The Children's Train: Escape on the Kindertransport

by Jana Zinser

  This was 16 Poppleton Circle, the home of the Cohens.

  Harry Cohen, a well-dressed, reserved man, and Doris Cohen, a precise woman, pushed Priscilla, their eight-year-old daughter, up the drive in a wheelchair. Becca walked with her disheveled curly head down, dragging her feet, exhausted from her tirade against the English.

  Mrs. Daniels, their no-nonsense Welsh housekeeper, adjusted her crisp white apron and opened the door. When she saw the little unglued refugee, she gasped. “Blimey! You look like death warmed up, lass!” She waved them in, her great flabby arms swinging with enthusiasm.

  “Mrs. Daniels, please,” Harry said, slightly shaking his head. “Rebecca has had a very difficult trip.”

  “She’s been screaming about her brother Peter since we got her,” Priscilla said. “My ears are ringing.”

  “We need to welcome her,” Doris said to Mrs. Daniels.

  “Welcome,” Mrs. Daniels said, half-heartedly. “I hope you’re done crying, Rebecca.”

  Becca looked up. “It’s Becca, and I’ll never be done crying. I hate all of England!”

  “That’s a lot to hate for one little girl,” Mrs. Daniels said.

  “I’d hate Germany, too, but my mother and sister are still there.” Becca stomped down the hall.

  “Well, she’s a right beauty, eh?” Mrs. Daniels said, her hands resting on her ample hips. “I’ll have my work cut out for me with two cheeky girls.”

  The truck carrying Eva and her parents slowed and then stopped at the Bockenburg Camp near Munich. A moment later, the huge door of the truck opened, and light streamed in.

  Grundy pointed a gun at them. “Out! All of you! You have arrived at the Bockenburg work camp, where you can no longer be lazy and a drain on German society.”

  At the Dovercourt Holiday Summer Camp, the boys and girls formed a long line, leading into the main hall of the camp. The refugee committee volunteers greeted the children and began leading them in groups to the small wooden cabins built for summer camp.

  A volunteer escorted Stephen, Hans, Peter, and a boy named Ralph, a chubby child who always spoke loudly, to a cabin. Peter opened the door and cautiously walked in. Hans, Stephen, and Ralph followed.

  Inside the cold cabin, there were small beds with one woolen blanket each and small, misshapen, stained pillows, several small windows, and a sink. The boys set their suitcases down. Peter carefully placed his violin case on his bed.

  Stephen patted the thin mattress. “All right, I want to go home now. What do you think, Peter?”

  “Home doesn’t exist anymore,” Peter said.

  That night, the boys slept with all their clothes on under their single wool blankets, for protection against the cold. Peter lay awake in his bed, his fingers playing the chords of a pretend violin, and his other hand guiding an invisible bow. He fell asleep to a rather difficult Mozart melody running through his mind.

  Back in Berlin, Noah crept in among the rubble of broken glass and the splintered boards in a looted Jewish watch shop. He made a barricade with the shelves to hide from intruders, and for protection from the wind and snow that blew through the shattered windows. He didn’t clean up the room. That would make it too obvious someone was hiding here if anyone looked in. He slept fitfully among the broken remnants of the timepieces and the Nazis’ fear of all things Jewish.

  At the Cohens’ luxurious house in London, Becca lay awake in her beautiful new room, in a big feather bed under a down comforter. Gina, the doll she’d brought from home, lay beside her. In the hall outside, she could hear Priscilla and Mrs. Daniels talking about her.

  “She doesn’t belong here,” Priscilla whined.

  “Hush, now. She might hear you and start that incessant crying again.”

  Lying on her back, Becca stared up at the ceiling. Her face was stone, blank and emotionless. She turned and hugged her doll. Taking the edge of the bedsheet, she pretended to wipe tears off its face. “Don’t worry, Little Gina,” she whispered. “Mutti still remembers you.”

  CHAPTER 19

  DO SOMETHING

  (January/February 1939)

  In Stephen’s old house in Berlin, where Sylvia and Baby Lilly still lived with Nora and Jacob, Sylvia dusted her bedroom with a feather duster. She reached around and dusted the dresser.

  She accidentally hit a picture frame, which dropped to the floor, breaking the glass. Sighing, she bent down and carefully picked it up.

  It was a picture of her family. They stood in front of the butcher shop, smiling, so proud and happy. Sylvia stared at the picture, as drops of despair ran down her face and splattered onto the picture of her children whom only England could protect.

  The Bockenburg work camp was surrounded by a ditch and a wall with seven police guard towers.

  Eva and her mother were housed in the small women’s barracks. Not many women or children were sent to work camps. Her father was housed with the men, which made up most of the camp. Each morning the prisoners, including Helga and Eva, were marched to the work areas where they built roads, worked in the gravel pits, and drained the marshes.

  That first cold day, Eva pulled boards along the ground, leveling out a roadbed. Her father traded places with the man beside Eva, so he could help her pull.

  “How long will we stay in this horrid place, Papa?” she asked.

  “Hitler’s power is growing. It may take a lot to stop him. It may take a war.”

  “I thought my life would be different,” Eva said, sadly.

  Bert put his arm around her. “So did I.”

  At Dovercourt Camp, the huge dining hall was like a large army mess hall. Holes in the roof had allowed snow to fall inside. The children brushed the snow off their chairs and ate with their gloves and coats on.

  Stephen, Hans, Ralph, and Peter waddled in, rounded out by wearing every item of clothing they owned against the cold. They sat down with their food trays at the crowded table, and stared at the watery soup and thin meat paste sandwiches.

  “I’m not hungry anymore,” Peter said.

  “Where’s the rye bread?” Stephen asked, looking around. “I thought England was a civilized country.”

  Hans opened up the bread, examining the meat paste in the sandwich. “What is this?”

  Tellis, a boy with big ears who was sitting next to them, leaned over. “It’s horse meat.”

  “You’re kidding, right?” Hans asked, making a puckered face.

  Tellis shook his head. “No, it’s horse.”

  “Horse, as in Muhamed.” Stephen made a whinnying sound and he pawed the ground, tapping with his foot.

  Tellis nodded and laughed.

  “Peter?” Hans asked.

  Peter, the butcher’s son, lifted up the bread and examined the meat. He smelled it. “It’s horse, ground shank, about seven days old.”

  “The old gray mare ain’t what she used to be,” Hans said. The boys laughed.

  Stephen pushed the sandwich away. He spooned the watery light brown soup, making a small brown waterfall. “Looks like dirty dishwater.”

 
“This is going to be a long few weeks,” Peter said.

  “Weeks? More like months, maybe years. If we’re not little and cute, we never get picked for a family,” Tellis said.

  Stephen and Hans looked at each other. “We’re goners for sure,” Hans said.

  “I’ve already been rejected,” Peter said. “Becca’s family didn’t want me.”

  “Guess they don’t know your music will save the Jews,” Hans said, teasing Peter.

  “If there’s any music left by then,” Peter said.

  Stephen looked at his food. “I’d kill for some hot cocoa and pastries.”

  In the Beckmans’ vandalized Berlin apartment, Arnold and Evelyn sat at their kitchen table, while Charlie slept on the couch.

  “What if Uncle Ernst can’t help us? America takes so few. What if no country will take us?” Evelyn asked.

  “They’ll take us.” Arnold nodded his head. “You’ll see.”

  “It better be soon. We’re running out of time.” Evelyn sighed. “If the Nazis find us here, we’ll be on the streets, or worse.”

  The wind blew through the trees and bushes near the street that almost blocked the view in front of the Cohens’ huge London house on 16 Poppleton Circle.

  In the dining room, Becca sat with her arms folded and her mouth shut tight. Mrs. Daniels held kippers up to Becca’s mouth. “Open your gob, lass!” she ordered, but Becca turned away, determined to starve before surrendering to the nasty English fish. Priscilla glared at her from across the table.

  “Eat your toast and kippers, dearie. You’re too skinny,” Mrs. Daniels coaxed.

  Becca, with her little arms folded across her chest, glared at Mrs. Daniels. “It tastes like wood and rubber boots, and you’re too fat.”

  “Listen here, young missy,” Mrs. Daniels scolded.

  “See what I mean? She doesn’t belong here,” Priscilla said, loudly. “She’s cheeky.”

  “And you’re mean!” Becca retorted.

  “That’s quite enough, both of you!” Mrs. Daniels snapped.

  Priscilla rolled her wheelchair out of the dining room, bumping into the doorframe as she fled. Becca got up and ran out the door. Both plates of food sat uneaten on the table.

  Mrs. Daniels shook her head. “Why do I even bother?” she muttered. “You’re both off your trolley!” she shouted after them.

  At the Dovercourt dining hall, Peter stared at Tellis as he loudly slurped his soup. Hans and Stephen pushed food around on their plates.

  Suddenly, the dining hall door opened, and a crowd of children tumbled in. “That must be the children from the Kindertransport that is already two days late,” Tellis said.

  The new Kindertransport children mixed into the crowd in the mess hall. They were all talking amongst themselves. Some children let loose tears and howling cries. The girl sobbing next to Tellis said something to him.

  “What’s going on?” Peter asked.

  “They say Hitler sentenced five hundred Jews to death, and no one is safe in Germany!” Tellis shouted.

  The crying and wailing in the hall intensified as the news spread.

  “Do something!” Tellis called to Peter.

  “Me? Why me?” Peter said. “I can’t do anything but play the violin.” He covered his ears and ran out of the dining hall.

  The room erupted into chaos. The refugee volunteers tried to calm the children down, but nothing worked.

  Peter ran outside, gulping the fresh air, feeling as if he had been choking on the emotion in the hall. He slowed down and walked toward the football fields outside his cabin. His head felt like it would explode. Are Mother and Baby Lilly, are they . . .? No, he couldn’t think of it. Could life get any worse?

  He remembered the day his father gave a huge roast to Yenta Moss. Peter had asked his father why he had given her such a gift when they themselves had eaten fatty meat scraps and potatoes the night before. His father had said that when life was at its worst, there was always someone who needed something you could give.

  Peter hurried off the football field and into his cabin. He quickly returned to the mess hall. Peter swung open the door and rushed in carrying his violin.

  He held his bow up, took a deep breath, and played “You Are Not Alone.” Peter swayed with the music as his bow caressed the strings.

  Infused with courage from the violin, Peter moved among the children, as he played the song. As he passed, the children hushed. Hans and Stephen rose from their table and sang the words. Their voices were uncertain at first, but grew in strength with the power of each word.

  The night is dark until the sunrise.

  Your heart is lonely until I answer your cries.

  Your path is steep and filled with stone,

  But I will walk beside you,

  You are not alone.

  Although the heavy pain you carry is your own,

  You are not alone.

  You are not alone.

  I am God. Follow the way I have shown, and

  I will help you find your way home.

  Soon, the soul-wrenching cries and screams were replaced by the hopeful music that swirled around the hall. Peter closed his eyes and became part of his music. For a moment, he forgot he was at Dovercourt and that Becca had been kidnapped by the English. He remembered his home above the butcher shop and how his parents had said God must surely know who they were, since the synagogue was across the street.

  The music in the massive dining hall seemed to float to the ceiling, out the holes in the roof, up to God, who was watching Peter, and would help him find his way home to Becca, his mother, and Baby Lilly.

  Forced by threat of death into Poland, Anna, Oma Greta, and Eddie arrived at the area called no man’s land in Zbaszyn. They had nowhere else to go, and even if they had, Oma Greta would not have the strength to walk there.

  In a desperate city of tents, makeshift shelters, and hopeless desolation, the unwanted people waited for the two countries to decide their fate. The ones who still had relatives in Poland had made their way into the cities, but many had nowhere to go. Other Polish Jews across the country were contributing what they could in terms of food, blankets, temporary shelter, and even schools for the children. But the need was overwhelming.

  “What will they do with us now?” Oma Greta asked.

  “Who knows? Neither Poland or Germany wants us,” Anna said.

  Eddie shook his head vigorously. “Tell them I don’t want them either.”

  In fact, shortly after the Vogners had arrived, both countries had agreed not to deport each other’s citizens. But that was no comfort to the thousands already there and trying to survive in no man’s land.

  A few days later at Dovercourt, Stephen and Hans hung around in front of their cabin, kicking a rock around like a football with the sides of their feet. Although there was still a thin layer of snow on the ground, it was never too cold to think of playing football, and being cooped up in the tiny cabin was unbearable.

  Peter sat on a stump, reading A Tale of Two Cities by Charl
es Dickens. It was a story about poverty, injustice, and violence due to the irresponsibility and cruelty of the ruling elite. He could relate.

  Hans kicked the rock back and forth between his feet. “I miss Otto.”

  “He was a good striker,” Stephen said.

  “I liked his side-kick,” Peter added, looking up from his book and smiling. “He looked like a crazy acrobat.”

  “He made us laugh,” Hans said.

  “Not so much when they kicked us out of school,” Peter said.

  “Yes.” Hans sighed. “But at least he said something.”

  Tellis walked up to them, carrying a football. “Are you tired of that rock? Do you want to really play?”

  Hans and Stephen smiled and nodded.

  “Well, then, the English boys are here,” Tellis said.

  Hans motioned to Peter. “Come on, Peter, you can watch us lose.”

  Hans, Stephen, and Tellis played football with the local English boys. Peter sat nearby, reading, occasionally looking up from the daring Dickens story of revolutionary France. He thought of how, in the book, England became a safe haven for those escaping the violence. Although he’d read the story before, this time it had a whole new meaning.

  Lennie, a tall, athletic English boy, kicked a goal just as the bell sounded at the dining hall.

  “What’s that?” Hans asked.

  “Time for the cattle market. The families come, look us over, and decide who they want to take home,” Tellis said. “Moo.”

  Peter shook his head. “I don’t like cows, unless they’re displayed in a meat case.”