Sessi Dzialowski was only eleven years old when she escaped from Germany on a Kindertransport, a rescue mission that saved nearly 10,000 children from Nazi persecution. The now great-grandmother shares her poignant, powerful story.
On December 1 1938 Sessi Dzialowski waved goodbye to her mother for the last time. The eleven-year-old girl was flanked by two of her older brothers as she boarded the first Kindertransport. Sessi and her brothers Leo thirteen and Salo fifteen each clutched a suitcase as they embarked on a journey from Berlin toward an uncertain future — but a future nonetheless.
On that fateful morning there were no farewells at the train station because the Nazis had forbidden it. The 207 children from Berlin Stuttgart and Leipzig had been forced to say their goodbyes earlier. The scene was terrible. Children were crying. Many didn’t even know why they were being separated from their parents. Fathers and mothers were putting on brave faces assuring their precious children that the situation was temporary — that soon G-d willing they would be reunited as a family again — all the while knowing that this dream might never be realized.
As the train prepared to leave the children desperately pressed their faces against the window to catch a final glimpse of their parents. But due to Nazi’s orders there were no beloved faces on the platform to wave back or throw a final kiss.
The Dzialowski siblings however could see their mother. Cilly Rosenak Dzialowski granddaughter of Rabbi Dr. Solomon Carlebach ztz”l had spent much of the prior evening checking out the layout of the station. She had discovered that if she stood on an embankment she would be invisible to those on the platform yet visible to the passengers on the train.
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