Holocaust survivors, Memorial Day 2006 are now being made. will take place at the Millennium will also address the meeting. With its theme 'One person can make a Conference Centre. The HMD Trust, established in May last difference', this national commemoration, The event is scheduled to begin at 7.00 year, is also arranging a pan-Wales pledge, due to enter its sixth year, aims to ensure pm and will include performances from the whereby schoolchildren fi-omacros s Wales that the crimes ofthe Holocaust are neither National Orchestra of Wales and the will be making a commitment, at the same forgotten nor repeated. National Dance Company of Wales. There time on the same day, 'to make a difference'. Holocaust Memorial Day is normally held will also be contributions from Simon K you would like to attend Holocaust on 27 January to mark the anniversary of Weston OBE, the British army veteran Memorial Day in Cardiff, please write to severely burned during the 1982 Falklands the liberation of Auschwitz in 1945. Mrs Estelle Brookner at AJR Head Office, However, as the 2006 anniversary falls on a war, the actor Phillip Madoc, and the poets Jubilee House, Merrion Avenue, Stanmore, Friday, it has been moved back to 26 Gwyneth Lewis and Gillian Clarke. Middx HA7 4RL or email January. The First Minister for Wales, the The Chief Rabbi, Sir Jonathan Sacks, who Rt Hon Rhodri Morgan AM, has accepted a has spoken of the special place held in the [email protected] Michael Newman

Austrian General Settlement Fund: A step closer In a ruling last November, the 2nd US not expected before next month at the litigation' and added that 'because many Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the last earliest. victims are eldedy and dying, it is Holocaust-era class action brought against The case was discharged in accordance important to bring some measure of the Austrian government for the with the legal principle of 'political justice to Holocaust survivors in their appropriation of Jewish-owned assets question doctrine', which overrules the lifetimes.' during the Holocaust. At the time of going interests and demands of individual Significantly, Judge Cabranes to press, it appears that one of the final plaintiffs. The ruling states that the US concluded: 'Leaving litigation as the sole obstacles preventing the distribution of government-negotiated GSF is a superior alternative will likely lead to disputes payments from the General Settlement method of resolving claims than litigation. between survivors and Austria and its Fund (GSF) has been cleared, setting the The ruling also reflects US foreign policy industries which will likely embroil the US stage for the release of $210 million under interests, which may be damaged by and set back its relations with the Austrian the terms of the Washington Agreement continuing litigafion. government.' of 2001. In his summation. Judge Cabranes ofthe While the Austria National Fund, which However, while representatives of the Court of Appeals noted that it would be is processing around 200,000 individual plaintiffs in the class action {Whiteman v 'impossible' to allow the litigation to claims to the GSF from approximately Republic of Austria) have agreed to the proceed 'without expressing lack of the 19,000 applicants, is prepared to make voluntary dismissal of their case, one respect due the Executive Branch'. He advance payments from the Fund, no plaintiff, taking separate legal advice, is continued: 'The agreement will provide monies can be distributed until an end to refusing to accept the case's dismissal. The benefits to more victims, and will do so litigation on this matter final resolution ofthe litigation is therefore faster and with less uncertainty, than Michael Newman

Largest ever Holocaust-era restitution: The Wertheim properties Hillary Kessler-Godin, Director of Germany and included the famous store on boycotts and the companies were eventually Communications at the Claims Conference,Berlin' s Leipziger Platz. In 2001 the Leipziger 'aryanised'. After the war the company was explains her organisation's role in the largestPlat z property - sited in what is today the heart sold, became one of Germany's most post-Holocaust property restitution in Germany.of Berli n redevelopment - was one of numerous successful retailers, and was acquired by The Claims Conference will use its share oftheWerthei m assets awarded to the Claims Karstadt in 1993. proceeds ofthe Wertheim properties, estimatedConferenc at e by the German government In accordance with the German Restitution more titan $100m, to pay for social arui welfarerestitutio n authority. The Leipziger Platz Law, introduced following Germany's programmes that benefit Holocaust survivorspropert y is believed to be the most valuable reunification in 1990, the Claims Conference and refugees tvorldtvide. piece of Holocaust-era property ever filed claims for the Wertheim properties. In Last month, the German retailing giant restituted. 2001 the Berlin Restitution Authority awarded KarstadtQuelle announced its intention to The other two properties to which Karstadt them to the Claims Conference. However, the withdraw claims to retain three properties that withdrew its claims are on Rosenthaler Platz, German govemment and Karstadt appealed, belonged originally to the Wertheim family, which the government had previously sold, and blocking recovery of the property. whose department stores were stolen under Schiffbauerdamm, adjacent to the Reichstag Negotiations continued for over a year the Nazis. The properties or proceeds from building and the location of the current In 2003, after considerable effort by the them will be recovered by the Claims Bundestag library. The Claims Conference will Claims Conference, the govemment withdrew Conference, which is working with Wertheim receive financialcompensatio n for both these all its claims to the properties. Karstadt heirs. KarstadtQuelle's decision follows the properties. All together, the Wertheim refused to do so. landmark court ruling last October which properties are estimated today to be worth Decisions on other Wertheim properties are guaranteed the Claims Conference's right to a about $590 million. pending before the Federal Restitution fourth Wertheim property. Three Wertheim brothers owned the stores Authority. The high court stated in its October The Wertheim Department Store Group before Hitler came to power. As early as 1933 decision that the ruling would be applicable to was the largest group of its kind in pre-Hider Jewish companies became the focus of Nazi other Wertheim properties. AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

nations.' Said was a professor at Columbia University, New York, where I received my MA and PhD degrees. fmnmih The Editor reserves the right Fighting his termination by Columbia to shorten correspondence University, he caused the Jewish faculty submitted for publication and students tremendous problems before he died. Two years or so before his death he travelled to Lebanon and, with a multitude of journalists and reporters witnessing, he shot bullets into Israel. He did not kill anyone: he just POINT OF VIEW 'followed Palestine's fortunes with great wanted to demonstrate what to do with Sir -1 have been a regular reader of your interest' unless she relied on sources like Jews. His students at Columbia journal on the internet for several years. Vanessa Redgrave. Even The Guardian University celebrated this spectacle. I have found it of interest, particulady as did not make such claims in the first Inge Trott's remarks saddened me. I too am the son of parents who arrived decade. Gerald M. Friedman in England as refugees from Germany 'After 1967 Israel occupied an Professor Emeritus, Northeastern and Belgium in 1939-40.1 have just read extensive part of Palestinian territory. Science Foundation/Rensselaer Center the article by Inge Trott (November The Israeli government established of Applied Geology, Troy, NY issue) and I find it totally unbalanced settlements ... in the midst of hostile and quite insulting to a nation that has Palestinian lands', Inge Trott continues. to fear every time a family member gets No. There was no Palestinian territory as LETTER TO THE STARS on a bus or goes to a supermarket. It the Arabs, including the Palestinians, Sir - Thank you, Ernst Flesch, for sharing presents a biased image of Israel that is had rejected the UN partition resolution www.lettertothestars.at with us so far from the reality of the country I and the territory was occupied by the (November issue, review). Austrian live in that it is pointless to start refuting invading Jordanians and Egyptians. refugees who read it will weep with the inaccuracies and half-truths one by When these had been driven out, Israel sorrow and with gratitude to the one. That such distortions should offered the territory to the Palestinians organisers of this initiative. The site told appear in your journal is deplorable. You in return for peace. This was rejected me the date and place where my have presumably made a conscious and the whole woHd, including the grandmother was murdered - Maly decision to change the tone of the Palestinians, demanded the return of Trostinec - and the search engine journal where Israel is concerned from the land to the invaders. The volte-face Google then led me to the details of the supportive attitude it had under the did not come until after the Yom Kippur what took place there. gifted editorship of Richard Grunberger defeat. Did Miss Redgrave not mention George Landers I write this because this is the second that? Crete such article I have read in your journal in Does Inge Trott really not know that the few months since his passing. the Israelis in Haifa pleaded with the ANNE FRANK + ME Shmuel Herold Arab population to stay and live in Sir - While supporting both literally and Raanana, Israel peace? If they really drove the Arab figuratively Ronald Channing's sentence population out so cruelly, how is it that in 'Anne Frank + me' (August 2005 The aim of the Point of View column, there are a million Arabs living in Israel? issue) - 'behind the shuttered window introduced in September 2005, is to About 30 years ago, the BBC showed a which she could not open to the stimulate discussion on topical matters series of violent anti-Israel propaganda world' - I once saw part of a film of and give readers an opportunity to films authored and presented by one Anne appearing at an open window express their views, while retaining a Keith Kyle. In one of them, we were of their fiat taken casually by a passer­ political balance (Ex. Ed.). shown a 'refugee', a young woman who by, panning the frontage of the boasted that whereas her father had building, perhaps trying out his new Sir - Inge Trott says she 'feared for their wanted to stay, she and her mother had camera on any subject which came his [Israelis'] safety when they were contemptuously rejected the Jewish way. It is reputedly the only moving attacked by Arabs intent on driving offer and left. If Ms Trott's friend's image of Anne. them into the sea.' Since the Arabs never mother is still alive, perhaps she could Rudi Leavor gave up that intention, when did she ask her about this. Bradford begin to object to Israel's Rudi Braude countermeasures? Kenton, Middx WIDE-RANGING INTELLECT OF 'I followed Palestine's fortunes with RICHARDGRUNBERGER great interest', she says. This remark is Sir - According to Inge Trott, The Israeli Sir - I am frankly alarmed by Simon followed by a statement of her apparent conductor and musician Daniel Halberstam's suggestion (December belief that the Israelis won every war Barenboim's friendship with the late issue) that one of R.G.'s columns should 'mainly due to their superior weaponry Palestinian Edward Said offers the hope be reproduced in each edition of this supplied by the Americans.'Both cannot that mutual misunderstanding will paper. While Richard Grunberger was be true: either she believes that or she finally lead to peace between our two undoubtedly an able editor, he was also AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

a very controversial one, and not materials on refugees from elsewhere everyone agreed with his views. I in Europe and, indeed, a profile of ARE YOU ON A LOW believe we should let him rest in peace a Polish refugee is currently being INCOME AND IN NEED and welcome the opportunity to listen prepared (Ex. Ed.). to a fresh editorial voice. Let me OF HOMECARE HELP? congratulate the AJR Journal on its THIRD GENERATION PROJECT AJR might be able to offer you excellent choice! Sir - A thoughtful benefactor, financial assistance for cleaning, Edith Argy concerned that the third generation gardening and caring. London 1/1/9 appears to have only a basic Members who might not understanding of the Holocaust, has otherwise be able to afford HERMANN HIRSCHBERGER PROFILE kindly donated funding to the Wiener homecare please contact: Sir - The profile of Hermann Library to facilitate the development of Hirschberger (December issue) was an educational project specifically Estelle Brookner, Secretary well deserved and excellently written. It targeting this generation. AJR Social Services Dept was only a pity that the photo was so The third generation project will Tel: 020 8385 3070 poor and unclear I was in a group with initially run for two years, the first of Hermann that sailed from Hamburg to which will be specifically aimed at Southampton and in the hostel in schoolchildren in London and the Cliftonville for a year, after which we South East. In the first year, the project Companions somewhat older ones were transferred will run a series of linked seminars of London to a hostel in Finchley Road to start beginning in the New Year. Through Incorpofating Hampstead Home Care earning our keep. using some of the unique material available at the Wiener Library, up to Henry Schragenheim A long established company LondonN15 15 participants will gain a clearer understanding of their families' past, providing care in your home the ongoing generational effects of Assistance tvith personal care REFUGEES FROM EASTERN EUROPE exile and genocide, an understanding General household duties Sir - On paying my annual subscription, of where and how to access historical Respite care Medical appointment service I was reminded of a longstanding and genealogical information, and grievance against your excellent develop a sense of community with •OUR CARE IS YOUR CARE' magazine. It appears to me that you other members ofthe group. 020 7483 0212/0213 are guilty of discrimination against Third generation members Polish and indeed all East European I interested in committing to six refugees, including those who suffered meetings in January-May 2006 should, in the Holocaust. I was born in (\, SPRING in the first instance, contact me at the Germany of Polish parents and held a GROVE Wiener Library on 020 7636 7247 or at Polish passport until naturalisation 214 Finchley Road [email protected]. during my wartime military service. London NW3 Monica Lowenberg Since no mention is ever made of my London's Most Luxurious Wiener Library fellow nationals, I feel positively RETIREMENT HOME discriminated against. Were there ever A SPECIAL THANK YOU • Entertainment-Activities only Austrian and German refugees? Sir - May I use your letters' page to • Stress Free Living During my period as a refugee, my • 24 Hour Staffing • Excellent Cuisine thank Myrna Glass and the AJR for family and I also had to take shelter in • Full En-Suite Facilities starting a Bristol/Bath group. At the Italy. There too, persecution oftheJews first meeting I went to, I met someone Call for more information was rampant under Mussolini in 1938- or a personal tour who had been at the Hugo Rosenthal 39. Apart from the persecution, this is 020 8446 2117 also a fascinating period in history and School while I was there. We have met or 020 7794 4455 worthy of more space in your and phoned each other since; we live in [email protected] publication. Primo Levi certainly 'different sticks' of Somerset. The thought it worth writing about. second time, there was a fellow KaHsruher. Bob Kutner Simon R Rhodes M.Ch.S. It is good to have a chance to Glasgow STATE REGISTERED CHIROPODIST reminisce about a mutual past - but Surgeries at: The lack of articles concerning even more interesting to share ideas 67 Kilburn High Road, NW6 (opp M&S) refugees from Eastern Europe and Italy about what goes on today with people Telephone 020 7624 1576 reflects the fact that the overwhelming of a similar background! Maybe there 2 Pangboume Drive majority of our readers are of German are more of 'us' out there in rural areas Stanmore Middx HA7 4QT and Austnan descent and the bulk of who would like such contact? Telephone:020 8958 8557 our materials necessarily relates to Bettine Cohn Visiting chiropojy service available them. We would very much welcome Bristol AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

where science ends and creativity begins. Some of the charisma of his genius arises from his most memorable REVIEWS face, which is shown in a massive cartoon as you enter the gallery: his hair flies aroimd his head like shards of scientific thought, or atomic particles. FILM You feel driven by the sheer energy of Nostalgia for the camps his brain. And his humour A life-size cut-out of him shows him riding his bike PATHLESS and grinning like a schoolboy; directed by Lajos Koltai elsewhere he poses for his 72nd Screen on the Hill, Belsize Park, birthday by sticking out his tongue. North London Drawings include a 1929 etching by John Philip, who also painted Pope Pius This haunting film, in Hungarian with XI. There's a cartoon of his meeting with English subtitles and shown at the George Bernard Shaw where the recent Jewish Film Festival, gains its power through the eloquently playwright asks: 'Do you really expressive face of the 14-year-old understand yourself?' To which the protagonist, Gyuri Koves, beautifully scientist tartly replies: 'No, Bernie, do played by Marcell Nagy. Based on the you?' Portraits of Einstein are now novel by Nobel laureate Imre Kertesz, considered collectable. I even have one himself a Holocaust survivor, Fateless myself by the expressionist artist, Joe traces the experiences of the teenager Rose, which shows the physicist from Budapest from the day his father Einstein 1933 Albert Einstein Archives, shedding tears of blood following the was called up for forced labour Jewish National and University Library, dropping of the bomb on Hiroshima and Hebrew University of Jerusalem A striking visual feature from the Nagasaki. outset is the prominence of yellow stars, Polymath, Renaissance Man, scientific But there is no evidence linking worn almost like ornaments on the genius, humanist, secular Zionist, Einstein to the development of the A- garments of a relatively well-heeled family man, musician, biker and sailor. bomb. His famous formula E = mc^ was selection of Budapest Jews gathered together to bid the father farewell. How many more adjectives can define apparently not crucial to the building of Gyuri is left with his stepmother, with the indefinable man of the twentieth bombs. He was shaken by the dropping the unctuous gentile family accountant century - Albert Einstein? He is hardly of that bomb as he was by the Holocaust, hovering in the background. the stuff of contemporary portraiture, which caused him to declare he would A bus journey to his temporary job is but then consider his extraordinary never return to his native Germany. the turning point in Gyuri's life. With features, those mournful bulldog eyes, Einstein defined Judaism as a 'culture other youths wearing a yellow star, he is the Chaplinesque moustache beneath of shared historical past and common hauled off the bus and held prior to an enormous nose, and the hair like a ethical values'. His belief that the divine being deported, despite their employer flying buttress bearing comparison with reveals itself in the physical is no protesting 'they are only kids' and his equally hirsute contemporary, David siurprise, but his liberal stance on should be released. Told that they are to Ben-Gurion. political and social issues and his be 'offered work' in 'Germany', the On the centenary ofthe publication of support of ethical Zionism were based detainees' response - that 'Germans are his three cosmological papers, the on the creation of a spiritual model cultured' - is ironically familiar Jewish Museum in Camden Town society in which the Palestinian conflict Various salient ingredients of the chronicles his life and times in its could be resolved by mutual consent. 'Holocaust movie' follow - the cattle exhibition, Albert Einstein, Man of Indeed, he warned of a narrow train, the obscene 'Arbeit macht frei' the Century. A supporting programme nationalism. signs, the selections. As Gyuri is moved from Auschwitz to Buchenwald and of events found parallels between Einstein rejected any Jewish attempt then to Zeitz, he comments on the Einstein's theories and those of at assimilation, however, after his tedium of these constant selections. He Maimonides, and discussed another experiences of antisemitism during the and his friends, from whom he is soon contemporary 'degenerate scientist' - Second World War. Proposed as separated, are alerted to the need to Sigmund Freud. successor to Chaim Weizmann as pose as '16' and 'fit for work'. A poignant Art may not be the main purpose of Israel's president in 1952, he apparently moment is the sighting of a this exhibition on the work of the man heeded Ben-Gurion's warnings - if he bespectacled friend, who was whose theory of relativity shook the accepts, we are in for trouble! He unsuccessful, in the queue to the gas foundation of Newtonian physics. But in rejected the offer while expressing chambers. the case of Einstein it is difficult to know himself much moved by it. Director Lajos Koltai has conveyed the AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

unfolding of the scenario through the slightly. In time, they were to become Germany any more, not India ... perception of a teenager with brief, cut two of the most important people in Shaken about the globe, we live out sequences, which fade out and are his life. our fractured lives ... Both Shanty and Henny were in the broader sense swiftly replaced. In this way the viewer Both born in 1908, Shanti and Henny exiled; each found in their fellow exile a catches glimpses of one horrifying first met when Shanti was seeking home.' incident after another, but none is lodgings in Henny's home as a dental developed at length. Equally effective student in Bedin in 1933. Henny's Martin Hasseck is the photography, with sepia and family were Jews, who considered murky black-and-white substituted for themselves assimilated 'bessere Leute'. colour, reflecting differing perspectives When Henny arrived in England as a Almost beyond belief of reality. In contrast, a scene in the Jewish refugee weeks before the camp hospital, where Gyuri is taken ZACHOR: CHILD SURVIVORS SPEAK outbreak of the war, only Shanti was with a hideously infected knee, finds Published for the Child Survivors' there to welcome her Whereas the him clean in a surgical, off-white robe, Association of Great Britain i/ garrulous Shanti was short and covered by a luxurious, deep wine- by Elliott & Thompson (London), energetic, a sharp dresser and a whisky coloured duvet. After liberation, colour 2005, 192 pp., £12.50 lover, Henny was tall, elegant, returns, though never so intense. handsome and less demonstrative. These 26 memoirs of Holocaust The subtle emotional tone colouring Although they had known one survivors present a vivid picture of everyday life in pre-war and occupied Gyuri's experiences is significant. another for many years, Shanti Europe. The authors of these Relationships between the prisoners proposed marriage only in the 1950s. are characterised by camaraderie and accounts, which are intended to be It was a marriage which knew little read by their children and solidarity, with Gyuri attracting various passion but considerable grandchildren, explain cleaHy how 'guardian angels', in particular a man companionship. As Seth writes, 'with their experiences affected them. from the same street who had spent so much suffering, isolation and In the post-war period it was not four years in Ukraine. It is not indifference, it is a cause for gratitude unusual for survivors who had surprising, on returning to Budapest that something is sufficiently good.' managed to return to their homes to and finding an unsympathetic bus Henny never discussed the be threatened. Yet there are numerous conductor demanding a fare, his family circumstances of the deaths of her instances of 'pure luck': a sympathetic home taken over by strangers, and his mother and sister in the Holocaust: landlord who allowed his Jewish widowed stepmother swiftly remarried tenants to be months behind with Seth was far more aware of Shanti's to the accountant, that he is their rent; peasant families who were history than Henny's. This changed disillusioned with the wodd 'outside' prepared to hide Jewish children; a when Seth's father discovered a trunk and irritated by constant questioning family willing to pass a Jewish full of correspondence between Henny by concerned - or prurient - teenager off as their daughter; a (she often kept carbons of her letters) member of the SS warning of acquaintances as to the horrors he has and friends in BeHin in the 1940s. The forthcoming raids. witnessed. Rather than obliterate his correspondence revealed the attempts past, as they suggest, he is determined Neutral Switzerland proved by Henny's friends to deal with the to retain it as part of his 'fateless' unwelcoming for Henry Abraham's guilt of surviving and the fact that group, released from Belsen in identity. His nostalgia for the Henny's mother and sister were sent to exchange for German prisoners. Met 'happiness'and'simplicity'of the camps Theresienstadt and Auschwitz with fixed bayonets, they were divided is reminiscent of Byron's newly released respectively. into Aryans and non-Aryans. Of the prisoner of Chillon, who 'learn'd to love original 100 arrivals, bedded down on Seth is deeply concerned with the despair*. straw and fed with tinned oily fish after morality of utilising the Emma Klein months of starvation, seven died correspondence discovered after his instantly. aunt's death: 'Considering the private In occupied Paris, Gisele Winton's person she was, I have sometimes Fellow exiles parents concealed the family's Jewish wondered whether I should have identity so that when she read about ranged freely over her TWO LIVES 'dirty Jews' in the newspapers she felt correspondence. But these letters deal enormous sympathy for those people. byVikramSeth with a period of great historical She was horrified when at the age of Little, Brown, 2005, 512pp., £20 consequence in Germany and many seven, a cousin explained that she too was a Jew. When Gisele's father was This is the story of Seth's great-uncle help to enrich our understanding of knocked down by a German lorry, the Shanti Behari Seth (Uncle Shanti) and the lives of ordinary people caught up on the events of those times.' family received visits from the driver to Henny Gerda Caro (Aunt Henny), a check on his progress. He had no idea married couple whose home in north­ The author of this thoughtful, the family were Jews. evocative combination of memoir and west London he frequently visited at Tom Sinclair recalls that 'all the old the age of seventeen, as he was about biography concludes: 'Where did people of Budapest were safe. They to begin his British schooling in Shanti and Henny belong, if not in the were too old to be deported and were Tonbridge. Then, they were both 60 wodd of a family or a circle of friends? put into a ghetto, and some into years old, and he knew them only Which country did they belong to? Not houses under the protection of the AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006 various neutral countries.' His grandparents and older relations survived and returned to their flat. The younger people were not so fortunate. Yet in a group being marched to the gas t>» Letter from Israel chambers, Tom's life was saved when he called out 'Guten Morgen' to passing German soldiers. Comments Martin Stern: 'Apart from the courage, sacrifice A few weeks ago, together with my She tried very hard to present a brave and help of others, sheer random sisters and other relatives, I visited and cheerful front to her relatives and chance was important.' Hamburg, the city where my not to give them cause for concern. In Described by Joan Salter as a cliche ancestors had lived for many addition to the letters, which are both because it happened so often, a Parisian generations until exiled by the Nazis. touching and inspiring, the book laundry van was used to smuggle out We were there to attend the contains Jurgen Sielemann's potential victims under the nose of the presentation of the book Aber seid meticulous account of the Gestapo. Her aunt had strong pre-war alle beruhigt, which contains letters developments which led to the connections with socialists and communists, many of whom became written by my grandmother before eventual deportation of the Jews of involved in the French resistance she was deported from Hamburg Hamburg. The book is in German but movement. Joan's father was able to in 1942. is currently being translated into use his sister's contacts to be smuggled Although my father escaped from English and will, I hope, eventually back to the family in Belgium, before Germany, my grandmother did not, be published. the family took separate journeys to the and she eventually perished in Jurgen Sielemann also organised unoccupied French zone. Trust was Theresienstadt. Left on her own and the installation of a Stolperstein often abused. While Joan's father was caught 'like a mouse in a trap', as she ('tripping stone') in front ofthe house waiting in a cafe in Perpignan hoping to put it, she wrote letters. They were her cross into Spain, he witnessed couriers where my grandmother lived. Before returning who boasted of how they had lifeline to the world. In the first few the unveiling of the plaque, which 'stripped the Jews of their possessions years of the war she managed to bears my grandmother's name and before turning them in.' Often it was correspond with her children via a dates of birth and death, he took our not what you knew, but whom you roundabout route. My father kept the little group, together with about 40 knew. Like an uncle's friend's son who letters, but 'forgot' all about them. Hamburg residents, on a walking was an official in the Polish embassy in I stumbled on the letters about ten tour of the Grindel, the Lisbon and helped Joan's father obtain years ago and felt they ought to be neighbourhood where most Jews had replacement papers so he could leave published, but that was not easy. once lived, pointing out my for England. Eventually, we got in touch with grandparents' house and other For Alfred Garwood, 'it all seems Jiirgen Sielemann of the Hamburg buildings of interest for the Jewish almost beyond belief, but sadly it was State Archives. He has worked there community. Contrary to my all too real.' for 40 years and regards it as his expectations, many of Hamburg's Laraine Feldman mission in life to prevent the horrors fine old buildings are still standing. ofthe Nazi rule from being forgotten. The Allied bombing of the city He is, of course, not Jewish. apparently left the area where my grandparents and most ofthe Jewish WANTED TO BUY Jiirgen Sielemann felt that the population lived relatively letters should be annotated and German and untouched. supplemented by a detailed account of English Books what happened in Germany, and I had been asked to say a few words especially in Hamburg, during the about my grandmother at the book Bookdealer, AJR member, Nazi period. This labour of love took presentation that evening. Initially, welcomes invitations to view and him almost ten years as he could do it this request struck me as somewhat purchase valuable books only in his spare time. It was he who odd, considering that I had never Robert Hornung made contact with Hamburg's known her. But when I started 10 Mount View, Ealing Landeszentrale fiir Politische thinking about what I was going to London W5 IPR Bildung, which undertook to publish say I realised that I did know her in a Email: homungbooksOaol.com the book. way, through her letters. And now Tel: 020 8998 0546 And so, ten years after my many more people would be able to grandmother's letters had been read about her too. The letters of this discovered, and 60 years after she was woman, who had to face her fate on Annely Juda Fine Art murdered, "her' book was published. her own, can serve as a mouthpiece for others like her, and the Hamburg 23 Dering Street (off New Bond Street) The title, roughly translated as 'But authorities deserve credit for being Tel: 020 7629 7578 Please Don't Worry', is taken from prepared to accept the challenge. Fax: 020 7491 2139 one of the phrases she used and reflects the general tone ofthe letters. Dorothea Shefer-Vanson CONTEMPORARY PAINTING AND SCULPTURE

10 AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

At the age of 96, Bemhard Herzberg, an spell in Buchenwald concentration camp active former soldier, retired was imprisoned for three years, industrialist and latter-day author, was PROFILE managed to emigrate vnth his wife to awarded an MA in Refugee Studies from Cuba in 1941, but their business, large Ronald Channing the University of East London, to whose house and jewellery were all campus he travelled on public transport confiscated. for lectures and tutorials three times a Bernhard Herzberg As Bernhard's ship docked in Cape week from his home in East Finchley. England's oldest Town, Dr Hendrik Verwoerd was This unique achievement for someone university student leading a demonstration and waving of his years gained him the award by the flags with swastikas against the arriving National Institute of Adult Continuing Jews. Bernhard wryly remarked: 'They Education of'England's Oldest Learner'. want to make us feel at home!' Drawing Not one to sit on his laurels, Bernhard on his experience of tanning, he found Herzberg has already enrolled on work as a £2-a-week clerk in an another course, at London University's industrial chemicals firm, learned School of Oriental and African Studies, Afrikaans, and made good use of his studying for an MA in African English and German. Selling flour, malt Economics and Literature. Although and beans in the African townships, he blessed with the intellect, experience began to make a living, eventually and qualifications required for a becoming the firm's managing director. doctorate, he took the view that it might Six months before war broke out he be a trifle ambitious to embark on a PhD became a naturalised British subject. course he would complete only at the His wife objected to his attempt to join age of 100! the army, but his final acceptance on 21 Bernhard came to London in 1985 as a June 1940 (on the fall of Paris) and his sprightly 75-year-old businessman, sent service as a coastal gunner brought by his South African company to open a found employment as a country club about a divorce. He remarried while on buying office for chemicals and waiter and a production statistician. embarkation leave in 1944, the year in pharmaceuticals, an office he ran for five In 1931 he returned to Germany, aged which, with the rank of bombardier, he years, retiring at the age of 80. Not being only 23, though his father, then an went to serve in Egypt, and then in Italy, too sure 'what to do with myself, he official at the synagogue, expressed landing at Taranto and fighting up the enrolled as an external student at the disappointment that his son had failed to Italian peninsular. His war ended in University of London for a BA degree in make his fortune. It was immediately Gorgonzola, near Milan, on 5 May 1945. German Language and Literature, for apparent to Bernhard that the Jewish Following a period of hospitalisation in which he studied virtually on his own community was in mortal danger from Florence, Bernhard returned to South over the following fiveyears . In 1995 he the rise of Nazism and he tried to Africa at Christmas via Egypt and began an MA in Refugee Studies, having persuade his father to sell up and leave British-ruled Palestine, seeking out experienced life as a refugee himself. Germany while it was still possible. surviving cousins and friends. After a Bemhard, a member of the AJR, and Having read Mein Kampf, he had no number of jobs with increasing his twin sister were bom in Hanover in doubt that Hitler meant to murder all responsibility in the chemical industry, 1909. His father, a German patriot who the Jews. he built up the largest chemical business fought for the Kaiser in the First World In January 1933, while his father, in Cape Town. In 1967 he started his War, was a successful leather merchant mother and young brother remained own firm, selling out to a conglomerate and taimer. At the gymnasium Bernhard behind, Bernhard left for Holland in which eventually posted him to London, studied French, Latin and Ancient search of work, but was soon put over where his wife and children had gone Greek, but in 1926, aged 17, he took up a the Belgium border Looking for a job at ahead of him. commercial apprenticeship in Hamburg. a leather fair in Brussels, he was Bernhard is the author of a memoir, On his own initiative, he sailed for strongly advised by a Jewish tanner to published in 1998 by a cousin on an Montreal in 1928 'to learn English leave Europe for South Africa. His Israeli kibbutz, entitled 'The Story of a properly' and, when his US visa came up, estranged father forwarded a ticket and Very Long Life'. There remain many made for New York. It was at the time of the £100 guarantee and he sailed for that more chapters yet to be written on the the Great Depression, but Bernhard country. Bernard's father, who after a life of this remarkable man.

11 AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

sage advice on how to deal with conmen enjoyed by all and sundry. We sincerely INSIDE knocking at one's door and how to be thank Myrna for all the work she does on aware of hazards when out walking or our behalf. Inge Ball driving. He answered our many questions theAJR with great patience. Meta Roseneil Sheffield: In Love and War Next meeting: Wed 4 Jan We heard an unusual tale of survival in wartime Italy. Renee Martin (nee Ebert) told us how her uncle Walter and his Second meeting for Hertfordshire Harrogate CF meeting on wife, Lily, escaped from Danzig and hid in group Kristallnacht anniversary a cave in deepest rural Italy, supported by Our second meeting took place in the We had a very gratifying 11 members at locals. They were in hiding with an cosy home of Monica Rosenbaum. Ten of our meeting on 9 November - a date English couple of singers and theirJewish us turned up, including two newcomers, which evoked memories for us all. A new friend Sigbert, a celebrated opera singer Renate Selo and Ruth Smith. We member, Eugene Black, warmly The story is told in full in the book In Love 'introduced ourselves' once again - that in welcomed, told us of his experiences in and War: A Letter to my Parents itself makes interesting listening. various camps. On a lighter note, RosI (reviewed in AJR Journal, April 2005). Sam Ostro Schatzberger entertained us with an Renee's uncle and aunt survived but the amusing story before we had Next meeting: Tues 31 Jan or Tues 28 Feb Englishman was arrested by the Germans refreshments. On behalf of'the Harrogate (depending on weather) and imprisoned! All eventually got away lot', may I wish everyone health and and lived on in England, but the story happiness throughout 2006. A jolly Old Time Musical Tea in West reminded us of the resilience needed to Inge Little survive those turbulent times. Midlands Sixteen of us met at Birmingham Dorothy Fleming Oxford talk on Rhine cruise Progressive Synagogue for a jolly Old The arranged speaker unable to attend, Time Musical Tea with our talented Pinner talk full of good advice one of our members, Oliver Lawton, member Terry Patrick playing the Michael Anvoner spoke to us on 'Wills stepped in. Oliver told us of his recent accordion and singing songs from and Inheritance Tax', to which he added cruise down the Rhine. His holiday began Austrian cabaret and operettas as well as 'Enduring Power of Attorney'. It was a with a flight to Dusseldorf and the tour a 'Jewish' medley. Sonja Shindler talk full of good advice, delivered with took them as far as Basle with many clarity, charm and wit, on a subject most interesting stop-offs. Among the Brighton & Hove Sarid given help with highlights of the trip were a visit to a of us would like to avoid for as long as claims Jewish museum at Speyer which contains possible. I think that after this The speaker at our well-attended a 900-year-old mikveh, and the presentation many will approach the meeting, Michael Newman, Director of magnificent Chagall windows in a Mainz topic more positively. PaulSamet the Central Office of Holocaust Claims, church. John Fieldsend Next meeting: Thur 5 Jan. Hugh Lewis outlined various funds and their from Friends of Bushey Museum, 'Sir functions. He was very informative, HGS tale of wills Hubert von Herkomer - painter, etcher, helping members to establish their When a lawyer offers a talk with the title musical playwright and filmmaker' eligibility to claim. He also presented a 'Where there's a Will, There's a Way', one breakdown of the work done by the AJR can expect a tale of wills, perhaps with a with special emphasis on help and Essex spellbound dash of humour, and Anthony Newton support provided, and still available, to We listened spellbound to Bertha didn't disappoint us. He had a fund of survivors. Ceska Abrahams stories about wills, in the process offering Leverton's description of collecting her MBE from the Queen, who told her how Next meeting: Mon 16 Jan. Ivor Richards insight into the legal aspects. His answers to our questions further elucidated the happy she was to have been able to help mechanism of inheritance, concluding an the Jewish people in their plight. A South London visit by Bertha Leverton informative and enjoyable meeting. similar meeting took place in Clarence MBE House at an earlier date, when Paul Cohn Our 11th anniversary was celebrated in Kindertransportees were warmly style including, of course, with a birthday Next meeting: Mon 9 Jan welcomed by Prince Charles and the cake. Our guest speaker. Bertha Leverton, Duchess of Cornwall. Julie Franks talked not only about her visit to Churchiliian humour discussed at Next meeting: Tues 17 Jan Buckingham Palace and her investiture Weald of Kent but also about the history of the A well-attended meeting heard with Talk by Erich Reich at North London Kindertransport, prompting the Kinder great interest James Taylor, Director of Speaking on the subject 'Long Past, among us to share some of their Research at the Churchill Museum, speak Ever Present', Erich Reich made every memories. A fine party and a good time on 'Churchill: Aspects of his Life'. Mr effort to keep his remarks in a lighter was had by all. IngeGrebley Taylor focused on the great man's sense vain but one couldn't escape the of humour - not always benevolent! - and feeling that there was an underlying llford full house for PC Mooney was happy to answer all our questions poignancy. It was most interesting After a break of two months we had a full afterwards. Jane and Max Dickson were and Erich's efforts to assist in helping house to hear PC Mick Mooney give us once again in charge of refreshments. the public at large to make better

12 AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006 use of their leisure time must be home towns. The group plans to meet Paul Balint AJR Day Centre applauded. Herbert Haberberg again in the spring, but no actual date was arranged. Myrna Glass 15 Cleve Road, London, NW6 Next meeting: Thur 26 Jan. Rabbi Alan Tel: 020 7328 0208 Plancey, 'Laughter is the Best Medicine' AJR LUNCHEON CLUB Surrey dual-status Brits Bournemouth: Wednesday 18 JANUARY 2006 Perhaps as an unconscious tribute to our Thank you for a relaxing holiday 11.45 am for 12.15pm dual status as Continental Britons, Thank you Carol, Annie and Ruth for Vernon and Jutta Saunders, hospitable as making our week so enjoyable. Even Ernest Sondheimer ever, served both Stollen and mince pies the weather was kind: apart from one will be talking about among other delectables, attracting a day we had lots of sun and mild days. Oscar Schlemmer, well-attended gathering despite the cold For me, the highlight was the a versatile artist from Stuttgart weather In a serious aside, Myrna afternoon concert by the charming pointed out how much our quarterly and excellent violinist Peter Witham Reservations required meetings meant to those of us living and pianist Barbara of the Please telephone 020 7328 0208 Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, alone and remote from any contact with Monday, Wednesday & Thursday others, a plight any of us may yet have to enlivened by the spontaneous artistic 9.30 am-3.30 pm face. Robert Miller spirit of Ruth Gee, conducting from her seat in the audience. PLEASE NOTE THAT FROM JANUARY 2006, THE DAY CENTRE WILL Our outing with the knowledgeable Bristol/Bath: delicious lunch and lively NO LONGER BE OPEN ON SUNDAYS conversation guide and coach driver Richard, our January Afternoon Entertainment Once again we met at the home of quiz evening and bingo, the hotel Gabriel and Kitty Balint-Kurti. We enjoyed entertainment and - last but not least - Mon 2 CLOSED excellent meals, all contributed to a a delicious lunch and lively conversation Tue 3 CLOSED relaxing holiday for us pensioners, about ourfeelings on revisiting the places Wed 4 Margaret Opdahl who mostly live on our own with of our origin, either as individuals or at Thur 5 Simon Gilbert nobodytotalkto. Thanks again. the invitation of the various Mon 9 Kards & Games Klub municipalities. Members explained why Hana Nermut Tue 10 CLOSED they had - or had not - returned to their Wed 11 Francis Spiegel Thur 12 Michael Heaton & Lynn AJR GROUP CONTACTS Radnedge Norfolk (Norwich) Mon 16 Kards & Games Klub Brighton & Hove (Sussex Region) Myrna Glass 020 8385 3077 Fausta Shelton 01273 734 648 North London Tue 17 CLOSED Bristol/Bath Jenny Zundel 020 8882 4033 Wed18 LUNCHEON CLUB Kitty Balint-Kurti 0117 973 1150 Oxford Thur 19 William Smith Cambridge Susie Bates 01235 526 702 Lisel Eisner 01223 356721 Mon 23 Kards & Games Klub Pinner (HA Postal District) Tue 24 CLOSED Dundee Vera Gellman 020 8866 4833 Susanne Green 0151 291 5734 Sheffield Wed 25 Mark Rosen East Midlands (Nottingham) Steve Mendelsson 0114 2630666 Thur 26 Mike Marandi Bob Norton 01159 212 494 South London Mon 30 Kards & Games Klub Edinburgh Lore Robinson 020 8670 7926 Frangoise Robertson 0131 337 3406 Tue 31 CLOSED South West Midlands (Worcester area) Essex (Westcliff) Ruth Jackson 01386 552264 Larry Lisner 01702 300812 Surrey Glasgow Edmee Barta 01372 727 412 DIARY DATES Claire Singerman 0141 649 4620 Weald of Kent Harrogate 26 January Holocaust Max and Jane Dickson Memorial Day Inge Little 01423 886254 01892 541026 HGS Hertfordshire 30 January 20th anniversary of Gerda Torrence 020 8883 9425 Myrna Glass 020 8385 3077 opening of Day Centre Hull Wessex (Bournemouth) 25 April Yom Hashoah Bob Rosner 0148 2649156 Mark Goldfinger 01202 552 434 11-18 June Eastbourne holiday llford West Midlands (Birmingham) Meta Roseneil 020 8505 0063 9-16 July Lytham St Annes Ernest Aris 0121 353 1437 holiday Leeds HSFA Myrna Glass, AJR South and Midlands Trude Silman 0113 2251628 Groups Co-ordinator For further information about any of these Liverpool 020 8385 3077 events, please call us on 020 8385 3070. Susanne Green 0151 291 5734 Susanne Green, AJR Northern Groups Manchester Co-ordinator Werner Lachs 0161 773 4091 0151 291 5734 'DROP IN' ADVICE SERVICE Newcastle KT-AJR (Kindertransport) Members requiring benefit advice please Walter Knoblauch 0191 2855339 Andrea Goodmaker 020 8385 3070 telephone Linda Kasmir on 020 8385 3070 to make an appointment at AJR, Jubilee House, Merrion Avenue, Editorials and articles published, and opinions expressed, in the AJR Journal are not Stanmore, Middx HA7 4RL necessarily those of the Association of Jewish Refugees and should not be regarded as such.

13 AJR JOURNAL JANUARY 2006

FAMILY ANNOUNCEMENTS BELSIZE SQUARE SYNAGOGUE HOLIDAY FOR Marriages 51 Belsize Square, NW3 4HX NORTHERN MEMBERS The Trustees, Management and Staff of We offer a traditional style of the AJR wish Andrea and Philip religious service. Sunday 9 July - Goodmaker mazeltov on the marriage of Details can be obtained from the Sunday 16 July 2006 their son Paul to Lynsey. Synagogue Administrator Telephone 020 8959 7086 or AT THE FERNLEA HOTEL email: [email protected] 11/17 South Promenade, Death Minister: Rabbi Rodney J Mariner St Annes Helga Beer, born Leipzig 21.10.31, died Regular Services Tel 01253 726 726 Amsterdam 29.10.05. Helga arrived in Friday evenings at 6.45pm The cost, England with the Kindertransport, but Saturday mornings at 10.00am later rejoined her parents, who survived Religion School: Sundays 9.45am - 12.30pm including Dinner, Bed and Theriesenstadt, in Holland. She became a Nursery School: 9.15am - 12.15pm Breakfast, is £405 per person Belsize Under 3's: 9.30 am - 11.30 am group psychotherapist and sculptress - in Space donated by Pafra Limited The hotel charges a 2006 her work will be exhibited in supplement per room for sea view Cambridge, where she went to school. Meeting Rooms and our reburbished or deluxe room Helga was much loved and will be sorely communal hall are available for cultural and social functions. missed by her husband Fons Koper and so Programme includes Tel: 020 7794 3949 many others. GOOD COMPANY ENTERTAINMENT STUDIO FLAT OUTINGS Leo Baeck Housing Association Ltd MEET OLD AND NEW FRIENDS Clara Nehab House AVAILABLE FOR RENT Residential Care Home PLEASE BOOK EARLY TO AVOID at 15 CLEVE ROAD DISAPPOINTMENT All single rooms with en suite bath/shower SINGLE OCCUPANCY Short stays/Respite and 24 hour £452 PER MONTH Travel to St Annes by Permanent Care. Large attractive gardens, RAIL, NATIONAL COACH or CAR Ground Floor Lounge and Dining rooms, FOR FURTHER INFORMATION Lift access to all floors. Easy access to PLEASE CONTACT Please contact Ruth Finestone on local shops and public transport CAROL ROSSEN ON 020 8385 3070

Enquiries and further information please contact: 020 8385 3070 The Manager, Ciara Nehab House 13-19 Leeside Crescent, London NW11 ODA Phone: 020 8455 2286 FillarCare (^jjtou^ Home Care Quality support and care at home Care through quality and • Hourly Care from 1 hour-24 hours professionalism 2s COMPANY • Live-In/Night Duty/Sleepover 2s Company specialises in Celebrating our 25th Anniversary Care companionship, whether for yourself, your family or friends. We can be there 25 years of experience in providing • Convalescent and Personal Health at any time and any place to accompany the highest standards of care in the Care you on any shopping trips, journeys, comfort of your own home • Compassionate and Affordable holidays, wall(s or even a cuppa. Living Service in or living out. Why not call us for an informal chat on • Professional, Qualified, Kind Care 020 7586 8988 mobile: 0778 880 8907 Staff ALL STAFF SCREENED AND VETTED • Registered with the CSCI and UKHCA

ACACIA LODGE Mrs Pringsheim, S.R.N. MATRON 1 hour to 24 hours care Studio I Utopia Villaj;o For Elderly, Retired and Convalescent Registered through the National Care Standard Commission •Ch.ilcot Ro.ul, \VV18LH (Ucensed by Bomugti of Barnet} • Single and Double Rooms. Call our 24 hour tel 020 7794 9323 • Ensuite facilities, CH in all rooms. www.colvin-nursing.co.uk • Gardens, TV and reading rooms. • Nurse on duty 24 hours. ALTERATIONS • Long and short term and respite, OF ANY KIND TO including trial period if required. SWITCH ON ELECTRICS LADIES' FASHIONS Between £400 and £500 per week Rewires and all household I also design and make 020 8445 1244/020 8446 2820 office hours electrical work 020 8455 1335 other times children's clothes 37-39 Torrington Park, North Finchley, PHONE PAUL: 020 8200 3518 West Hampstead area 020 7328 6571 London N12 9TB Mobile: 0795 614 8566

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Obituary Arts & Events Diary Central Office for Last surviving mother of January Holocaust Claims a Kind Samara Wolinsky and Michael Newman To 16 February 'The Last Goodbye: The Franzi Groszmann, mother of the author Rescue of Children from Nazi Europe' Jewish Programme for former slave and Lore Segal, has died in New York at the Museum, Finchley forced labourers age of 100. She was the last surviving To 8 January 'Albert Einstein: Man of the mother of a Kind. Franzi and her husband Century Jewish IVIuseum, Camden Town According to the German Foundation Igo put their ten-year-old daughter Lore Mon 9 Reggie Oliver, The Gothic Quest: The law, the last day on which payments in on the first Kindertransport to leave Ghost Story from 2000 BCE to the Present respect of slave and forced labour Vienna. They came to England as Day Club 43 from the German Foundation domestics - she as a cook, he as a butler - 11-13 'Beyond Camps and Forced Remembrance, Responsibility and the and were among the approximately ten Labour: Current International Research Future may be made to eligible per cent of Kindertransport parents who on Survivors of Nazi Persecution - 60 Years On' Second international persons is 20 September 2006. escaped Hitler's Europe to be reunited multidisciplinary conference at Imperial Individuals eligible for payment withtheirchild. War Museum. Further information at include: Franzi was featured in the Oscar- www.iwm.org.uk/conferenceBCFL winning documentary Into the Arms of 16-28 Photographic Holocaust Memorial 1 Survivors who are eligible for, but Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport exhibition 'Absence and Loss' by Marion have not yet received, full payment; and its companion book. During the Davies. Illustrates progressive impact of 2 Applicants yet to receive any making of the film, newsreel footage of Nazi accession to power on German Jews. Lore stepping off the gangplank onto Michaelhouse, Trinity Street, Cambridge, 9.30 decision regarding theirclaim; am to 5 pm. Tel 020 8458 3438 British soil was discovered. 3 Recipients of the Heir Application Mon 16 Dr Ian King, 'Rosa Luxembourg: Lore's novel Other People's Houses tells Packet who have yet to submit the Revolutionary in Theory and Practice' required forms; her experience of the Kindertransport Club 43 and traces the family's 13-year odyssey 4 Those with appeals pending before Mon 23 Ralph Blumenau MA, The United from Vienna, the war years in England, States as a Magnet for Europe' Club 43 the Appeals Authority. and the time spent in the Dominican Tues 24 Dr Robert Knight, 'Austria and the Republic waiting to enter the US in Heirs of deceased persons who are Holocaust: Coming to Terms with the Past?' eligible for payment must notify the 1951. The book draws a loving portrait Sixth Annual Holocaust Memorial Lecture, of Franzi. Western Infirmary Lecture Theatre, University Claims Conference, the organisation In her early New York years, Franzi Place, University of Glasgow, Spm which administers claims, within six worked as a salad cook and a salesclerk. Thur 26 Holocaust Memorial Day months of the death of the survivor in After helping Lore in the first few weeks Thur 26 Dr Sybille Steinbacher, 'Auschwitz: order to receive payment. with her first baby, she trained herself to Model of Germanisation and Annihilation'. Any individual who fits into one of become a baby nurse. At Wiener Library, 7.00 pm. Tel Leo Baeck Institute on 020 7580 3493. the above categories should contact After both Lore and Franzi were the Claims Conference and submit all widowed, they lived in separate Fri 27 to Sun 29 Refugee Voices: Moments and IVIemories (2005). Refugees who necessary information as soon as apartments in an apartment building in escaped from Hitler and settled in Britain possible. Only claims filed before New York's Manhattan district. Franzi tell their story. Prod, and dir. by Dr Bea the deadline of 30 September 2006 visited Lore's apartment to look after the Lewkowicz for the AJR Imperial War children and manage the household; Museum, 11.00 am (40 mins.) will be processed. Lore visited Franzi's apartment to write Fri 27 to Sun 29 The Boys (2004) A Please note that the Foundation will her novels. documentary about child survivors of the not accept any new applications. The Franzi never ceased to inspire and Nazi camps who came to Britain in 1945. original deadline to submit Dir. by Herb Krosney IWM, 12 noon (60 mins.) amuse me, the producer otinto the Arms applications was December 2001. of Strangers and the daughter of a Sat 28 and Sun 29 Sophie Scholl - The Final Heirs of survivors are entitled to claim Days (2005) Prize-winning film about Kindertransport survivor She provided a only where the survivor passed away German student who resisted the Nazi singular perspective on the regime With thanks to the ICA. IWM, 2.00 pm after 16 February 1999. Kindertransport that elevated and (117 mins.) Written enquiries should be sent to enriched our film. She said appearing in Mon 30 Martin Page, 'John Mackinnon Central Office for Holocaust Claims Into the Arms of Strangers was one of the Robertson, 1856-1933: Free Thinker, (UK), Jubilee House, Merrion Avenue, proudest events in her later life. Freeing Radical, Sociologist, Literary Critic - a Varied Stanmore, Middx HA7 4RL, by fax to herself of most of her possessions after Life'Club 43 020 8385 3075, or by email to moving into a nursing home, she kept ORGANISATION CONTACTS michaelCSajr.org.uk Assistance can be next to her bed copies of Lore's books, Club 43 Meetings at Belsize Square family photographs, and the film's Synagogue, 7.45 pm. Tel Hans Seelig on provided strictly by appointment companion book with her interview, 01442 254360 at the Holocaust Survivors Centre from which Lore would read to her aloud. Jewish Museum, Camden Town, tel 020 in Hendon, north London. For Deborah Oppenheimer 72841997 an appointment, please ring 020 Jewish Museum, Finchley, tel 020 83491143 8385 3074.

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Newsround

Holocaust jewellery recovered Threats to civilisation Four survivors of the Holocaust have found jewellery and other precious A top soldier's analysis objects which they and other prisoners buried 62 years ago near Majdanek At a time of terrorist threats to civilian solved internationally, and he was certain concentration camp. The four had populations, including last year's attacks on that 'appeasement does not work'. There travelled from Australia to take part in a London Transport, which killed 52 was an inevitable trade-off between documentary about Majdanek, which is passengers at random and injured many security and freedom but, in his view, it was now a museum. more, I was recently privileged to attend a 'absolutely right to change the law to meet special conference on terrorism and human new threats'. Investigations were now very Brundibar revived rights. The conference, at the International complicated and international in scope. The children's opera Brundibar has been Institute of Strategic Studies, was co- The suppression of the financing of revived at Berlin's Konzerthaus for its first sponsored by the Clemens Nathan terrorist acts was extremely important but, major production in over six decades. Research Centre and hosted by Clemens to date, this area had met with a large Brundibar was performed over 50 times Nathan himself. The viewpoints of a measure of failure by the West's security at Theriesenstadt and was used by the number of leading academics and other services. The military, which he termed Nazis to present the camp as a model to authorities on the subject were presented 'hard power', certainly had a part to play but international inspectors. The opera was and debated, but the keynote address on civil, or 'soft', power - the police, the performed in Czech so that its thinly- 'How Dangerous is the Threat?', delivered judiciary et al - was even more important. veiled symbolism was lost on the Nazis. by General Lord Guthrie, Chief of the Intelligence had to be more widely shared. Defence Staff in 1997-2001, was especially General Guthrie emphasised the New editor for German-Jewish paper worthy of attention. importance of 'knowing our enemy'. He Christian Bbhme has taken over the Lord Guthrie emphatically took the view characterised Osama bin Laden as a leader editorship of the weekly Judische that terrorism was a 'serious threat to our who 'looked the part, was articulate and Allgemeine Zeitung (JAZ), Germany's societies' and that increased international repeated a simple message'. This centred largest Jewish circulated paper, from co-operation and understanding were on an understanding of Arab history and the Judith Hart, who had edited it for 12 essential to combat it. Though terrorism fell ofthe Ottoman Empire in the aftermath years. The JAZ is the organ of the Central had a long history, today's manifestation was of the First World War. What Guthrie called Council of Jews in Germany and was founded in 1946. Bohme, the first non- different. Al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden 'failing states' needed to be helped to Jew to become editor of the paper, had been known to intelligence agencies in prevent a terrorist takeover. previously edited Berlin's prestigious the 1980s, but no common approach had 'Religion and conflict are ancient Tagespiegel. then been adopted to alleviate any threat partners', Lord Guthrie said, and the they might have represented. authorities were confronted by extremists Son of Yehudi Menuhin ousted for Modem societies were more vulnerable, who saw 'death as a passport to paradise'. antisemitic claims Lord Guthrie pointed out, and sophisticated He believed that it was the moderate Gerard Menuhin, 57, son of Yehudi states such as our own were 'easy to Muslims who were best equipped to Menuhin, has been ousted as head of the damage'. The information revolution had combat extreme members of their religion. German branch of his father's foundation brought about cheap communications, He warned that a failure of the United on account of his far-right views. He which could be used internationally by States to stem terrorism was likely to lead claimed that Germany was being terrorists who no longer needed to gather to increased terrorism around the world, blackmailed by an international Jewish together to plan their attacks. Weapons of and concluded by asking 'Do we have the conspiracy preying on the country's mass destruction could now be 'small, light will to prevail?' war guilt. and cheap'. Among others presenting papers to the In his view, acts of terrorism had become conference were Professor Anthony Glees, Saudi teacher sentenced for praising 'more brutal and indiscriminate'. Terrorist author of a recent study on the Jews groups had proved far harder to penetrate development of extremism on university A Saudi citizen has been sentenced to 40 and he quoted examples which included the campuses, Dr Aryeh Nusbacher of months' imprisonment and 750 lashes for Oklahoma City bombing, the sarin gas Sandhurst, Professor David Kretzmer of praising Jews. According to a Jewish attack on the Tokyo subway, and the many the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Telegraphic Agency report, Mohammad examples of Islamist terrorism. Professor Frangoise Hampson of Essex Al-Harbi, a teacher, is to receive the Considering the means to combat University, Michael Whine of the punishment for 'dubious ideology, terrorism, Lord Guthrie suggested that the Community Security Trust, Professor mocking religion, saying the Jews were objective should be to reduce the scope and Javaid Rehman of Brunei University, and right, discussing the Gospel and frequency of terrorist acts - at least to an Dr Patrick Sookhdeo, UK Defence preventing students from leaving class to 'acceptable' level. Terrorism had to be Academy. wash for prayer'.

Published by the Association of Jewish Refugees in Great Britain, Jubilee House, Merrion Avenue, Stanmore, Middx HA7 4RL Telephone 020 8385 3070 Fax 020 8385 3080 e-mail [email protected] Website www.ajr.org.uk

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