‘Never thought we’d meet again’: Holocaust survivors reunite after more than 80 years

The first time their paths crossed, Alice Hubbers and Sonja Cowan were teenage girls sent away from home by their parents to save their lives.

Both had escaped the Nazi regime via Kindertransport – a rescue program that ran between 1938 and 1940, saving 10,000 mostly Jewish children from Germany, Austria and the former Czechoslovakia by rushing them to Britain.

Alice (nee Engel), who is almost 99, fled Vienna in December 1938 shortly after the terrifying and deadly wave of antisemitic violence known as Kristallnacht swept Germany and Austria. The following August, Sonja left her Berlin home on another evacuation from Germany.

Alice Hubbers and Sonja Cowan reunited after more than 80 years. Credit: Paul Jeffers

By 1940 the pair were among 160 Jewish refugees who lived at the Whittingehame Farm School – a former mansion in Scotland where children trained in agriculture, hoping to migrate to then Palestine.

Fast-forward to 2024 and neither imagined they would ever meet again with a fellow Holocaust survivor from Whittingehame. But fate had other plans.

Last year I wrote about my grandmother Sonja’s 100th birthday and her escape from Berlin as a 16-year-old girl. A few days later I received an email from Alice’s daughter, Caroline Lewis, who lives in Sydney. She had read my story and claimed Alice remembered Sonja from their time in Whittingehame together.

Caroline reported that Alice still lived independently in London and was planning a three-month trip to Sydney, which had become an annual ritual.

Alice Hubbers as a teenager at the Whittingehame Farm School.

“If there’s any chance of us being in touch that would be amazing!” Caroline wrote.

I rang Sonja and, incredibly, she did remember Alice among the many children at Whittingehame.

So, earlier this month Alice flew to Melbourne to reunite with Sonja for the first time in more than 80 years.

Sonja was surrounded by family in her youngest daughter’s home when Alice arrived, and we held back tears as they slowly walked to each other and embraced.

“We never thought we’d meet each other again,” Sonja said. “We are old people now, and we were so young.”

Alice described the moment as “almost unreal”. “I mean, it’s almost more than a lifetime,” she said.

A pamphlet for the Whittingehame Farm School with Sonja Cowan on the cover. Credit: Paul Jeffers

The pair gossiped and chatted. They pored over old photos and quizzed each other about the fate of other children from Whittingehame. Both had fond memories of the farm school even though they were so far from home.

There were Friday night Sabbath meals, singing, Hebrew and English lessons. They reminisced about the rhododendrons and other flowers that surrounded the historic building.

“There was this huge fir tree,” Alice remembered. “And we used to go in there and hide.”

Both girls spent time working in the laundry.

“There used to be these big long strings and the washing was icy cold. Frozen,” Sonja said.

They remembered some daring boys and girls sneaking into each other’s room by scaling the perilous heights of the outside walls.

“They used to walk on the outside ledge from one room to the other,” Alice said. “I mean, this is madness, on the second floor.”

Alice remembered well the horrors of Kristallnacht when mobs attacked Jews in their homes, businesses and on the streets. At the time, Alice was in her Vienna apartment with her mother when a group of Nazis stormed in, one of them seizing her money box and prizing it open.

“I was heartbroken. It was all the savings that I had,” Alice said. “He gave me a slap on my face. Oh, but I was not going to cry. I was not going to give him that satisfaction.”

It was not until 1947 that Alice was reunited with her parents. Sonja, however, never again saw her single mother Toni Ibermann or older sister Lotte who were murdered among the six million Jewish Holocaust victims.

After World War II, Alice settled in London, married and had three children. Sonja had three daughters in Glasgow before the family moved to Australia in 1962.

January 27 is International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which commemorates the genocide of Jews by the Nazis and their collaborators.

Alice and Sonja catching up.Credit: Paul Jeffers

Sonja and Alice are among an estimated 245,000 Holocaust survivors who are still alive, according to research published by the Claims Conference this year. But their number is fast declining.

Now, Sonja and Alice have a fresh beginning for their friendship. Our families have become entwined.

Although they may never embrace in person again, we have already started talking about their next meeting online. And with almost 200 years between them, there is still so much to catch up on.

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