Immediately after the opening of the DP International Children’s Centre, over 100 children of different nationalities arrived. They had experienced unimaginable poverty and the humiliation of concentration camps or hiding. Many were traumatised by the loss of family and home. They all longed for physical and emotional closeness.
To prevent the spread of infectious diseases, the newly arrived children had to be de-loused, examined by a doctor and cared for hygienically. They bathed, received clean clothes, could finally eat to their heart’s content and go to sleep in their own clean bed.
“The entire personality of a child seemed to change when the old, dirty, misshapen garments were replaced by clean, well-fitting and non-institutional clothes. … Apart from the feeling of well-being, it contributed to the re-establishment of a sense of personal worth…” *
Greta Fischer, UNRRA
1. Fitting clothes, Sofia Karpuk on a table, Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre
Many children arrived in Indersdorf with nothing but what they were wearing. They wanted to get rid of their rags as soon as possible and finally feel like a girl or a boy again.
2. Alexander Pecha measuring shoes, United Nations Archives and Records Center, New York
After years of hard work in ill-fitting shoes, leather boots were a real treasure.
* Pg 65