Ray Wolff

Citation Text: You have reached the cached page for http://www.nls.uk/catalogues/o...ries/acc12475.pdf Below is a snapshot of the Web page as it appeared on 08/04/2011. This is the version of the page that was used for ranking your search results. The page may have changed since it was last cached. To see what might have changed (without the highlights), go to the current page. You searched for: `Helen Weir Dunn Gollan` We have highlighted matching words that appear in the page below. Yahoo! is not responsible for the content of this page. Microsoft Word - Acc 12475 _UH_.doc Acc.12475 January 2008 Inventory Acc.12475 Rainer Wolff National Library of Scotland Manuscripts Division George IV Bridge Edinburgh EH1 1EW Tel: 0131-466 2812 Fax: 0131-466 2811 E-mail: manuscripts@nls. uk © Trustees of the National Library of Scotland Family correspondence, official documents and family photographs, 1924-1976, of Rainer, or Ray, Wolff (4 October 1924-14 August 2002). His father being of a Jewish family, Rainer Wolff was sent out of Germany to Scotland on a `Kindertransport`, organised by the Quakers, in 1939. He first lived with a family in North Berwick, then moved with them to Roslin, then moved to Edinburgh. He attended Edinburgh Academy and later studied engineering and draughtsmanship. In 1947 he married Helen Weir Dunn Gollan (1923- 2000), sister of John Gollan (1911-1977), socialist author and General Secretary of the British Communist Party (see Acc.11479). In 1949 he was able to visit his parents for the first time after ten years, but Scotland remained his home for the rest of his life. His parents, Werner Wolff (1891-1969), a schoolteacher, and Elisabeth Wolff, née Dibbern (1896-1979), had originally intended to emigrate together with Rainer, who was their only child. However, the costs of this, as well as the fact that the USA and Great Britain would not take any more immigrants by this time, had forced them to remain in their hometown of Hamburg and only send their son to safety. They were initially able to remain in communication with Rainer with the help of a relative in Switzerland and the letter service of the Red Cross. They suffered under the anti-Jewish legislation of Nazi Germany, which resulted for example in Werner Wolff's forceful retirement in 1935, but his marriage to a non-Jewish wife initially protected him from deportation. In February 1945, however, this exemption was generally abolished and he was deported to Theresienstadt, where he remained until the end of the war while his wife stayed in Hamburg. Nobody else of his closer family survived. After the war he was reinstated as a schoolteacher and worked until his retirement in 1956. Following his training in engineering, Rainer Wolff worked for United Wire and Cameron Ironworks until 1988. He had been interested in politics from a young age and met his wife as a fellow member of the Young Communist League. Having married into a large family of politically active communists, his life continued to be heavily influenced by politics. He was involved with the trade union movement and was an active member of the Edinburgh Trades Council, to whom he bequeathed a fund for the training of trade unionists. The collection was kept by Elisabeth Wolff and is centred on her and the family's struggle to stay in touch with each other during and after the war. The letters and documents span the period 1928-1995 and cover private family matters. After the Second World War, the focus is mainly on the German side of the family. However, references to Rainer Wolff's Scottish career can be found in his letters to his mother and in the tributes read at his funeral. See also the papers of the Edinburgh Trades Council (Acc.11177). Deposited, 2002 . 1-8 Correspondence 9-10 Official documents 11 Diary 12-15 Family photographs 16 Tributes to Rainer Wolff 1-3 Correspondence of Rainer Wolff 1 Rainer Wolff, letters, 1939-1946 Letters, 1939-1946, of Rainer Wolff to his parents in Hamburg; also letters of his host family, the Patersons, Roslin, and other persons connected with his move to Scotland. Many of his communications are telegraph-like letters conveyed by the Red Cross. 2 Rainer and Helen Wolff, letters, 1947-1979 Letters, 1947-1951 and 1971-1979, mainly of Rainer and Helen Wolff, to Elisabeth and