Tributes have poured in for the late holocaust hero dubbed ‘The British Schindler’, who led a former Bucks Free Press journalist to safety in WW2, writes Jasmine Rapson.

Sir Nicholas Winton, who organised the rescue of 669 children destined for Nazi concentration camps, died at Wexham Park Hospital aged 106 on Wednesday, July 1.

Former Bucks Free Press reporter, the late Harry Warschauer was among the many who escaped the clutches of Nazi control on one of the trains organised as part of Sir Winton’s rescue mission.

Harry’s wife, Judy Warschauer, also a former Free Press reporter, paid tribute to Sir Winton.

She said: “I can’t thank Sir Nicholas enough; I owe 30 years of happy marriage to him after my late husband was rescued by him when he was just 15-years-old.

“It was 669 children but think of the thousands of descendants. Sir Nicholas and his family should be very proud of his legacy.

“I was able to thank Sir Nicholas myself if only briefly in 2009 at Liverpool Street station after a trip from the Czech Republic to London to mark the 70th anniversary of the rescue.”

Due to his extreme modesty, Sir Winton had kept his involvement in the Kindertransport a secret from everyone, including his wife, until she found a scrapbook documenting her husband’s work in 1988.

It then became public knowledge after featuring on BBC programme ‘that’s life’ and he was reunited with many of the children he rescued.

German-born Harry had previously thought the trains had been arranged by Quakers, before discovering they had been the work of Sir Winton after watching and Ester Rantzen documentary.

Harry used to run the Cookham book fairs in the 80’s and finally got the chance to meet Sir Winton, who lived near Maidenhead in 1989.

Sir Winton was born on May 18, 1909 in London to Jewish parents. He was a young stockbroker in London, before he dropped everything in 1938 to go to Prague and dedicate his efforts to the rescue of Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi occupation.

Bucks Free Press:

Harry Warschauer with Sir Nicholas Winton.

He was 29 when he formulated the huge rescue plan. He and his team persuaded the British authorities to allow the refugees in to the country without official documentation, and arranged for eight trains to aid their evacuation from occupied Prague, along with other forms of transport set up from Vienna between March and August 1939.

After their safe evacuation, Sir Nicholas endeavoured to find British families to foster the children, paying them up to £50 to look after the young refugees.

Sir Winton leaves a long legacy behind him; he was knighted in 2003 for services to humanity and a statue of him was unveiled at Maidenhead station in 2010.

There are also statues at Liverpool Street Station in London where the Kindertransport arrived in the UK and at Prague’s main railway station.

To add to the list it was announced in 2014 on his 105th birthday that he would receive the Order of the White Lion, the Czech Republic’s highest honour.

David Cameron took to Twitter to pay tribute to the hero saying: “The world has lost a great man. We must never forget about Sir Nicolas Winton’s humanity in saving so many children from the Holocaust.”

Maidenhead MP, Theresa May also paid tribute saying: “Sir Nicholas Winton was a hero of the 20th century. Against all odds he almost single handedly rescued hundreds of children, mostly Jewish, from the Nazis – an enduring example of the difference that good people can make even in the darkest of times.”

Sir Winton died to the exact day of the 76th anniversary of the departure of the train carrying 241 children, the largest number over the course of the six months.