‘There was no chance to be a child’: new exhibition shows how war changes children’s lives | Children

When John Hajdu was three years old, his parents gave him a teddy bear small enough to fit in his hand: 86 years later, it is the only thing that has survived from his childhood.

The bear, whom the 89-year-old calls “teddy”, stayed with him when his father was taken to a concentration camp, his mother was sent to a concentration camp, and he hid in a non-Jewish neighbor’s closet before being forced into the Budapest ghetto.

From 31 July, the teddy will be shown in public for the first time as part of Childhood in WarA new exhibition at the Imperial War Museum, London, explores how conflict changes the lives of children.

Displayed in a World War II bedroom, the bear sits among toys, books and personal items that invite visitors to imagine what childhood looks like when sports, education and family life are disrupted by war.

The exhibition includes hundreds of objects that have a deep space, including a full-scale railway, a wartime classroom and a living room and a cold kitchen, along with testimonies from children living in conflict in places such as Ukraine, Sudan and Afghanistan.

For Hajdu, the teddy represents a troubled childhood. Before the war, his life was that of a well-to-do, Jewish family. By 1944, after years of anti-Semitic persecution in Hungary, her father was sent to a concentration camp and Hajdu and her mother were forced into the yellow star house.

He said: “We only took what we could carry, and this meant only clothes and a few teddies. “There was no opportunity to be a child. I didn’t have any other toys or books. We were allowed to go out during the day wearing the yellow star. I couldn’t meet the other kids. We were not allowed in parks, movie theaters or swimming pools or restaurants. I was completely alone.”

This show looks exactly at the daily losses. The reconstructed classroom shows how war disrupts children’s education through materials from conflicts including World War II, Northern Ireland, Afghanistan and the former Yugoslavia.

There are jokes to warn children about landmines and unexploded ordnance. Visitors can also board an evacuation train filled with letters sent home and Kindertransport items, including a red knitted jumper given to Jochewet Heidenstein by his parents before he and his sisters fled Berlin to Britain.

In October 1944, Hajdu’s mother was arrested and taken to the Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria. Believing that he would never return, Hajdu’s aunt banished him to the closet of a non-Jew.

He said: “I had a teddy in my pocket. “I was in the dark and I had to be quiet. It seemed like a very long time, which was very scary for a seven-year-old…

He later moved with his aunt to the Budapest ghetto, sharing a house with more than 20 strangers. There were no children. We survived on horse meat and bread. Dead bodies were piled up in the streets, dead from cold, hunger or disease. I was always hungry. Again, I had a teddy in my pocket.

The ghetto was liberated by the Soviet army in January 1945, before the German soldiers returned and planned to destroy it. Miraculously, Hajdu was reunited with both of his parents. His mother survived Mauthausen after US forces liberated the camp, but returned with broken ribs, broken teeth and lasting mental scars. He said: “I was sure that I would never see my parents again.”

Ten years later, after the Soviet Union crushed the Hungarian rebels, Hajdu and his mother walked 40 kilometers across a frozen river in the dark to reach Austria. They arrived in Britain in 1957 on a Red Cross train, with Teddy in tow.

Throughout the show, stories like Hajdu’s are juxtaposed with contemporary stories about children facing war today. Visitors can see a 360-degree tour of an underground school in Ukraine made by one of its students, read poems written by Ukrainian children for Unicef’s. Poems for Peace projectand see children’s cartoons in Sudan which was later presented as evidence for alleged war crimes brought before the International Criminal Court.

A poem by a 15-year-old Afghan girl describes the time when the Taliban returned to Kabul in August 2021: “I saw how that day darkened not only the sky of Kabul, but also the dreams and hopes of many.”

The show also explores how childhood can become political, with material from the Hitler Youth and the Soviet Komsomol.

“We wanted to talk about the impact of war on children’s lives,” says curator Fran Singleton. “With so much contention in the news right now, it felt like the right time to create a show that gives families a chance to come together and discuss these important topics.”

For Hajdu, letting teddy leave his home for the first time has been incredibly difficult.

He said: “Teddy really did that, and he still means a lot to me.” That was the only family connection I had when I was three years old. “It’s hard for me to look at the desk where he sits all the time.”

Now a grandfather of four, Hajdu spends a lot of time speaking in schools about how to survive The Holocaust. As the number of survivors dwindles, he hopes younger generations will continue to tell these stories.

“I tell them, ‘When you go home, talk to your grandparents and your parents, find out if they have faced any danger, either in Asia or Africa.

“My little story is an example that you can survive.” Unfortunately, people are suffering all over the world.