A True Story from World War Two

On the night of 30 September 1938, Harry Lewy must flee for his life.

At the stroke of a pen, Czechoslovakia's border region has switched from comfortable home to dangerous place for any Jew. By agreement with the Allied powers of Britain and France, Adolf Hitler's Germany is taking over the Sudetenland and Harry, a Jewish German speaker, must abandon everything in his previously secure world to escape persecution.

Forced to lie low with soldiers taking control of the streets, he seeks to make his way covertly out of Czechoslovakia. Fear, uncertainty and danger accompany him on the perilous journey across Europe – across the heart of Nazi Germany – in search of sanctuary.

Ultimately, he finds himself in a new state: isolated and vulnerable, penniless and unwanted. Like others fleeing war and disaster, he has been stripped of his position, his dignity and his identity. This story tells one refugee's flight from fear towards a new life.

Reviews

Michael Lewis captures perfectly the mix of terror, determination and sheer exhaustion that his Jewish father experienced as he fled for his life from his Czechoslovakian homeland, eventually crossing Nazi Germany to safety in Belfast shortly before the outbreak of the Second World War.

While it is the unique story of one refugee who loses everything, risks everything and starts again in a foreign country, it will surely help us understand better the plight of those who continue to make such perilous journeys in our own time, and perhaps deepen our compassion for them as well. The Revd Canon Dr Alan Billings

Harry's story is richly informative about historical events that should never be forgotten. At the same time, its human details engage our current predicament.

It narrates an individual as we hope they would be treated in law and policy – not labelled as 'refugee', 'asylum seeker' or 'migrant', but recognised as a person with dignity, needs and rights. John Birtwhistle