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I was born on January 28th 1944 and I was living in Paris. My Hungarian father joined the Foreign Legion in 1939 and came home in 1940. My mother fled when the Germans approached Paris in my uncle’s car and went to the Lozere region.

When she came back to Paris — in the early stages all the Jewish people were told to register, otherwise they would be fined — so they registered. We refused to wear the yellow star.

In 1943 Churchill announced that the outcome of the war was changing. We as Jews weren’t allowed to work so father worked at home instead of the shop — and my mother worked at home. At the onset of the war, my mother went to the doctor and was found to be anaemic — so she went to the horse butcher and said that she would make dresses for meat.

In 1944, the Germans started to take the Jews to camps. I had a friend called George in the police and parents (who were pregnant with me) — and were told that they had 3 weeks to move if they didn’t want to go to concentration camps. In two days they had gone to another flat in Paris.

My mother was frightened to death, but my father didn’t care — he would go out in the morning and he said he didn’t know whether he would come home again tonight. With no yellow star, if he were caught he would be taken to a concentration camp. END

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