Harry Olmer, Windermere Boy turned dentist and Holocaust educator, dies at 98

Harry Olmer, one of the last of the child Holocaust survivors known as the Windermere Boys, died in mid-January 2026 at the age of 98. His death was reported by Jewish News on 15 January and by the Jewish Chronicle the following day, prompting tributes across British Jewry and from the Holocaust Educational Trust.

He was born Chaim Olmer in Sosnowiec, Poland, in November 1927, the fourth of six children. After the German invasion the family fled to a nearby village, where Jews were forced into labour. In 1942 the Jews of the area were rounded up; his mother and sisters were deported to Bełżec and murdered, while Harry, his brother and his father were sent to the Płaszów labour camp in Kraków. He was then forced to fill shells and mines with dangerous chemicals at a munitions factory in Skarżysko-Kamienna, a place he later described as hell on earth, before being moved to Buchenwald and its Schlieben sub-camp. He was liberated at Terezín on 8 May 1945.

Later that year he was among about 300 young survivors flown to Britain and taken to the Lake District to recover. He arrived speaking no English, yet passed his exams within two years, studied at Glasgow University and qualified as a dentist in 1953. He became a British citizen in 1950, served briefly as an army dentist and practised for six decades, retiring in 2013 at 86. He and his wife, Margaret, raised four children in Potters Bar.

In later life Olmer spoke tirelessly in schools, synagogues and community groups. His testimony was published as a book, 'My Revenge on Hitler is my Family', through the Federation of Jewish Services' My Voice project, and he was appointed MBE in 2023 for services to Holocaust education.