Rabbi John Desmond Rayner CBE (30 May 1924 – 19 September 2005) was born in Berlin as Hans Sigismund Rahmer. He left Berlin in 1939 on one of the last Kindertransports. There were about 10,000 children on the train. Both his parents, Ferdinand Rahmer and Charlotte Landshut, were murdered in the Holocaust. He was an active participant in inter-faith work as co-chairman of the London Society of Christians and Jews. As a result of this work in 1993 he was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire. John Rayner was married and had three children and two grandchildren.