I know that using the term ‘Kristallnacht’ is controversial nowadays, and the last thing I want to do is upset anyone affected (directly or indirectly) by the pogrom, but it’s what my Oma called it in her memoir and, in Britain at least, it’s the most commonly-recognised name for the events around the 9th-10th November … More Kristallnacht
This year I’ve been tweeting extracts from my Oma’s 1943 diary (follow me @MyMischlingFam). The diary is an interesting mix of harrowing wartime experiences and mundane teenage angst. I think that interacting with it on a near-daily basis has really brought me closer to my Oma, what she was like as a 16 year-old, and … More Rosenstraβe
I spent a while thinking about what blog I would write for Holocaust Memorial Day. The theme this year is ‘Be the Light in the Darkness’. The blog I posted in February last year, about the different ways people helped my Oma’s family, would have been perfect for it. When I looked down my list … More Tante Liesel
I’ve been planning today’s blog for a long time. I want to tell the story of ‘Aunty’ Jeanne, a woman whose World War 2 experience has always fascinated me, but it feels like there’s so much I don’t know. Jeanne and her husband didn’t have children – like many other Jewish couples in central Europe … More Jeanne & Ernst Part 1: Staatenlos
Doing this research is hard. Reading my Oma’s diaries and memoirs can be pretty depressing, and the more I learn about the whole period, the bleaker it seems. My family – although temporarily exempted from the mass deportations of Jews – lived under harsh restrictions, with increasingly meagre food rations and in constant fear for … More Small acts of kindness
January 27th is Holocaust Memorial Day in the UK – in 2020 it marks 75 years to the day since Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Nazi’s largest concentration camp, was liberated. The theme for this year’s Holocaust Memorial Day is ♯StandTogether and the organisers are encouraging people to take part online, by sharing information about someone who died … More Onkel Fritz
My Oma (my mum’s mum) kept diaries for most of her life and we recently found a whole box of them in our attic. Her diaries are the type I’ve always wanted to be able to keep up – notes of what she did each day, with a couple of lines about more personal things. … More Oma and the Rosenstrasse Protests
My Mischling Family 