STEPPING off the ship at Parkeston Quay meant safety for thousands of jewish children fleeing Nazi Europe.

All under the age of 17 and some so young they were carried in the arms of older children, the Kindertransport was their salvation.

The first youngsters arrived on December 2, 1938 - they had come from a jewish orphanage in Berlin burned down by the nazis on November 9 in what became known as Kristallnacht.

That night saw about 100 jews killed, 267 synagogues and community buildings destroyed, tens of thousands of jewish shops and homes broken into and almost 30,000 Jewish men arrested and sent into concentration camps.

In response to the brutal persecution growing in Hitler’s Germany, the British Government agreed to take in refugee children.

Sobbing youngsters were parted from their heartbroken families and put on a one-way train to the Hook of Holland, before boarding ships that ferried them across the North Sea to Harwich and safety.

Anne Shearer from Colchester said the pain of the atrosities at the hands of the nazis is still felt by descendents of jewish survivors today, but so is the gratitude for the Kindertransport.

"My mother-in-law, my uncle and my aunt came to Britain on the Kindertransport," she said.

"It saved the lives of thousands of children from middle Europe under the threat of execution and concentration camps.

"But how difficult it must have been to put your child on a train not knowing if you will ever see them again - most of them never did."

The full feature is in this week's Standard - out now.