The Past Is Always Present

By Lillian Belinfante Herzberg

On March 11, 1925, Heinz Stephan Lewy is born after a miraculous pregnancy and an arduous labor to a German mother and Jewish father. As Stephan grows up within a strict home environment, everything changes the day his mother suddenly dies, leaving Stephan and his socialist father in dire circumstances. Soon, Stephans father has no choice but to send the six-year-old to an orphanage where he knows he will be safe.

Stephan, who feels his identity has been ripped away, bravely attempts to accept his new home. With help from new friends, Stephan eventually adjusts to life in a dormitory where he must share a bathtub with other boys, eat awful food, and assume daily chores. As he immerses himself in Judaism and matures into a young man, Stephan embarks down a remarkable path where he must overcome a multitude of challenges that include escaping Nazi Germany to America, facing the horrors of World War II as a member of the United States Army, and reconciling his painful past in order to make a difference in todays world.

The Past Is Always Present is the true story of Stephan Lewys life, his coming-of-age journey through war and peace, and how he continues to use his experiences to enlighten modern youth.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Archway Publishing
• Release date: Nov 23, 2015
• ISBN: 9781480821958

Lillian Belinfante Herzberg

Lillian Belinfante Herzberg earned an Associate in Arts at Grossmont College and a Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences from San Diego State University. She is an award-winning writer whose stories have appeared in newspapers, literary magazines, and in Chicken Soup for a Kid’s Soul. She is a mother of three and lives in San Diego. This is her fourth book.

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Copyright © 2015 Lillian Belinfante Herzberg.

A Sojourn into Freedom was published in November,2003. Several of her sort stories have appeared in First Draft, Grossmont College literary magazine; Silent Night, Crystal Night, in Chicken Soup for a Kid’s Soul, and several prize winning short stories.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Archway Publishing

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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ISBN: 978-1-4808-2194-1 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4808-2195-8 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015918188

Archway Publishing rev. date: 11/23/2015

Contents

Part One

My Parents

Life After The Great War

Another Hurdle

In The Beginning

The Fever

Mother Love

Losses

My Life In Auerbach

Boys Will Be Boys

Religious Life

My Life In Auerbach

Frustrated, Frightened And Furious

Hateful Signs

Memories Of School

The Nazi Net

My Failed Employment

The Winter Olympics

Summer Olympics

Desperate Measures

A Second Chance

My New Life

The Note

A Very Distant Cousin

Complicity Of Silence

The Hostage Game

Travesties

Three X’s

Viva La France

Arthur’s Desperate Measures

Air Raid In Quincy

A New Life For The Lewys

Idiosyncrasies Of War

Paris

Chateau De Chabannes

Gathering The Crops

Life As I Lived It

The Search

The Letter

The Visa

Family Or Friends

Marseilles

Casa Blanca

Strictly Kosher

The Long Wait

The Encounter

At Last

Living A New Life

Surviving In Wartime

A Second Chance

News From France

Family Life

Seventeen

Greetings From The President

I’m In The Army Now

Intelligence Corp

The Real War

Pickles And Beer

My Personal Vendetta

Gratification

The Past Will Always Be Present

Points

Part Two

My ‘War’ Was Not Yet Over

Homecoming

The Gi Bill

Traditions

My Name Is Frances

Reparation

My Future In The Stars

Part Three

Phantoms Of The Past

A New Journey

Into The Past

Bricks And Memories

My New Career

Making A Difference

You Are Not Jewish

Epilogue

For Stephan who lived it

and for his children

who didn’t have to

PART ONE

MY PARENTS

G ertrude, my mother had been warned that a pregnancy could kill her. It was a miracle we both survived. No one could have predicted my hazardous birth foreshadowed the struggle I was to experience in the future, just so I could exist.

Arthur Lewy, my father, was a severe disciplinarian. He had been brought up in an environment of rigidity and regulations, and in his youth had received neither tenderness nor compassion. I believed he had no nurturing role model since he lost his family at such an unusually young age.

I remember he once hit me so hard I felt the pain for a week. If I did something wrong, that hand of his was quicker than lightening. Sometimes when I transgressed, he slapped me so hard with the back of his hand across my face I felt the sting for a long time. Even today I think I can still recall the sound of his palm connecting to my skin.

Since I had no siblings I believed his methods of correcting me were what fathers did. So I grew up to believe my father’s conduct was standard behavior for parents. As a child I never realized I was being prepared for my future. Perhaps it was my father’s intent all the time. My father always lived a life that demanded much of him. He was only nine years old when he stood stiff and mute before the superintendent of Auerbach Orphanage. Your name and age boy? Herr Kolky asked him. Too frightened to answer, he lowered his head and the woman who worked for the offices of the Jewish Charitable Organization, and who brought him to the home responded, He’s nine years old Herr Kolky.

What’s his story? the director asked, now ignoring the shaking child standing before him.

As far as we know he was born sometime in July of l893, one of nine children.

"And where is his family now?

His parents and seven of his siblings are dead, the cause of their death a mystery. Only he and his four-year-old brother now survive.

Yes, well, his brother is too young to qualify for admittance to the orphanage.

That’s all right. The child has already been placed with a family.

Auerbach, the Jewish orphanage located in Berlin, had operated on a system similar to the German military style. The children were taught to obey the elders in charge without question. In this cold, rigid environment of the institution, the residents were dressed in uniforms and helmets resembling Berlin police. During his years in the orphanage, Arthur Lewy lost track of his younger brother. Much later, during World War II, he learned his brother had died in a Nazi concentration camp.

In 1909, a somber, repressed, lonely sixteen-year-old young man, he was now eligible to leave the orphanage. Called into the superintendent’s office, a rotund middle-aged man sitting behind the huge oak desk, spoke in a condescending tone.

Your teachers have informed me you have qualified for the university, Arthur. Life goes on after school, you know, therefore you should have a plan for your future.

I will have to give it some thought sir, he answered.

Very good. I hope you have learned something here in Auerbach that will see you through life. Good luck.

And so he left the place that had been a roof over his head for seven years.

When Arthur left the orphanage he did attend college, but soon after he was graduated, he was drafted into the German army. His war experiences in the Great War both sickened and hardened him.

Life in the trenches was deplorable. Does anyone ever get used to the ever present misery of the rats or the stink of the decaying bodies defiling the air?

When winter was upon him, it brought freezing rain and snow. Keeping dry is impossible, he complained a fellow soldier. I seem to be spending most of my time scraping muck off of my shoes and pants.

Have you heard? his sergeant Unteroffizier asked, Our army has started to use a new weapon, a Flammenwerfer, a flame thrower. It spews out a stream of burning fuel and burns the victim to death - if he’s lucky, that is. I think when we reach Flanders we are going to use it to attack the British. Ach, will the British be surprised.

Gott im Himmel, Arthur cried to a fellow soldier. What have we come to?

When he saw the horror it inflicted on its victims, it made him put his feelings behind an imaginary steel case hidden deep inside his soul, so he couldn’t envision the pain inflicted. Both the users and the targets usually became casualties.

Except for an attack on the enemy, Arthur’s life, if one could call it that, was routine and dull. One Sunday afternoon, when all was quiet, he had difficulty lighting a cigarette. A young fellow soldier offered him a light. Thanks, Arthur told him, and introduced himself. Arthur Lewy, he said.

Helmut, Helmut Braun. They call me Ziggy.

I don’t know which is worse, Arthur told Ziggy, his new army friend, The fighting or the monotony.

I know what you mean.

One night Ziggy and Arthur were assigned to repair the sides of the trenches by packing them with mud. I think boredom is a better situation than this, Ziggy whispered in desperation to Arthur. One could get killed here.

Arthur did not disagree.

As soldiers, the two of them stood guard or checked telephone lines, or brought food from behind the battle lines for some of the men. And at night, on patrol, they repaired barbed wire while officers tried to gather information about the enemy.

To pass the time Arthur and Ziggy talked about food, movies and the war. Arthur never mentioned his background so Ziggy took it as a sign not to talk about his.

By now the German army started to use poison gas on the Allies. Fortunately, Arthur had been assigned a clerical job at the rear of the fighting. His friend Ziggy was not so fortunate. He was lucky to escape the consequences, but he witnessed what the gas did, especially when the wind switched direction.

My God, when the wind changed it made our own soldiers vomit or cause them be be asphyxiated from the gas - sometimes both, he informed his friend. I hope to God neither one of us get exposed to it.

Just as the fighting came to an end Arthur and Ziggy were transferred to the Eastern front, and the strength of the fighting shifted to the Western Front. In the Spring, Germany began to stage three offensives. Arthur and Ziggy were now in the middle of the fighting. Much to the ordinary soldiers relief, by the end of March, British troops were on the retreat.

Late March, the Germans started to bombard Paris.

They are going to use the Paris Gun or the Kaiser Wilhelm Geschutz, the Leutnant told his men. Its sole purpose will be to shell Paris from extreme distances starting in March. It is capable of firing shells into the stratosphere from locations as far as 13.1 km from Paris, the men were told. Those gigantic guns are capable of hurling their shells up to 5 miles away. It all will be over soon, boys, and we can go home.

Arthur had no enthusiasm for war as did some of the officers. Unhappily, he took part in the second German offensive beginning in April, along the Lys River in Belgium. Thank God they finally called off the attack, Arthur told the soldier fighting next to him. We may yet survive this war.

A month later, on May 27th, Germany attacked Belgium for a third time near the Aisne River.

"I hope someone on our side realizes Germany can no longer overcome the superiority of the Allies before we are all killed, Arthur said in his quiet way.

I agree, his Commanding Officer said, taking his men into his confidence. In spite of our advances, I don’t think we’re going to win this one, so try not to get killed.

The Officer was right. The turning point to end The Great War was the Second Battle of Marne.

Shortly after, Arthur and Peter were transferred back to Berlin where they were discharged. Arthur resolved never to pick up a weapon again.

LIFE AFTER THE GREAT WAR

A fter he was discharged from the army, Arthur felt restless. One sunny warm afternoon to relax and cheer himself up, he took a stroll down Kurfuerstendamm, and looked in the windows of several shops whose owners were trying to attract shoppers with the few articles they had for sale.

He came across a konditerie and decided to treat himself to whatever he could afford which was some ersatz coffee and a small cookie. To his surprise he saw his old army buddy, Ziggy, seated at one of the tables enjoying coffee and a sweet.

Is this seat taken? Arthur asked.

When Ziggy looked up and recognized his old army buddy, he grinned and pointed to the empty seat. I am delighted to see you again, Arthur. How the hell are you? You look better than you did in the trenches.

Well, you look great. What’s been happening in your life?

Nothing too exciting. Say, I’m having a few friends in for supper. Why don’t you join us? I think you will like them.

Arthur was about to refuse the invitation not knowing what to expect. Thanks just the same, Ziggy, but I’m not much for socializing.

Oh, come on. It’s hard to get decent food these days, but I managed to get something tasty. And it will be a hell of a lot better than the slop they gave us in the army. Please come.

Well… he hesitated. All right. In that case, I’ll be there.

Ziggy handed him a card with his name, Helmut Braun, and address engraved on it.

Arthur was a bit jittery as he approached the address printed on Helmut’s invitation. He recognized the address was located in the more affluent part of Berlin. Hmm, he never mentioned where he lived before, Arthur thought. When he arrived at the door of Helmut’s elegant residence he was having second thoughts. Maybe I should have stuck to his guns and refused his invitation.

As he stood at the front door, he wondered, should I leave while I can? But by then, Helmut had opened the door.

Great to see you again, old man. Glad you could come.

Arthur took a drink offered to him by a gentleman dressed in tails. My God, he thought. He has a butler! Helmut had never let on that he came from money, and always treated me as an equal, Arthur reflected.

Arthur looked around the room and admired the blonde wood furniture. It looks as if all this was imported from Sweden or Denmark.

A maid appeared in a black outfit covered with a starched white apron announced quietly to the twelve people gathered in the salon. Dinner is served,

They all moved into the dining room.

It took a great deal of searching to find some decent food, Helmut told his guests. I hope you like it.

You sit here, Arthur, next to my friend Gertrude Puls.

Arthur’s dinner partner, a charming young woman dressed in pale gray chiffon, with hair a beautiful shade of blonde. By the end of the evening she had captured Arthur’s heart.

I am going to tell my friends I fell in love between the tomato soup and the apple strudel, she told Arthur.

They had started to see each other at least once a week. His income limited where they could go. When Gertrude offered to pay for a movie or dinner, Arthur refused. He knew she loved the movies and he saved enough out of his limited income earned as a clerk in a tobacco store to take her to see her favorite actor, Albert Bassermann starring with Asta Nielsen and Carl Ebert in Erdgeist, or Earth Spirit. He was intrigued with the movie’s title. While watching the film and holding her hand, he got the courage to whisper in her ear while the organist played the music which enhanced the story of the silent film, You must know I love you.

Yes, and I love you, she said, her eyes glued to the film.

Would you do me the honor to be my wife? I understand…

Of course I will, she interrupted, still staring ahead.

Really?

Yes, really, now watch the movie.

ANOTHER HURDLE

A few months later, as they walked along the romantic Unter den Linden, an avenue lined with beautiful Linden trees, Arthur told Gertrude, I still cannot believe my good fortune that you are willing to marry me. What do you see in such a somber, solitary fellow as I?

She touched his face with her fingers. It is your beautiful blue eyes.

Are you really sure you want to do this?

Yes, I am sure. Come, no more excuses. I want you to go with me to Altglienicke and meet my parents and two brothers.

Altglienicke?

Yes, it’s a small lovely village, and easy to get to since it is quite near Berlin. Oh, one more thing you should know. As a very young man, my father had been struck by lightning, and lost his ability to hear and speak. He does read lips however, but my mother usually speaks for him.

They left the train at Adlershof, and after a brief bus ride, it was only a short walk to where Gertrude had once lived with her loving family.

The sun is shining, and the weather is just right. I hope it is a good omen, Arthur said.

You do not have to be nervous, my love. I love you, and everything will be fine.

Arthur had always lived in a city, and as such, village living was unfamiliar to him. As they approached the village, Arthur walked into a world that was new to him.

The two-story house in which the Puls lived was in the midst of similar looking homes. All the roofs were painted the same shade of red. Each building had a similar area of grass in front of it.

The houses all look alike, Arthur commented.

Ah, but if you look closely, the Puls garden is much prettier, don’t you think?

They walked up the path to the front door, also in red. When Gertrude turned the knob, the door opened, much to the astonishment of her city-bred suitor.

You don’t lock your doors here?

No one does. No need, my love.

Arthur had never dined with a family before, and he walked into another situation new to him.

Dressed in a floor length black silk gown, Frau Puls greeted her daughter and her companion. Her dark hair was pulled back tightly which emphasized her hawk-like facial features. Right on time. Dinner is ready. Then directing Arthur to a door on the left she said imperiously, You can wash up in there, Herr Lewy.

Arthut, startled by Frau Puls appearance, thought she might be trying to subtly reveal the family’s attitude concerning Gertrude’s choice of a companion.

They were seated in a formal dining room with the large window overlooking the back garden. The breakfront holding the china and silverware was dark looking mahogany, matching the table and chairs.

This is a lovely room, Arthur told Frau Puls, not knowing what else to say.

Gertrude introduced Arthur to Ewald, her younger brother, who worked in his father’s upholstery business, and Herman, the eldest, an engineer for the A. G. Farben Company. Almost immediately, the maid dressed in a black uniform with a white apron tied in back served the first course.

They all sat around the dining room table eating in silence. The sauerbraten is delicious, Frau Puls, Arthur said, breaking the silence.

Frau Puls responded, The meat was not easily come by, Herr Lewy, as you can imagine. We ordinarily do not eat like this.

The cool reception Arthur received, and the frigid atmosphere, made the Puls’ displeasure at their daughter’s choice obvious.

Shall we adjourn into the sitting room for our coffee? Frau Puls asked as she arose from the