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'British Schindler' The Man Who Saved Hundreds of Children From Nazis

The 'British Schindler' who Saved Hundreds of Children from the Nazis

Sir Winton received the Czech Republic’s highest state honour in August of 2014 having saved hundreds of mostly Jewish children from the Nazis. Winton arrived in Prague to collect The White Lion Order from President Milos Zeman in a special ceremony last autumn. A keen airman and RAF Veteran, Winton only agreed to be flown from Britain by the Czech military on the condition that he would be able to look out from the cockpit during the flight.

The remarkable achievement of this modest man, coined the ‘British Schindler’, was kept under wraps for more than half a century and only came to light thanks to some spring cleaning. The story of Sir Nicholas Winton emerged when his wife Greta came across an old leather briefcase in an attic and found lists of the children and letters from their parents. He hadn't even told her of his role during the war.

Sir Nicholas Winton died in 2015.

Images of some of the 669 ‘kinder’ put up for adoption

Sir Nicholas Winton was 29 when he acted to save 669 Czech children from their otherwise inevitable fate in Nazi hands. Having visited refugee camps in Prague, Czechoslovakia in early 1938, he was alarmed by both the influx of migrants endangered by the imminent Nazi invasion, and the lack of effort to save any of their children. Nicholas Winton later recalled:

"The commission was dealing with the elderly and vulnerable, but people in the camps kept telling me that nobody was doing anything for the children"

Much in the same vein as Kindertransport, Winton organized for trains to move children from Czechoslovakia to any country he could find that was willing to accept them. Having contacted numerous countries to no avail, only Sweden and his own government agreed to open their borders.

The original letters Winton sent as an appeal to President Roosevelt and the American Ambassador in London (Dispatch No. 749) asking for American support to evacuate children from Czechoslovakia. (NARA)

The first train left Czechoslovakia on March 14th 1939, a day before Germany invaded and occupied the Sudetenland in Western Czechoslovakia. On September 1 1939, Winton’s biggest transport of over 200 children was scheduled to leave from Prague. Unfortunately for all those on board the train, war was declared when Hitler’s army marched into Poland and took control of all borders, thus barring the way for escape.

Nicholas reflected: “Within hours of the announcement, the train disappeared. None of the 250 children aboard was seen again. We had 250 families waiting at Liverpool Street that day in vain. If the train had been a day earlier, it would have come through. Not a single one of those children was heard of again, which is an awful feeling."

Winton’s achievements went unrecognised for more than half a century. For fifty years most of the children did not know to whom they owed their lives.

Winton himself expresses surprise at all the attention he has received and denies that he was courageous, claiming that "I was at the right place at the right time". Sir Nicholas Winton, now 105, continues with his conviction that what he did for the Czechoslovak children was commonplace.