Wikipedia Quote.
Sir Nicholas George Winton, MBE was a British humanitarian who organised the rescue of 669 children, mostly Jewish, from Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia on the eve of the Second World War in an operation later known as the Czech Kindertransport. Winton found homes for the children and arranged for their safe passage to Britain.
After the war, Winton did not discuss his efforts with anyone; his wife found out what he had done only after she discovered a scrapbook in their attic in 1988, detailing the children's parents and the families that took them in. The British press dubbed him the "British Schindler".He was awarded the highest honour of the Czech Republic, the Order of the White Lion, by the Czech president, Miloš Zeman.
Winton succeeded, thanks to the guarantees he had obtained from Britain. After the first train, the process of crossing the Netherlands went smoothly. Winton ultimately found homes in Britain for 669 children, many of whose parents would perish in the Auschwitz concentration camp. Winton’s mother worked with him to place the children in homes and later hostels. Throughout the summer, Winton placed advertisements seeking families to accept the children. The last group of 250, scheduled to leave Prague on 1 September 1939, did not reach safety. Hitler had invaded Poland and the Second World War had begun. Nearly all of the children on the last, unsuccessful train perished during the war.
Sir Nicholas George Winton died a few days ago at the ripe old age of 106, a quiet, gentle, unassuming man whose story remained untold for almost fifty years. Today we recognize actors, singers etc when they pass on and rightly so but surely a place should be found in our hearts for Nicholas and those like him. As one of the children he saved said ‘Me, my children and their children wouldn’t be here now but for the work of one man’ and you have to multiply that by well over 600 times. R.I.P. Nicholas.
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