Copyright 2012 by Purdue University. All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Baumel-Schwartz, Judith Tydor, 1959-
Never Look Back: The Jewish Refugee Children in Great Britain, 1938-1945 / Judith Tydor Baumel-Schwartz.
p. cm. -- (Shofar Supplements in Jewish Studies)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-55753-612-9 (pbk.: alk. paper) -- ISBN 978-1-61249-223-0 (epdf) -- ISBN 978-1-61249-222-3 (epub) 1. Jewish refugees--Great Britain--History--20th century. 2. Kindertransports (Rescue operations)--Great Britain. 3. Refugee children--Great Britain--History--20th century. 4. Jewish children--Great Britain--History--20th century. 5. World War, 1939-1945--Evacuation of civilians--Great Britain. I. Title. II. Title: Jewish Refugee Children in Great Britain, 1938-1945.
DS135.E5B27 2012
940.53'18350830941--dc23
2011047678
Front cover photo courtesy of Joseph Haberer.
Preface
Every book has at least one mother or father, but is often blessed with a number of midwives and this book is no exception. And while most gestations are counted in months or occasionally even years, the gestation of this book has to be counted in decades.
The nucleus of this book was an MA thesis which I wrote between 1979 and 1981 at the department of Jewish history at Bar Ilan University under the supervision of Dan Michman. Focusing on the Jewish refugee children in Britain, the thesis charted many of the facts known at that time about the Kindertransports and drew upon interviews I had conducted with Kinder (refugee children from Central Europe) and wartime refugee activists who were still alive. It lacked, however, the depth of conceptual analysis which would only come through years of historical study in dealing with the refugee problem in general and the intricacies of cultural history in particular.
Aside from three short articles which I culled from the thesis, it basically sat on a bookshelf in my study, superseded by the projects that followed. Throughout the thirty years since I began my thesis I occasionally contemplated reworking my original research into a book, but each time I was sidetracked by yet another project in which I was involved: books about the rescue of children to the United States during the Holocaust; the Holocaust and Prayer; Kibbutz Buchenwald; Gender and the Holocaust; the IZL delegation in the United States; the World War II parachutists from Palestine; and finally, my late father Yechezkel Tydors biography.
If a book is supposed to be written, eventually someone will write it, is something I remember my father saying, and it appears that in this case he was correct. About a year ago I received an email from Joseph Haberer, founding editor of Shofar, an interdisciplinary journal of Jewish Studies, who had read my thesis and encouraged me to turn it into a book. A former refugee child from England who eventually settled in the United States, Joes kind words about my original thesis encouraged me to consider the project, and after he put me in touch with Charles Watkinson, Director of Purdue University Press, the present book began to take shape. Insisting that after not having touched the material for thirty years I should be given a chance to rework it into a broader manuscript, Charles and Joe both encouraged me in this desire over the next few months. The result is a book that is very different in most senses from the original thesis, both in its breadth and depth, and of course in its analytical focus. I thank the staff at Purdue University Press and especially Becki Corbin, Dianna Gilroy, Katherine Purple, Joyce Rappaport, and Bryan D. Shaffer for all their assistance in publishing this manuscript.
The list of people who I am pleased to thank for their assistance is quite long, as it basically stretches back over thirty years to the close to one hundred original Kinder whom I interviewed or questioned then and those to whom I came back now, and to the staff of the various archives and repositories who assisted me thirty years ago and today: the American Friends Service Committee Archives, Philadelphia; the Central Zionist Archives, Jerusalem; the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, NY; the Imperial War Museum, London; the Labor Party Archives, Beit Berl; the Leo Baeck Institute, New York; the Oral History Division, Institute for Contemporary Jewry, the Hebrew University, Jerusalem; the Public Record Office, Kew; the Religious Kibbutz Archives, Kevutzat Yavneh; Yad Vashem, Jerusalem and Givatayim Branches; and especially to Lilian Levy and the World Jewish Relief, formerly the Jewish Refugees Committee and the Association of Jewish Refugees in London, which was kind enough to allow me to use their administrative files at the Wiener Library, and to Ben Barkow, director, the Wiener Library Institute of Contemporary History in London, who was instrumental in finding me material that had become available since I wrote my original thesis.
My thanks go especially to a select group of people who figurative held my hand throughout my new research, providing me with leads and pertinent information and encouraging me throughout. In particular, to Steffi Birnbaum Schwartz who unstintingly shared her experiences with me, encouraging me with her very special brand of humor; to Walter Laqueur, historian par excellence, witness to the period and incredible friend, who as usual was my mainstay of assistance and information regarding almost anything historical and otherwise; and of course to my close friends who helped me through many important junctures, research and otherwise: Maoz Azaryahu, Adam Ferziger, Baruch Forman, Yoav Gelber, Chanita Goodblatt, Aviva Halamish, Hilda Nissimi, Tali Tadmor Shimony, Eli Tzur, Yechiam Weitz, Hanna Yablonka, and Mira Katzburg Yungman. Of the entire group only Hilda and Mira lived through the writing of the original thesis with me, and all that it entailed at the time, but the entire group of friends shared in encouraging me throughout the writing of the present book and have been there for me through thick and thin.
My family, as always, has been the mainstay of my life that makes it all worthwhile. My very special and one-of-a-kind mother, Shirley K. Tydor, who warned me of a major pitfall connected with my MA thesis over thirty years agomother, you have been vindicated!; my loving in-laws Bernice and Dr. Arthur Schwartz; my incredible daughters, Beki and Rina; my terrific step-children and their childrenLaya and Alon and their sons Eviatar and Uriah, Chaim and Ayelet and their daughter Halleli Miriam, and Yoniwho have made us into a large and wonderful family for which I am grateful on a daily basis.
Above all, to my one and only, my beloved husband Joshua J. Schwartz, whose first words to me: Do you ever do anything but write? still echo laughingly in my ears as we do so much more together today and, I hope, for many, many decades to come. This is the third book I dedicate to him, three being a hazakaa Jewish symbol of possession and continuityand a testimony to how wonderfully enmeshed we have become in each others existence and lives.
