Description
Physical description
Book with a blue hard cover. The words "LANGENSCHEIDTS TASCHEN – WÖRTERBÜCHER" appear in a red rectangle on the spine and the words "I/II Englisch–deutsch Deutsch-englisch" appear in a black rectangle. The book is a bind-up of two volumes of a 1929 German-English dictionary by Prof. Edmund Klatt.
Label
Public opinion was so shocked by Kristallnacht that the British government relented and agreed to take in Jewish children provided they would not be a burden to the state. Desperate parents flooded Jewish organisations in Germany with applications. Charitable organisations in Britain, particularly the Refugee Children's Movement, arranged travel and accommodation for the children. This became known as the 'Kindertransport' (children's transport). Under this programme, 9,534 children arrived in Britain between December 1938 and August 1939 from towns and cities across Germany and its occupied territories. The children were taken by train to the Hook of Holland; from there they crossed the North Sea to Harwich and travelled to London by train, arriving at Liverpool Street Station. The Nazis restricted the children to one suitcase. It was supposed to contain only essential items, such as clothes, but often family mementoes were also included. The Nazis specifically forbade the children to take anything of value with them. The majority of the children from the Kindertransport were then distributed to hostels, boarding schools and foster families. The last train left Berlin on 31 August 1939, the very eve of war. Most of the children never saw their parents again.
Fifteen year Annette Bankier learned of the Kindertransport only when she saw children queuing up to register for the scheme in her home town of Vienna. On 10th December 1938, within days of her registration, Annette arrived in England. She was eventually placed in a hostel for Kindertransport refugees near Tunbridge Wells in Kent. She brought this German -English dictionary with her on the Kindertransport. Annette's parents also managed to leave Austria, reaching Shanghai in 1939.
History note
Mrs Saville was a Jewish refugee from Vienna, when aged 15 in December 1938.