Meanwhile in Sweden
Summer 1942 Munkfors, Värmland
Eva is six years old and already attends school. She, her mother and brother Walter have moved into their own apartment. Elsbeth works in various households, teaches German, French and mathematics and gives violin lessons.Eva’s father Gottfried has been moved to another camp in France, but continues to write to them.
On 28 July 1942, Gottfried wrote one of his many letters from the French internment camp to his family in Munkfors. He wroteabout his job planting tomatoes and corn. He asked if the children were growing a lot and whether they had enough clothes. He also askedElsbeth to make new contacts in Sweden, so that he could get a job and thus a residence permit. ”You must try everything”, he wrote.
Then Gottfried’s letters stopped coming. In December 1942, a message arrived from the international Red Cross: Mr. Gottfried Israel has left the camp for an unknown destination, along with many other internees.
Summer 1943 Gothenburg
Lilo has not heard from her parents for quite some time. A card arrives from her grandmother, but she is no longer back home in Berlin. The card is postmarked in Theresienstadt.
“My dearest Lilochen, I am pleased to tell you that I am healthy and doing well. Surely you must know how often my thoughts are with you. . (…) Have you had any news from your parents? Please write to me soon. With the warmest greetings and kisses from your adoring Granny, Rosalie Jacks”
Lilo’s grandmother was among the elderly Jewish residents of Berlin who were deported to Theresienstadt, in what is now the Czech Republic. The Nazis used Theresienstadt as a model camp and occasionally allowed the outside world a glimpse of life inside the camp. Nevertheless, living conditions were very poor. Many of those imprisoned there died of starvation and disease.
In the summer of 1943, Lilo was nineteen years old. During the years 1943–1944, she worked several different jobs in the textile industry before starting a new career as the matron of Lorensberg Restaurant in the summer of 1945.
Spring 1942 Bondegatan, Stockholm
In March of 1942, Walter turns fifty. In the same month, he and Lilli receiveword that her parents, Solomon and Frieda, have been deported from Berlinto Poland. Swedish authorities have granted them entry permits, but Solomon and Frieda are unable to travel to Sweden for the time being.
Lilli’s parents, Frieda and Solomon Veisz, were two of the approximately 65,000 Jews deportedfrom Berlin to ghettos and camps in Eastern Europein 1941 and 1942.
When the Brünns learned that Lilli’s parents had been sent to Poland, they clung to the hope that Frieda and Solomon would still be able to use their entry permits at a later date. Walter wroteto the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs asking for their permits to be extended.
After moving to Stockholm, Walter had initially worked various gardening jobs. Then he found employment as a warehouse assistant at Sandberg’s Bookstore on Humlegårdsgatan. The bookstore’s CEO, Gunnar Josephson, was the leader of Stockholm’s Jewish congregation. The following year, Lilli also got a job as an office assistant at an insurance company.