Rosa's Child (11 page)

So her father was dead. As for his life, it had hardly been a shining example of moral rectitude. Nobody denied the obvious fact that his behaviour had been disreputable, dishonest and cruel. Was he not guilty of the ultimate act of rejection, in abandoning twins before their birth and leaving their mother to fend for herself. As a pregnant but unmarried Jewess, Rosa Bechhöfer was doubly at risk in a society steeped in racial hatred and moral bigotry.

And yet for Susi, finding out about her father had been what she had set out to achieve. Now, thanks largely to the tireless work of Brigitte, she had been successful. As she wrote in her diary:

I am so happy to know about this man, because life is all about KNOWING. Our fears come from the unknown. It was the not knowing that has always been the most difficult to endure, worse than anything I might ever find out. And yet, despite genuinely believing that as I sit here and write, recalling this journey of mine, there is a part of me that would, without any doubt, much rather have retained that wonderful fantasy of my father.

Susi had every reason to feel proud of herself, for her determination had led to the discovery of the truth. But it was not yet the whole truth.

EIGHT

Cousins Galore

A
s the reunion to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the Kindertransport approached, Bertha Leverton was working at a pace which alarmed her family and friends. She knew that without adequate publicity and promotion this key event, designed to highlight one of the Nazis' grossest sins, was likely to pass by unremarked. For Bertha, even to contemplate such a thing was itself a sin. It was imperative that she seize every opportunity to drive the message home. Therefore when visiting her sister in Israel it was only natural to Bertha to take advantage of her presence in that country by speaking on a radio programme to be broadcast by the English-language section of Kol Yisrael, part of the Israeli Broadcasting Authority. She pleaded with Efraim Geffen, the programme's producer, to allow her just thirty seconds at the end to mention one particular name. He agreed, and so listeners heard the message: 'Bertha Leverton has a special appeal regarding one of the former Kindertransport children', and then Bertha herself:

Anybody who has heard of the name Bechhöfer - two little twins, and they were hardly three years old - and it was only recently that a surviving twin, now called Grace Stocken, who lives in a small town in England - she found out that her name was Bechhöfer, that her father's name was Otto Hald and her mother was called Rosa Bechhöfer from Munich. If anybody has any recollection of someone called Bechhöfer, would they please get in touch, because she is desperate to find out who she was.

No sooner had the programme ended than listeners began to phone in. It was as if, out of nowhere, an international Jewish network had sprung into being, with names and telephone numbers enthusiastically exchanged in a number of cities around the world. The word soon spread to America, home of six million Jews. A Mrs Orbach and a Mrs Bamberger made contact to give the phone number of Mark Breuer, both women stating that his sister Meta was married to Jerry Bechhõfer. This man, whose name apparently lacked the umlaut, so that it was pronounced differently from Susi's, was the head of a large family of orthodox Jews living in a suburb of New York. Here, it seemed, was one possible family member.

'When Bertha returned from Israel and told me that people were coming forward, well, I went into ecstasies,' recalls Susi. 'I said to myself: "Calm down, calm down now -it might not be anybody." Alan told me to take it easy too-because I would just go up to the ceiling. Of course it might not be anybody, but then again, I thought, it could equally be a big breakthrough.'

Before Susi was able to pursue this latest lead, Jerry Bechhõfer beat her to it.

October 17th, 1988

Dear Miss Bechhõfer

One of your friends told us that you were on Kol Yisrael News on October 7th and that you were looking for relatives.

If you are one of the daughters of Rosei Bechhofer, then you are indeed my first cousin. My father was Bernhard Bechhofer, one of Rosel's older brothers. Your mother, if she was that, was the next-to-youngest sister of thirteen siblings.

Two brothers died young. Seven sisters perished in the Holocaust, one sister survived and died here app. 15 years ago. My father and his remaining two brothers died here - the last, Isaak - app. 12 years ago.

So, are you our cousin? If so, are you not one of twins?

Please write to us.

Sincerely

Jerry G. Bechhofer

'Well, yes, of course I'm one of the twins,' Susi exclaimed in her diary, 'so it's very clear to me not just that I'm Rosel's daughter, but that it is my first cousin writing to me.'

Barely a fortnight after his first, rather cautious enquiry, Jerry Bechhofer was back, this time outlining the history of the entire clan and enclosing a family tree. Now he too was in no doubt: a first cousin had indeed been found. 'Of course you are our cousin,' he wrote. 'It's very simple. Your mother was our Tante Rosei (we never called her Rosa), a very kind woman who did not have an easy life.'

Jerry went on to speak about Frieda, the eighth child of Gabriel and Sara Bechhöfer, Susi's and his mutual grandparents. The only member of the family who had put herself out to help Rosa by covering her expenses during her pregnancy and then during her confinement, Frieda had died in a concentration camp. Three of Rosa's brothers had made it to America, but over half of the Bechhöfer children had perished in the gas chambers. The story of the Bechhöfers was, in this respect, that of the greater part of European Jewry in that dark time: they had been caught up in a programme of systematic slaughter the horror of which the world had not witnessed before or since. However, those who had survived had gone on to replenish the family stock, Jerry explained. On a more personal note, he said: T want to tell you how exciting and moving it is to have heard from you and to have "found" you. I hope that some day we meet in person. Ours is a very historic people and everyone counts - very much. It's thrilling that now, instead of 8 cousins, we are 9.'

In fact, there were in the United States and elsewhere in the world cousins galore - at least two dozen second cousins and well over fifty second cousins once removed. Mainly orthodox Jews living strictly in accordance with the Torah, some members of the family had had six or seven children, others even more. Indeed, when Jerry had enclosed the family tree he had apologized because it was not quite up to date. 'For example, section II shows only 6 grandchildren for us. That was nine grandchildren ago. I hope all this is not too much family for you - after having been virtually without one all your life,' he added.

'Receiving this long letter was one of the most earth-shattering experiences of my life,' says Susi. The reasons were clear: at last someone had told her who her mother was, and that she had not just one but many living relatives. And then there was the shock of learning that many of my family had perished in the Holocaust. Up until now its horrors had been something that had happened to other people, and had in no way impinged on Susi's life. Making all these discoveries at once, she recalls, made her glimpse what it must be like to go crazy.

Bertha Leverton was thrilled for Susi and enormously gratified to have played a crucial role in reuniting her with her family. For had this not been her self-imposed brief from the start: to put the former children of the Kindertransport in touch with family, relatives and friends? Her objective achieved, Bertha did admit later: 'Sometimes I do feel a little guilty though, for having turned her life upside down.'

Not too guilty, however, to stop her dropping a strong hint to the
Jewish Chronicle,
the long-established newspaper of Britain's Jewry, that there was a story which could be of interest to them, namely the apparently successful outcome of Susi's search. Coverage of the story, Bertha was well aware, would also give welcome publicity to the Kindertransport reunion, now only a few months away.

A few days later Susi received a telephone call from Jenni Frazer, a journalist from the
Jewish Chronicle.
The newspaper, until that day unknown to Susi, did indeed want to run the story, regarding it as of enormous interest to the Jewish community.

'Refugee Susi Home At Last,' the paper announced, giving considerable prominence to the piece. 'Saved from the Nazis and raised as a Christian, Susi Bechhöfer has retraced her roots,' it added below. And there, surrounded by a moving account of Susi's quest to date, was a photograph of the twins at about four years of age, each child beautifully turned out in a pretty matching dress with a lace collar, and both smiling broadly.

The article was well written and caused something of a stir in Jewish circles, unaccustomed to tales with a happy ending. Nowhere was this more true than in the Bath home of an elderly lady by the name of Miss Edith Moses. She was not a regular subscriber to the
Jewish Chronicle;
it was by chance that she had bought that edition. She looked at the picture of the twins again and again, and became convinced that here were two little faces on which she had set eyes before.

'I shouted out to my sister: "I know those children",' she would later recount. I was very excited, very surprised. I said to my sister: "I must contact the JC straight away" -and that I was there at the home where they were.'

She was indeed. Edith Moses had been a teacher working at the Antonienheim in Munich from April 1938, a few weeks before the twins' second birthday. It was she who had seen Rosa Bechhöfer coming and going from the orphanage, always rushing, always looking fraught. Miss Moses herself had only just managed to escape from Germany in time.

If the breakthroughs were now coming thick and fast, this did not diminish the impact of every new discovery. In this case Susi found it particularly distressing to learn of someone who not only knew her mother but who had witnessed her pain at such close quarters.

"It is a very strange feeling,' Susi confided to her diary, 'as if the doors of the orphanage have been opened again. Walking through its corridors again, and a return to being a little girl. It's very confusing.'

Edith remembers absolutely everything, even the gap in my teeth. She told me that we were put there when we were 6 weeks old. I find this fact very difficult to look at. Not so much in terms of myself - but in terms of my mother -the pain that must have been hers. She gave a very graphic description of Rosa coming to the nursery, of seeing us both and having to leave us - and of how upset she used to be that she couldn't actually look after us. This is one of the hardest things of the whole picture to come to terms with.

Before long Susi and Edith Moses met. For the former teacher the reunion was one of pure joy:

It was simply wonderful to see Susi again. I stood here by the window and I waited for the taxi. I watched her get out of the taxi, went down the stairs and I said: 'My darling little Susi, did I ever think in my wildest dreams that I would ever see you again?' I just couldn't believe it - it was like a miracle.

For Susi it was also an unforgettable day, but because of the feelings the meeting evoked, it was a bitter-sweet experience. Back in Rugby that evening, Susi turned to her diary once more. Only here, it seemed, could she express herself freely.

The most significant day since May 18th 1939. 50 years ago I lost her and now have found this lovely lady. If ONLY is what I came away with - if only the other plans she spoke of had come to fruition, then it would have been a home with a Jewish family in California. Or at least a home in the orphanage knowing my mother - if only there hadn't been a war. But no - it was a childhood of misery. At least now though there is a future that holds the promise of recapturing some of the things that were lost - my name, my Jewish heritage and family.

Quite unconsciously, Susi had developed a strategy for survival. She would simply switch off at various points, anaesthetizing herself against the pain, despite the clear therapeutic value of her diary. For she could only absorb so much information at any one time. So whenever the occurrence of the name Rosa Bechhöfer seemed to threaten great pain, Susi simply refused to confront the situation directly. She would distract or distance herself from any information which she felt to be unappealing, unfavourable, or in any way damaging to her cause. For ever since Jerry Bechhofer had started to correspond with the new cousin whom he had yet to meet, he did not disguise his view that Rosa was most unlikely to have survived the war. Was Susi therefore not clinging to false hopes?

'It seems strange to me that she should have made her way to England in 42 or 43,' he wrote. 'The Germans didn't let anyone out any more at that time. Where is your information that she came to England?'

In answering this question Susi was pleased to be able to refer to the documents she had received from the Central British Fund, and indeed to that organization's covering letter, in which the secretary had categorically stated that Rosa Bechhöfer had come to England to work as a domestic servant in April 1943. Susi sent photocopies of the material, hoping her cousin might come to share her belief that Rosa might still be alive. But Jerry Bechhofer, always meticulous when it came to chronicling his family's history, was not impressed.

'What is the C.B.F.?' he asked in a subsequent exchange of letters. 'It occurs to me that perhaps this was just an application from her to come to the U.K. Or do you have knowledge that she actually came to England? If she did then it should be possible to trace her. In those days one had to register, even if one was an alien.'

Another cousin, Senta, the daughter of Susi's newly acquired aunt, the sprightly 94-year-old Martha, likewise made contact to suggest that Rosa was no longer alive, contending that she had had breast cancer at some unspecified date, after which she had been deported to a camp.

'Impossible,' Susi wrote in her diary. 'I say no. I can't bear this thought; this has to be the worst scenario. I will prove otherwise.'

If Susi was stubbornly refusing to countenance the idea that her mother had perished along with a number of other Bechhöfers, so was her son, although their perspectives differed. Now busy working for his final examinations at St Catherine's College, Cambridge, Frederick had from the outset displayed little enthusiasm for the venture. What good could possibly come of it, he wondered. 'If my grandmother went to a concentration camp,' he declared, 'then that is something that I just don't want to know.'

The organ scholar was equally dismissive when Jerry pointed out in one of his letters that in the eyes of Jewish law Frederick was a Jew himself, born as he was of a Jewish mother. 'Well, he would say that, wouldn't he?' was his initial response. Yet, despite his repeated protestations to the contrary, Frederick would in time develop a keen interest in the issues raised by his mother's search for her roots.

On 18 May 1989, fifty years to the day since the twins had arrived in England, Susi flew to New York's John F. Kennedy Airport to meet the American Bechhofers for the first time. Before she left, Alan had continued to play the role of devil's advocate, warning his wife: 'You don't know what these people are like. You don't know what their customs and beliefs are going to be.' Not that it mattered to Susi, because whatever their religious practices or idiosyncrasies, they were her family now.