UK historian defies experts, discovers unknown Kindertransport records deep in Yad Vashem

Holocaust experts told historian Amy Williams there was no such thing as a list of the Jewish children rescued in the iconic Kindertransport rescue operation, which saw some 10,000 relocated from continental Europe to Britain and other countries between 1938 and 1940.

Contrary to the assumption of experts, however, Williams has meticulously pinned down documents created for 9,000 of the Jewish children evacuated on the Kindertransport. For decades, those documents had lain buried at Israel’s Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial and museum, deep within a Dutch file on “foreign nationals” in the Netherlands — until Williams identified them at the end of 2024.

“I don’t think people found the records [because] they aren’t catalogued under Kindertransport and they exist within a file which has hundreds of other lists,” said Williams. The historian works for the Association of Jewish Refugees (AJR) as the Kindertransport scholar-in-residence.

“[The Kindertransport lists] are with other lists of people leaving the Netherlands for Africa and British Mandate-era Palestine on the Youth Aliyah scheme,” Williams told The Times of Israel.

“The records were created by the Jewish communities in each child’s homeland, such as Germany, Austria, Poland and Czechoslovakia. These lists were then sent to the Dutch Kindertransport committee and the Dutch border guards to ensure that the transports had permission to travel through the Netherlands and also [inform them] when they would pass through,” she said.

The records include children’s names, home addresses, dates of birth, parents’ names, chaperones’ names, as well as Kindertransport numbers and departure dates. Williams noticed that some records include the names and addresses of British host families to which the children were assigned.

The Kindertransport has been commemorated around the world, including with statues featuring Jewish children wearing nametags. When Nazi Germany invaded Western Europe in 1940, the possibility of rescuing Jewish children all but ended.

After Germany passed the Nuremberg Race Laws in 1935, some Jewish parents began to consider the possibility of sending their children to safety abroad. Few details about the 10,000 Jewish children rescued in the Kindertransport are known, partly because most of the rescued children’s parents and siblings were murdered in the Holocaust.

“It’s important as I’ve found lists which show that the Kindertransport isn’t just a British rescue. The children went to many different countries,” said Williams.

‘A feeling of authentication’

Hanna Zack Miley, 92, who was rescued on a Kindertransport, said that seeing the records identified by Williams was a transformative experience.

“I am still feeling the reverberations of seeing my details on the Kindertransport list. Reclaiming the past is an ongoing journey for me,” said Miley, who lives in Arizona. Williams and Miley have since met each other and pored over the latter’s collection of artifacts related to her flight from continental Europe.

“My first reaction was a feeling of authentication — this actually did happen, I was really there. I’m embracing more deeply both the losses and the deliverance, the saving of my life,” said Miley.

Williams hopes the Kindertransport records will eventually be housed at the UK-based Association of Jewish Refugees and World Jewish Relief, in part so survivors and their descendants can easily access the information.

In addition to personal details about Kindertransport participants, the records reveal previously unknown aspects of the rescue. For example, a host of organizations around the world were involved in trying to get Jewish children out of Europe, said Williams. (In some accounts, an organization called the Dutch Rescue Committee receives credit for organizing the operation.)

“What [the documents] show you is the extent to which all the different organizations were desperately trying to get people out to so many different places. The files aren’t digitized or searchable, so you manually have to go through everything, and there are thousands of pages,” said Williams.

Working with the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People at the National Library of Israel, Williams is pinning down the names of children rescued from Austria and sent to the UK, France, Belgium, and Australia. The historian said that she anticipates this research will yield future announcements regarding the names of Jewish children relocated from Austria.

“I also found Kindertransport lists of children who left Croatia for British Mandate-era Palestine,” said Williams. “We often think of the Kindertransport as a Western European scheme, but… the scheme was much broader and more extensive.”

‘Kindertransport lists to death’

Kindertransport survivors, including Miley, have already used the newly deciphered records to make contact with previously lost relatives.

“These documents are of huge historical significance and will help answer questions that many Jewish people have carried for their entire lives,” said William Niven, a professor of German history at Nottingham Trent University, of which Williams is an alumna.

“For those people who were on the Kindertransport but have since passed away, it will allow their children, their grandchildren, and great-grandchildren to learn more about their family origins and the historic train journey that gave them freedom,” said Niven.

In her deep dive at Yad Vashem, Williams identified another set of lists bearing the name Kindertransport. However, these lists were not created by rescue groups, but by German authorities. Chillingly, the names of some Jewish children appear on both lists.

“Some of the children who were on Dutch Kindertransports were later deported to the concentration camps and death camps. Many did not survive. These were Kindertransports to death,” Williams said.

“The Kindertransport is synonymous with rescue and arrival, but it didn’t always mean that at the time,” she said.