Category:Kastner Train (subject)

Kastner Train

• See List of the Rescued
• See also : Magdeburg Train -- Terezin Train -- Troebitz Train

Overview

The Kastner train consisted of 35 cattle wagons that left Budapest on 30 June 1944, during the German occupation of Hungary, carrying over 1,600 Jews temporarily to Bergen-Belsen and safety in Switzerland after a large ransom was paid.

The train reached Bergen-Belsen on Sunday, 9 July, 1944 the passengers were taken to a special section, what would be known as the Ungarnlager (Hungarian camp), where they were held for weeks, and in some cases months.

The first batch of 318 passengers arrived in Switzerland on 18 August 1944, and the rest in December. It is reported that approximately 1,350 passengers arrived in Switzerland in December 1944.

The total saved was about 1,670. The group was housed in the Swiss village of Caux, near Montreux, in requisitioned former luxury hotels. The Orthodox Jews were housed in the Regina (formerly the Grand Hotel), and the others in the Hotel Esplanade (formerly Caux Palace).

Noticeable Child Survivors

• Peter Munk (M / Hungary, 1927)

• Péter Szondi (M / Hungary, 1929-1971)

• Thomas Kremer (M / Hungary, 1930-2017)
• Sever Sternhell (M / Poland, 1930)

• Simon Polgar (M / Hungary, 1931)

• Adam Heller (M / Hungary, 1933)
• Ladislaus Löb (M / Hungary, 1933)

• William Stern (M / Hungary, 1935)

• Meir Brand (M / Poland, Hungary, 1936)
• Thomas Komoly (M / Hungary, 1936)
• Shaul Ladany (M / Hungary, 1936)

• Judy Jacobs (F / Hungary, 1937)

• Itzik Weinberg (M / Poland, Hungary, 1938)

• John H. Merey (M / Hungary, 1940)

• Judith Rotem (F / Hungary, 1942)

• Michael Pinto-Duschinsky (M / Hungary, 1943)