Return of the Kinder

On Thursday 4 September 2014, the Mayor of Harwich, accompanied by numerous civic dignitaries as well as the Town Crier, welcomed a small group of former Kindertransport refugees at Harwich Parkeston Quay, commemorating the 75th anniversary of the conclusion of the Kindertransport. The vast majority of the 10,000 or so Kindertransport children passed through Harwich and many were accommodated locally at Dovercourt and other holiday camps. Peter Hedderly has been involved with organising train journeys for much of his working life. His first involvement in the Kindertransport story was when he helped plan and operate the ‘Winton Train’ from Prague to London in 2009. In planning the current journey, his aim was to honour both the unsung heroes of the 1930s and to help children threatened by war today. The operation of the 4 September train was approved only in August. The lack of adequate notice resulted in the number of those participating being much smaller than such a splendid venture deserved. This special train, known as the ‘Chadwick Train’ from London to Harwich and the ‘Warriner Train’ from Harwich to London in honour of Trevor Chadwick and Doreen Warriner, who worked closely with Sir Nicholas Winton, left platform 10 at London’s Liverpool Street Station at 10.37 am and arrived punctually at Harwich Parkeston Quay at 11.51 am. As we stepped off the train the Town Crier read a special welcome to those returning to Harwich after 75 years. Two boys and two girls from the local All Saints’ Church of England Primary School presented flowers to us. A very warm welcome! An old red London double-decker bus took the entire party to St Nicholas Church near the sea front for a moving service of thanksgiving and remembrance. The group then moved on to the Harwich Electric Palace Cinema, built in the early 20th century and today a Grade II* listed building. It has the ideal atmosphere in which to watch the short BBC film on Nicholas Winton: Our World: Saving a Generation. At 4.20 pm the special train departed from Harwich Parkeston Quay, arriving at London’s Liverpool Street at 5.44 pm. Peter Hedderly put an incredible amount of work, of a totally voluntary nature, into organising this remarkable train journey. He was clearly well supported by the train company Abellio Greater Anglia and by onezulusevenzero Ltd. Those few of us who were there thank him and his colleagues for a splendid event. Ernest Simon I took part in the visit to Harwich organised by Peter Hedderly on the 75th anniversary of the Kindertransport. I have already expressed my gratitude to Peter for organising the event. Everything went extremely smoothly. It was heartwarming how we were received on arrival on the Harwich station platform by the Town Crier, the Mayor, various local guides, an odd councillor or two, and not forgetting the smartly dressed schoolchildren who presented each of us with a lovely white flower and enquired eagerly about how we had felt coming as children on the Kindertransport. The tour that followed was very congenial. The local guides were highly communicative. I was accompanied by someone who took me to see the plaque on the promenade wall commemorating the arrival of Kindertransport children in Harwich and who then invited me to have lunch with him. He told me he was a great admirer of Israel and visited the country regularly. Pity there aren’t more of his kind. Michael Brown We experienced this very special anniversary arranged by Peter Hedderley at very short notice. We left Liverpool Street Station having first visited Frank Meisler’s commemorative statue to the Kindertransport on the forecourt. There were only 20 of us, due in part to the short notice. Only four of us had been on the original transports to England. On arrival in Harwich, we were greeted by a reception committee comprising the Mayor, the Town Crier, the headmaster of All Saints’ School, Richard Hopkins, and one of his masters, Richard Spencer MBE, together with four pupils from the school. Each of the four of us who had travelled on the original trains in 1939 was presented with a beautiful gerbera. We then travelled on a beautifully restored red London bus with the names of locations in Central Europe from which the Kindertransport children had fled clearly written round the upper deck. The tour took us round Harwich. Heritage Guides pointed out places of interest, in particular where Dovercourt had once stood and where so many Kinder had lived. Now it is a housing estate. Later we attended a special thanksgiving and remembrance service at St Nicholas Church led by Rev. Peter Mann. We went to the Electric Palace Cinema, where we saw the BBC documentary Our World: Saving a Generation. We thanked all the kind people who had made the visit so memorable for us. We would particularly like to thank Peter Hedderley for arranging such a memorable day. Lia and Philip Lesser