大象传媒

I was born in Hamburg, Germany in 1931. My father was a journalist at the time, with Ullstein, in Hamburg. He was descended from Leopold Ullstein, the founder of the business, who was his great grandfather. Soon after the Nazis came to power they bought our the Ullestein business (newspapers and book publishers) then said to employ about 10,000 people throughout Germany) the partners and directors ( mostly jewish)lost their jobs, pensions homes etc and many left Germany. My father came to England approximately 1934 my mother and I followed about two years later, soon after the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games. I can remember standing on my grandparents balcony, they having had to move home twice already, and watching a smart looking motorcade on its way to and from the games flanked by motorcycle outriders and with a man standing up in an open car, with his arm in the air, Adolf Hitler, as I now know.I can rememer re-visitng my grandparents in Berlin on my own, in about 1938 or 1939 and being met by my cousin in German airforce uniform - he was doing his National Service. My visit was cut short presumably due to threat of war, and I was the last to see my grandparents alive: they perished in the Holocaust.

The first school I attended was in North London; I could not speak English when I started at this school, but I must have soon learned. In 1940 my parents and German uncle, who was living with us ( father of the cousin who had met me in Berlin) were arested and interned. Our house was closed and I went to live with her and her parents in-law in Macclesfield. My sister was not interned, presumably because her husband ( also German) was already in the British Army actually serving with the BEF in France.

When they were settled on the Isle of Man I went to join my mother in the women's camp in Rushen. We were billeted in a seaside boarding house in Port St Mary with several other German ladies. At that time our house had no electrcity. I can remember it as a pleasant time though not so, I suppose for my parents, as they were forcibly seperated. My father was in one of the men's camps around Douglas. I can remember we were taken to visit him and sat in rows in the auditorium of a theatre or holiday camp before being returned to our own camps. As at that time there was no school for us internees I was particualrly pleased on the island because my previous school days in Macclesfield and after our release, in various places in England, were particularly unhappy. I was German, had a German surname, (Hess!) and nearby towns and cities were being bombed. I was used to becoming embroiled in many arguments and scraps. Between and 1939 and 1945 I think I attended seven or eight schools.

Were were released from internment when father joined the English army at the end of 1940 beginning of 1941 and then followed him around his various postings in England, usually living in just rooms in a house. In about 1943 we settled in London and about this time I acquired my English surname as father was due to be posted abroad. My uncle who was arrested with my father in 1940 had meanwhile been transported to Australia on the Dunera where he died in 1945.

I can remember air raids on Liverpool ( though we lived outside the City) The bombers came over our district and I recall the joys of collecting shrapnel the next morning.

Soon after D Day and the start of the flying bomb campaign in 1944 I was evacuated and I can remember being taken to St Pancras station with a suitcase and a label. We were put on a train, on arrival we were told this was Leeds. Not having the benefit of televised footall, none of us had any idea where this was except it was a long way from home. By a process of elimination eventually we were allocated to various "homes". I ended up in a very kind home although I hated the experience of separation from my own home, and was certainly no easy evacuee. Eventually I returned home to London early were I can still remember flying bomb raids and certainly V2 rockets.

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