Ursula Gilbert, Berlin, prewar:

My father always used to find something good in everything. Family was very important to him. He always used to read to us & talk & explain. He'd always say: ‘Things are not so bad. We'll get through it.’ Until the very, very last day.

During WW1 he was a prisoner of war in Russia. That's how he got the Iron Cross. When war ended he walked back to Berlin. He said it was quite easy: ‘I walked along the railway lines from Tashkent'.

My parents were under 50 when I left, before they were sent to Auschwitz. Older people were sent to Theresienstadt & younger people to Auschwitz, unfortunately. The little things I remember. 

My father sometimes talked about the children who were desperate to come to England on the children’s transport. I wanted to get away quickly. At school the Jewish children had to sit near the window instead of wherever we wanted. We had to be separate. We couldn’t mix in the school yard. We weren’t allowed to buy any second-hand books because ‘No, you can afford to pay for the new ones’. Lots of little pinpricks.

My father was very conscious & god-fearing. He believed in the goodness of people. He always said ‘Why quarrel?’ My sister & I, ‘you don’t get anything out of it, it’s silly.’ 

Words were very important. He'd always find the right words. Even the last—I have a lot of letters. Because my parents were sent to Auschwitz very late, in 1943. He sent a telegram to my uncle in Sweden saying ‘I’m going on the 9th transport’. That was the last I ever heard from them. 

Life is strange! My sister was 18, she met a boy, they got married on special permission. In Berlin she never had a boyfriend. Then she'd write to me, talking about this particular boy. They got special permission & were married the day before they were deported. So they were able to all be deported together, my father wrote.

Because he was convinced everything’s going to end in a happy way, I feel my father made it possible for my mother & sister not to be so frightened. It made their life more pleasant & more bearable, I think. He could talk & you could find always the good side of things.