A number of splinter groups have separated from Jehovah's Witnesses since 1931 after members broke affiliation with the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania.
Jesse Hemery was appointed overseer of the Watch Tower Society's British Isles branch office by Charles Taze Russell in 1901,[1] holding that post until 1946.
[2] Scholars estimate that during the Nazi regime, about half of all Jehovah's Witnesses in Germany were incarcerated in prison or concentration camps, where they were exposed to "sadism marked by an unending chain of physical and mental tortures, the likes of which no language in the world can express.
"[3] At the time, they were represented by several geographical Bible Students Associations, each of which considered itself affiliated with the Watch Tower Society despite little contact with their US headquarters in Brooklyn.
[8][9] In 1956, Watch Tower Society representatives visiting Freetown, Sierra Leone, encountered a splinter group called the "Ecclesia of Jehovah's Witnesses" that had formed several years prior.