Abstract/Summary

This article examines how three Kindertransport refugees negotiated notions of identity and belonging throughout their lives. By focusing on the unpublished testimony of Ruth Balint and the diary-memoir narratives of Edith Bown-Jacobowitz and Elisabeth Orsten, this research highlights the complexities of identity formation in the face of exile and displacement. The findings show that belonging transcended national frameworks, manifesting itself in multifaceted attachments to places, communities, religious practices, and social connections that evolved continuously over time. The comparative methodology of analysing both contemporary diary entries and retrospective memoirs written by the same individual highlights processes of memory and identity construction, while also illuminating discrepancies that emerge through temporal distance and changing perspectives. The testimonies demonstrate that Kindertransport refugees were not passive recipients of rescue, but active agents who renegotiated hybrid identities throughout their lifetimes, often developing various attachments. This research contributes to Kindertransport scholarship by revealing how the trauma of displacement manifested itself not just through geographical relocation but as psychological fractures that influenced identity formation well beyond the immediate refugee experience, creating what many experienced as a perpetual cultural limbo that challenges conventional narratives of successful integration or assimilation.