The 'half-Irish' Herbert Remmel

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Date
2015
Authors
O'Driscoll, Mervyn
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WVT Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier
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Abstract
This book chapter examines Herbert Remmel’s childhood experience which juxtaposed Hitler’s Germany and de Valera’s neutral Ireland. Born in 1936 in Cologne he experienced the war from the perspective of a child. As a fortunate nine year old, he escaped the bombed out Rhineland by taking advantage of a humanitarian operation involving the Irish Red Cross and the Save the German Children Society (SGCS). He landed off the mail-boat from Liverpool at Dun Laoghaire in Dublin on 27 July 1946 as a member of the first group of approximately 80 German children arriving under the scheme. Herbert’s experiences with his two Irish foster families instilled in the young German boy a deep and intimate appreciation of Ireland, its society, the Irish sense of place, the people’s traditions, the Irish rural way of life and Irish nationalism. Though only in Ireland for just under three years, the interlude was indelibly imprinted on his being and identity. His experience granted him rare insights into both his native fatherland, Germany, and his fostering motherland, Ireland.
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Herbert Remmel , Save the German Children Society (SGCS) , Rural Ireland , The Emergency , Irish-German Studies
Citation
O'Driscoll, M. (2015) 'The 'half-Irish' Herbert Remmel', in Egger, S. (ed.) Cultural/Literary Translators: Selected Irish-German Biographies II, Trier: WVT, pp. 95-116. isbn:978-3-86821-582-3
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© WVT Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, 2015