Taube Sussman

The Central British Fund (CBF) put together a large team of people to look after the Boys. 

The Boys were teenage and child-Holocaust survivors, who were brought to the UK after the war for rest and rehabilitation.

The British government offered 1,000 visas to bring the Boys to the UK but the caveat was that the CBF were responsible for their care and would pay all the expenses.

^{Tosca Sussman kneeling in the centre with Judith Singer in Windermere in 1945.}

Taube Sussman was the daughter of Jacob and Sima Sussman. She was known as Tosca and was born in Berlin on 18 February 1924. She had two siblings Aron (b.1922) and Sonia (b.1933). Jacob immigrated to Germany in 1923 from Poland where he ran a textile business. His wife joined him in 1924.

Kindertransport

The family was very Orthodox. Tosca’s brother Aron was a brilliant student and artist, but was denied access to higher education by Nazi regulations. In 1939, Tosca was sent for training for four weeks in Vorbereitungs lager, Rudnitz, before being sent on a Kindertransport to England. Only half of the group was selected to go on the transport since there were not enough certificates for everybody. Upon arrival in Harwich she was sent to Great Engham Farm for two weeks and then to Gwrych castle where she lived and worked for two years as a hair dresser. From there she went to Sealand and then to Manchester to a “Mercaz Limoud” to study Hebrew and then to Buckingham.

Though Tosca survived, her immediate family all were killed. Her brother Aron and father were sent to Oranienburg concentration camp. Tosca’s mother was able to buy them out in 1941, but they were told that they had to leave Berlin in 24 hours, which was not feasible. Her father was sent to Sokolow in Poland where he was killed, and Aron was sent to Stalowa Wolla, a labor camp in Poland. In 1944 he tried to escape and was shot. Her mother and sister were deported to Auschwitz, where they were gassed.

After World War II

After the war, Tosca went to Windermere to help care for the first group of the Boys.

She left for the United States in 1948. She married her brother’s best friend Ignaz Kempler. He survived Westerbork, Auschwitz/Dora, Mauthausen, Buchenwald, a death march and Theresienstadt. They had one son.