The Story of Emmy Golding 1914-2010
Helen Stone’s mother Emmy Golding, née Kaufmann, was born in a small village near Cologne in Germany just as World War One was beginning. The 12 Jewish families in her village, who had lived there for many generations, were well integrated and yet maintained their religious identity. The insidious rise of the Nazis from 1933 onwards forced Emmy, her parents and her sister to flee Germany in search of a safe haven.
Emmy has amazing recall and describes her experiences vividly and powerfully on a video recording made by the Spielberg Foundation in 1996. She talks about growing up, school and the local community as well as about her dangerous but successful attempt to smuggle money out of Germany and her confrontation with an SS official in a desperate bid to have her father released from Dachau Concentration Camp.
She escaped to Britain on a domestic service visa in May 1939 and succeeded in rescuing her parents, who arrived in London just three days before the start of war in September 1939. She married, had children and eventually made a fulfilling life for herself and her family in England.
Helen’s presentation intersperses Emmy’s own testimony with personal memories of her mother. The Spielberg video, family photos and artefacts are combined with brief footage of the rise of the Nazis, thus setting the story against its historical background.
Although this presentation deals with the Holocaust, it does not give details of concentration camp life and ultimately has a positive and uplifting message to convey
Presented by Helen Stone
Helen Stone has 40 years’ experience as a secondary school teacher of English and Special Needs. She was the Head of English in a Pupil Referral Unit in the London Borough of Brent. Currently she teaches English as a Second Language to refugees and asylum seekers for New Citizens’ Gateway, formerly Barnet Refugee Service.
Since her retirement she has been presenting the story of her mother, Emmy Golding, to schools, trainee teachers and other organisations. Her mother started to tell her story when already in her 90s, and since she passed away in 2010 Helen has felt the need to continue the work that her mother began and this is why she became a founder member of the G2G committee. She is especially keen to speak to non-Jewish audiences who may have little knowledge of the Holocaust.
Watch an excerpt from the story of Emmy Golding
