VOLume 12 NO.6 june 2012

British politicians misuse ometimes it almost seems as if an investigation into the incident. This instead in the knee-jerk hostility to the centre of gravity in current has yet to report, several months later, Europeans widespread on the Tory right. Sexchanges about anti-Semitism and while Burley remains a backbench MP. By dressing as he did, Mark Fournier Nazism has moved to the Middle East, One can reasonably assume that the evidently aimed to provoke the French: allowing such sentiments in Britain to pass Prime Minister has adopted the trusted ‘We wanted to see how a Nazi uniform in unchallenged. While heated accusations tactic of using an investigation to kick the middle of France would go down,’ he of anti-Semitism are regularly levelled an unwelcome issue into the long grass, is reported as saying. ‘The answer is not at those who criticise Israeli policies hoping that the media will lose interest that well at all.’ His intention would seem towards the Arabs, provoking the equally and that Burley’s resignation, which would to have been to taunt the French with their contentious counter-argument that it is force a by-election that the Tories could defeat in 1940 and the subsequent years of possible to be anti-Zionist without being easily lose, can be avoided. occupation – conveniently forgetting that anti-Semitic, some recent, thoroughly As a result, Burley continues to enjoy the British Expeditionary Force retreated reprehensible actions and just as fast as the French in face of statements by British politicians the Nazi onslaught and was only have passed without attracting the saved from destruction by escaping condemnation they deserve. across the Channel, protected by a The worst of these was the largely French rearguard. attendance of Aidan Burley, The image of France regularly Conservative MP for Cannock promoted by the right-wing media in Chase, at a stag party held on 3 Britain is based on this historically December 2011 in a restaurant in truncated view, which focuses the French Alpine resort of Val entirely on the French surrender Thorens, where the bridegroom, in 1940, in apparent ignorance of Mark Fournier, chose to wear SS the long record of French military uniform. According to the Mail prowess, not least the mass heroism on Sunday of 22 December 2011, that the French forces displayed in guests chanted the names of Hitler, repelling the initial German thrust Himmler and Eichmann. One of the into France in summer 1914. The guests was quoted as having raised same media peddle an equally a toast to the organiser of the party Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial distorted image of Germany, seen ‘and if we’re perfectly honest, to almost exclusively through the the thought process and ideology of the the Conservative whip, living to smirk lens of the Nazi period and ignoring Third Reich’. another day and no doubt hoping to the thorough-going re-education of the Readers with a strong stomach can resume his ministerial career. In the German people in democracy and anti- view images of this deplorable incident 1950s, AJR Information reported that militarism over six decades. on the internet, on MailOnline, where a man who had raised a Nazi flag on a That very welcome development Burley can be seen alongside the SS-clad building on Finchley Road had had to does not prevent papers like the Daily Fournier, grinning cheesily. Both men are be protected by the police from angry Express (Jewish-owned, alas) from Oxford graduates, professionals in their passers-by. Now, it would appear that resorting routinely to the stereotype of the thirties, and quite unlike the uneducated those participating in Nazi-styled events jackbooted Nazi in its reporting of German young louts from whom such behaviour enjoy the protection of the Conservative affairs – the kind of national stereotyping might be expected. On the contrary, to Party. Speaking personally, I would not familiar from the conservative-nationalist judge by the evidence on the internet, vote for a party which boasts an individual press in Germany either side of the First it looks as if Fournier and his cronies like Burley as one of its parliamentary World War. Branding all Germans as understood perfectly well what they were representatives. I would regard it as a Nazis, actual or potential, is of course doing and saying. betrayal of my murdered relatives to do so. highly offensive, as people like Fournier The reaction of the Conservative Party This is not to suggest that a right-wing well appreciate. Why would any upright has left much to be desired. When the Tory like Burley genuinely harbours Nazi British citizen, they seek to suggest, want scandal broke, sacked sympathies, even if he enjoys participating to have anything to do with nations whose Burley from his junior ministerial post in tasteless pranks in Nazi uniform. If historical record consists primarily in as Parliamentary Private Secretary at the there is any ideological underpinning to supporting Nazism (the Germans) or in Department of Transport and announced this kind of escapade, it is to be found continued overleaf 

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British politicians misuse the Holocaust cont. from p1 Dr Anthony Grenville’s book  Jewish Refugees from Germany and Austria in Britain, 1933- kowtowing to it in defeat (the French)? We Erich Heller – a 1970 has been reprinted. For British may have come down in the world centenary tribute copies (paperback), write to since 1945, but we were on the right side Anthony Grenville at the AJR, in the war, weren’t we? onnoisseurs of German literature enclosing cheque for £22.50 (incl. postage A similar sense of inflamed nationalism will regret that the centenary and packing) made out to the author. inspired by unthinking anti-European Cof the birth of the great literary feeling was exhibited in the House of Lords scholar Erich Heller has passed largely by Lord Willoughby de Broke (UKIP). unmarked. Heller was born in Komotau ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING Speaking in a debate on the European (now Chomutov in the Czech Republic) on of the ASSOCIATION OF Union on 16 February 2012, the peer did 27 March 1911 and studied law in Prague. JEWISH REFUGEES not scruple to compare the EU’s policy on In 1939 he fled to Britain, where he was THURSDAY 7 JUNE 2012, Greece to the Holocaust. Characteristically awarded his doctorate at Cambridge 11.00 AM describing the economic policy as German University in 1943 for a dissertation on at the AJR Paul Balint Centre – those jackbooted Nazis lording it over Thomas Mann, the predecessor of his Belsize Square , London NW3 4HX the Continent again – Lord Willoughby influential study The Ironic German: A Lunch, if required, £7. Must be ordered made the remarkable statement that Study of Thomas Mann (1958). Heller held and paid for in advance – please telephone ‘austerity macht frei seems to be the lecturing posts at the London School of 020 7431 2744. remedy prescribed by the Germans’ Economics, Cambridge and the University Agenda to Greece. Readers may well recoil in College of Swansea, where he was head Annual Report 2011 Hon. Treasurer’s Report shock and disgust from this casual abuse of the Department of German, being Discussion of the notorious phrase ‘Arbeit macht promoted to the rank of professor in 1950. Election of Committee of Management frei’ (‘work sets you free’), which was In 1959, he was appointed Professor of All questions for the chair should be inscribed above the gates to Auschwitz. submitted by Thursday 24 May to the Head German at Northwestern University in of Administration at Jubilee House, Merrion The reference was plainly deliberate: Evanston, Illinois, where he lived until his Avenue, Stanmore, Middx HA7 4RL. blithely insensitive to the distress likely to death in 1990. ELECTION OF COMMITTEE OF be caused to Holocaust survivors and their Heller was best known for The MANAGEMENT descendants by his grossly inappropriate The following members will be Disinherited Mind (1952), a brilliant proposed for election or re-election to the invocation of Auschwitz, the noble lord series of studies of German literary Committee at the AGM proceeded, when challenged, to repeat figures from Goethe to Rilke and Kafka, on Thursday 7 June 2012: the comparison. including Nietzsche, Jacob Burkhardt, Mr A C Kaufman, Chairman, Mr W D Rothenberg, Vice Chairman & Hon. Treasurer, Mrs E S This is a clear case of the trivialisation of author of The Culture of the Renaissance Angel*, Secretary, Mr C W Dunston*, Trustee, the Holocaust, and deeply reprehensible. in Italy, and Karl Kraus. The essays Mrs D Franklin, Trustee, Mrs G R Glassman, By likening what happened at Auschwitz are case studies in ‘the spiritually Trustee, Ms Karen Goodman, Mrs J Millan, Sir E Reich*, Mr A Spiro – the murder of at least a million disinherited mind of Europe’, examining *Committee members retiring by rotation defenceless, innocent human beings, the relation of poetry and truth ‘in an age and being proposed for re-election mostly – to the attempt by the EU dispossessed of all spiritual certainties’, Anyone wishing to propose any other and the International Monetary Fund member for election as Hon Officer, Trustee, a world where the moral and cultural or Committee member must submit to AJR’s to resolve Greece’s financial crisis by a certainties underlying the real order Head of Administration such a proposal policy of debt reduction, Lord Willoughby have ceased to obtain and where, in signed by ten members qualified to vote at provided a textbook case of Holocaust the meeting and with the signed agreement consequence, the artist has to create of the person being proposed no later than relativisation, and one that deserves that order for himself, thereby inevitably Thursday 24 May. much sharper refutation than it has distancing his art yet further from the received. For if the Nazi genocide was no world around him. At the book’s heart is worse than some historical commonplace Hölderlin’s lament, in his poem Brot und ARTS AND EVENTS like an austerity programme, then why, Wein (Bread and Wine), ‘wozu Dichter DIARY one might ask, do Jews get so worked in dürftiger Zeit?’ (‘why be a poet in a Wed 6 June ‘Target Heydrich: Laurent up about it? spiritless age?’) – a fundamental question Binet on HHhH’ Laurent Binet will discuss Lord Willoughby’s outburst, apart from that Heller’s dazzling erudition went his novel HHhH, winner of the 2010 Prix reinforcing the case for the abolition of some way to resolving. Goncourt du premier roman and now the House of Lords in its current form, published in English translation. At Wiener Anthony Grenville Library, 6.30 pm. Admission free but tel 020 shows that some on the British right are 7636 7247 to reserve a space prepared to disregard the aura of respect AJR Directors To 8 June ‘Traces’ Exhibition by photographer that normally surrounds the Holocaust by Michael Newman Julia Winckler about her great-uncle Hugo dragging iconic sites like Auschwitz down Carol Rossen Hecker, who in 1939 escaped from Vienna David Kaye into the hurly-burly of political slanging to England and whose family perished in matches and degrading them into terms AJR Heads of Department the Holocaust. At Austrian Cultural Forum, Sue Kurlander Social Services 28 Rutland Gate, London SW7, tel 020 of abuse aimed at ‘Europe’, their favoured AJR Journal 7584 8653 target. There are European countries Dr Anthony Grenville Consultant Editor Mon 2 July Baroness Deech, ‘Restoring where such violations of the sanctity of Dr Howard Spier Executive Editor Andrea Goodmaker Secretarial/Advertisements Our History: Poland and Jewish Property’ the Holocaust would not be tolerated, Ben-Gurion University Foundation. 6.00 pm but apparently­ Britain is no longer one Views expressed in the AJR Journal are not at a central London venue. Contact Hannah of them. necessarily those of the Association of Jewish Allen on 020 7446 8558 or at hannah@ Anthony Grenville Refugees and should not be regarded as such. bguf.uk

2 AJR JOURNAL june 2012 New light thrown on capture of Hoess ntold details about the tracking refugees, was accepted into the Pioneer in Warsaw for murder and hanged down and arrest of Rudolf Hoess, the Corps, mainly digging trenches. him on 16 April 1947 on the same U­notorious Kommandant of Ausch-­ But by the end of war he had been spot in view of his villa (now occupied witz,were revealed when a Belsize Square moved to Intelligence and, again by a retired teacher) where prisoners Synagogue group travelled to Cracow like many other German-speaking of Auschwitz were publicly hanged. just after Passover. Jewish refugee soldiers, he was sent to After demobilisation, Mr Alexander A quick search on Wikipedia gives the Germany to act as interpreter. Only in went into a career in banking, mainly outlines of Hoess’s final years. But there are his case there was a very specific task. at S. G. Warburg and under successive no names, just the mention of his capture In Germany he joined a group of take­overs. His story, intertwined with a by ‘British troops – some of whom were British soldiers, Jewish and non-Jewish, study of Rudolf Hoess, is being written born in Germany – on 11 March 1946’. intent on finding the ruthlessly efficient for publication by his great-nephew, Now, we have a name: the late Hoess. As the Red Army approached Thomas Harding: ‘There were rumours Hanns Alexander. Members of Hanns’s from the east to liberate the 20,000-acre in the family about Hanns being a war family were among the 35 Synagogue Auschwitz complex, Hoess had sent his crimes investigator but nobody really members on the trip, led by Stuart wife and five children home from the knew,’ Thomas said: Altshuler and Professor Antony Polonsky, comfortable villa they occupied on the The first time I heard it mentioned was at who holds the chair of Holocaust Studies edge of the site, and then quietly slipped his funeral in 2006. Most people doubted this was true and put it down to one of at Brandeis University, Massachusetts. away. The British team went to Hoess’s his tales. The search for the truth was Hanns’s daughter, Annette Hughes, wife and threatened her with handing what got me going on my book, and made the journey, as did his nephew, over her oldest son to the Russians unless it was not until I started my research, Frank Harding, with his wife Belinda and she revealed her husband’s whereabouts. and found confirmation in the British, American and Polish archives, including son Thomas. Under pressure Hedwig Hoess gave Hanns’s field dispatches, that I was able On the short coach trip from Cracow the location where her husband was to confirm that Hanns was indeed the to the sombre guided tour of Auschwitz, working as a farmer under the assumed man who arrested Rudolf Hoess. several of the party explained their own name of Franz Lang. He was living in a He had backup, particularly Field Security Section 92, but Hanns had personal links to the site: grandparents barn. After he had been severely beaten been charged by the War Crimes Group lost, a last-minute escape from Germany. and confessed to his true identity, Hanns to arrest Hoess, and it was Hanns who Thomas Harding told the group about Alexander arrested him and handed carried out the arrest. He also delivered him to Camp Tomato, the interrogation his research on his great-uncle, which him over to the International Military centre, where Hoess made his first began at Hanns’s funeral in 2006. Tribunal at Nuremberg, where he gave confession about Auschwitz and the Hanns Alexander was 19 when he left the first authoritative and detailed millions who had been murdered there. his native Berlin for Britain – he flew into account of the entire camp operation. But, as his daughter confirmed: Croydon airport in 1937. The rest of his Senior Nazis on trial could no longer ‘Dad was very reluctant to talk about family – twin brother, two older sisters claim ignorance of the extermination his wartime activities. The past was the and parents – came separately. As soon policy and its implementation. past. He was grateful to England for as war was declared he volunteered for Hoess was then handed over to giving him another chance in life.’ the army and, like most German-Jewish the Polish authorities, who tried him Ruth Rothenberg

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(From left) Joanna Millan, Joseph Berger, Zdenka Husserl Tel: 020 7435 5351 he Child Survivors’ Association (CSA) Martin Gilbert’s book of that name. Fax: 020 7435 8881 Torganised a visit to the ‘Windermere CSA Chair Joanna Millan was [email protected] Boys’ exhibition at the Manchester three years old when she arrived at Jewish Museum, where they were met Windermere. Together with fellow by local members of the AJR. CSA member Zdenka Husserl and AJR In August 1945 300 children members Josef Berger and Abraham switch on electrics liberated from Theresienstadt were Pawlowski, these four ‘Boys’ shared Rewires and all household brought to England and settled at their memories of their experiences electrical work the Calgarth Estate in Windermere. at the Calgarth Estate with the rest of Although the group included 40 girls, the group. PHONE PAUL: 020 8200 3518 it became known as ‘The Boys’ after Joan Salter Mobile: 0795 614 8566

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Closure: A visit to Minsk

The following are notes made by the my old home. A lad of 15 or 16 allowed was accommodation for 1,000 men. author during a visit to Minsk last us to come into the apartment. It’s not It was intended to destroy it after the October (Ed.). as I remember it. It was rebuilt and a war but it was so solidly built that it is t took more than 50 years before it family of six now live there. They each now going to be used as an educational became known what happened to have their own room with all their establishment. On Sunday morning Ithe poor people who were deported things and it’s full of all their stuff – we drove to Frankfurt for Belarus and from Cologne on 20 July 1942. This was quite a mess. It was sad: not the lovely arrived in Minsk in the evening. the only transport – some 1,100 people home we had. We also visited our This morning, Monday, an early – that went to Minsk. previous home, still in the same place start. We were collected by our guide, A book was published by Dieter where we had lived when I was about a nice young woman who showed us Corbach (6:00 Uhr ab Messe Köln- five years old. many of the memorials and places of Deutz: Deportationen 1938-1945 After that we dropped by the remembrance to the Holocaust victims. (Scriba, 1999)) following the discovery Roonstrasse Synagogue. Too late to Minsk has almost 200,000 inhabitants of an archive with all the gruesome have lunch. Every they have and is a large modern city with a lot of details of that time. Groups of Jewish building works. people were instructed to report at the Then we visited the Holocaust local railway station with enough food Research Centre. On one wall were and provisions for 24 hours to be sent to all the names of the transport from the east to work. They were convinced Cologne in July 1942. I saw the names of this was the fact. They had to pay 50 my mother and father and all the other marks per person for the rail fare. names of the people who had been on My mother and father were on this that transport from Cologne in 1942.We transport with many of my friends had a long interview with the director of and acquaintances, as were my old the Centre, who is creating an archive headmaster and his family who had been of all that took place at Maly Trostinec. instrumental in saving my life by getting (From left) Kurt Marx, Wolfgang Freier, After lunch we had a guided tour of the Kusma Kosak me and some 130 other Jawne pupils to town. It was a long day. Tomorrow we England on the Kindertransport. a communal lunch. There must have will be taken to the actual site of Maly For me, this visit to Minsk was one I been 50 or 60 people there. The rabbi Trostinec. We were told there are about had to make. I had made a number of asked us to join them. There are around 15,000 Jewish people currently living attempts to join a party but hadn’t been 5,000 Jewish people living there now, in Minsk, possibly more as they are not successful. A friend in Germany finally mostly from Eastern Europe. To think I required to mention their religion in the enabled me to join a tour. It’s not easy was Bar there in 1938! We then census now. to enter Belarus and the area of Maly drove to a place called Vogelsang in the Tuesday up early, first stop the Holo- Trostinec just outside Minsk. Eifel. Vogelsang was built by the Nazis caust History Society. They want to know We now know what happened when in 1936 to educate an elite who would all about me and the family history. They the deportation took place. The journey become a civilian force to govern all are trying to create a record of all who took some three days. The train was the captured territory in the east. There were transported to Maly Trostinec. diverted to Maly Trostinec, where all the The most complete record is the one I passengers dismounted, were taken by came here for. The record in our book lorry to a prepared site and murdered. is the most complete. They have the At some time during their journey names of all the people who came in they were moved from the passenger July 1942. They have all the names on train to cattle trucks. One cannot the wall of their centre similar to the imagine what went through their minds ones in Prague. After the interview, we at that time. went on to Maly Trostinec, a few miles From Gatwick on Friday to Cologne, from Minsk. We saw the various sites where Wolfgang Freier collected me to of the camp. When my parents arrived take me to his home in Reifferscheid in they were taken from the then existing the Eifel, a pretty village of 300 people. goods station by lorry to the area in the Wolfgang and his wife Gisela couldn’t woods, walked to the pits and, as far do enough for me. On Saturday we as we know, were murdered together very busy. We looked at the cemetery in with the 1,100 other women, men and Vernich, where a number of the original children. Marx family are buried. Karolina Marx, As the weather was fine, the walk whom we met in 1992 and was almost wasn’t bad. The car we were in got 100 when she died, was buried next to quite close to the site; in wet weather her parents 15 years ago. it would very difficult. The authorities Then we went to Cologne, where have left the approach to the site in they took me to my old home in a very bad condition as if to make it Wittekindstrasse. We managed to visit Memorial to Jewish victims at Maly Trostinec continued opposite 

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AJR representatives at Buckingham spring grove Palace for Diamond Jubilee celebrations 214 Finchley Road London NW3 JR Co-Director Michael Newman London’s Most Luxurious and AJR member Clemens Nathan RETIREMENT HOME A had the honour of attending a special ceremony at Buckingham Palace  Entertainment  Activities as part of the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee buckingham palace  Stress Free Living celebrations. Both are members of the 12 April, 2012  24 House Staffing Excellent Cuisine Board of the Anglo-Jewish Association  Full En-Suite Facilities (Clemens is a former President and Michael Call for more information or a personal tour is the current Deputy President), which, together with the Board of Deputies, has 020 8446 2117 I have been asked to thank you for your letter of or 020 7794 4455 enjoyed since Victorian times the status the 4th April containing a message of congratulations, of one of Her Majesty’s Privileged Bodies sent on the occasion of The Queen’s Diamond [email protected] of the Crown. Jubilee. This has been shown to Her Majesty and I It is a great privilege to be able to now have pleasure in enclosing her reply. pay homage to the reigning monarch at The Queen was interested to learn of your kind special and historically important times. gesture in donating £45,000 to your members with On this occasion, 27 delegations ranging the greatest needs and sends her best wishes to all concerned. JACKMAN . from the churches, various town mayors and royal boroughs, the Chairman of the SILVERMAN Bank of England as well as Mayor Boris COMMERCIAL PROPERTY CONSULTANTS Johnson representing London and the Knights of the Garter, were present. David Ryan Representatives of each delegation Director, Private Secretary’s Officer made a short speech and presented a scroll to Her Majesty. His Royal Highness Andrew Kaufman, Esq the Duke of Edinburgh sat next to her at Telephone: 020 7209 5532 the front of the magnificent Throne Room. [email protected] This was followed by a reception in the In response to the AJR’s letter of Queen’s Gallery, where the Royal Couple congratulations to Her Majesty on the mingled with the distinguished guests. occasion of her Diamond Jubilee, we There the Queen asked Michael whether were delighted to receive the above reply. In his letter to the Queen, AJR the wishes of our delegation that she Annely Juda Chairman Andrew Kaufman informed should live to 120 years included mental Her Majesty of the decision of the AJR Fine Art as well as physical health. He assured her Charitable Trust to make an additional 23 Dering Street (off New Bond Street) that this was the case! payment from our Self-Aid fund to those Tel: 020 7629 7578 Clemens Nathan of our members with the greatest need. Fax: 020 7491 2139 CONTEMPORARY PAINTING  A visit to Minsk cont. from p4 AND SCULPTURE difficult to get there. On the way are 2 million, with many good roads a number of memorials to the people and modern cars. We were told the taken there. It is estimated that 250,000 unemployment rate is very low. people lost their lives in this place alone. Tomorrow, before we leave, we will regional In the woods, which were planted after visit the Jewish Museum. We were told get-together the war, previous visitors, mostly from Minsk has three that are at Vienna, had placed plaques on the trees functioning. The Jewish Museum had New North London Masorti Synagogue, in memory of their dear ones. The place a history of the community in pictures Finchley shows no evidence of what happened and some artefacts. The Jewish lady Thursday 12 July 2012 there in 1942-43. It was destroyed by who showed us the exhibits spoke only All-day event including lunch and refreshments the Germans at the end of 1943 before Russian – not a word of . We met We are delighted our guest speaker will be Luciana Berger MP, Shadow Minister for Energy and Climate the Russians came. I have taken a one old gentleman who had been with Change number of photos. I finally managed to the partisans. He showed us the book he Luciana grew up in north-west London in a close say Kaddish for them. It was necessary. had written, again only Russian. We also Jewish family. Before being elected as MP for There are quite a number of memorials met at the Holocaust Research Centre Liverpool Wavertree, she was the Director of Labour Friends of Israel and was a national student leader. in and around the town. the director, the historian Dr Kusma Come along and hear about Luciana’s journey to the On the way back, we visited Katyn, Kosak. As I mentioned above, they have Houses of Parliament and her vision for the future another memorial to the villages very little detailed information on those After lunch we will be entertained by Julian Saxi, an destroyed by the Germans in 1941-43. deported by the Germans to Minsk. accomplished violinist, pianist and arranger. Julian has worked as a freelance with many orchestras, These were burned to the ground and This was a journey I had wanted to including the Brandenburg Sinfonia, the London completely destroyed, including most make for many years. At last I was able Concert Orchestra and the BBC Philharmonic of the inhabitants. to say Kaddish close to the place where Places limited – be sure to book early! Before the war Minsk had about my mother and father and some 1,100 £25 per person For further details, please contact Susan Harrod 150,000 inhabitants, almost half of poor people lost their lives in July 1942. on 020 8385 3070 or at [email protected] them Jewish. Today it has almost Kurt Marx

5 AJR JOURNAL june 2012

up pops my favourite adversary, Peter Phillips, with his long list of pet dislikes, mainly about Israel but also about Jews LETTERS The Editor reserves the right generally! He doesn’t think we integrate TO THE to shorten correspondence sufficiently into British society. It submitted for publication. obviously hasn’t occurred to him that EDITOR as hard as he tries to assimilate and act the Engländer, to those around him we will always remain Jews – and foreigners to boot. Anyway, I thought that is now celebrated REFUGEES IN SOUTH WALES once again contained many interesting in this country. He also doesn’t approve Sir – Your journal is a veritable treasure articles. of Jewish faith schools, never mind that trove, with articles of personal interest in I was particularly moved by Monica other faiths have their schools too. And practically every issue. The April issue was Lowenberg’s account of her search for before he dismisses me as what he calls a no exception. her uncle Paul Loewenberg in Latvia and ‘frummer’, I would point out that I never The letter headed ‘Refugees in South I am indebted to her for quoting the sent my children to a Jewish school, nor Wales’ by Anne Marx (née Kohnstamm) inscription to be found on a plaque in do my grandchildren attend one, though gave me an opportunity to hear in a the Venice ghetto – the oldest ghetto in they all went to good private schools – sort of roundabout way from a friend of the world – which reads ‘Perche le nostre perhaps he is against that too. To me, some 70 years ago. And yet, how clearly I memorie sono la vostra unica tomba’ (For what really matters after the Shoah is to remember it all! our memories are your only grave). uphold our Jewish heritage, imbued with Anne’s paternal grandparents were It is the duty of those of us who have a love of Zion – that’s how I was raised. staying in Boarding House Sachs (‘Pension survived to keep alive the memory of the I am pleased to see that Peter felt Sachs’, as it was known in refugee circles) six million who were murdered and have ‘curiously’ at home in Israel, but he has at 4 Adamson Road, London NW3, where no known graves, among whom was nothing positive to add about the place. my grandmother was living till her death my own beloved father z.l., and to pass He also has it wrong about Tzipi Livni. in November 1955 and where my parents their memory on to the next generations He would not approve of her if only he and I were staying for many months whenever and wherever we can. knew her pedigree: her father was high towards the end of the war. Betty Bloom, London NW3 up in the Irgun! This helped her climb Anne Marx, then known as Anne Marie the political ladder. When the horse- Kohnstamm, was the middle one of three GERMAN-JEWISH VETERANS, 1914-18 trading began after the election, Tzipi sisters. The oldest of them was Hannelore, Sir – My grandfather, Max Behr, served would not consider joining a coalition and their grandmother – a real character (rank unknown) in the Imperial field with the Likud – which would have been – used to refer to her as ‘die Hannelore artillery. I was only about five when my natural as Kadima is a breakaway from der Soldat’ – though I never saw her in parents fled after the Machtergreifung by the Likud – unless she got the No.1 slot, uniform. The youngest she would refer to the Nazis so I did not realise until much ie Bibi’s job no less. Displaying her usual as ‘das Gretele’. later that his habit of washing his hair pouting frown, she would not settle for Whenever she spoke of the family’s stay every single day must have derived from the No. 2 foreign ministry slot. Had she in South Wales, she never put it simply the trenches! been more amenable and thought of as ‘in Abergavenny’, but invariably as ‘in The noteworthy thing is that in her country first, it would have kept the Aberg­ avenny, da wo wir waren’ (where we September 1935, over two years later, he ‘frummers’ out of government and made were), which she pronounced in her Fran- was notified (in a citation printed on very Peter Phillips happy! She might even have conian accent ‘da wo wir waan.’ Even now, flimsy paper) that he had been awarded been a successful foreign minister, but after all these years, I might still call it that! an Ehrenkreuz medal for his service. she miscalculated. The fact is, Tzipi was We all came from the same region in Fortunately, grandfather died not long a failure as leader of Kadima. She ran a Germany. In fact, it transpired that in her after of natural causes and did not witness negative campaign and the electorate youth she had lived in the same house the degradation of what he had fought for. realised this. She has since been ousted as in Nuremberg as my father’s maternal Michael Feld, London N3 leader by her own party. Sad really. grandparents and known the family Rubin Katz, London NW11 intimately well, thus being able to provide GERMAN-SPEAKING REFUGEES us with lots of interesting background Sir – Your correspondent Dr Frank is Sir – I share Peter Phillips’s concern with the information. (almost) right when he writes that ‘the stranglehold the Orthodox parties in Israel I recall moreover that Anne Marie was journal is entirely about German-speaking have on the formation of governments working at a London insurance company refugees from Hitler.’ due to the system of proportional where she was expected to do all her What about the Danish, Dutch, Flemish, representation. Small extremist parties calculations twice over, ie both with and Walloon, French, Polish and Russian can subvert the will of the majority. A without a calculator. speakers? Also note that not all AJR constituency-based system would be quite I would also like to refer to the letter, members are refugees and that some feasible. The often advanced argument also in the April issue, by Gerald Leyens belong to the Second Generation. that it would not be feasible in a small about the Jawne in Cologne. This would Henri Obstfeld, Stanmore country is mistaken. Greater London, with have been of interest to my late husband, about the same population, is divided into a former pupil there. AT HOME IN ISRAEL council constituencies for elections to the (Mrs) Margarete Stern, London NW3 Sir – I’ve been absent from your columns London Assembly. for some time – this is partly due to health As to the majority of Hasidim not doing KEEPING THE MEMORY ALIVE problems and also because no one raised their military service, their stand should Sir – May I congratulate you and your team my ire sufficiently as to make me want be accepted on one condition: in an on the April issue of the AJR Journal, which to put pen to paper. Lo and behold, emergency they would have no right to be

6 AJR JOURNAL june 2012 defended by those who perform military service. Those who refuse to stand by Israel Yom HaShoah, 2012 cannot expect its protection. Music of the future? We can but hope. Statue unveiled in Frederick Hirsch, Pinner, Middx JR members attended the unveiling of Sidney Mayer, Halina Moss, Michael Sankie, PS The news from Israel on the formation a specially commissioned statue. The Susan Slater and Agnes Isaacs. of a new coalition government – especially A bronze statue, by Lynn Wolfson, was Halina Moss spoke of the significance of its purported programme – is very dedicated by the Queen’s Park Charitable Yom HaShoah and paid tribute to those who Trust. Proposed by Martin Slater, son-in-law perished in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. welcome. of the late Marion Grant, the memorial will The statue is housed at Queen’s Park serve as a permanent reminder of the six Cemetery. The Memorial Book too MOVING WITH THE TIMES million who perished. Thanks are due to Eddy is on display. Sir – Peter Phillips writes that the Christian Mandel, Chairman of the Trust, for making Rabbi Moshe Rubin of Giffnock Synagogue religions have moved with the times and it possible. and Alex Mackie, Provost, that I should too. But the Catholics have Rosa Sacharin and Henry Wuga unveiled spoke movingly. The Glasgow Jewish Singers, not moved from their dogma – only the statue and candles were lit by First- and led by Eddie Binnie, also took part in the adopted the vernacular instead of Latin. Second-Generation survivors Lore Lucas, ceremony. Agnes Isaacs Among Protestants, the Amish are even stricter than the Hasidim. AJR member addresses US Air Force troops Several great nations of 2,000 years ago have disappeared. But, despite severe at RAF Lakenheath persecution, the Jews have survived This letter was written to AJR Southern we are where we are today. because they did not abandon their faith Region Outreach Co-Ordinator Esther Rinkoff Mr Perry then spoke to two groups of High following an address by Geoffrey Perry at the School (ages 13-18) students in a presenta- and are now the modernity. US air base at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk. tion and question-and-answer period. This Henry Schragenheim, London N15 r Perry was absolutely amazing in all included members of the High School staff. regards. The day began with coffee The students thoroughly enjoyed his words, as SECOND FRONT Mwith members of RAF Lakenheath was evident from their thoughtful questions. Sir – Regarding Anthony Grenville’s recent and Mildenhall’s Jewish faith. The exchanges The members of RAF Lakenheath and article on Club 1943, whatever the right were outstanding and the military members RAF Mildenhall have been honored to have answer, the question of the timing of a not only enjoyed the event but grew from Mr Perry as our guest. He made an impact ‘second front’ can hardly be regarded as ‘no the experience. on our community that will not be soon forgotten. I am hopeful that he would business’ of refugees, themselves part of Mr Perry was the guest speaker for the Holocaust Remembrance luncheon. He spoke consider visiting our bases in the future. European society and of the world, in 1942. to about 200 military members and spouses. Zachary J. Capogna, There were those who believed that His words brought to life the importance of United States Air Force a defeat by Hitler of Soviet Communism never forgetting and, I think, improved our Senior Master Sergeant, would be preferable to the reverse – and military community’s understanding of why RAF Lakenheath probably some who hoped both might, if left to themselves, fight to mutual ‘The will to survive’ exhaustion and collapse. You tell us only his year’s Yom Hashoah remembrance internationally. Alfred Unger’s negative thinking. evening at Pinner Synagogue was Zdenka said how naive she had been initi­ In retrospect, and apparently at the Tattended­ by some 450 people. Repre- ally in not believing what she was witnessing, time, attacking the European underbelly sentatives from the embassies of the Slovak yet she never lost the will to live. She related after victory in north Africa was no bad Republic, the Czech Republic, Germany, how, while travelling in a cattle truck from strategy. The USA had its own Far Eastern Austria and Romania, as well as the mayor Terezin to Auschwitz, she shared a tin of of Harrow, attended. sardines with Raphael Schaech­ter, the prime problem, in 1942 and thereafter. What do The theme of the evening’s commemo- mover of musical activities in Terezin, where military historians have to say? ration was ‘The will to survive’. The event the ­inmates staged productions declar- Alan S. Kaye, Marlow, Bucks marked specifically the 70th anniversary of the ing the cynical message of the triumph of assassination by good over evil. DARK SIDE TO BAEDEKER Czech freedom She told a tear- Sir – I possess a fascinating collection of fighters of Rein- ful audience over 70 Baedeker guide books, some in hard Heydrich, about the tin one of the mas- ring (the name German, some in English, and one or two terminds of the of her book) even in French. They interest me as a mine ‘Final Solution’. her boyfriend of outdated information and geographical Survivors (from left): Frank Fantl, Victor Greenberg, Zdenka Sir Andrew Fantlová, Gerta Vrbova, Josi Knight, Zdenka Husserl had given her in knowledge. I am also a keen student of Burns, former anticipation of maps and town plans. UK Ambassador to Israel and UK Envoy their marriage should they survive – which he However, there is a dark side to for Post-Holocaust ­Issues, gave an address did not – and which inspired her throughout Baedeker;­ after the Nazis came to power, outlining the significant role of the British all her tribulations. Government (cross-party) in building rela- Baedeker was a staunch supporter of Victor Greenberg grew up in the city of tionships across Europe, not only better to Majdan (now in Slovakia). In 1941 he and his the regime. I also have a volume on the understand the issues related to the Holocaust family were among the few to escape when ‘General­gouvernement’ (mainly Poland), but also to be vigilant regarding the threat of almost the entire Jewish population of the in which Baedeker seeks to give the the rise of anti-Semitism. village was massacred. Their ‘reward’ was to ­impression that life is running its ­normal Zdenka Fantlová, who today lives in the be put on a transport to Auschwitz, where course. The date is 1943. Baedekers Auto- very building in London’s Bayswater in which Victor’s family were murdered. He was finally führer Deutsches Reich (Grossdeutschland) the British Special Operations Executive liberated in Gunskirchen by the Americans 1939 has an introductory page in praise planned the assassination of Heydrich, and arrived in Britain in 1946. Victor, one of grew up in the town of Rokycany and lost ‘The Boys’ in Martin Gilbert’s book, held the of Hitler. all members of her immediate family. She audience spellbound with his account of his These guides were produced at the time survived a number of concentration camps determination to overcome the odds against of the death camps. They look so civilised. and is a well-known speaker nationally and him. Brian Eisenberg Hans Hammerschmidt, Oxford

7 AJR JOURNAL june 2012

be laughing all the way to the bank with his diamantine wallpaper, his gleaming, REVIEWs bejewelled skulls, his sculptures exposing organs (derived from the artist Gunther A rt von Hagens, who flayed and plasticised dead bodies). In the midst of recession, On the side of the underdog: From Kindertransport child Notes war, Euro-mania and unemployment, he is throwing his wealth and his anarchism to renowned DDR writer Gloria Tessler in our faces. IM FLUSS DER ZEIT – AUF DREI Great artists may portray death, KONTINENTEN (In the Flux of Time – but they usually hint at the meaning on Three Continents) of life and its ultimate ending, whether by Walter Kaufmann lmost as many column inches they describe the Crucifixion or the Berlin: Dittrich Verlag, 2010, 288 pp. have been spent on him as the Holocaust. Hirst’s subject matter, and hardback, illustrated, A insect life he has squandered in his vast apothecary of coloured bottles, ISBN 978-3-937717-45-6 his quest for celebrity. I am talking about suggest we cling to immortality, but that he cover of this autobiography Damien Hirst. His latest fantasia of everything dies. We know that. But art quotes from a speech by Professor conceptualism at Tate Modern is about should celebrate life. TP. G. Klussmann at the award to death staring you in the face. Dead cows There is something to celebrate in Walter Kaufmann of the 1993 Literature and calves, splintered down the middle to the Ben Uri’s successful Josef Herman Prize of the Ruhr Region, linking his reveal their sanitised innards. Butter­flies exhibition moving to Bristol’s Royal West travel journals with those of Goethe, flowering in their beauty only to flutter of England Academy for the artist’s Chamisso, Heine and Fontane. A big claim and die on the floor, or trapped in a virtual centenary. Josef Herman: Warsaw, I am unable to verify, but Kaufmann’s stained-glass window formed by their ­Brussels, Glasgow, London, 1938- writing here is certainly vivid, compelling and engaging. bodies. Maggots escaping from a rotting, 44 examines the six years in which the Kaufmann was born in Duisburg in bloody cow’s head. A million flies turned artist fled across these cities leaving his 1924 and brought up by a Jewish cou- into a deathly- ple, the father a respected lawyer, leader black mandala of the Jewish community and recipient on the wall. of the Iron Cross during the First World Hirst has War. Like so many Jewish men, he was many detrac- interned for some weeks in Dachau – a tors. Brian traumatic experience about which he Sewell wrote never spoke. But things were not what in the ­Evening they seemed. After the war, when Kauf- Standard mann reclaimed a few of his father’s three blister- belongings from a former secretary, he ing pages of discovered adoption papers showing he criticism. was born to an unmarried and impover- Others have ished 17-year-old Jewish woman by the pleaded vainly name of Rachela Schmeidler, who had in the cause felt unable to bring her son Jizchak up of animal­ and Damien Hirst in front of one of his butterfly canvases, part of his retrospective and had had him adopted at the age of at Tate Modern. Photograph: Ray Tang/Rex Features insect rights. three. One of the most poignant stories Is there anything left to say? indelible mark. We see his experimental in the book is how Kaufmann, by then Yes. Because Hirst poses the period and his brilliant colours in oil, a well-known writer, tried to discover question: is it art or nihilism? The gouache and tempera, inclu­ding works his birth mother’s history and how he splayed mother and calf or the shark on paper from his series Memories of managed to speak to a woman who had known her and had minded the little in formaldehyde are touched by the Memories. The Expressionist­ artist Jizchak while his mother was at work. cold hand of death. Nothing here paints his many losses – loss of his The three continents of the title breathes. And that suggests that neither family in the Warsaw Ghetto, loss of are Europe, Australia and the USA. the beauty nor the pathos of art is religion – but there are also gains: Kaufmann was sent to England early relevant – burned out like the cigarette those of political awareness and a dark, in 1939 on a Kindertransport, with a butts you passively inhale from Hirst’s mystical sense of his connection to the well-to-do uncle in London who failed massive white ashtray. It implies that common man. The intense muscularity to turn up at Liverpool Street Station the richness of our artistic inheritance, of The Cobbler (My Father), the anguish to meet him, having expected him a from the Byzantine to the Baroque, from of Warsaw and the plaintive portrayal day later. Uncle Hugo soon washed the Renaissance to the Enlightenment, of his grandmother in heavy sepia his hands of him and dispatched him from Expressionism to post-Modernism, tint – hinting at her grace and power by railway with a label stating his has drifted away like smoke through – were the crucible in which his gifts destination, ‘Faversham’, to join Bunce our fingers. Conceptual art cannot be were honed and solidified. Herman’s Court School – the progressive Jewish criticised because it is in the head – remembered childhood is a dream-like boarding school evacuated from south perhaps better it stays there. procession of people, of animals ‘radiant Germany to the North Downs of Kent Of course Hirst the businessman may with an inner light’. in 1933. Kaufmann was happy with

8 AJR JOURNAL june 2012 the relaxed way the school was run, on the side of the underdog. He met a Ireland at that!) where most of them though his memories here are, in some plethora of interesting people, including spent about a year. respects, suspect! Having arrived at Fidel Castro and Ernest Hemingway. As the author points out, little has the school at roughly the same time, I But meanwhile his marriage to Barbara been written about the trials and cannot recall some of the teachers and had, perhaps not surprisingly, failed. tribulations of Slovakian Jewry during pupils he names and there certainly was The final trigger was a torrid affair the Second World War. Is this because it no woman teaching maths .... After a with an American woman he had met is (again) a small country which borders year his school life was terminated by accidentally – one of several affairs he Poland to the north and Hungary to internment as an ‘enemy alien’, a fate describes with disarming frankness the south and was formerly part of that befell many Jewish males over the and sometimes in rather purple prose. Czechoslovakia? age of 16 in 1940. He later married Angela (Brunner, For me, the most interesting parts of Worse was to come. With hundreds not Davis!), with whom he had two this book are the detailed descriptions of others he was sent to Australia on the daughters, and has lived happily with of how the children were found and the Dunera of ill repute, though strangely he Lissy, a radiological nurse, for the last method by which they were brought to doesn’t mention the presence of ­several few decades. England after the war and before the other Bunce Court boys, and especially What I missed in this otherwise Communist takeover of Eastern Europe. one of the teachers, Hans Meyer, who thoughtful book was a penetrating The main mover in this grim ‘game’ elected to accompany ‘his’ boys to Aus- discussion of Kaufmann’s attitude to was Rabbi Dr Solomon Schonfeld, born tralia. Despite the trauma this entailed, the less agreeable side of the DDR. in 1912 in London. His father was born in Australia proved to be his making. It was It so happens that, as I wrote this Sutto, between Bratislava and Budapest, there that he met his first wife, Barbara, review, a television interview with the in 1880. Rabbi Schonfeld had travelled published his first novel, Voices in the widow of the former DDR leader Erich extensively on the European continent Storm, and became involved with left- Honecker was shown in Berlin. In exile before the outbreak of the Second World wing politics and trades unions, leading in Chile, she was wholly unrepentant, War and had been successful in bringing to membership of the Communist Party. even though it was she who had been several hundred, mainly orthodox, He gave many readings from his novel to responsible for thousands of forcible families, as well as Viennese children, seamen and dockyard workers in Sydney adoptions of children from parents to safety in England. Although there is harbour and this led him into an exciting who opposed the regime. She dismissed reference to the Kindertransport, Rabbi life as stoker and working on deck on the brutal shootings of the many who Schonfeld’s opinions, maverick attitude freighters sailing in the Pacific. This pro- attempted to flee to West Germany over and unconventional methods made him vided him with rich material for some of the notorious wall as trivial. Early on work alone. He felt he was a brinkman his later, much acclaimed travel books. Kaufmann was, in fact, given the choice with ‘a direct line to his Creator’. One photo of that period shows him as a of returning to Duisburg but, having After the war, when the fate of debonair seaman, with prominent black tried it, he found its Nazi past oppressive Continental Jewry became clear, Rabbi moustache and sailor’s cap. No wonder and soon returned to the DDR. There he Schonfeld was one of the first to take women found him attractive. was lionised, became a member of the care of the survivors and search for This autobiography is not written committee of the writers’ association hidden children. On several journeys he in chronological order, has no chapter and PEN, and had his numerous books managed to bring some 800 children, headings and no index, and is written readily published. The only novel that mainly from Poland, to Britain. For his in a wildly free kaleidoscopic manner had a frosty reception from the press own safety, he had been advised to and interspersed with extracts from his was written about a doctor who was travel in a uniform – which he designed novels. Perhaps it is not surprising that I determined to leave the DDR for West himself. He just about escaped an failed to establish exactly how and when Germany, based on a real-life incident. attempt on his life. the author returned to Germany in the This book testifies to the incredible ‘It is not entirely clear how Rabbi early 1950s. His choice of the DDR rather richness of the German language and Schonfeld operated in Europe or how than West Germany was clearly dictated chronicles the life of a man who has he selected the Slovakian group,’ the by his left-wing ideology and his anti- come triumphantly through the turmoil author writes. He extended an invita- Nazi stance and, with his background of the 20th century. tion to war-damaged children to spend and reputation as a budding author and Leslie Baruch Brent a year in Britain in a traditional Jewish holding a British passport, Kaufmann setting. This message was sent across was given a warm welcome. His literary Slovakia and reached the re-establishing output was prodigious, both in travel Grim ‘game’ Jewish communities. It resulted in a reportage and novels. He travelled group of 148 children meeting at the THE HIDE-AND-SEEK CHILDREN widely – to the Middle East (Beirut and Prague railway station for their journey – RECOLLECTIONS OF JEWISH Damascus, as well as to Israel on several to London. Some of the details read like SURVIVORS FROM SLOVAKIA occasions), Belgium (as an envoy of a cloak-and-dagger story. I must include by Barbara Barnett the DDR Olympic Committee), West this quote: ‘He is said to have visited Germany, Cuba, the Soviet Union, Japan, Glasgow: Mansion Field, 2012, a convent where the Mother Superior the UK and the USA, gathering material 495 pp. paperback, illustrated, index, told him she had no Jewish children. He for his travel books and reportage ISBN 9781905021109 asked to accompany her “good night” wherever he went. In America he he title of this book is intriguing. If tour of the dormitories. At each door- attended the trial of Angela Davis, you overlook the early explanation, way he quietly pronounced the opening who was falsely accused of murder, Tyou have to read many pages words of the Shema. Several times little hitchhiked to the deep South to witness before you find the answer: it refers to voices joined in. He left with a contin- at first hand the fight for emancipation a game these children invented at the gent in tow.’ of the black population, and was always ‘castle’ in Ireland (yes, and Southern continued overleaf 

9 AJR JOURNAL june 2012 reviews cont. from page 9 It is unknown why Rabbi Schonfeld children as well as of members of staff adulthood, to become a writer, a chose Ireland as the destination for this are told in greater or lesser detail. The poet, of renown. Language was the group of children. However, he had stories are subdivided in accordance main difficulty: German was out of persuaded a well-to-do Manchester with the children’s experience: children the question – it had to be English. to purchase Clonyn Castle as a home for hidden with their mother and/or a Mastering a language in sufficient depth these refugee children. At the time, the sibling, on their own, in institutions, to pass muster in a literary setting takes Dublin Jewish community was divided as those that survived Auschwitz, and much longer than gaining an everyday to whether to offer help to the children. some post-war recollections. They are working knowledge. The burning desire Before the group made it to Dublin, followed by appendices and notes. of the young Loewenthal to emigrate they first had to travel from Prague This is a well-written and liberally to Israel had to be pushed into the through Germany and Belgium to illustrated and documented book background – yet another language was England. In Ostend, there was the small which adds to our knowledge of the unthinkable. complication that the number of visas Holocaust and its aftermath. Readers Karen was beautifully played by two did not match the number of children. might also like to visit the website, actors – Lindesay Mace as a young girl The administrative and bureaucratic www.thehideandseekchildren.org, and Vanessa Rosenthal as a mature obstacles overcome were numerous and which refers to texts of a similar nature. woman. This device allowed the author are spelled out in some detail. Henri Obstfeld to verbalise the conflicts within Karen, At about this stage, the text becomes although it, and the heavy German interspersed with extracts from the accent adopted by Ms Rosenthal, made children’s memoirs. These include descrip­ Theatre unusual demands on the audience. tions of daily life at the castle, how the Throughout, David Riley, playing an older girls helped to look after the young- Karen’s Way 18th-century Italian violin, and Marion er children, religious observance, visits to KAREN’S WAY: Raper, piano, movingly played an ingen­ the nearby village, and a football match A KINDERTRANSPORT LIFE ious selection of music appropriate with the village children. There is ample by Vanessa Rosenthal to the mood of the moment. George description of the hard work by several York Theatre Royal Studio Gershwin needed a piano and an ­entire adults responsible for the daily running t is tradition in this York theatre to orchestra to express the hustle and of the ‘Clonyn Castle Children’s Hostel’. perform with small casts and mini- bustle of New York in his Rhapsody in Finally, we come to a more detailed Imalist props. In this ‘dramatisation Blue, while Marion Rapier and her piano account of how this book came about. with live music’, two fine actors (one of managed to evoke a train journey all One of the (former) children suggested a them the author) and two accomplished by herself. reunion to commemorate 50 years since musicians, together with a bench, two After the performance the cast, their arrival in Britain. A Jubilee Reunion suitcases and a box, sufficed to provide a together with Professor Nigel Mace in Committee was set up in 1996 and, searching performance depicting the life the chair and Chris Wilkinson, Director, by 1998, addresses all over the globe of the middle-class Loewenthal family in formed a panel and held an interesting for nearly half the original group had Germany before and during the rise of discussion with the audience. been found. No fewer than 160 people Hitler and the need for parents to send This production of Karen’s Way attended the grand reunion dinner! their children to safety by the only means was staged on 17-18 April 2012. The In the postscript to the first part of available to them, the Kindertransport. performance on 18 April was sold out the book, the wish is expressed that it, The emphasis was on the problems due to some schools making extensive together with the personal stories of the encountered by Karen Gershon, a bookings. Further performances will children, will be a monument to Rabbi lone young refugee girl in England, follow at 7 Arts in Leeds on 27-28 July Schonfeld’s endeavours. It is a huge problems similar to those experienced and at the Edinburgh Fringe on 13-25 achievement in itself. by thousands of youngsters. The radical August at theSpace@Venue45. A visit In the 200 or so pages of the second difference was that this girl wanted to this event is highly recommended. part of the book, the stories of the passionately, from early youth into Marc Schatzberger

Theatre Outing Top Hat Tuesday 24 July 2012 at 2.30 pm Aldwych Theatre WC2B 4DF Tom Chambers (Holby City heart throb Packed full of Irving Berlin’s greatest hits, such and Strictly Come Dancing winner) plays as Let’s Face the Music and Dance, Cheek the irrepressible Broadway sensation Jerry to Cheek and Top Hat, White Tie and Tails, Travers, who dances his way across Europe stunning tap, romantic ballroom and a little bit to win the heart of society model Dale of Busby Berkeley thrown in for good measure, Tremont, played by triple Olivier Award TOP HAT is a giddy, glorious celebration of nominee Summer Strallen (Love Never 1930s song and dance, featuring magnificent Dies, The Sound of Music, The Drowsy sets, over 200 costumes and a love story that will set the pulses racing! Chaperone). We have only 20 tickets – best seats in the house in Dress Circle – no stairs! £32.50 per person – be sure to book quickly. For further information, please contact Susan Harrod on 020 8385 3070 or at [email protected]

10 AJR JOURNAL june 2012 A 70-year friendship

enee Mittler became my classmate Nevertheless, it was a happy interlude and all three children were married; the boys when we were both 11, and my we parted reluctantly – she for France and lived and worked in Paris, Cathy in Geneva, Rfriend at 13. By the age of 15 she had I to resume my duties as a skivvy and earn and there were five grandchildren. metamorphosed from a chubby child into some money. Sometimes Renee came to Cannes to a tall, broad-shouldered, narrow-hipped, Renee married Edouard Cohen, a Turk see me but, because she preferred it, I almost beautiful girl. I say ‘almost’ for, by birth, early in the war. During the usually took the train to Monte Carlo and although she had enormous limpid brown occupation, they and her entire family she always met me at the station. We eyes, she also had a snub nose and her survived the war in a village in central walked and talked and swam in the sea front teeth were too widely spaced – but France, mainly by bribing the police. and Edouard took us for delicious meals. these imperfections added to rather than We weren’t to meet again until the She still swam regularly in a pool, and detracted from her charm. late 50s, when my husband and I spent the couple had become keen golf players. She excelled at any sport she tried her a day and a night in Aix-en-Provence on Then, in 2002, Edouard’s health began hand at and successfully competed in our way to the Côte d’Azur. Renee’s father to fail and he died in June. Renee had national swimming events for the Hakoah. answered my call and insisted we have been diagnosed with cancer but had But she was also clever and quick-witted dinner with them. Renee, Edouard, their been assured that the growth had been and planned for a career in journalism. three children – four-year-old Cathy and successfully removed. The only child of an ideally happy teenagers Pierre and Guy – as well Renee’s I sent her a card from an Austrian couple, she was devoted to her parents parents and assorted uncles and aunts, holiday in early September and, as usual, and her grandparents and her many aunts all lived in a very large flat in Marseilles. rang her on her birthday in October. All I and uncles and they all adored her. It was a happy reunion and our husbands got was, rather eerily, Edouard’s voice on It must have been in the spring of got on famously. the answering machine. Two days later 1939 that she came to London. I was, as Because my husband loved the South of I tried again. This time Cathy answered. so often, between domestic jobs and she France we had holidays there most years ‘Forgive me, I’m a coward,’ she said. Renee was, perversely, preparing her journey to and spent many agreeable hours at the had died on 11 August but she hadn’t had France, where her family had fled. They Cohens’ villa at St Aygulf. They – and that the heart to tell me. came from Bratislava and she held a Czech always included Renee’s parents and at A few years later I went to see Water- passport. least one aunt and uncle – were the most marks, a film about the women who had For a few weeks we rented a room generous and thoughtful of hosts. swum for the Hakoah in the 1930s. At the from a young Jewish refugee couple in Widowed by the nineties, I still visited end it said: ‘This film is dedicated to Renee . We shared not only the the French Riviera regularly because my Mittler-Cohen and ….’ I didn’t wait to find room but also the bed; I slept on its base, brother had retired to Cannes. By that out to whom else and fled. I was very she on the mattress on the floor. We time, the Cohens had moved to Monaco close to tears and wasn’t going to make were so hard up that we hardly ever used and lived on the 48th floor of one of the a spectacle of myself. It felt as if I had lost public transport. We walked everywhere posh skyscrapers overlooking the sea. By my friend of 70 years for a second time. and once a week we ate only fruit. that time, there were no Mittlers left and Edith Argy

search notices

The Allied Museum Berlin is searching for Has anyone info on the role Glyndebourne I am researching the following (among others) persons, information and artefacts for an Opera or its members played in assisting German refugees who worked as picture restorers in exhibition. The subject is German-Jewish and Austrian musicians to come to England as the UK or in their country of origin: Johannes refugees who emigrated in 1933-38 and refugees from the Nazis? Michael Heppner, Hell, Helmut Ruhemann, Sebastian Isepp, returned to Berlin in 1945 as members of tel 020 8444 2290, [email protected] Erich Wagner, Joseph Deliss (Delitz), Marianne the Allied Occupation Forces. Pls contact Adler, Gerhardt Frankl, Hans Schubart, Ursus My mother Queeny Francis Harvey (née Hahn) [email protected] Dix. Pls contact Morwenna Blewett, National died in London in July 1940 aged around 20. Gallery, Trafalgar Square, London at morwenna. My father Walter Alt, b. 1926, left Vienna via Her address was 43 Louisville Road, Balham, [email protected] Kindertransport. The family’s friend in England, Wandsworth. My father’s name was James Mr (?) Kalman, may have helped him, but he Harvey. Any info on my mother please to possibly ended up in a Catholic boarding school. [email protected] Seeking info on a Kindertransport girl from Contact Marlene Alt, Canada, on 613 270 0038 Vienna last name Posomeiter or similar Any info pls on Sigmund Levi, detained at or 613 608 0116 or at [email protected] spelling. Contact Michlean Amir, US Holocaust Kitchener Camp around 1940. He became a Memorial Museum, Washington DC at mamir@ PhD student researching émigré art collectors naturalised British citizen on 10 July 1947 in ushmm.org seeks info on Peter and Irene Meyer, Lily Meyer- Liverpool and took the name Leslie Seymour. Also Wedell (1881 Düsseldorf – 1944 London), (?) Kuchinsky, from Berlin, who was in Kitchener A Quaker family in Leeds took in four sets of Dr Ernst J. Nelkenstock, later Norton (1893 Camp and was shipped to Australia as enemy (possibly) Kindertransport sisters. Family name Hanau, from 1937 London), Dr Fritz Rothmann alien. Herbert Kolb, [email protected] Happold. Frank and Margaret were the parents, (1893 Danzig, from 1934 London). Pls contact David Litvinoff, b. David Levy in Whitechapel, their children Elfrieda and Ted (Edmund), who [email protected] London in 1928, grew up in Dalston, half- died in 1996. Any info pls to Victoria Fisher at For purpose of a screenplay am researching brother of writers Emanuel and Barnet Litvinoff. [email protected] all aspects of Austrian life including before, Evacuated to Habonim camps in WWII. Became during and after the Depression and Anschluss; associate of , Rolling Stones, Lucian Schubert family, Albert and wife Martha family life; local government; the Socialist Party. Freud and Chelsea Set. Died 1975. Any info pls (b. Berlin 1886) and sons Klaus and Hans. Contact Marcus Hunefalk-Franzen at palfour@ to his biographer Keiron Pim, 1 Pelham Road, Arrived Dover March 1939. Were probably Berlin hotmail.com Norwich, Norfolk NR3 3NG, tel 01603 487679 shopkeepers. Pls contact Charles Masters at or 07921 376656, [email protected] London-based artist wishes to meet people (or [email protected] family members) who lived in Munich before For purpose of Stolperstein any info please 1945 for film by Munich Jewish Museum. on Erna Elle Rahel Moser, b. Berlin 21 June I am trying to locate Jewish refugees who Contact Sharone Lifschitz on 020 880 60132 1905, deported to Auschwitz 3 March 1943, worked at Trent Park during WWII. Any info or 07980025054 or at sharone.lifschitz@ last known address Hohenfriedbergstr. 5, Berlin. pls contact me on 0207 284 6868 or at kate. gmail.com Contact [email protected] [email protected]

11 AJR JOURNAL june 2012

Café Imperial Looking Out for One’s Fellow Man OXFORD RIVERBOAT CRUISE A collective of Gents and Ladies today. BOAT CRUISE AND Reminiscence of seders past. Cards sent PICNIC LUNCH ONBOARD to Willy Field wishing him well and to INSIDE Geoffrey Perry on his 90th birthday. This outfit looks out for its fellow man. Esther Rinkoff the AJR Pinner Needy Jews in Romania rebooked for This meeting differed in being held at thursday 14 june 2012 NPLS in Northwood; in our speaker Sharon due to bad weather in may Barron’s powerful portrayal of poverty in Romania; in her and her fellow trustees’ A unique opportunity to cruise the Surrey Nice Food and Endless Talk assurance that all sums donated to the waterways of Oxford with expert guide Fifteen enthusiastic members met again Turgu Mures Trust go to the needy Jews; and Lewis Carroll Society member Mark at Edmee’s house to enjoy her hospitality and in the Pesach treats after the lecture. Davies.Find out how these beautiful and good company. A very pleasant Walter Weg rivers inspired Lewis Carroll to write the morning spent eating nice food and Next meeting: 7 June. Brian Nathan, ‘The classic book Alice in Wonderland. talking endlessly to old, and new, friends. Jewish Contribution to 20th-Century Transport will be provided from a Popular Music’ Not forgetting the 100th birthday of our pick-up point in North West London. The sprightly member Alice Moller. cruise will last 2 hours and will include a Eva Gold-Young picnic sandwich lunch. Return transport back to North West London. Ealing Alice and the Thames For further details, please contact Mark Davies, who is author of Alice in Susan Harrod on 020 8385 3070 or Water­land and lives on a houseboat in at [email protected] Oxford, gave us a talk on the key role played THE ZEMEL CHOIR by the River Thames in the creation of Alice INTERNATIONAL JEWISH in Wonderland. Leslie Sommer CHORAL FESTIVAL Brighton & Hove Sarid Sunday 17 June 2012 The Current Financial Situation Leeds CF Full agenda 7.30 pm at West London Synagogue Bank of England Agent Andrew Holder A full agenda. We watched the remarkable 33 Seymour Place, London W1H 5Au discussed the financial situation in Watermarks film about the Vienna Hakoah Tickets £15.00 per person comparison with previous years and sports club and Liesl Carter told us about The Zemel Choir is hosting an International told us the Monetary Policy Committee the Terezin conference at the Leeds College was closely monitoring all aspects of the of Music. Susanne provided details on the Jewish Choral Festival culminating in this Gala Concert for all participating country’s economy. Ceska Abrahams promotion of the ‘Recipes Remembered’ choirs. The choirs expected to attend Next meeting: 18 June. Mark Perry-Nash book in London. Barbara Cammerman are the Wiener Jüdischer Chor and the Edgware ‘Jewish Mother, Nazi Father’ Coro Ha-Kol Choir from Rome. The Angela Schluter told us her life story – a Ilford Magen David Adom Festival has been accepted by the London Eli Benson offered insight into the work of Organising Committee for the Olympic most interesting story, especially when one the Magen David Adom, which does far and Paralympic Games to be branded with talks about it in a pleasant atmosphere more than provide an ambulance service the Inspired LOGO as part of the Cultural to people who can well imagine the but, with the help of volunteers, helps Olympiad. prevailing times. Felix Winkler Israel in numerous ways. A very interesting Next meeting: 19 June and informative morning. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hear these three choirs and their Meta Roseneil Kent A Treasure Trove of Ephemera wide repertoire, embracing Ashkenazi, Next meeting: 6 June. Evelyn Friedlander, Evelyn Friedlander took us on her trail of ‘The Rescued Scrolls’ Sephardi, Yiddish and Israeli cultures. southern rural Germany. She and her daughter For further details, please contact Ariel scoured overgrown cemeteries and Susan Harrod on 020 8385 3070 or BRIEF ENCOUNTER at [email protected] Launch of Visit to St Pancras Station ’Recipes Remembered’ Thursday 21 June 2012 Monday 2 July 2012 Kingston CF 3-5 pm at the Wiener Library The Best Cake Shop in Kingston 29 Russell Square, London WC1B 5DP Eleven of us got together in the best cake We are delighted that we will be joined shop in Kingston – aka Susan Zisman’s by Annabel Karmel MBE, author of books house – for lots of chat. Hazel’s basset on nutrition and cooking for babies, children and families. Visit this unique station and hear its hound, Shirley Basset, though not strictly history with an official guide an AJR member, was in attendance and The recipes in this book were welcomed by all. Jackie Cronheim sent in by members of Continen­ Visit Foyles, London’s oldest family tal Friends and AJR Groups bookshop around the country. A miscellany­ Enjoy a luxury cream tea at the of tastes, aromas and recollections of times St Pancras Grand – which boasts the of prosperity or ­privation, the book is made longest champagne bar in the world up of memories of meals cooked and food eaten long ago in a different time and place. £20 to include guide, tea and transport Refreshments, including cakes and £15 to include guide and tea biscuits made from recipes in the book, will All welcome be served. The contributors of some of the Please note there will be a fair amount recipes will talk about the story behind their of walking during the afternoon. dish and a representative from the Wiener Library will show us recipes and food-related For further details, please contact items from their archives. Susan Harrod on 020 8385 3070 Please contact Susan Harrod on 020 8385 or at [email protected] 3070 or at [email protected] Shirley and Anne Marie Seelig see eye to eye

12 AJR JOURNAL june 2012 former synagogues to find a treasure trove Cambridge The History of the Kibbutz of ephemera, including lottery tickets and David Merron enlightened us on the Meals-on-Wheels binders. Esther Rinkoff origins of the Kibbutz and its current crisis. To order Meals-on-Wheels Next meeting: 19 June. Phil Eckersley, Bank A very interesting talk, covering everything please telephone 020 8385 3075 of England Agent from politics to agriculture. (this number manned on Hazel Beiny Wednesdays only) or 020 8385 3070 Radlett A Rabbi and His Dog Next meeting: 21 June. Helen Fry, ‘Veterans Rabbi Jonathan Wittenberg recently of the Second World War’ walked from Frankfurt to London accom­ The AJR Paul Balint Centre panied by his dog. Bringing along his Marlow CF Excellent Lunch, at Belsize Square Synagogue dog, Mitzpah, he spoke to us about his Stimulating Conversation 51 Belsize Square, London NW3 4HX journey – a talk full of warmth, humour We had an excellent lunch and stimulating and humanity which sparked an animated conversation – an event so successful that Telephone 020 7431 2744 discussion. Fritz Starer we overstayed by nearly an hour. Looking Open Tuesdays and Thursdays Next meeting: 20 June. Myra Sampson, forward to the next meeting. 9.30 am to 3.30 pm ‘The Story of Jack the Ripper’ Alex Lawrence

Outing to Westcliff AJR Group ALSO MEETING IN JUNE AJR LUNCHEON CLUB Tuesday 12 June 2012 HGS 11 June. Warren Ashton, Thursday 21 June 2012 ‘Groucho Marx’ David Barnett Essex (Westcliff) 12 June. Annual Lunch ’Jewish London‘ Welwyn GC 12 June (pm). Social Get-together KT-AJR We are pleased to announce a visit to the Kindertransport special AJR Essex Group, which meets in Westcliff- St John’s Wood 13 June. Helen Fry, interest group on-Sea. This annual event is always a ‘Inside Nuremberg Prison’ most enjoyable and relaxing day out. Tuesday 12 June 2012 Wessex 14 June. Annual Summer Ruth Rothenberg The price of £20 per person includes Outing refreshments on arrival, a buffet lunch, a ‘My Life in Jewish Journalism’ Bromley CF 18 June. Lunch at home tour of Westcliff, and return coach journey. please NOTE THAT LUNCH of Liane Segal WILL BE SERVED AT 12.30 PM For further details, please contact Reservations required Susan Harrod on 020 8385 3070 or Temple Fortune Dancing with Please telephone 020 7431 2744 at [email protected] Ginger and Singing with Gracie June Activities Dennis Hart gave us insight into his Tue 5 CLOSED (JUBILEE) career as a Fleet Street photo-journalist. Thur 7 French Conversation Class – Ruth Sands Highlights of his career were dancing with Book Club – Ruth Sands. Exercise Class – Rosalie AJR GROUP CONTACTS Tue 12 KT Lunch Ruth Rothenberg Computer Classes – Lisa (ring Judy/Annie on Bradford Continental Friends continued on page 16 Lilly and Albert Waxman 01274 581189  020 7431 2744 on Tuesdays or Thursdays to book) Exercise Class – Jackie Brighton & Hove (Sussex Region) Chiropodist (ring Judy/Annie on 020 7431 Esther Rinkoff 020 8385 3070 Norfolk (Norwich) 2744 on Tuesdays or Thursdays to book) Bristol/Bath Myrna Glass 020 8385 3077 Thur 14 Exercise Class – Rosalie Myrna Glass 020 8385 3070 North London Tue 19 Computer Classes – Lisa (ring Judy/Annie on Cambridge Ruth Jacobs 020 8445 3366 020 7431 2744 on Tuesdays or Thursdays to book) Hazel Beiny 020 8385 3070 Oxford Exercise Class – Jackie Cardiff Susie Bates 01235 526 702 Thur 21 Luncheon Club David Barnett NB the speaker Myrna Glass 020 8385 3077 will start at 12.00 Pinner (HA Postal District) Exercise Class – Rosalie Cleve Road, AJR Centre Vera Gellman 020 8866 4833 Myrna Glass 020 8385 3077 French Conversation Class – Ruth Sands Radlett Book Club – Ruth Sands Dundee Esther Rinkoff 020 8385 3077 Agnes Isaacs 0755 1968 593 Tue 26 Computer Classes – Lisa (ring Judy/Annie on Sheffield 020 7431 2744 on Tuesdays or Thursdays to book) Ealing Steve Mendelsson 0114 2630666 Exercise Class – Jackie Esther Rinkoff 020 8385 3077 South London Thur 28 Exercise Class – Rosalie East Midlands (Nottingham) Lore Robinson 020 8670 7926 Bob Norton 01159 212 494 All activities begin at 10.30 am. Admission is £7 South West Midlands (Worcester area) to include lunch from 12.30 pm, or £2 for activity Edgware Myrna Glass 020 8385 3070 alone. There is a nominal charge of £3 for a carer Hazel Beiny 020 8385 3077 Surrey accompanying a member for the day, including lunch. Edinburgh Edmée Barta 01372 727 412 Françoise Robertson 0131 337 3406 Temple Fortune June Entertainment Essex (Westcliff) Esther Rinkoff 020 8385 3077 Miriam Kleinman 01702 713884 Tue 5 CLOSED (JUBILEE) Weald of Kent Thur 7 Margaret Opdahl Glasgow Janet Weston 01959 564 520 Claire Singerman 0141 649 4620 Tue 12 KT LUNCH Welwyn Garden City Thur 14 Geoffrey Strum Harrogate Hazel Beiny 020 8385 3070 Inge Little 01423 886254 Tue 19 Paul Toshner Wembley Hendon Laura Levy 020 8904 5527 Thur 21 LUNCHEON CLUB Hazel Beiny 020 8385 3070 Wessex (Bournemouth) Tue 26 Mike Marandi HGS Mark Goldfinger 01202 552 434 Thur 28 David Peace Gerda Torrence 020 8883 9425 West Midlands () Hull Fred Austin 01384 252310 Susanne Green 0151 291 5734 Ilford Meta Rosenell 020 8505 0063 Hazel Beiny, Southern Groups Co-ordinator Agnes Isaacs, Scotland and Newcastle 020 8385 3070 Co-ordinator Leeds HSFA 0755 1968 593 Trude Silman 0113 237 1872 Myrna Glass, London South and Midlands Liverpool Groups Co-ordinator Esther Rinkoff, Southern Region Co-ordinator Susanne Green 0151 291 5734 020 8385 3077 020 8385 3077 Manchester Susanne Green, Northern Groups Co-ordinator KT-AJR (Kindertransport) Werner Lachs 0161 773 4091 0151 291 5734 Andrea Goodmaker 020 8385 3070 Newcastle Susan Harrod, Groups’ Administrator Child Survivors Association–AJR Walter Knoblauch 0191 2855339 020 8385 3070 Henri Obstfeld 020 8954 5298

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family announcements Deaths Robert Schon Meyer, Hans Bernd, late of Newcastle and Tax Solicitor Portugal, died 3 May 2012 aged 86. Deeply Member of Solicitors mourned and never to be forgotten by his for the Elderly wife Margaret, children Richard and Penny, (020) 8958 7400 07939 554 738 I specialise in: grandchildren Leah, Matthew and James, Fully Qualified and Insured and sister Susi. Estate Planning Engineers Powers of Attorney and Robbey, Kathe (née Lehfeldt), born Magde- Deputyship applications burg 2 February 1915, died April 2012. Special Offers Living wills Consecration We are offering to supply and fit Tax and non domicile issues The memorial stone for Rolf Julius Carbon Monoxide Detectors at a very including helping to bring competitive price!! Weinberg will be consecrated at undeclared offshore funds to Edgwarebury Cemetery on Sunday 10 Carbon Monoxide Detector the attention of HMRC June at 12.00. Rabbi Rodney Mariner will (Supplied & fitted) £25 be present. Tel 020 7267 5010 Combined Smoke & Carbon Email: [email protected] Monoxide Detector West Hill House, 6 Swains Lane, New Organiser at the (Supplied & fitted) £35 London N6 6QS AJR Centre Offers exclude 10% discount for Judy Silverton has tak- first time customers en over as ­Organiser of the AJR Paul Balint While Stocks Last! ANNUAL Centre at Belsize Square Synagogue following NORTHERN GROUPS Susie Kaufman’s retire- 535707 GET-TOGETHER ment. Thursday 14 June 2012 Judy’s background at Stenecourt Manchester is in publishing, edu- cational professional development and Discussion Groups am and pm conference management. She has been Lunchtime speaker involved in voluntary work at Middlesex Complementary Therapy Centre Rickie Burman New Synagogue in Harrow for over 30 Jewish Museum, London years. Judy has been married for nearly 39 years and has a son, a married daughter For further details, please contact and a granddaughter. Susanne Green on 0151 291 5723 Her great passion is going to the or at [email protected] Refer to our website to choose a treatment theatre. She likes nothing more than fitting in 29 shows in a week at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival! Judy is looking forward enormously to HOLIDAY IN continuing and enhancing the dynamics of the AJR Centre. EASTBOURNE 2012 The AJR are doing another holiday at the Lansdowne Hotel PillarCare Sunday 22 July to Sunday 29 July Holiday for Quality support and care at home £520 per person double/twin, dinner, bed and breakfast. Northern Members £40 per week single room supplement Sunday 2 September  Hourly Care from 4 hours – 24 hours to include transport from Cleve Road, to Friday 7 September 2011  Live-In/Night Duty/Sleepover Care lunch on outward journey At the Inn on the Prom Book early to avoid disappointment  Convalescent and Personal Health Care 11/17 South Promenade, St Annes Please contact Carol Rossen or Tel 01253 726 726  Compassionate and Affordable Service Lorna Moss on 020 8385 3070 Cost, including Dinner,  Professional, Qualified, Kind Care Staff Bed and Breakfast  Registered with the CQC and UKHCA £640 per person Call us on Freephone 0800 028 4645 Home Care For further details, please contact ColvinCare through quality and Ruth Finestone PILLARCARE THE BUSINESS CENTRE · 36 GLOUCESTER AVENUE · LONDON NW1 7BB professionalism on direct line 020 8385 3082 PHONE: 020 7482 2188 · FAX: 020 7900 2308 Celebrating our 25th Anniversary or mobile 07966 886535 www.pillarcare.co.uk 25 years of experience in providing the highest standards of care in the comfort LEO BAECK HOUSING of your own home LEO BAECK HOUSING ASSOCIATION ASSOCIATION Clara Nehab House CLARA NEHAB HOUSE 13-19 Leeside Crescent, London NW11 RESIDENTIAL CARE HOME Small caring residential home with large attractive OUR ANNUAL GARDEN PARTY gardens close to local shops and public transport 25 single rooms with full en suite facilities AND OPEN DAY 24 hour Permanent and Respite Care will take place on Entertainment & Activities provided Ground Floor Lounge and Dining Room 1 hour to 24 hours care SUNDAY 17 JUNE 2012 Lift access to all floors. Registered through the National Care Standard Commission 2.30 – 5.00 pm For further information please contact: Afternoon tea will be served The Manager, Clara Nehab House Call our 24 hour tel 020 7794 9323 13-19 Leeside Crescent, London NW11 0DA Everyone welcome Telephone: 020 8455 2286 www.colvin-nursing.co.uk

14 AJR JOURNAL june 2012 Obituaries Walter George Siller, 11 November 1924 – 23 October 2011 alter and I first met at the Friends’ manding task. Untrained around every department, before starting School in Cumberland, also in the British summer his studies at the ‘Royal Dick’ veterinary Wknown as Brookfield, and quickly ritual of cricket, we college of the university. formed a close friendship. Both refugees volunteered to look after After the war Walter rejoined his father from Nazi-occupied Austria, we had been the open-air swimming in Vienna. He obtained a doctorate from granted, with numerous others, free pool during the summer the outstanding Vienna Veterinary School. school places by the wonderful Quakers, term instead. This He developed an overwhelming interest in thus rescuing our broken education and demanded damming of the ‘beck’ to allow pathology, even taking courses in human prospects for life. the water – plus frogs, small fish and less pathology. Walter’s father was a non-Jewish oral wholesome items – to reach the feeder pipe But the pull of Scotland proved too much surgeon in Vienna, his mother a Jewish phy- to the pool, which we had to sweep daily. It and he returned to Edinburgh, where sician. In 1939 Walter and his brother were was a fascinating biological study. he was based for the rest of his life. He sent to Scotland on the Kindertransport. Walter had decided early on that he turned himself into a music-hall Cale­ They were soon followed by their mother, would like to become a vet. He took on donian, complete with accent, heavy who had to accept humble domestic em- farm work during each vacation, returning tweeds and not averse to a wee drop. ployment. Their father remained in Vienna, with lurid tales about how he had spent His working time was devoted to pathol- deluded by the belief that ‘The whole silly weeks having to throw large pigs and tups ogy research and to the investigation of business will soon blow over.’ on their backs. animal disease outbreaks. He became I recall the young Walter as a large and After Brookfield he spent six months as recognised inter­nationally as an authority jolly character, willing to take on any de- keeper at Edinburgh Zoo, working his way on domestic fowl. In 1962 his university awarded him a PhD for his work on renal diseases. In Bryan Reuben, 12 January 1934 – 25 February 2012 1963 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal he March edition of the AJR Journal South Bank University, Society of Edinburgh. In 1972 he received saw the last book review written by where he was a principal a special merit promotion to Senior Princi- T Bryan Reuben, a scientist by training lecturer responsible for pal Scienti­fic Officer. For his international who wrote on a wide range of subjects with encouraging research. contribution to research, the Vienna Vet- humour and insight. He was one of the He was a teacher erinary School elected him a ‘freeman’ founder members of Mosaic, a Jewish youth with a gift for explaining (Ehrenbürger). magazine, where his notion of the Divided complex problems with Walter was multilingual and translated Synagogue (a satirical version of the United clarity and wit, which is numerous textbooks and articles into Synagogue) was born. His article ‘proving’ probably why he was asked to give courses English. In 1981 he received the Tom that Shakespeare was a Jew was taken up all over the world, including Brazil, Sweden, Newman International award for ‘the Most by the Manchester Guardian. the USA and Israel. He had longstanding Conspicuously Meritorious Contribution Bryan was born in Bradford, where his research projects with colleagues at the to Research in Animal Husbandry’. During father was a GP. It was in his dispensary Hebrew University and spent time teaching his working years he published over 100 that Bryan carried out the early and often at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. original articles and lectured widely in this explosive experiments that awakened his For many years he had wanted to write country and abroad. love of chemistry. From Bradford Boys’ a book for the popular market (‘such as In 1954 he married Henrietta. They Grammar School he won a scholarship to people might buy at airports’, as he used had two children, Peter and Wendy; there Queen’s College, Oxford, where he was to say) and in 2008 Bread – A Slice of were four grandchildren, to whom he was involved with the Inter-University was written with John Marchant a devoted grandfather. Federation and the Oxford Union and wrote and Joan Alcock, colleagues at South Bank Walter retired at the age of 60 and songs and sketches for comedy reviews. University, where he became Professor of devoted himself to family, travel, fishing After a post doc at Brookhaven National Chemical Technology in 1990. He enjoyed and classical music, a man much loved and Laboratory on Long Island, he returned to appearing as an authority on bread on the admired by his friends worldwide. He died England and worked for a while in industry BBC Four programme ‘In Search of the aged 86, typically while feeding his beloved before turning to academia. Perfect Loaf’. This caught the attention of garden birds. His ashes were scattered At Battersea College of Advanced Caitlin Moran in The Times who, to his great partly in Vienna and partly close by his Technology, soon to become the University pleasure, called him ‘the nutty professor’ favourite Scottish trout stream. of Surrey, he ran one of the first industrial and said he should have presented the (Dr) Hans L. Eirew chemistry courses in the country with whole programme. his great friend and colleague Mike Bryan was an avid skier and delighted Burstall. Together they wrote The Chemical in taking the family to different resorts. slopes with such enthusiasm. Economy (1973), one of the 13 books and In 1987 he had a serious skiing accident Apart from the book reviews and articles more than 140 papers on the chemical, and tore his aortic valve, which had to be he wrote for the AJR Journal, Bryan often pharmaceutical and process industries replaced by a porcine valve in a pioneering worked with Rita Rosenbaum and her team which Bryan produced. Industrial Organic operation. He enjoyed the subsequent recording the Journal for blind and partially Chemicals in Perspective, which he wrote halachic debates in the Jewish Chronicle sighted readers. with Harold Wittcoff in 1980, was so letters column, to which he was a frequent In 1966 he married Catherine Katzenstein, successful that he was working on proof- contributor all his life. He continued to ski, who survives him together with their children reading a third edition when he died. In despite two further open heart operations, David, Debbie and Anthony and nine 1977 he moved to the chemical engineering until last year, and his greatest joy was grandchildren. department at Borough Polytechnic, later watching his grandchildren take to the Catherine Reuben

15 AJR JOURNAL june 2012

in harmonious dialogue with one another, supporting one another in bringing out Letter from Israel every brilliant note. After the interval, when hot drinks as well as hot soup made by Alex Tamir were available for the members of the A memorable concert audience, the musicians played what is one of Schubert’s final and saddest pieces: cold and rainy Saturday morning most popular pieces of chamber music the quintet for two violins, viola and two with no visiting grandchildren in the world. In addition, the Millennium cellos, D956. In stark contrast with the Aor social obligations presented a Ensemble, consisting of outstanding musi- light-hearted gaiety of the ‘Trout’, it is golden opportunity to attend a concert cians, most of them originally immigrants full of tragic cadences and passages that of chamber music given in the nearby from Russia, played with a sensitivity and seem to presage Schubert’s own untimely neighbourhood of Ein Kerem. This is an profundity that brought tears to my eyes. and imminent death. In some ways its outlying part of , consisting The first chord of the ‘Trout’ quintet dark, brooding themes echo elements of mainly of picturesque old houses, (D667) resonated with a clarity so full and Schubert’s last piano sonatas, especially many of them inhabited by artists. The rich that it was immediately clear that we his posthumous D960. Nevertheless, in programme on this occasion consisted were in the presence of musicians of the this quintet, as in the sonata, despite the of two quintets by Schubert, and we had first water. Schubert’s joyful music echoed tragic beginning Schubert tries to finish hastened to order tickets earlier in the through the auditorium as the artists on a more optimistic note. week. played in perfect harmony, their hearts And deservedly so, as although his The Eden-Tamir Music Centre in seeming to beat as one, sweeping the physical existence was so heartrendingly Ein Kerem was founded by Alexander audience along with them and taking us all brief, Schubert’s music is immortal, and (Alex) Tamir and the late Bracha Eden, to higher realms. Sitting in the auditorium, through it he continues to live on in our both renowned pianists. During Bracha listening and watching, it struck me that hearts and minds. Eden’s lifetime they played as a duo, but no matter how well one knows a piece A few weeks later we went back to today Alex Tamir, who is now aged 80, of music and how many times one has hear another concert, this time one no longer performs but continues to give heard it on the radio, records, discs or devoted to chamber music by Mozart broadcasts about music on the radio. The any other medium, nothing can compare and played by the same ensemble. Music Centre is also his home and it is in with hearing and seeing it performed live, It concluded with an arrangement the auditorium there, with its wonderful especially if you’re in one of the front rows for sextet of the sublime Symphonia acoustics and seating for an audience of and the musicians are almost sitting on Concertante, which again took us to the about 120, that concerts are held, usually your lap. It is only then that one can catch heights of intellectual and emotional at the weekend. all the nuances, observe how Schubert pleasure. The soup was delicious too The concert we attended was sold sends the same musical element from – almost reaching the same level of out, and we soon understood why. The one instrument to the other, and how the excellence as the music. two Schubert quintets are among the music benefits when all five musicians are Dorothea Shefer-Vanson

inside the ajr continued from page 13 Ginger Rogers, singing with Gracie Fields Wembley Account of a travelogue on Israel was also worth seeing. and flying with the Red Arrows. Trip to London Herbert Haberberg David Lang Our meeting was as enjoyable as ever. One Next meeting: 28 June. David Barnett, Next meeting: 26 June. Myra Sampson, of our members, Ruth Pearson, enjoyed ‘Jewish Trades in Regency London’ ‘The Story of Jack the Ripper’ the whole experience of the London trip which the AJR organises for its-out-of- Book Club A Jolly, Lively Group Hendon Famous Phrases and towners, though the outings are open to Their Origin A jolly, lively group enjoyed a discussion all. Ingrid Morland about Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Next meeting: 27 June. Social get-together Warren Ashton’s interest in the origin Sweet. We were delighted to be joined of well-known phrases began when he by AJR Journal art critic Gloria Tessler, was at school in the ‘Square Mile’. He whose novel Carmen, as well as Irène North London Celebration of explained to us the origins of ‘at sixes Némirovsky’s Suite Française, we will Yom HaAtzmaut and sevens’, ‘getting the sack’, ‘double- read next. Julian Barnes’s The Sense of an Along with members of other groups, we crossed’, ‘a square meal’ and many more Ending will follow for the next meeting celebrated Yom HaAtzmaut. Myrna, Hazel such phrases. Shirley Rodwell on 27 June. and volunteers did us proud by serving Next meeting: 25 June. Roger Sanders, ‘My Esther Rinkoff a most wonderful Israel-style lunch. The Life as a Judge’

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] For the latest AJR news, including details of forthcoming events and information about our services, visit www.ajr.org.uk Printed by FBprinters LLP, 26 St Albans Lane, London NW11 7QB Tel: 020 8458 3220 Email: [email protected]

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