Jane Haining: A Life of Love and Courage

By: Mary Miller

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Synopsis: A &“very moving biography&” of a courageous woman who gave her life in order to stay with her orphaned students during the Nazi invasion of Hungary (Scotsman). A farmer&’s daughter from Scotland, Jane Haining went to work at the Scottish Jewish Mission School in Budapest in 1932, where she was a boarding school matron in charge of around fifty orphan girls. Jane was back in the UK on holiday when war broke out in 1939, but she immediately went back to Hungary to do all she could to protect the four hundred children at the school, most of them Jewish. She refused to leave in 1940, and again ignored orders to flee the country in March 1944 when Hungary was invaded by the Nazis. She remained with her pupils, writing &“if these children need me in days of sunshine, how much more do they need me in days of darkness.&” Her brave persistence led to her arrest by the Gestapo in April 1944, for &“offenses&” that included spying, working with Jews, and listening to the BBC. She died in the Nazi concentration camp at Auschwitz just a few months later, at the age of forty-seven. This story of her courage and self-sacrifice, her choice to stay and protect the children in her care, is &“an inspiring tale of quiet heroism&” (Neil MacGregor). &“Haining&’s firm moral compass emerges clearly, making her story heroic as well as heart-rending. Materially, she may have left little behind, but her legacy is enduring.&” —Church Times