Lake District Holocaust Project secures £80,000 archive fund

An £80,000 grant has been awarded to the Lake District Holocaust Project to help make its archives available.

In August 1945 about 300 Jewish children were welcomed to Cumbria after surviving Nazi concentration camps.

They became known as the Windermere Children, with many rebuilding their lives in the UK.

The Arts Council England funding will allow work to take place in time for the 80th anniversary of their arrival in 2025.

Trevor Avery, director of the Lake District Holocaust Project, said it would also include stories of those from the area who welcomed the children into the community.

"We are very aware that we have had a lot of archive hidden behind the scenes because we just spent our time gathering the documents and interviewing and talking," he told BBC Radio Cumbria.

"Over the next two years we can make them available for local people and internationally, so people can see where the Windermere Children film came from, for example.

"We have got all of this documentation, all these stories, we just need to let people share in the glorious material that we have."

The children described the stay in Cumbria as "paradise".

They lived in wartime accommodation on the Calgarth Estate, at Troutbeck Bridge, near Windermere, which had been built for workers and their families employed by the Sunderland Flying Boat Factory.

Mr Avery has travelled to Israel to talk about the project, which was established in 2013.

"I am a guy who works in and around Troutbeck Bridge," he said.

"There I am in television studios and in people's homes for their Holocaust Memorial Day talking to them about this unique project about Jewish survivors that were welcomed here."

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