The Australian Women's Register

2 hours 10 minutes Gertrud Wilkins was born in Brne in 1910, which after the First World War became part of Czechoslovakia. Her mother had a millinery business and her father was a chartered accountant. The family was Jewish. Gertrud describes her schooling and teacher training. She had a short-lived marriage and at the outbreak of was in 1939 was living and working in Prague. Gertrud decided to flee her country and describes the journey across country to Poland and on to London. Gertrud’s situation came to the attention of the South Australian branches of the Women Graduates Club and the League of Women Voters who sponsored her immigration. She sailed to Australia via New Zealand in 1940. Gertrud tried to get work with the Education Department but was ‘knocked back time and time again’. Her sponsors found her a job in a private kindergarten for a year, after which time she remarried and ‘suddenly overnight became…worthy to teach Australian children’. She taught for two years at Adelaide High School before moving to the country. Mrs Wilkins concludes by describing her marriage, which ended amicably; the raising of her son; and the relatively little contact she has maintained with the local Czech community.