Margot S Memoir Surviving Hitler And Stalin

Margot Richens grew up in Nazi Germany. In school she learned obedience and self-repression. Her table grace: "Fold your hands, bow your head, and thank the Fuehrer for your bread." She belonged to the Hitler Youth, and she sold blue advent candles for Hitler. During the war, she survived the bombing and escaped the raping of two million females as Germany collapsed. Then Margot speaks of infestations of lice and scabies, of no heat and stealing coal, of root canals without anesthesia, of eating dogs, even of cannibalism. She speaks of refugee camps and deportations to Russia. Every male seemed a predator, and Communist oppression replaced Nazi oppression as the Soviets "liberated everything dear to us." Then came her harrowing escape westward. Through all the terror, the love for her mother runs through her memoir like a golden thread-the saving uplift to the benumbing cruelties of the Nazis and Soviets, the belittling unkindness of her father, and the uncaring thoughtlessness of the alcoholic, Canadian soldier she married. In 1955 the newly-weds arrived in Canada where Margot, bearing the weight of past and present, began her search for self-expression and her own light......

Margot Richens grew up in Nazi Germany. In school she learned obedience and self-repression. Her table grace: “Fold your hands, bow your head, and thank the Fuehrer for your bread.” She belonged to the Hitler Youth, and she sold blue advent candles for Hitler. During the war, she survived the bombing and escaped the raping of two million females as Germany collapsed. Then Margot speaks of infestations of lice and scabies, of no heat and stealing coal, of root canals without anesthesia, of eating dogs, even of cannibalism. She speaks of refugee camps and deportations to Russia. Every male seemed a predator, and Communist oppression replaced Nazi oppression as the Soviets “liberated everything dear to us.” Then came her harrowing escape westward. Through all the terror, the love for her mother runs through her memoir like a golden thread—the saving uplift to the benumbing cruelties of the Nazis and Soviets, the belittling unkindness of her father, and the uncaring thoughtlessness of the alcoholic, Canadian soldier she married. In 1955 the newly-weds arrived in Canada where Margot, bearing the weight of past and present, began her search for self-expression and her own light...

The oral history of a renowned Czech writer, whose optimism and faith in people survived grueling experiences under authoritarian regimes.

“The terrified yell of my comrades makes me stop. I drop the potatoes into the grass and turn around. He has pulled out the pistol and is taking aim. Slowly I come back.” Surviving the Gulag is the first-person account of a resourceful woman who survived five grueling years in Russian prison camps: starved, traumatized, and worked nearly to death. A story like Ilse Johansen’s is rarely told—of a woman caught in the web of fascism and communism at the end of the Second World War and beginning of the Cold War. The candid story of her time as a prisoner, written soon after her release, provides startling insight into the ordeal of a German female prisoner under Soviet rule. Readers of memoir and history, and students of feminism and war studies, will learn more about women’s experience of the Soviet gulag through the eyes of Ilse Johansen.

Between 1941 and 1945, thousands of German Jews, in fear for their lives, made the choice to flee their impending deportations and live submerged in the shadows of the Nazi capital. Drawing on a wealth of archival evidence and interviews with survivors, this book reconstructs the daily lives of Jews who stayed in Berlin during the war years. Contrary to the received wisdom that “hidden” Jews stayed in attics and cellars and had minimal contact with the outside world, the author reveals a cohort of remarkable individuals who were constantly on the move and actively fought to ensure their own survival.

When the Red Army invaded Finland in November 1939 most observers expected a walkover. Instead, in a gallant stand that captured the world's imagination, the tiny Finnish army was able to hold off Stalin's mechanized echelons for 105 days. Gordon F. Sander peels away the layers of myth surrounding this Nordic Thermopylae to reveal the conflict in its full military, political, and cultural contexts. A bestseller in Finland, the English-language version of Sander's book draws on interviews with both Finnish and Russian veterans of the war, in addition to a bountiful archive of articles from both the Western and Finnish press, to create the most comprehensive and up-to-date single-volume history of the war. Written in "real time" to give the reader a you-are-there feeling, the book describes the Finns' stunning defeat of the Soviets' initial massive offensive, including the destruction of several Red divisions by Finnish ski troops; the deceptively calm January interregnum, when the two sides engaged in a complicated diplomatic minuet; and the final, titanic Red assault itself, which finally drove the Finns to the peace table-though not before they had forged one of the great legends of modern military history. Using his intimate knowledge of Finland and Finnish history, the author explains how the Finns' winter skills, their innate sisu, or toughness, and their devotion to both their young republic and their brilliant and inspiring commander-in-chief, Gustaf Mannerheim, together enabled them to make their historic stand. Sander explores such oft-ignored aspects of the conflict as Finnish press censorship; the abortive Allied "rescue mission" across Scandinavia that was a factor in Stalin's surprising decision to bring the war to a halt; the Kremlin's novel use of paratroopers in the war; and the pivotal role played by the Lotta Svard, the Finnish all-purpose women's auxiliary. Illustrating Sander's fast-paced text are nearly 50 photographs, including numerous never-seen-before images of both the battlefront and the home front. Hailed by Helsingin Sanomat, Finland's leading daily, as "a bittersweet morality play" that "opens up this quintessentially Finnish tale to a much wider and admiring readership" and by STT, Finland's leading news agency, as "an outstanding book that combines brilliant writing with a rock-solid factual foundation," Sander's compelling book fills a key gap in the record of the Second World War.

"In these tales the reader can observe Anne's writing prowess grow from that of a young girl's into the observations of a perceptive, edgy, witty and compassionate woman"--Jacket flaps.

In the Third Reich, political dissidents were not the only ones liable to be punished for their crimes. Their parents, siblings and relatives also risked reprisals. This concept - known as Sippenhaft – was based in ideas of blood and purity. This definitive study surveys the threats, fears and infliction of this part of the Nazi system of terror.