Page 34 - Kol Bogrei Habonim - Winter 20
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completely white with lots of glass, and it had Britain, on condition that someone would
a profound effect on me”. fund them and be responsible for their
transport and absorption. The price for each
When the Nazis entered Vienna, he began to
feel the change. “My mother’s brother lived child was 50 pounds and a relative, Ernest
there. They closed his business and took him Levy, paid for him.
for interrogation. Then the family started to From the moment it was decided that
be afraid.” His parents began to think about London, not Palestine, was the destination,
the implications regarding their son. First, his parents removed the contents of the trunk,
they removed him from the Czech youth replaced them with warm clothing, suitable
movement, Sokol, and transferred him to for the English climate, and squeezed in a
Maccabi Hatzair, and then increased his family photo album and some books.
Hebrew studies. Jewish schools were closed, “Everything happened very quickly.” so
and Fritz stayed at home but wasn’t bored. “I Kahana remembers the fateful day of 27th
had so many hobbies,” he says. “I read books, June, 1939. “We left for Prague early in the
particularly those of Karl May, who wrote morning with my parents and my aunt, and
adventure stories about Winnetou, the leader we arrived at the central train station. The
of an Indian tribe in America, I collected Nazis had already arrived in April 1939 and
stamps and butterflies and I played the roamed the streets in their black SS uniforms;
piano.”
there was great fear. We got to the platform.
My aunt didn’t agree about Palestine, and I was 12 years old, and didn’t completely
so my trunk was repacked understand what was happening, so for me,
as for all the other children, it was all an
“One day, my parents told me they wanted to
send me to Palestine with Aliyat Hanoar. adventure. I was already used to travelling to
They registered me, bought a big trunk, and the other side of Czechoslovakia for a month
packed everything necessary for a long each summer to visit an aunt, and here I
voyage.” But his aunt objected to sending thought I was travelling to an uncle in
Fritz to an unknown country in the Middle London, and it was clear to me that I would
East, and wanted him to go to England, where return. For my parents, it was completely
there were relatives, who had moved there in different; they knew they might never see me
the 19th Century. It was clear that his parents again. We parted with a hug and a kiss.”
couldn’t travel with him, as at this time no- Don’t open the window for two days
one above 17 years old could leave Nazi- Each child received a tag with his name and
occupied territories. So began his joining the number, attached it to the upper part of his
Kindertransport, the rescue project that was shirt, and boarded the special train that had
the initiative of UK Jews (among them the been hired by Nicholas Winton, a British Jew
High Commissioner for Mandate Palestine, who initiated the emigration of almost 700
Herbert Samuel), who managed to persuade Czechoslovak children in the Kindertransport
the British Government to enable endangered programme. Two foreign ladies went from
Jewish children from Europe to immigrate to
carriage to carriage asking the children how
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