passed away in 2014.. She was part of the 'forced' Hitler youth, which, in essence, was the Girl Scouts in Germany.. Her group voted her to hand flowers to Hitler during a rally.. She handed them to him and his reply was, "Thank you little girl"..
She had TONS of amazing stories.. Her mom died when she was 6.. her dad went off to war as a Lieutenant Colonel, but was fighting, apparently on the Russian front, where he was captured and did 3 years in a Russian gulag.. they only let him go when he contracted shingles and they didn't want the entire camp getting it.. as an officer, he was shown respect and sent home, whereas an ordinary soldier would have been taken out back and had a bullet put in his head..
So, when she was 13, she was pretty much running the household with her younger brother and sister.. during a bomb run, a bomb went through their roof, down 3 stories into the basement where it didn't explode - or i wouldn't be here.. she had to climb on the roof, in the rain, to put a cover over the hole so that rain didn't come through the bomb hole in their roof..
Around the same age, she was at a train station that was attacked by P-38's.. she HATED P-38's from then on.. they strafed the train station and everyone was running willy-nilly and an officer grabbed her, at age 13, and tried to shelter her in a bomb shelter at the station, but the shelter guard told him, "only family allowed" to which the office yelled, "she's my wife!" and pushed past him - or, again, I wouldn't be here as very few people survived the attack..
I could go on and on, but those are the stories I usually tell.. No the German people had no idea what was really going on.. Hitler's propaganda machine was extremely effective at convincing the German people that they were defending themselves.. they had no idea what was going on with the Jewish people..
Oh, I forgot one of my favorites: My uncle owned (dunno if its still owned by the family or not) Joseph Goebbels house in Berlin and I stayed there a week when I was about 8 - I didn't know it was his house then, or even who he was..
Friendship is like peeing your pants.. Everybody can see it, but only you can feel the warmth..
