Anonymous – “the debt of gratitude can never be repaid”.

My brother and I left Prague, with some 270 other children , at the end of June 1939. My parents had hoped to get to either Portugal or the USA but their hopes were dashed by the outbreak of war, and we never saw them again.

Our train went north through Germany to The Netherlands, and we boarded a ferry from Hook-of-Holland to Harwich – for most of us the first glimpse ever of the sea (and also the first taste of white bread!)

Our guardians were waiting for us somewhere near Liverpool Street Station. All we knew in advance was that they were Quakers, and that my guardian was a lady teacher and my brother’s was a male teacher. We were shepherded into a big room with hundreds of chairs. The 270-odd children’s surnames were read out by two people – one in alphabetical order and the other in reverse alphabetical order. This meant that children with surnames between L and P (which included us) were the last to leave the large reception hall and be introduced to their “guardians”.

We had been learning English for some nine months and could make ourselves understood reasonably well. Our guardians were in their fifties, used to dealing with children. They were very kind and most generous to us throughout the rest of their lives. They were also strict disciplinarians - with a wonderful sense of humour.

My brother joined the Czechoslovak Army in the UK in 1941. He kept in touch with his guardian up to the time of his death many years later.

In September 1939 I was evacuated with my guardian’s school to Buckinghamshire. After a few weeks she moved me to her sister’s home in the Midlands where I could attend a much better High School. The sister’s family were all Quakers, too, and I was made very welcome there. There were two girls in the family – one 3 years older and the other 18 months younger. Each of us were given fair shares of small domestic duties – and I was accepted as a member of that family. I obtained my Schools Certificate in 1942, and moved back to London for secretarial training . My guardian paid for my college fees and for my lodgings in London. During the spring of 1943 I obtained an office job in Islington and became financially independent. I promptly enrolled as an evening student at Birkbeck College (where my guardian had been a student before the First World War) and graduated in 1946.

I remained in touch with my guardian up to the time of her death over 30 years later, and to this day I keep in touch with her nieces and their children. Indeed, I was made aware of the Friends’ Commemoration of the Kindertransport by one of my “adopted nieces”.

The debt of gratitude which I owe to my guardian and her family can never be repaid. I am sure that my brother, who died in 1997, felt the same.

Anonymous