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Sir Nicholas Winton

Sir
Nicholas Winton
MBE
Nicholas Winton in Prague.jpg
Winton in Prague on 10 October 2007
Born Nicholas George Wertheim
(1909-05-19)19 May 1909
Hampstead, London, England
Died 1 July 2015(2015-07-01) (aged 106)
Wexham Park Hospital, Slough, Berkshire, England
Other names Nicholas George Wortham
Alma mater Stowe School
Occupation Humanitarian
Years active 1938–2015
Spouse(s) Grete Gjelstrup (m. 1948; d. 1999)
Children 3
Website nicholaswinton.com
Military career
Allegiance United Kingdom
Service/branch Royal Air Force
Years of service 1940–1954
Rank Flight lieutenant
Battles/wars Second World War

Sir Nicholas George Winton MBE (born Wertheim; 19 May 1909 – 1 July 2015) was a British humanitarian who organized the rescue of 669 children, most of them Jewish, from Czechoslovakia on the eve of the Second World War in an operation later known as the Czech Kindertransport (German for "children transportation"). Winton found homes for the children and arranged for their safe passage to Britain. The world found out about his work over 50 years later, in 1988. The British press dubbed him the "British Schindler".

In 2003 Winton was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for "services to humanity, in saving Jewish children from Nazi Germany occupied Czechoslovakia". On 28 October 2014, he was awarded the highest honour of the Czech Republic, the Order of the White Lion (1st class), by Czech President Miloš Zeman.

Winton was born on 19 May 1909 in Hampstead, London, a son of bank manager Rudolph Wertheim and wife Barbara (née Wertheimer). His parents were German Jews who had moved to London two years earlier. The family name was Wertheim, but they changed it to Winton in an effort at integration. They also converted to Christianity, and Winton was baptised.

In 1923, Winton entered Stowe School, which had just opened. He left without qualifications, attending night school while volunteering at the Midland Bank. He then went to Hamburg, where he worked at Behrens Bank, followed by Wasserman Bank in Berlin. In 1931, he moved to France and worked for the Banque Nationale de Crédit in Paris. He also earned a banking qualification in France. Returning to London, he became a broker at the . Though a stockbroker, Winton was also "an ardent socialist who became close to Labour Party luminaries Aneurin Bevan, Jennie Lee and Tom Driberg." Through another socialist friend, Martin Blake, Winton became part of a leftwing circle opposed to appeasement and concerned about the dangers posed by the Nazis.


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