Man who escaped Nazis says meeting Prince William is ‘fairy story’

Henry Foner was sent on the Kindertransport, which saw thousands of Jewish children evacuated to escape the clutches of the Nazis

Prince William met Henry Foner, who was just six when he was sent by his father Max Lichwitz, a prominent lawyer in Berlin, on the Kindertransport to Britain in 1938.

As the continental Europe began to fall to the Nazis,  thousands of Jewish children taken in by Britain as part of Kindertransport, which continued until war was declared in September 1939.

Bewildered and homesick, he was fostered by a Jewish family in Swansea, the Foners.

Henry had already lost his mother at a young age and from the moment they parted, his father wrote him an almost daily postcard in German.

On Henry’s seventh birthday Mr Lichwitz telephoned him from Berlin but as his son had already forgotten his native language they began to converse in English.

Henry’s ‘adopted’ parents kept every postcard and letter he was ever sent from his family and gave them to him on his wedding day.

They which have since been compiled into a book, Postcards to a Little Boy.

Mr Lichwitz, whose courage and foresight to part himself from his only child saved his life, was deported to Auschwitz on December 9, 1942 and was murdered a week later.

Speaking before today’s service of remembrance, Mr Foner said: ‘I found myself on a train when I was six from Berlin to Britain.

William and Yad Vashem chairman Avner Shalev (next to the duke) meet Holocaust survivors Mr Foner (rear right), 86, and Paul Alexander (nearest camera), 80, at the museum

William and Yad Vashem chairman Avner Shalev (next to the duke) meet Holocaust survivors Mr Foner (rear right), 86, and Paul Alexander (nearest camera), 80, at the museum

‘People took those children from the goodness of their hearts. I missed my family, obviously, so they sent me a postcard each day, mostly my father.

‘The people who adopted me, they never pretended to be my parents, they never tried to replace them. They said “Henry, when the war finishes we will see what happened to your family”.

‘So I called them uncle and aunt and we changed my name from Heinrich to Henry and Lichwitz became Foner, because it wasn’t a good idea to have such a German sounding name. I became Henry Foner and I stayed that way, because they were my family. ‘

Mr Foner said he felt ‘excited’ to meet Prince William as he wanted the chance to express his gratitude to Britain for saving his life. 

He said: ‘I was a soldier in the British army, I did service, so did he. I’m really very, very grateful to Britain. They saved my life, it’s as simple as that.

‘I guess it’s sort of a fairy story in a way. A little refugee kid is sent to a country where he knows nobody, luckily he is sent to a nice family who look after him and his family write to him every day.

‘And then one day he gets to the chance meet the prince to say thank you. I think it’s like a fairy story. ‘

William was also thanked by the descendants of a family who survived the Holocaust after being sheltered by the Duke of Cambridge’s great-grandmother and told him: ‘We all owe our existence to the courage of Princess Alice’.

The prince, who has learned about the extraordinary life of Princess Alice from Prince Philip, her son, spent time with Evy and Philippe Cohen at the residence of the Israeli Prime Minister.

Paul Alexander and Henry Foner after meeting the Duke of Cambridge

Paul Alexander and Henry Foner after meeting the Duke of Cambridge

During a private meeting, the Cohens told the Duke how their family survived the Holocaust thanks to Princess Alice sheltering their relative Rachel Cohen and her daughter Tilde during the occupation of Greece.

Speaking after they met with the Duke, Mr Cohen said: ‘It was extremely moving. It allowed us to tell a really difficult but beautiful part of the family history.

‘Prince William was very proud to know that his great-grandmother had saved our whole family.

‘He seemed to know the story very well, and asked us questions regarding our family and how it happened.

‘Princess Alice’s attitude was extraordinary, and what she did was absolutely extraordinary.

‘She was very courageous. She risked her own life to take in a family in need.’

Princess Alice, who was posthumously honoured as Righteous Among The Nations for her valiant effort to save the Cohen family, is buried on the Mount of Olives with a tree dedicated to her at Holocuast memorial Yad Vashem.

William will visit her grave later this week.

 



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