~ A Beautiful Street In Berlin Germany ~
~ Ellen is eight years old in this photo 1943 ~
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Hello This is Ellen
I must tell you a little bit about my wife Ellen, because she was my back bone in the course of our life together from the day we met, So please let me tell you about this beautiful woman, and my beloved wife.
I must tell you a little bit about my wife Ellen, because she was my back bone in the course of our life together from the day we met, So please let me tell you about this beautiful woman, and my beloved wife.
ELLEN GROWING UP IN BERLIN GERMANY 1936 - 1958
I will tell you now that there is no way I will be able to capture Ellen`s memories the way she remembers them. There will be no pictures or photo`s for you to see, you wouldn`t want to see them anyways. you won`t be able to smell the odor`s she smelt in the streets from dead horses and humans flash, you are not going to understand her nightmares from seeing people fighting each other for the dead horse meat that covered the street of Berlin .
Because it was the only food they could get with out being shot, they would kill to get it, during the war. Back then in 1939-1945. (Ellen was 9-years old ) Your not going to hear the sirens and horns blasting all day and night. you will not hear or see the air plains booming her city where she lived. I will not be able to describe the hurt and sadness when she saw her cousins, and neighbors being killed during the booming, And you only can imagine what it was like when she and her sisters were looking for their Mother in the rubble.
You won`t hear her cries, and won`t see any of her tears either. Her father was taken right out of their house and away from his family to go in to their Army. That must have made life harder for them all with out their father to support them though those rough times.
No one knows what it is like to go to bed at night with out eating all day for two, or three, or even four, days. I will do my best describing her memories and nightmares, Because Ellen was not one to speak of her life as a child and what
she went though. I drag most of what I am about to tell you from Ellen over the forty-seven years I known her...
I will tell you now that there is no way I will be able to capture Ellen`s memories the way she remembers them. There will be no pictures or photo`s for you to see, you wouldn`t want to see them anyways. you won`t be able to smell the odor`s she smelt in the streets from dead horses and humans flash, you are not going to understand her nightmares from seeing people fighting each other for the dead horse meat that covered the street of Berlin .
Because it was the only food they could get with out being shot, they would kill to get it, during the war. Back then in 1939-1945. (Ellen was 9-years old ) Your not going to hear the sirens and horns blasting all day and night. you will not hear or see the air plains booming her city where she lived. I will not be able to describe the hurt and sadness when she saw her cousins, and neighbors being killed during the booming, And you only can imagine what it was like when she and her sisters were looking for their Mother in the rubble.
You won`t hear her cries, and won`t see any of her tears either. Her father was taken right out of their house and away from his family to go in to their Army. That must have made life harder for them all with out their father to support them though those rough times.
No one knows what it is like to go to bed at night with out eating all day for two, or three, or even four, days. I will do my best describing her memories and nightmares, Because Ellen was not one to speak of her life as a child and what
she went though. I drag most of what I am about to tell you from Ellen over the forty-seven years I known her...
ELLEN AND HER MEMORIES OF GROWING UP IN BERLIN
Ellen had told me that her Father and Mother were two wonderful parents. And her Grandparents were the greatest to have. Ellen has three sisters, she did not have much or did her country. In America we had what you call depression in the 1930`s. In Germany it is like that all the time during the war . There was no work to fine, and if your Father or Mother did have a job it paid very little.
Needless to say they were always hungry, and lived in a two room apartment. Ellen has told me that they were one of the lucky one to have apartment even before the war. Ellen had many sad memories of her childhood. She can remember back to when she was four years old. She remember they didn`t have breakfast and dinner or supper any more for a
while, they eat when ever they had food to eat, yes back then if you didn`t use it you would lose it, so they ate what they had quickly because there was no way to store it away for tomorrow or the next day..
There were times she would go to bed hungry, they were lucky to even have one meal a day. there were times waking up in the morning with nothing to eat for breakfast. What ever food they could find, they would bring it home so the whole family can eat some thing no matter how little it may have been. And when I say find, the children would go to the farmers land and sneak on to the fields after they were harvest. They would bring home the discarded vegetable like Turnips, Potatoes, Carrots, Beets , and again they had to eat what they had because it would go bad on them, they would even share and give some to some one just so it won`t go bad..
The people would do their best to keep food safe, they would wrap it in cloth and buried the food in the ground where it was cooler in the summer times But she said she was happy because she had great grandparents who took good care of the whole family. It didn`t make any difference to her and her sister`s that they were hungry, and cold in the winter`s
Before the war, they only had a small oven stove to heat the apartment if they could get free coal, Ellen and her sister`s
would go to the train station or yard, and find bits and pieces of coal, they would fill a pail that each had and bring it home, they didn`t have any money to buy coal. She didn`t have a radio during the war and before. they were not allow
to have one. back then during the war you could be shot if you are found with one.
Ellen had told me that her Father and Mother were two wonderful parents. And her Grandparents were the greatest to have. Ellen has three sisters, she did not have much or did her country. In America we had what you call depression in the 1930`s. In Germany it is like that all the time during the war . There was no work to fine, and if your Father or Mother did have a job it paid very little.
Needless to say they were always hungry, and lived in a two room apartment. Ellen has told me that they were one of the lucky one to have apartment even before the war. Ellen had many sad memories of her childhood. She can remember back to when she was four years old. She remember they didn`t have breakfast and dinner or supper any more for a
while, they eat when ever they had food to eat, yes back then if you didn`t use it you would lose it, so they ate what they had quickly because there was no way to store it away for tomorrow or the next day..
There were times she would go to bed hungry, they were lucky to even have one meal a day. there were times waking up in the morning with nothing to eat for breakfast. What ever food they could find, they would bring it home so the whole family can eat some thing no matter how little it may have been. And when I say find, the children would go to the farmers land and sneak on to the fields after they were harvest. They would bring home the discarded vegetable like Turnips, Potatoes, Carrots, Beets , and again they had to eat what they had because it would go bad on them, they would even share and give some to some one just so it won`t go bad..
The people would do their best to keep food safe, they would wrap it in cloth and buried the food in the ground where it was cooler in the summer times But she said she was happy because she had great grandparents who took good care of the whole family. It didn`t make any difference to her and her sister`s that they were hungry, and cold in the winter`s
Before the war, they only had a small oven stove to heat the apartment if they could get free coal, Ellen and her sister`s
would go to the train station or yard, and find bits and pieces of coal, they would fill a pail that each had and bring it home, they didn`t have any money to buy coal. She didn`t have a radio during the war and before. they were not allow
to have one. back then during the war you could be shot if you are found with one.
But her grandfather did have one, Her grandfather also was hiding two Jewish friends in his root cellar when Hitler`s army was rounding them up to put them in to concentration camps. the two Jews were hiding in or on their grandfathers
vacation property. this property is for growing vegetables and gardens given to them by the government to use.. and when her grand father could not get there, Ellen or her sister`s would bring food and supplies to the Jewish folks.
The memories of that period still linger on in her mind till the day she passed away. It was a bad life and it didn`t stop there, During the war, the Russians were beating and raping most of the young women, Ellen`s oldest sister and Mother
were raped by the Russians. The horror of that alone sends chills up my back,
Ellen`s Mother receive a litter or notice from someone telling her that her husband was in Poland, and he was wounded and was not going to live because his liver was torn apart. Back then they did not know how to mend a damage liver. Ellen and her sisters with their Mother went to Poland to see him.
Ellen remembers seeing her Father once before this she was five years old, she was in the hospital with scarlet fever. Her Father was not able to go in to the hospital to see her . Ellen was quarantined in a ward with many children with the same illness. So her father manage to get a tall ladder and climbed up to her window and did get to say hello.
Ellen never saw her Dad again because of the war, she was told he was dead due to a damaged liver. But that was not true, her Dad did recovered and was sent back to his out-fit and ended up as a POW in the Russian camps. Ellen`s Fathers brother her uncle was also a POW but was in a different camp. Ellen`s Father was release one year later after the war.
Her uncle was not until three years later. Now Ellen is eight year old , and the war is at its worse. It`s 1944 Ellen`s Mother got the sanitation disease during the war from dirty water or food she may have taken. Ellen`s grandfather put her mother in a wooden wheel barrow and wheeled her to the hospital at least five miles or more, there was no other means of transportation for them to use.
The hospital was damaged, and they had no place to take her. there home was also damage from all the booming every where, they had to put her Mother with a group of injured and sick people while they tried to find some help for her, Later they could not find her Mother when they went back, no one could tell them what happen to her Mom, or where did she go. Ellen and her sisters did not find their Mother for days. Sister Rita was the oldest sister, but sister Gisela was the leader of them all , four girls looking for their Mom, two days of looking, Gisela found her dead,
IT took (13) days before they could buried their Mother ,Because there were lots of bodies to be buried, they would
give you a day to show up at the cemetery site and you had to wait for your number was called that they also gave you. Many bodies were buried in paper bags, but Ellen Mother had a casket given to them by their grandfather. their Moms Father.
The streets were covered with bodies, people going around stealing of the dead bodes and being shot if and when they been seen. The smell from the dead bodies and the animals was unbearable I was told. Lots of sickness was spreading
around, but that did not stop people taking shoes and clothing from the dead, It was at tough times during the war, you did what you had to do to stay alive and make it though the day or week. No matter how bad the horse meat smelled, they would cut down as far in to the flash to find clean meat to ate. Ellen said people were fighting over the meat even with thier own cousins and neighbors.
Day and night you would hear the siren`s and the loud horns going off for hours. Ellen told me many times when she ears our fire station siren go off, that it remind her of the war The continuously booming was so scary. Ellen was so frighten of thunder storms and lighting. It brings memories of the bombing of her city in Berlin .She will go around the house today and put all the lights on so she won`t see any of the lighting flashes. Then she would cover her ears and hide
her head under a blanket so she won`t hear or see the thunder. Many times I would find her under the dinning room table during a bad and loud thunder storm.
In Germany, they did not have as many of schools for the kids to go to. Ellen and her sisters had to walk to school four miles in the cold mornings during the winter . This is how she saw more of the damage that the bombing had done.
and to find many of her favorites places she like to go to, and she found her school was bombed badly. and the ones that were standing did not have any windows or heat, there was rubble all over the city. THAT`S WHAT WAR CAN
DO TO YOU.
Many of her childhood friends that she went to school with were killed in the bombing her neighbors were also gone a cousin was killed . I already mention that her Mother was killed. Just living with Ellen for forty seven years and watching her go though thunder storms the way I have, I hate it every time when I hear the weather station reporting there may be thunder and lighting tonight.
I would sit in the room with Ellen to try to comfort her though it, Ellen again would ask me to put all the lights on so she can`t see the lighting flashes. I must mention again if the room is dark, the flashes reminded her of when she was on the streets of Berlin during the black outs. and all you can see is lights in the sky form the airplanes that was dropping the booms
Ellen`s Grandfather took the four girls to live with him at his little garden property that I spoke of earlier. The Grandfathers home was also boomed out in the city. But he had his garden property left, it was only a small parcel piece of land for growing vegetables, it was large enough to have a small little house that he and Grandma live in during the summer.
So now there will be grandma and granddad with four girls living there, plus two Jews living in the root cellar who had Grandpa`s radio If Ellen`s Grandfather got caught having the Jews he would have been shot, but they were her Grandfather`s and Grandmother`s best friends most of their lives and they were not worrying about themselves at the time.
HER Grandfather had lots of food to eat, he had fruit tree`s and chickens and rabbits. lots of root vegetables in the root caller, and would not turn any one away who knock on his door who came there looking for something to eat and hungry.
Ellen told me it was like living in a different world living with her Grandfather and Grandmother. They all had to bath in a tub most of the time with cold water, If her Grandfather could find any wood to burn, he would heat the waster to luke warm, just to take the chill off it to get in.
Six people using the same tub of warmed water was a task at hand, It went like this, the first person up to the fifth person would get in and could not stay any longer then five minutes, the six person had the dirty and coldest water, but he or
she could stay in the tub as long as he wanted. LOL
Grandpa would yell out to every one WHO WANT TO GO LAST? So it got to where every one wants to go last, So Grandpa held six straws where each one was shorter then the other, and who got the longest straw went last. and the rest went like this the shortest straw went first next shortest went second and so on and so on
Father came home to Berlin City after the war, It was told to every one he was dead from his wounds, He had only one-third of his liver left but it mended and kept him alive. It was told that he looked for his family for days until a neighbor told him about his wife being dead, and his girls are with there Grandfather in their garden house. slowly things started to become a normal life,
Ellen Father got married again a year later. and his new wife had a four year old boy, then later they had their second son. This marriage was not working out for the girls, and their step mother was giving attention to her two sons more then the girls........ ( Rita Gisela, Ellen, Lore,)
vacation property. this property is for growing vegetables and gardens given to them by the government to use.. and when her grand father could not get there, Ellen or her sister`s would bring food and supplies to the Jewish folks.
The memories of that period still linger on in her mind till the day she passed away. It was a bad life and it didn`t stop there, During the war, the Russians were beating and raping most of the young women, Ellen`s oldest sister and Mother
were raped by the Russians. The horror of that alone sends chills up my back,
Ellen`s Mother receive a litter or notice from someone telling her that her husband was in Poland, and he was wounded and was not going to live because his liver was torn apart. Back then they did not know how to mend a damage liver. Ellen and her sisters with their Mother went to Poland to see him.
Ellen remembers seeing her Father once before this she was five years old, she was in the hospital with scarlet fever. Her Father was not able to go in to the hospital to see her . Ellen was quarantined in a ward with many children with the same illness. So her father manage to get a tall ladder and climbed up to her window and did get to say hello.
Ellen never saw her Dad again because of the war, she was told he was dead due to a damaged liver. But that was not true, her Dad did recovered and was sent back to his out-fit and ended up as a POW in the Russian camps. Ellen`s Fathers brother her uncle was also a POW but was in a different camp. Ellen`s Father was release one year later after the war.
Her uncle was not until three years later. Now Ellen is eight year old , and the war is at its worse. It`s 1944 Ellen`s Mother got the sanitation disease during the war from dirty water or food she may have taken. Ellen`s grandfather put her mother in a wooden wheel barrow and wheeled her to the hospital at least five miles or more, there was no other means of transportation for them to use.
The hospital was damaged, and they had no place to take her. there home was also damage from all the booming every where, they had to put her Mother with a group of injured and sick people while they tried to find some help for her, Later they could not find her Mother when they went back, no one could tell them what happen to her Mom, or where did she go. Ellen and her sisters did not find their Mother for days. Sister Rita was the oldest sister, but sister Gisela was the leader of them all , four girls looking for their Mom, two days of looking, Gisela found her dead,
IT took (13) days before they could buried their Mother ,Because there were lots of bodies to be buried, they would
give you a day to show up at the cemetery site and you had to wait for your number was called that they also gave you. Many bodies were buried in paper bags, but Ellen Mother had a casket given to them by their grandfather. their Moms Father.
The streets were covered with bodies, people going around stealing of the dead bodes and being shot if and when they been seen. The smell from the dead bodies and the animals was unbearable I was told. Lots of sickness was spreading
around, but that did not stop people taking shoes and clothing from the dead, It was at tough times during the war, you did what you had to do to stay alive and make it though the day or week. No matter how bad the horse meat smelled, they would cut down as far in to the flash to find clean meat to ate. Ellen said people were fighting over the meat even with thier own cousins and neighbors.
Day and night you would hear the siren`s and the loud horns going off for hours. Ellen told me many times when she ears our fire station siren go off, that it remind her of the war The continuously booming was so scary. Ellen was so frighten of thunder storms and lighting. It brings memories of the bombing of her city in Berlin .She will go around the house today and put all the lights on so she won`t see any of the lighting flashes. Then she would cover her ears and hide
her head under a blanket so she won`t hear or see the thunder. Many times I would find her under the dinning room table during a bad and loud thunder storm.
In Germany, they did not have as many of schools for the kids to go to. Ellen and her sisters had to walk to school four miles in the cold mornings during the winter . This is how she saw more of the damage that the bombing had done.
and to find many of her favorites places she like to go to, and she found her school was bombed badly. and the ones that were standing did not have any windows or heat, there was rubble all over the city. THAT`S WHAT WAR CAN
DO TO YOU.
Many of her childhood friends that she went to school with were killed in the bombing her neighbors were also gone a cousin was killed . I already mention that her Mother was killed. Just living with Ellen for forty seven years and watching her go though thunder storms the way I have, I hate it every time when I hear the weather station reporting there may be thunder and lighting tonight.
I would sit in the room with Ellen to try to comfort her though it, Ellen again would ask me to put all the lights on so she can`t see the lighting flashes. I must mention again if the room is dark, the flashes reminded her of when she was on the streets of Berlin during the black outs. and all you can see is lights in the sky form the airplanes that was dropping the booms
Ellen`s Grandfather took the four girls to live with him at his little garden property that I spoke of earlier. The Grandfathers home was also boomed out in the city. But he had his garden property left, it was only a small parcel piece of land for growing vegetables, it was large enough to have a small little house that he and Grandma live in during the summer.
So now there will be grandma and granddad with four girls living there, plus two Jews living in the root cellar who had Grandpa`s radio If Ellen`s Grandfather got caught having the Jews he would have been shot, but they were her Grandfather`s and Grandmother`s best friends most of their lives and they were not worrying about themselves at the time.
HER Grandfather had lots of food to eat, he had fruit tree`s and chickens and rabbits. lots of root vegetables in the root caller, and would not turn any one away who knock on his door who came there looking for something to eat and hungry.
Ellen told me it was like living in a different world living with her Grandfather and Grandmother. They all had to bath in a tub most of the time with cold water, If her Grandfather could find any wood to burn, he would heat the waster to luke warm, just to take the chill off it to get in.
Six people using the same tub of warmed water was a task at hand, It went like this, the first person up to the fifth person would get in and could not stay any longer then five minutes, the six person had the dirty and coldest water, but he or
she could stay in the tub as long as he wanted. LOL
Grandpa would yell out to every one WHO WANT TO GO LAST? So it got to where every one wants to go last, So Grandpa held six straws where each one was shorter then the other, and who got the longest straw went last. and the rest went like this the shortest straw went first next shortest went second and so on and so on
Father came home to Berlin City after the war, It was told to every one he was dead from his wounds, He had only one-third of his liver left but it mended and kept him alive. It was told that he looked for his family for days until a neighbor told him about his wife being dead, and his girls are with there Grandfather in their garden house. slowly things started to become a normal life,
Ellen Father got married again a year later. and his new wife had a four year old boy, then later they had their second son. This marriage was not working out for the girls, and their step mother was giving attention to her two sons more then the girls........ ( Rita Gisela, Ellen, Lore,)
Ellen mention to me that her step mother would give candy to her son`s right in front of her and get none. and specials and nice things were given on special days but not the girls, the boys always got new clothes and the girls had to use (hand me downs ). except from Rita the oldest girl. she did get new clothing when needed. the boys always eat better, and even got more of it, this would always happen when Ellen`s Father was gone on business and stayed a way
from the family for days.. it was a little normal when he was back home again .When the girls were old enough, they all left their Fathers house. and went on their own.
Ellen was 17 when she left on her own, I came into the pitcher in 1955 Ellen was 19, I was 18,Two very young but grown up kids
Ellen loved her Grandfather very much and was broken hearted when the wall went up that divide the East sector, from the West sector. Ellen`s older sister Gisela and her Grandfather was now cut off from seeing them. there was a area where they only had barbed wire at the border, Ellen and I would go there every chance we had to see if we could see her Grandparents because we could see her Grandfather`s yard from there, the people would let Ellen get in front when they knew she can see her Grandfathers yard hopping she might see him, we didn`t see them always when we went their. because we did not know when we would be able to get there and what time.. So it was like hit or miss. there were times that we did see them and we would yell over to them , but it was to far for them to hear us or see us. I would put Ellen on my shoulders so she could see better, and maybe she could catch her Grandfather eye when she was waving with both
hands' WE did sneak over to see them before going to the states,
When Ellen came to America, she lost contact of her whole family, we went back six years later to find that Ellen was not allow to cross the border at CHECK POINT CHARLIE, because she only had a German passport. I was able to cross because I had the American passport
We were told here before leaving that she did not have to have a American passport to go to the other side. when we came
back and complain to the travel agency what happen, they said they were talking about Ellen going from America to Germany. not from West sector to the East sector . So I went over with the three children, looking back at Ellen crying and waving her hands at the border, I met her younger sister Lore to take us over to see her older sister Gisela, and then we found out that her Grandparents were dead.
Ellen did find her Fathers house while I was gone. and two sisters in the West sector, we did stay with her Father while we were in Germany.
Thirty years has passed, Ellen did not know how to contact any one from her family, They all have moved and had new addresses, all her mail was being returned. Ellen didn`t know if her Father was still alive, or when he died same for her grandparents. Ellen knew they had to be dead after all these years, Ellen can`t forgive herself for not getting a American passport to go and see her grandparents..
After the wall came down in1989, we were contacted by mail from a friend of Ellen`s step bother dieter there was a phone number in the letter and we called it and talked to her Brother`s girl friend who was visiting America, She gave Ellen her step Brothers phone number, and he gave Ellen her sister Gisela`s phone number, and then another sister and another sister . We went back to visit for six weeks, and got to see every one in the family after thirty years.......
WOW, The day when I first saw Ellen was the most happy and lucky day of my life when I look back today. I recall that moment
as if it was yesterday, It felt like a ton of bricks fell on my head when I saw her the first time. I am so happy that I went to the
Christmas party that night, I was not going at first because I didn`t have a date or knew any one yet , I only have been in
Berlin two weeks. a few of the guys came in my room and said they are going to the party and invite me to go along with them, that`s how and why I was there on that bus that was caring Ellen...LOL
Once we got to the restaurant, I push myself in the dancing area where the sergeant and the girls were sitting, I made sure I had a
table near Ellen. I sat there at my table and would not get involved with the party or the group drinking that was going on. I just sat
there all night trying to get Ellen`s attention and interest in me to dance. My being determined had paid off, I DID GET TO DANCE WITH HER, BEFORE THE NIGHT WAS OVER.
I melt right in her arms ..LOL and before it the night was over.....WOW Look I know I am repeating myself here, but it is worth it, It just high lights of what has happen to me that I must repeat..
It was along walk back to my compound ,and all I could think about was her. I could not sleep that night, all I could think about how beautiful she was, and how soft spoken with a smile that would knock you over. She had beautiful white teeth that showed when she did smile ...WOW. She had beautiful black wavy hair, and she smelled like she was wearing the most expensive perfume.
WE would go to that café' every night when we were together, even if it was only for one glass of wine. but we would not end the day or night with out going there. we went there for over two years, The café' owner would not let anyone sit at the small table for two that was in the rear left hand corner of the café' He would always have a single flower in a vase for us, it was the only table that had a flower on it.
If you only could see the looks we would get at first, and then all the local learn to know us We went back and found it was torn down. Boy did I love this woman who I called ( MY BABE ) and I still do ...THE END
HERE IS ELLEN`S FATHER OTTO & MOTHER ARNNA
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SLIDESHOW BELOW IS SHOWING ELLEN`S NEIGHBORHOOD
SLIDESHOW IS SHOWING ELLEN`S NEIGHBORHOOD