The year is 1945 and the war that has ravaged most of Europe is drawing to an end. The Nazi Germans and their collaborators have been defeated. Poland, Russia and Yugoslavia expelled millions of ethnic Germans living within their borders as retribution for the horrific human atrocities perpetrated by the Nazis against their people. The ethnic Germans living in Yugoslavia, who had nothing to do with the war, were forced to abandon their homes, leaving everything behind, and make the long, arduous journey to safe haven in Austria and Germany. The ethnic Germans that refused to leave or could not travel were forced at gunpoint by communist Yugoslav partisans, into concentration death camps where they were tortured, raped, murdered, of left to die from starvation or disease. This true story follows the life of a young ethnic German girl born and raised in Serbia, then part of Yugoslavia, amid the chaos, destruction, and death AFTER WWII. Her will to live is a testament to the strength and courage of the human spirit.
The year is 1945 and the war that has ravaged most of Europe is drawing to an end. The Nazi Germans and their collaborators have been defeated. Poland, Russia and Yugoslavia expelled millions of ethnic Germans living within their borders as retribution for the horrific human atrocities perpetrated by the Nazis against their people. The ethnic Germans living in Yugoslavia, who had nothing to do with the war, were forced to abandon their homes, leaving everything behind, and make the long, arduous journey to safe haven in Austria and Germany. The ethnic Germans that refused to leave or could not travel were forced at gunpoint by communist Yugoslav partisans, into concentration death camps where they were tortured, raped, murdered, of left to die from starvation or disease. This true story follows the life of a young ethnic German girl born and raised in Serbia, then part of Yugoslavia, amid the chaos, destruction, and death AFTER WWII. Her will to live is a testament to the strength and courage of the human spirit.
          World War II has been the subject of countless books, films, plays, magazines, lectures, and much more. History has recorded just about every minute of WWII, from beginning to end. In contrast, little is known about what happen after WWII. In particular, what were the effects of the war on the European people that survived?
The Aftermath
     The end of World War II was the beginning of the horror for many Europeans, especially the ethnic German populations of Eastern Europe. After the WWII, countries like Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union expelled millions of ethnic Germans living within their borders as retribution for the atrocities perpetrated by the Nazis against their people. These expulsions created the largest forced migration of a population in human history. It was estimated that more than 15 million ethnic Germans became refugees between 1945 and 1950. Most of them left behind everything they owned and made the long arduous journey, sometimes hundreds of kilometers, many by foot, to Austria and Germany. Many ethnic Germans died along the way from starvation and disease.  As chaotic and horrible as this exodus was, these Germans were the lucky ones. The ethnic German families that decided to stay in their homes and fight for their property faced a fate far more horrific than the expulsions.
      In the beginning of WWII, Yugoslavia refused to align with the Nazis, instead, fought against them. By April 1941, the Royal Yugoslav Army lost the fight and surrendered to the Nazis. The Nazi Germans immediately divided up the country between Germany, Italy, Hungary and Bulgaria. The Nazis set up garrison outposts, check-points, and prison camps.  The torture and murder of the Yugoslavian citizens by the Nazis instilled a deep hatred of the Germans, all Germans, including the ethnic German civilians, the farmers, tradesmen and business owners who wanted nothing to do with the war.
       The occupation of Yugoslavia by Axis forces (Nazi Germany and it’s collaborators) did meet some resistance from Chetniks Rebels and Serb Partisans although fierce infighting took place between these two groups. The Serbian Partisans were unorganized and undisciplined, until the rise to power of Josip Broz, otherwise known as Tito. Born in Croatia, Tito was a Communist and a Revolutionary. As the self-appointed leader of the Partisans, Tito was very effective at organizing and waging guerrilla warfare against the occupying German Army. The Partisans of Yugoslavia adopted the Communist ideology and came to be known as Tito Communist Partisans.
       By late 1944 throughout Europe, the German Wehrmacht, (War Machine), was showing signs of defeat. Taking advantage of the weakening German Army, the Communist Partisans, with the help of the advancing Russian Red Army, succeeded in driving the Nazi German Army and their collaborators out of Yugoslavia.
       Starting in 1945, with permission from Yugoslavian authorities, the Communist Partisans carried out the deportation of over one million Danube Swabians.  The Swabian Germans that chose not to leave voluntarily, were rounded up at gun point by the Communist Partisans and forced into ghettos. After many months of being crowded into small sections of each town, with 25 to 30 people in each house, the Swabian Germans were transported by railroad cattle cars to concentration death camps, set up and guarded by armed Communist Partisan Serbian Soldiers. Starvation and disease was the preferred method of exterminating the Swabian ethnic Germans.
       Such was the fate of the Friedrich family. In 1945 Anna Friedrich was 12 years old. Her father and two brothers, Mischi and Juri had volunteered to fight for the German Army. This left Mother, 41, her oldest child Kathi, 24 with her own child Annemarie, 4, and Mother’s two youngest children, Anna, and Stefan, 14, to fend for themselves. What happens next is what this story is about. This is Anna’s story, told from her experiences and memories.
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Anna’s story
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“How could I not write this story?” asks author Steven Kautner in this gripping and harrowing account about what happened to his mother, Anna Friedrich, and her family of ethnic Germans after World War II. The follow-on is, "How can anyone not read this story?” Because Anna’s Story is absolutely astonishing. Eye-opening. And jaw-dropping. It’ll blow you away.
This is the untold true story of what happened to the ethnic Germans of Eastern Central Europe in the aftermath of WWII. This intensely personal account chronicles a time when “the cruel and inhumane treatment of the ethnic German people was unprecedented.” Told to the author by his mother, “who actually lived the journey of this book,” Anna’s Story recounts how the brutal retribution and revenge against the ethnic German people for Nazi war crimes went unchecked from 1944 to 1949, when Anna Friedrich escaped. What emerges is a spellbinding and shattering story of unimaginable horrors inflicted upon ethnic Germans after the war simply because they were German.
The story follows Anna Friedrich’s life from 1939, when she was five years old, until 1984, when she is fifty-one and living in the United States. Anna was born and raised in Serbia, then part of Yugoslavia, by ethnic German parents. The first quarter or so of this book is devoted to an in-depth look at Anna’s life as a young child: Anna’s schooling, home and family life, food, work, culture and traditions. This portion of the book may seem a bit plodding to some readers. But it’s important back story, providing a broader context and sharp contrast for the horrors that are to come.
Caught between the Nazis and the advancing Russian Army in late 1944, some of the townspeople in Anna’s village flee to Germany. Those who can’t or won’t leave have no idea what’s coming. In taut, tense prose, the author narrates how his then-eleven year-old mother, Anna, and her family are soon caught in a firefight between the Russian Red Army and retreating German forces. Then the Serbs take over. Looting, pillaging, mayhem, murder and worse ensue in this startling and stunning narrative.
Anna recalls how communist partisan soldiers “took everything we had, even our animals.” The family is rounded up, loaded on cattle cars, and transported to concentration death camps in northern Serbia. Here, the author details Anna’s fight for survival in place where “the smell of death hung everywhere.” Where disease, starvation and cruelty dog every step. Where children fight over discarded potato peels. Where typhus, dysentery, vermin, despair, and bitter cold without heat result in people dying faster than they can be buried. In the camps, disease kills one out of every four people. There’s no soap, no bathing, and no washed clothes for over a year. Here, Anna becomes “a walking dead person.” She’s thirteen years old and half her family is dead.
But Anna’s mother is indomitable. Suffering from disease and malnutrition herself, Anna’s mother is still a force of nature. She eventually orchestrates an escape from the camps to Hungary. The tattered remnants of Anna’s family continues to Austria, crossing the border on foot. Anna later emigrates to the United States, where she eventually becomes a proud U.S. citizen. (Names and faces come to life in a section of family photos.)
This true story is astonishing. Appalling. Disturbing. It’s also riveting. Eye-opening and jaw-dropping. Tip: Don’t start this book late at night. If you do, you’ll be turning pages into the wee hours until the very end (don’t ask how I know that). I couldn’t put it down!
Anna’s Story isn’t a light read. But it’s an important one and deserves a wide audience. It’s also a towering achievement, especially for a first-time author.
Finally, this reviewer rarely awards five-star ratings. But this eloquent and articulate account of a little-known piece of human history will grip your heart and wring it dry on its way to a five-star rating. Don’t miss it!