Marie Schmolka was the only Czechoslovak representative at the Evian conference of July 1938, which focused on the Jewish refugee crisis. After the Munich agreement of September 1938, together with Doreen Warriner, she organised the Kindertransporte scheme that brought in Sir Nicholas Winton.
Schmolka was arrested by the Gestapo and gruelingly interrogated,her life at extreme risk. The Nazis exiled her to Paris, conditional upon her removing as many Jews as possible from Czechoslovakia. With the fall of France, she escaped to London, where she lived with the noted British Pacifist and Humanitarian, Mary Sheepshanks, in Gospel Oak, London. By now, her health had been broken by her extreme efforts to save Jews and others from the Nazis. She died, age 47.
Marie Schmolka saved thousands upon thousands of lives.
Czech Jewish feminist, social worker, and organizer of aid for refugees from Nazism. Chair of the Czech National Coordinating Committee for refugees that harbored tens of thousands of political refugees during the 1930s.
Erected 2021 Jewish American Society for Historic Preservation, Marie Schmolka Society.
