Red Cross, Red Crescent, Red Star of David

The founder of Red Cross, Henry Dunant, was a Swiss citizen who had accidentally found himself in Italy at a time when French and Austrian victims from the Battle of Solferino (in 1859) were lying around uncared for.  He quickly organised the women of the town to provide medical and transport assistance to the wounded. Dunant himself built temporary hospitals and arranged for decent medical supplies to be brought in. Then he asked captured Austrian doctors to work in those makeshift hospitals.

Very soon after, Dunant wrote A Memory of Solferino and had it published in 1862. Its effect was quite a surprise in that many Europeans were interested. He described the carnage he had found in Soferino and described the efforts his team of volunteers had made, trying to help the wounded. Would it be possible to get an agreement between governments to give medical attention to the injured, wherever they fell (in battle or from natural disasters)? Would it be possible to create international treaties that would protect the volunteers, wherever they came from and whichever wounded they saved?

The answer was a resounding yes! The International Committee of the Red Cross is a humanitarian institution that was formally founded in 1863 in Geneva, organised by Gustave Moynier, a prominent lawyer and president of the city's Society of Public Welfare,. The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum in Geneva holds the original document of that first Geneva Convention, signed by 16 mainly European countries.

Agreements reached at the first Conference, 1863.

Somehow, at that moment in time, all the nations of the world agreed to give the Red Cross authority under international humanitarian law to protect the victims of all wars! I cannot imagine the nations of the world ever agreeing to an organisation with international rights again. We know it was working - delegates of the International Committee visited the prisoners-of-war throughout the 1864-1914 era and, as noted in their reports, got improvements in conditions for captives on both sides.

In order to not force their Islamic citizens to be carried in ambulances with Christian symbols on the side, Ottoman officials in 1876 requested that a red crescent be used to mark their ambulances and that the Christian cross would be removed. Thus the red crescent emblem was first used on Islamic ambulances during the war between the Ottoman Turks and Russia (1877–8). It took a while before the crescent symbol was accepted by the Red Cross Society, but it was formally adopted in 1929, and so far 33 Islamic states have taken it up.

British women driving ambulances in France, World War I.

“National” Red Cross and Red Crescent societies have always concentrated on natural disasters within their own borders. The “International” Committee of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Society, on the other hand, tended to concentrate on situations of warfare across borders. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies was founded in 1919 and still coordinates activities between the all the individual national societies. The Federation Secretariat is well located in neutral, central Geneva.

Ambulance and nurses, Palestine, 1940s

Jewish patients were probably not prepared to travel in ambulances marked with Christian crosses either, but they had a bigger problem than mere symbolism. There was a concern that the Jewish Legion of Palestine, a Battalion of the British Army who were fighting to liberate Israel from Turkish rule during WWI, needed medical help. A Jewish ambulance service, called Magen David Adom/Red Star of David, was organised to aid both the Jewish Legion and the ordinary citizens. It was disbanded at the end of WW1.

Magen David Adom (MDA) was not officially chartered until the vicious riots of 1929 against the Jewish citizens who had no access to professional first aid services. While still under the British Mandate, the organisation was founded in Tel Aviv in June 1930 by nurse Karen Tenenbaum, 7 Israeli doctors, one hut and one ambulance. They added a branch in Haifa (1931) and in Jerusalem (1934), then a nation-wide network of services was slowly introduced for Jews, Muslims and Christians, reaching a total of 600 ambulances.

During World War Two, only two MDA services were recognised by the British Authorities. It wasn’t until after the state was established that the new parliament passed a law, giving MDA the formal title of Israel's National Emergency Service. From July 1950, Magen David Adom provided services in Israel regarding:

1. emergency medical care,
2. disaster care,
3. ambulances and
4. blood bank service.
5. a tracing service, to locate the children and grandchildren of families lost in the Holocaust.

MDA currently funds c1,200 emergency medical technicians, paramedics and emergency physicians. But in Israel (as in other nations?), MDA is mainly staffed by volunteers; 10,000+ of them. Today all volunteers complete a 60-hour course that covers many topics ranging from common medical conditions and trauma situations... to mass casualty events. Those who pass the course are then sent out across the country and work with local volunteers in ambulances.

MDA headquarters and its blood bank are located at the Tel Hashomer hospital, a place I know very well since I lived there back in 1971 and 1972. The organisation operates 95 stations over the country, with a fleet of over 700 ambulances nationwide. Air ambulance service is provided by Israeli Air Force 669 unit with MEDEVAC helicopters.

Carrying wounded civilians in the 1948 war (Life)

Naturally Magen David Adom applied for membership in the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, as soon as it was founded and fully operational. But it was too late. The "Red Star of David" symbol was not submitted to the ICRC until 1931 and membership for new organisations and symbols was closed at the 1929 conference. The conference decided that if they allowed the Jews to have a red star, instead of a cross or crescent, the Buddhists would want a symbol of their own, the Hindus might request something different etc etc. The Soviet Union avoided the problem by accepting the Red Cross as their official emblem, in order to gain entry.

Every attempt in the decades since 1931 to have Magen David Adom included in the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement failed. Until the American Red Cross became involved. The Americans stated that unless Jews, Christians and Muslims could all use their own symbol for their own citizens, they would withhold all administrative funding from the international organisation. From May 2000, the Americans did indeed withhold millions of dollars, until the Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies caved in. In June 2006, MDA was recognised by the ICRC and admitted as a full member of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent societies. It had taken from 1931 to 2006, 75 long long years.

Middle East Affairs Information Centre has a wonderful MDA poster from 1918 and a photo of the first modern ambulance being launched in 1931.

19th 20th Century History Images has a fine photo of Red Cross women running an ambulance service in 1928.

For an excellent review of the founding of the Red Cross in October 1863 and its early history, see Richard Cavendish in History Today October 2013. Of particular interest is the tense and destructive relationship between Dunant and Moynier. Moynier considered Dunant an impractical idealist and soon forced Dunant from his own movement!! Dunant was declared bankrupt and lived out his life in poverty. The only thing Moynier could not take away was Dunant's Nobel Peace Prize in 1901.

Australia's own Deco treasure - Burnham Beeches

Burnham Beeches in Sherbrooke was a large home built in the leafy Dandenong Ranges, an hour outside Melbourne. It was designed for the very wealthy Alfred Nicholas (1881 - 1937), a man who made his money by buying his brother's patent for analgesics. Nicholas marketed them under the brand name Aspro, a word that went into the Australian language as a generic headache tablet.

Burnham Beeches, 2010. The original Deco features are still in place, including glass bricks,  zig-zag motifs on the wrought iron work and cantilevered balconies.

The architect, Harry Norris (1888-1966), was a commercial architect in Melbourne in the inter-war era. And he stayed up-to-date by making a number of trips abroad, especially to the USA, to observe modern architectural trends. But probably Norris was given the job because he was a neighbour of the Nicholas family in Melbourne.

Norris was given explicit instructions; the new house was to have “fresh air, sunshine and an outlook of command, yet under control”. I have no idea what that meant, but being built in the 1930-33 era, the architect had no trouble coming up with an Art Deco design that fitted the bill.

The use of advanced reinforced concrete technology at Burnham Beeches was important; it provided for spiffy Steamlined Deco architectural elements eg cantilevered balconies, wide spans and continuous windows. So like many Deco buildings, the lines of Burnham Beeches really do remind viewers of an ocean liner moving through the water. A zig-zag motif was used on the decorative wrought iron work and on the balcony balustrades. Finally, the white exterior of the house was decorated with Australian fauna motifs in moulded relief panels.

Burnham Beeches, exterior straight after WW2 ended

One element of Burnham Beeches that Alfred Nicholas managed himself was collecting trees for the property. In every city of Australia, he searched for established trees to be purchased and planted. Then he travelled to Britain where he met one of the main gardeners at Kew Gardens, Percival Trevaskis. Percy was offered the position of head gardener at Burnham Beeches and quickly involved himself in designing the garden, rockeries, pools, waterfalls and an ornamental lake. Alas Alfred died in 1937, before the task was quite completed, but the vast majority of the work had been done by then. 

Allow me to mention another connection. In 1938, world renown violinist Yehudi Menuhin married Nola Nicholas, daughter of the George Nicholas (Alfred's brother), and sister of Hephzibah Menuhin's first husband Lindsay Nicholas. When Burnham Beeches was operating as a hotel later on, the main restaurant was aptly named Menuhin’s.

In 1941, right in the worst part of World War II, the house became a children’s hospital. Alfred Nicholas’ widow returned her main home in Melbourne and had Burnham Beeches restored to its pre-institutional standard.

interior Deco features still intact, in 2000

I am not sure why the house was considered too small, but in the decade after World War Two ended, two additional wings were added on. From 1955, the Nicholas Institute used the house as a medical and veterinary research facility, and later this grand old house was converted into a hotel. Even more accommodation units were added to the original building as recently as the 1980s.

In Feb 2010 the property went up for sale, again. Being heritage listed, I cannot imagine a developer trying to sneakily pull the building down in the middle of the night (although it has happened before). But in any case there are 50 guests suites in the renovated building, and even more could be added, with council approval.

gazebo, Alfred Nicholas gardens

I am not a bushwalker, but BOB'S AUSTRALIAN BUSH WALKING JOURNAL recommends walking throughthe acreage near the house. It is known for its extensive water features including waterfalls and an ornamental lake, complete with boat house. These gardens were donated to the Shire of Sherbrooke in 1965 and named the Alfred Nicholas Memorial Gardens. Acquired by Parks Victoria in 1972, a range of restoration projects have been done over the decades, including the rejuvenation of the lake.

The original 12 hectare Burnham Beech estate is still maintained in its utterly gorgeous state, as I can testify personally. I strolled the length of every path in the estate last weekend, concentrating on the spring growth:  mountain ash and liquid ambers of course, but also the flowering azaleas, viburnum and cherry trees.

A Wonder House in the Hills: the History of Burnham Beeches was written by Deborah Lee Tout-Smith, 1993.

paths wander throughout the Alfred Nicholas gardens

Extraordinary war heroine: Irena Sendler

I have known a great deal about the German Oskar Schindler, ever since I became close friends with the daughter of a Schindler-Jew in 1965. And I knew even more about the Swede Raoul Wallenberg because he was the greatest hero of my parents’ generation. Even the American Varian Fry and the Englishman Nicholas Winton became familiar names amongst Jewish historians of the 20th century. But Irena Sendler?

Irena Sendler (1910–2008) was a Polish Catholic social worker who served in a Polish resistance organisation in German-occupied Warsaw during WW2. The daughter of socialist and medical parents, the young woman was already committed to saving human life wherever possible, but that seemed like an improbable dream in Nazi-controlled Poland.

Jewish children in the Warsaw Ghetto, 1942

Zegota, the Council for Aid to Jews, was already organised by the Polish underground resistance movement. But Sendler, who was part of Zegota, had one big advantage. The Warsaw SocialWelfare Department’s canteens used to provide meals, financial aid and other services for orphans, the elderly and the destitute. By 1942 Irena could ensure that the canteens could also provide clothing, medicine and money for some Jews whom she registered under fictitious Christian names. And as an employee of the Welfare Department’s Epidemic Control Section, she had a special permit to enter the Warsaw Ghetto to check for signs of typhus, something the Nazis feared would spread beyond the Ghetto. She and her colleagues wore nurses uniforms (see photo below).

Using these typhoid-focused inspection tours of sanitary conditions, Sendler and her team of brave Catholic women smuggled out babies and small children in ambulances and public transport, wrapping the toddlers up as parcels. She also used the old courthouse at the edge of the Warsaw Ghetto as one of the main routes for smuggling out children.

As soon as it was safe to do so, the rescuers found heroic Polish Catholic families who would take the Jewish children in, as if they were their own nieces and nephews. When they couldn’t find families, Sendler used the Sisters of the Family of Mary orphanage in Warsaw, or various Roman Catholic convents more distant from the capital city. It is estimated that the team saved 2,500 Jewish children by getting them safely out of the Warsaw Ghetto, against all odds.

The project only came to an end in 1943 because Sendler was captured by the Gestapo and sentenced to death. But she had taken precautions. She had carefully noted, in coded form, the children’s original names and their new identities. She buried the records for safe keeping, hoping she could one day reunite the children with their true parents. Alas not a single Jewish mother or father survived the war.

Sendler in Epidemic Control Section uniform, 1942

The Polish Genealogy Project has a wonderful photo of Irena in a Social Welfare Department car, during Warsaw’s 1st May Parade in 1948.

Again against all the odds, Sendler survived into old age. Quite rightly, she was recognised by Yad Vashem in Jerusalem as one of the Righteous among the Nations in 1965. Sadly Poland wouldn't allow her to travel to Israel until 1983; then she could finally be acknowledged before the entire Jewish world. Clearly things have changed in Poland. Joedresch's blog noted that Irena Sendler was awarded Poland’s highest distinction, the Order of White Eagle in 2003, and she won the Jan Karski award for Valour and Courage in 2003. This very very old lady was officially designated a national hero in Poland and schools have been named in her honour.

Sendler was nominated for 2007 Nobel Peace Prize; eventually it was awarded to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and Al Gore, which was as it should have been. But what a shame that Sendler wasn’t nominated earlier. Like Winton in Britain, they waited until she was 100 years old before giving her the recognition she deserved.

Two films were made celebrating her life. Irena Sendler, In the Name of Their Mothers 2003 was a documentary based on the last interviews given by Irena Sendler before she died, and interviews with some of the children she saved. And The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler 2010 is a dramatic recreation of the events of 1942 and 1943.

The book The Other Schindler: Irena Sendler was written by Abhijit Thite and appeared in 2010. The publishers used an imaginative method to release the book; they held their launch next to the tree planted by Irena Sendler herself, along the Avenue of the Righteous in Jerusalem.

Avenue of the Righteous Gentiles, Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial, Jerusalem

Klimt, Kunstschau and Vienna: 1908

In April 1897 a few Viennese artists formally organised themselves into a group, having the rather ambitious goal of bringing the city into more active contact with progressive art abroad. This Vienna Secession, which consisted of Gustav Klimt (president), Koloman Moser, Josef Hoffmann, Joseph Maria Olbrich and Max Kurzweil, did not intend to make a total break from the mainstream art world. In fact they accepted help from the city government so that the Secession could quickly secure land for an exhibition hall; the building itself was constructed within a few months.

From the first, the Vienna Secession Building advertised with fine art nouveau posters for each of the Secessionist art exhibitions. In late March 1898, for example, the Vienna Secession opened its first exhibition. In Sept 1899, the 5th exhibition was devoted exclusively to French drawings and graphics, including Renoir, Pissarro and Vallotton.

The 8th Secession exhibition was held in Vienna in late 1900. It included rooms filled by the Glasgow School and CR Ashbee's Guild of Handicraft. They presented works of the most important artists from the rest of Europe: Charles Rennie Macintosh, Vincent van Gogh, Edvard Munch, Toulouse-Lautrec and Paul Gauguin.

The 14th exhibition in April 1902, was the best they put on - focusing on Beethoven. In early 1903, the Secessionists presented their 16th exhibition called The Development of Impressionism in Painting and Sculpture.

                                                       
The Wiener Werkstätte/Vienna Workshops, founded in 1903 by Josef Hoffmann and Koloman Moser, wanted the unification of the fine and applied arts. But the presence of these crafts-oriented individuals in the Secession did not warm the hearts of the many members who gave top priority to painting. Disagreements became more vigorous and so the Klimt Group went off on its own, within just two years of the Werkstatte’s formation.

The Kunstschau/Art Show of 1908 was arranged by artists in the Gustav Klimt Group and coincided with the celebrations held in Vienna for the diamond (60th) anniversary of Emperor Francis Joseph I’s reign. The artists were offered the use of vacant land, which had been designated for an eventual Konzerthaus, as an interim exhibition venue. In only a few months, Josef Hoffmann, Gustav Klimt, Otto Prutscher, Koloman Moser and others built and furnished temporary buildings accommodating 54 exhibition rooms, gardens, interior courtyards, café, a summer stage and a completely furnished, two-storey country house.

 Painting, sculpture, graphic arts, decorative arts and stage design were combined to create an art programme on exhibition premises covering 6,500 square metres. Indoor and outdoor floor space, walls, and showcases were filled and covered with works by 176 artists and many students from the Vienna School of Arts and Crafts.

Entrance to the Kunstschau exhibition hall

                                                         
Whereas the Procession of Emperor Francis Joseph I in the diamond jubilee year showed off the Habsburg monarchy’s long cultural diversity, the Kunstschau was somewhat different. Gustav Klimt (1862-1918) , in an opening speech that apparently was quite moving, declared the Kunstschau was a show of force of Austrian ambitions in art.

For young artists and students like Oskar Kokoschka (1886-1980) and Egon Schiele (1890-1918), the Kunstschau was their first exposure to foreign art, and a brilliant exposure it was. But there was a downside. Despite the enthusiastic press reviews, and the enthusiasm of those who did turn up, the numbers were smaller than hoped for. Perhaps there was a deliberate campaign against the Kunstschau.

How do I know how the exhibition rooms were set up? In October 2008, 100 years after the initial exhibition, the show was recreated at the Lower Belvedere. A large part of the original exhibits was exhibited in replicas of the former exhibition rooms, as well as documentary photographs, models, original plans and films.

One room was allocated to leading members of the Wiener Werkstätte. Another room had reproduced posters, pasted directly onto the walls as they were back in 1908. And yet another room of Theatre Art had glass mosaics and puppets, stage designs and costumes. Perhaps the most important room was dedicated to major works by Gustav Klimt eg Fritza Riedler (1906), Adele Bloch-Bauer I (1907), The Three Ages of Woman (1905), Danaë (1907/08) and his most famous work The Kiss (1908), which was acquired for the collection now housed in the Belvedere.

Gustav Klimt, Portrait of Fritza Riedler, 1906

Had I been alive back then, I would have hoped that the Kunstschau of 1908 might improve the reputation of Gustav Klimt in mainstream art circles. But with hindsight, we can see that the good times were not going to last for long. With the deaths of Gustav Klimt, Koloman Moser and Egon Schiele all during WW1, Austria’s flirtation with modernism came to a shuddering halt.

And after the war ended, it was even worse. The post-war economy could not feed its own citizens, let alone support an active art market. Even Kokoschka left Vienna and spent most of his long career outside the country. The Wiener Werkstätte and the Secession WERE still operating, but their impressive years were long gone.

Room depicting poster art