Mrs. Ilse Cranmer was just twelve years old when, in 1939, amid the rise of Nazi persecution, she was sent to England as part of the Kindertransport rescue operation. “To my shame, I was not at all worried about traveling to England because I had been told that my new family had children and a dog,” Mrs. Cranmer recalled.
Now 98, this dark period of her life remains etched in her memory. As a young girl, Mrs. Cranmer witnessed the Nazis marching through her hometown of Vienna and she vividly remembers the signs declaring “Jews Out.” Her father, Hugo, promised they would reunite in America soon. This promise was tragically unfulfilled, however, as both he and her mother, Theresia, perished in the Holocaust.
Mrs. Cranmer arrived in England on June 23, 1939, unsure of what awaited her. “I had not one word of English,” she said, yet her adoptive family welcomed her with open arms, providing not just shelter but also love and support. “They adopted me like a child,” she recalled, describing how they enrolled her at a local school, where she quickly adapted and learned the language.
Recently, our team at World Jewish Relief had the profound honor of revealing something special to Mrs. Cranmer and her family: her original case file from 1939, which contained information about her foster family, her schooling, and her work life up until her marriage.
For decades, World Jewish Relief’s case files were lost and forgotten until a chance discovery revealed a treasure trove of documents detailing the extraordinary help the charity provided to Jews fleeing Nazi persecution. Now, we are returning these documents to families, unveiling fascinating details of their histories.
In Mrs. Cranmer’s words, “I am extremely grateful to have received my case file from you so quickly, and from so many years ago. My daughter read it to me as I am partially sighted. Some of the things I knew about, and lots I did not. The files will be kept safely as historic family records, and I hope treasured for the years to come by my next generation.”
