“An aid society sent me, my two older brothers, and my sister to Switzerland. My mother and baby brother hid for two years in a French castle with non-Jewish refugees. My father escaped from a work camp and joined the resistance. We all survived and reunited after the war.” Read about two Holocaust survivors, German Jewish newlyweds sent to America by their parents to have children to “save our people,” in One Person’s Loss. Learn more about the book in NOVELS.
Jews and non-Jews hid from the Nazis in a crumbling French castle
Berlin, 1937. Jewish newlyweds flee Germany for Brooklyn on the eve of the Nazi slaughter
I’ve always thought a castle would be a terrifying and grossly inconvenient place to live. There’s no lights. Darkness dominates every time the sun sets, until it rises again. Everything is made of stone.
Have you ever read Uncertain Refuge: Italy and the Jews during the Holocaust. I read this book the year I met Rabbi Levy. I was studying for conversion and had chosen the Jews of Italy as my focus. It is one of the best books I read, especially the parts about the diplomat Guido Lospinoso, who had a sense of humor about Nazis…
I haven’t read Uncertain Refuge, but I’ve read about Jews crossing the Alps to escape from northern Italy. I agree about castles. They always struck me, not only as dark, but as cold (drafty) and wet. No wonder they hung all those tapestries on the walls to try to keep out the chill!