of a national park and Lutz would gaze, enthralled by the radiant, emerald-green hue of the shimmering water.
Lutz’s mother had a good friend who owned a farm near Nuremberg at a little place called ‘Dennenloh’, and they often went to visit them during the school holidays. There were a couple of horses and some cows on the property, and Lutz particularly loved to go bareback horse riding; in fact he taught himself to ride and he would free-spiritedly canter or gallop across the fields and paddocks. Apart from their friends’ much younger son, there were rarely any other children around for company, but Lutz didn’t mind that as he enjoyed the fresh air and open space of the countryside regardless of company his own age. He remembers always having marvellous times there with his mother and her friends.
Nearer to home, Lutz and his mother regularly visited the Dutzenteich Park where, when the weather was fine, he would sometimes take his mother rowing on the lake among the other colour-faded wooden boats. It wasn’t particularly deep and was bordered by tall evergreen trees at one end and dense reed beds at the other. Lutz was strong and sturdy, and greatly enjoyed the physical sensation of rowing. Occasionally his grandmother accompanied them to the park and once she even took a boat ride with them. This was another memorable moment for Lutz when his grandmother insisted on getting out of the boat before they had completed their trip. Lutz and his mother eventually managed to reassure her and Lutz finally got them back safely to shore. Sometimes, on weekends, his father accompanied them on their walks but he never joined them in their rowing expeditions.
Lutz loved to ride his bicycle around the streets of Nuremberg. He cycled just for the love of cycling but usually had some destination in mind – over to his Aunt Adele or to the homes of his school friends. Apart from the weekend sports club, this pursuit had become almost his sole recreation since the introduction of the Nuremberg laws, as most places of entertainment and restau-rants had become prohibited to Jews. However, the Eichbaums continued to lead an active social life with their family and friends despite the fact that their participation in cultural and community facilities and events was severely curtailed.
However, worse was to come with the introduction in March 1938 of the most pervasive anti-Jewish law yet since the introduction of the Nuremberg laws: ‘The Law Regarding the Legal Status of Jewish Communities’. This law further eroded citizenship rights for Jews by denying them legal protection and subjecting them to increasingly austere administrative controls by the Nazi regime. By June all Jewish establishments had to be registered and identified as Jewish, clearly labelling them as such in the shop window or business entrance. This naturally included Friedrich’s toy export business, but although a sign was duly posted up at this time it did not have an especially detrimental effect on his trading. The dilemma of whether to stay or leave became the main focus of conversation around Jewish dinner tables, at work and at school.
These restricting new laws didn’t seem to have had a profound impact on Lutz’s enjoyment of life, partly because he was well protected from adverse events by his parents, and being young he was easily able to adapt his own social life accordingly. However, he was aware at that time that Liesl’s parents (her architect father was Aryan, her mother Jewish) were forced to observe the anti-intermarrying laws resulting in their immediate divorce. The Eichbaums learnt about the increasingly threatening and divisive activities of Hitler mainly from the newspapers, and to a lesser extent from the radio. As a teenager growing up in these times, Lutz was aware of an insidious rise in tension and increase in restrictions when out in public areas, and he noticed the proliferation of Nazi flags waved in the streets and displayed in people’s windows; also the foreboding anti-Jewish slurs and yellow ‘Stars of David’ painted on abandoned shops and buildings. His non-Jewish friends and acquaintances were afraid of getting into trouble if they associated with him so they tended to keep their distance. Lutz was inclined to accept his parents’ interpretation of events and naturally, as their only son, they were keen to protect him from the intensifying intolerance and its sinister implications. However, Fritz and Gretl could not prevent their son from experiencing some victimisation first hand.
There were many theatres and an opera house in Nuremberg and, before the cultural restrictions were imposed, Lutz used to enjoy live entertainment. He remembers the last occasion, attending the opera with his school friend Franz to see a performance of ‘Die Fleidermaus’. Although he wasn’t particularly musical, this was a favourite opera of his and he waited for the curtain to rise in happy anticipation. It was a full house and Lutz noticed many Nazi officers seated in front of him wearing their distinctive swastika-emblazoned uniforms. Unfortunately for Lutz and Franz, Adolf Hitler was also in attendance that night, and before the curtain went up an announcement was made that all Jews should leave the opera house immediately. Lutz and Franz had no choice but to join the bewildered and humiliated crowd of outcasts and they quickly left the opera building.
Shortly afterwards Lutz encountered this prejudice face to face. He was walking alone when a Nazi soldier stopped him on the footpath and asked him for street directions. Lutz immediately and helpfully described the route, then mid-sentence the soldier asked him if he was Jewish. On hearing his answer the soldier’s tone turned cold and he said, ‘ I don’t want to know the way’ and briskly walked off. Lutz could have been mistaken for being non-Jewish because of his fair hair and blue-eyed looks; he certainly didn’t conform to the ridiculous caricature of Jews as depicted by German propaganda. At fifteen, Lutz and Trudi were spending much of their spare time together. She was slim and dark-featured, and although having a serious side to her nature, was quick to laugh at Lutz’s jokes. They enjoyed each other’s companionship and spent many hours walking around the streets of Nuremberg, their preferred walk taking them up to the circular tower, capped with a peaked turret; it was a main feature of the city landscape. Their relationship didn’t last long as Lutz had to leave Germany about six months later. Lutz never saw Trudi again. After the war he discovered through a mutual acquaintance that she had been transported to a concentration camp. She survived this experience but tragically, shortly after her release, Trudi committed suicide.
The Growing Terror
The terror was stepped up with fresh business boycotts, which prevented people going about their daily work, and a prominent synagogue was deliberately destroyed by fire. Businesses were closing down or owners were being extorted to sell their livelihoods at a fraction of their worth. Unemployment among Jews was increasing rapidly, which was exacerbated by Nazi decrees that led to a significant proportion of civil servants being dismissed from their jobs, which were subsequently filled by Aryans. This included lawyers, doctors and then teachers as well as lower status workers.
Public degradation and harassment reached a climax with one particular episode that brought the reality of anti-Jewish hostility directly into every Jewish home. It occurred shortly after the annual Nazi party meeting held in Nuremberg. This was the infamous event of Kristallnacht on 9 November 1938. The Nazis retaliated violently following the shooting death in Paris by a young Polish Jew of one of their officials, the German Embassy’s Third Secretary. The entire Jewish community was blamed as a pretext for the Nazis to begin their ferocious campaign to rid Germany and Austria of their Jewish population. The reprisals fired off throughout Germany, resulting in synagogues being set aflame, businesses destroyed and Jews humiliated, injured and killed.
Lutz and his family were aware of the increasingly hostile activities of the storm-troopers or ‘Brownshirts’ as they marched through the streets of Nuremberg, singing anti-Jewish songs and shouting out racial slogans. Their own business and home had been attacked on previous occasions by Hitler youth who threw stones at the windows and painted anti-Jewish vulgarisms on the adjacent walls.
The Brownshirts arrived at the Eichbaums’ home early one morning. The family could hear the storm-troopers wreaking havoc from a long way off, then the approach of stomping boots before they eventually arrived at their door. They had hoped to be spared in spite of hearing otherwise; word had quickly got around that no Jewish family in Nuremberg would escape the violence of the Nazis’ retribution. There was shouting and loud knocks at the door, stones were being thrown at their
