From Terror in Berlin to Peace in America

By Elsa Fabig

This is the story of a young woman and the struggle she had to keep her family from the horrors of Nazi Germany. Beginning with her comfortable life as the wife of a successful doctor of political science in Berlin, she takes her three young children through a harrowing journey across Germany and to the East Sea in an attempt to keep them safe during World War II. Their escape took them from Berlin to Poberow on the East Sea, then on loaded ammunition trains as they narrowly escaped the Russians

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Nov 13, 2020
• ISBN: 9781684564804

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From Terror in Berlin to Peace in America

Elsa Fabig

Copyright © 2019 Elsa Fabig

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING, INC.

New York, NY

First originally published by Page Publishing, Inc. 2019

ISBN 978-1-68456-479-8 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-68456-480-4 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Rostock, Mecklenburg

Berlin

Berchtesgaden

Berlin

Poberow

Krangen

Poberow

The Escape

Rodesuette

Escape to Kirchberg in Hunsrück

Kirchberg

Herrstein

Bad Kreuznach

Bad Kreuznach to America

On January 30, 1933, Reich President Paul von Hindenburg signed Hitler’s appointment as reichskanzler and inevitably brought the Nazis to power.

After the death of Hindenburg in 1934, the führer and reichskanzler began with terror to undermine any opposition of human rights and made himself—within the German people, who had to obey the führer—many enemies.

As he appointed himself in 1941 to the highest-ranking member of the Wehrmacht, the Third Reich began to sway. His dilettantism started the beginning of the end and left Germany in ruins.

The pain and suffering he caused his people passed him by, being always well protected. He never felt the burden of what he had caused. He chose a less painful road by taking his own life.

Rostock, Mecklenburg

As the signs of an upcoming war cast its shadow on us, we were living at the time in Rostock, Mecklenburg.

I was forty-one years old; my husband, forty-three; my daughter Marianne, nine; my son Peter six years old, and my son Lutz was born in August 22, 1938.

My husband was self-employed and didn’t have to worry about losing his job, although he was under constant threat for not belonging to the Nazi Party.

We were saved from being one of the mass murderers and blind sheep. Until the end of 1938, our lives were in a content daily flow.

My husband’s income was good, and we were able to live our life on our own terms. In our days off, we would drive to the nearby Ostseebad, Warnemünde, where the children could play at the ocean. In the evening, we would leave the kids with my mother, who lived with us, and would then go down to the local tavern to discuss the here-and-now’s of daily events and to try and forget the lingering fears of things to come.

We were jolted out of our peaceful life as the Jewish persecution began since we had Jewish friends and were very worried about their fate. One particular event that unfolded nearby threw us in upheaval.

Marianne invited her friends from school to a party. One of them was a Jewish girl. The children were outgoing and playful, and nothing was going to change the atmosphere. The next day Marianne was going to bring her Jewish girlfriend the party gift that she had won the day before and had left behind and became a witness to furniture and family pictures being tossed through the window and on to the street. The Jewish family was no longer present, and we have never heard from them again.

Our life steered clear of any further horrors. With the acceptation of a single air raid in which the train station was damaged, we were still able to enjoy our days at the ocean, see our friends, play tennis, and spend time at the local tavern.

Belonging to our circle of friends were also an English fellow who was an antic art dealer, and his fiancée, an operetta singer from Berlin. On his word of honor not leave town, he was set free later as the war took on a larger scope. He was rearrested. We also never heard from him again.

My husband was given the responsibility to take over the factories in Heinkel by Warnemünde, which made window treatments to cover any light that could give a building away during air raids. He also was given to oversee the experimental work factory of Werner von Braun.