Sir Nicholas George Winton MBE (born Nicholas George Wertheim; 19 May 1909 – 1 July 2015) was a British humanitarian who organized the rescue of 669 children, most of them Jewish, from Czechoslovakia on the eve of the Second World War in an operation later known as the Czech Kindertransport (German for "children transportation"). Winton found homes for the children and arranged for their safe passage to Britain.
Winton died peacefully in his sleep on the morning of 1 July 2015 at Wexham Park Hospital in Slough from cardio-respiratory failure having been admitted a week earlier following a deterioration in his health. He was 106 years old.
Winton's death came 76 years to the day after 241 of the children he saved left Prague on a train. A special report from the BBC News on several of the children whom Winton rescued during the war had been published earlier that day.
Moved by what he'd seen on a trip to Prague, Winton -- then a young stockbroker -- returned to London and began organizing evacuations of children in 1939. He marshaled a team of volunteers to outwit immigration restrictions, and arranged for British families to open their homes when other countries shut their doors.
