Harry Schwarz

Harry Schwarz was born Heinz Schwarz to Fritz (1897–1969) and Alma Schwarz (1901–1999) in Cologne, Germany.

His family belonged to the Glockengasse Synagogue.

Harry Heinz Schwarz (13 May 1924 – 5 February 2010) was a South African lawyer, statesman and long-time political opposition leader against apartheid in South Africa, who eventually served as the South African Ambassador to the United States during the country's transition to majority rule.

He arrived in South Africa as a Jewish refugee from Germany in 1934 with his mother and younger brother Kurt.

His father Fritz, a Social Democratic Party activist, left for South Africa the night the Nazis came to power.

They boarded the SS Giulio Cesare in Genoa, Italy which took them to South Africa.

When they arrived in Cape Town they stayed in one room in a house in Kloof Street.

Schwarz described how he was "lucky" as eventually he was able to sleep in a bathroom in a rusty bath.

He spoke no Afrikaans or English at first and had strong memories of being taunted on the schoolyard for being different.

Following his graduation from school in 1943, he was offered a job working for a stockbroker, as well as a university scholarship.

However, Schwarz instead joined the South African Air Force during World War II in order to defeat Nazism.

He served as a navigator and fought in North Africa, Crete and Italy.

It was in the air force that he adopted the name Harry, as his Colonel said Heinz would not stand him in good stead if he were captured by Germans.

He was in 15 Squadron and seconded to the RAF.

In 1946 he went to University of the Witwatersrand (more commonly known as Wits University) in Johannesburg with the help of a Government loan and grant, where he first befriended fellow students and future anti-apartheid political activists Nelson Mandela and Joe Slovo.

He joined the United Party and assisted in the 1948 election.

However, as a result of the National Party victory, he was determined to become more active and was elected Chairman of the United Party branch at the university.

He argued that the National Party's victory in 1948 was reversible and anyone who opposed them should concentrate on defeating them.

As a South African Air Force World War II veteran during the 1950s, Schwarz co-founded the Torch Commando, an ex-soldiers' movement to protest against the disenfranchisement of coloured people in South Africa.

Described as South Africa's "most feisty politician" and a political "maverick", he was known for his parliamentary clashes with the apartheid government over its racial and economic policies.

In his political career spanning 43 years, in which he gained respect from across the political spectrum, he never lost an election.

Advocating a more aggressive political opposition to the National Party's racial policies in the 1960s and 1970s, as Leader of the United Party in Transvaal and leader of the liberal "Young Turks", he clashed with the United Party establishment.

Schwarz rose from the childhood poverty he experienced as a German-Jewish refugee to become a lawyer and a member of the Transvaal Provincial Council, where from 1963 to 1974, he was Leader of the Opposition.

In the 1964 Rivonia Trial he was a defence lawyer.

He pioneered the call in white politics for a negotiated end to apartheid and in 1974 signed the Mahlabatini Declaration of Faith with Mangosuthu Buthelezi for a non-racial democratic society in South Africa.

He was in the opposition for over 40 years and was a founding member of the Democratic Party.

In 1984 he was made an Honorary Colonel of the 15th Squadron.

In 1988 he received the Order for Meritorious Service and received several Honorary Doctorates.

He was also one of the South African Jewish community's foremost leaders and spoke out strongly against anti-semitism.

Schwarz was described by the University of Stellenbosch as "one of the conceptual and moral fathers of the new South Africa" in the sense that he had not only been one of apartheid's most prominent opponents, but his ideas and the initiatives he had taken had played a key role in the development of the concept of a negotiated democracy in South Africa, based on the principles of freedom and justice.

Nelson Mandela, a friend of his whom he visited while in prison, described him as a "champion of the poor".

In light of his record, his appointment as South African Ambassador to the United States in 1990 was widely heralded as symbolic of the government's commitment to ending apartheid, and played a significant role in renewing the nation's image as the new democratic South Africa.

Schwarz stated in an interview in 1991 that "I know what the word discrimination means, not because I've read it in a book, but because I've been the subject of it. And I know what it means to be hungry."

The discrimination and financial difficulties of his family left a strong impression on Schwarz and helped shape his political philosophy with its emphasis on social justice and the rule of law.

He attended Tamboerskloof School and South African College Schools in Cape Town and then Jeppe High School for Boys in Johannesburg.

In an interview in 1991, Schwarz said on the National Party victory that "To me, they were the people who had supported Germany during the war. As a young man, it was very objectionable to me that the very people I had been fighting against were the people that the National Party had supported."

He was also president of the university's ex-servicemen's league and chair of the Law Students Council.

He stood as a candidate for treasurer of the Students Representative Council and refrained from voting for himself which he considered to be unethical.

When the votes were counted, it was announced that Schwarz had lost by one vote.

He was awarded a BA, with distinctions in both history and economic history, and later an LLB.