March 1945: Susan Pollack OBE, age 15, is on a death march from Guben slave labour camp to Bergen-Belsen concentration camp:

I never exchanged a word with anyone. I was on my own, withdrawn within myself. If you'd been found talking to someone, you'd have been shot. No place to escape. I didn’t know anyone. Where would I go? Who'd help me? I was very obedient & did what I was told. 

That was their way, making sure that you follow. I don’t know how we survived, how anybody survived. Conditions were so dreadful. A long, long, long walk.

I wasn’t there very long, the barrack in Belsen. Conditions were… bodies all over, dead, rotted. I woke up to find my neighbour dead. I heard shouting when the liberation came. But it didn’t mean anything to me any more. It didn’t matter. Bergen-Belsen was a place of death.

Look, I’m grateful I’m alive. I’m grateful that I could survive with an enormous amount of pain. The Swedes were helpful actually, in creating—that’s what music does to one’s life. Music, that was my recovery, help. 

We walked away, there was no revenge. We walked away, we didn’t commit any crimes or hate or anything like that. I’m glad we did not. We just walked away & hoped perhaps we can somehow build a life, just a little life. 

I became a Samaritan, that was very helpful to me. I used to take my children at Christmas time to hospitals & relieve the staff from serving tea. We would do it. That I found, for me, is very helpful. 

I had befriended a number of British soldiers who had liberated Bergen-Belsen. They are my real heroes, who liberated after such a long battle & yet retained kindness, helpfulness. That stayed with me. Goodness, kindness & helpfulness are the driving forces for life.

After liberation Susan was sent to Sweden to convalesce.

I began to understand that there is a goodness in the world. I don’t have much recollection about getting there. I was in a daze. I thought it must be a dream, a fantasy that people cared about me. I feared that the picture will disappear. I didn’t completely understand liberation myself yet. It had to come gradually. 

Listening to music every night. This wonderful, youngish man had a very big collection of music he played to us. Lights off, we sat in the dark. And I learned I had an inner life. That inner life was strengthened by listening to the music, because Beethoven understood me. Somehow the beautiful, lyrical music was there. And the darkness opened up like a flower.