Sir Nicholas Winton given Czech postage stamp honour

The Czech Post has issued a postage stamp in honour of Sir Nicholas Winton, the British humanitarian who organised mass evacuations of children to save them from Nazi concentration camps – just days after a successful Jewish News campaign to have the great man immortalised on a Royal Mail stamp.

Sir Nicholas arranged eight trains to carry 669 children, most of them Jewish, from Czechoslovakia through Germany to Britain at the outbreak of World War II in 1939. He died in July at the age of 106.

Sir Nicholas received the country’s highest award, the Order of the White Lion, last year in Prague.

The Czech Post says it is the first such commemorative stamp for the humanitarian, though the UK is also planning a stamp to honour him.

Sir Nicholas’s daughter, Barbara, called it “a special tribute” and “a lasting memento of his relationship with the Czech Republic”.

A successful Jewish News campaign for a Royal Mail stamp in his honour has been signed by 106,000 people.