Description
Object description
German schoolchild in Hanover and Celle, Germany, 1933-1945
Content description
REEL 1 Background in Hanover, Germany, 1927-1933: family; education. Recollections of period as schoolchild in Hanover and Celle, Germany, 1933-1945: outbreak of Second World War, 1/9/1939; father's call-up for military service; attitude towards membership of League of German Girls; state sponsored holidays; emigration of aunt and Jewish uncle to Belgium, 1937; story of how family were interrogated by authorities each time aunt visited family in Hanover; impact of father's call up for military service; activities with League of German Girls; aftermath of Kristallnacht, 10/11/1938; nature of anti-Semitic restrictions; father's posting as pioneer with German Army to France; construction of air raid shelters; effect of air raid alarms.
REEL 2 Continues: keeping rabbits to offset food shortages; industrial targets bombed in Hanover; attitude towards British; reaction to German victories; story of bombing of family home by Royal Air Force, 4/10/1943-5/10/1943; sheltering in school after bombing, 5/10/1943; story of meeting friend in aftermath of bombing; move to live with grandparents who were living on farm, north of Hanover; father's arrival on compassionate leave; attending school in Celle; story of train being strafed by Allied aircraft, 1944; food shortages; mother's employment; physical condition.
REEL 3 Continues: arrival of ethnic German refugee family from Poland; clothing shortages; question of degree of awareness of nearby Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp; reasons for leaving school, 1945; hearing sound of artillery; story of helping mother to bury two dead German Army soldiers, 1945; attitude towards British Army troops; Allied dropping of propaganda leaflets; impact of liberation of Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp on surrounding area; reaction to end of Second World War and life under British occupation; meeting future husband Geoff Young; work as unofficial interpreter; question of how local German women were made to clean out huts at Bergen-Belsen Concentration Camp; relations with British Army troops.
REEL 4 Continues: hearing of end of Second World War, 8/5/1945. Aspects of period as civilian in Germany and GB, 1945-1948: journey to GB, 3/1947; marriage to Geoff Young in GB, 1947; learning that father was prisoner of war in Soviet Union; father's return to Hanover, 1948; story of how parents rebuilt family home in Hanover; father's attitude towards her leaving Germany; arrival of British Army troops, 1945; socialising with British Army troops; living conditions in immediate post-war period; parents' post-war lives in Hanover.