Kristallnacht, Kindertransport, and help for refugees

November 15, 2018

Quak­er refugee work cir­ca 1933:

The reports gath­ered from the Jew­ish com­mu­ni­ty in Ger­many by Quak­ers were of influ­ence when Quak­ers accom­pa­nied the Jew­ish del­e­ga­tion who went to see Home Sec­re­tary Sir Samuel Hoare to plead the case for allow­ing immi­gra­tion of chil­dren into Britain with­out the usu­al visa restric­tions. They swayed the gov­ern­ment and this planned immi­gra­tion of Ger­man and Aus­tri­an Jew­ish chil­dren became known as the Kinder­trans­port. Around 10,000 chil­dren were evac­u­at­ed from Ger­many and Aus­tria to Britain between 1938 and 1939. 

What I find most fas­ci­nat­ing is the detail that the Friends library in Lon­don does­nt have a lot of records of this work. It was so much in line with oth­er refugee assis­tance Friends were doing in Europe that they evi­dent­ly con­sid­ered it just anoth­er day on the job, so to speak. I shared a piece on the relat­ed Quak­er­speisun­gen a few days ago.

Kristall­nacht, Kinder­trans­port, and help for refugees