Not Welcome. Sue Everett
border; whether they would be sent back or allowed to continue on their journey. They stopped at Mainz and Cologne before eventually reaching Emmerick. At the border uniformed Nazi officers entered the carriage and examined their passports. They shrank back into their seats as if trying to become invisible. The German officials searched through their bags and checked some of the children for money sewn into the seams of their clothing and hems of dresses. Some children were detained and sent back for reasons that neither Lutz nor Liesl could understand; perhaps their papers weren’t in order.
The train journey was long, tiring and hot, relieved only by sharing the refreshments that Lutz’s mother had packed for him. They didn’t see any adults on the train, but there were many on the platforms of the stations that they stopped at. Liesl noticed some of them staring at them, whispering to each other while glancing in their direction.
Lutz and Liesl travelled in the same carriage all the way to The Hague where they were checked off the train and herded onto a flat-bottomed ferry that crossed the North Sea to Harwich in England. They travelled by train from Harwich to Liverpool Street Station in London, where Lutz was met by his second cousin Hans Scherbel while Liesl sat for hours in a disused wooden hut waiting to be collected by her solicitor host family. She worked for them as a maid throughout the early war years, eventually settling in Nottingham (North England) in 1942, maintaining contact with Lutz throughout the ensuing years whenever possible.
Refuge in England
Hans Scherbel was Lutz’s elder by some ten or fifteen years. He was tall, dark-haired and bespectacled, working as a dentist in his own surgery in London, opposite St Paul’s Cathedral. He also had a surgery at home where he practised in the evenings and at weekends. Hans’ mother, Bertha, was a short woman with thick grey hair, her face traced with wrinkles and creased in perpetual consternation. She wore brown ribbed stockings beneath a tweed skirt, always donning an appropriate hat when she left the house. At home she wore a clean apron tied around her waist, exuding a practical but humourless demeanour.
Lutz had met his great-aunt Bertha and Hans a couple of times previously during the time they lived in Nuremberg but he wouldn’t have recognised them if he had bumped into them in the street. Due to their obligation as relatives, Lutz went to live with them at 10 Ditton Court Road in their single-storey house in Westcliff-on-Sea and was treated most unsympathetically (particularly considering his plight and his youth). His uncle was somewhat more receptive to Lutz’s presence in their home than great-aunt Bertha, who made it very clear from the beginning that she resented his appearance in their lives. Hans demonstrated great fondness for his mother and gladly accepted the responsibility of caring and providing for her. Mother and son preferred to keep to themselves and, except for Hans’ patients, people rarely came to the house.
The house wasn’t far from the beach, and Lutz regularly took himself off for walks to avoid the oppressive atmosphere inside the house. Hans and Bertha preferred to speak German to him, although they had already lived in England for quite a few years; speaking English would have been Lutz’s preference, if only to help him adjust more quickly to his new environment. They rarely addressed Lutz directly and then only if there was an essential domestic matter to discuss. This was disappointing for Lutz, who was used to being asked about his day and his progress. As an only child he was accustomed to being the focus of his family’s attention.
One day, not long after his arrival, his large cabin trunk arrived; it had been sent out by his parents just after he had left Germany. The trunk, which was mainly full of clothes (that Lutz was expected to eventually grow into), was about as high as the coffee table and approximately one by two metres in the other dimensions; there were shelves or layers constructed inside the trunk which was fabricated from some type of brown, wooden fibre – the lid fastened by means of two locks and latches. For some reason Lutz was never able to fathom, his great-aunt was furious with him at its unexpected arrival and insisted it be placed against the kitchen wall next to the dining table. He was expected to sit on the trunk during mealtimes when he would frequently turn his head to look out of the window to the leafy garden, at the rough and twisted branches of the apple tree, for some relief from the cheerless atmosphere inside. He missed his own family all the more for the coldness of this reception.
The night following the arrival of the large cabin trunk, Lutz was alone with his dejected ponderings as he reflected over the happenings of the last few days …
From the moment I arrived I was clearly not welcome in their home – I was an intruder. My great-aunt and Hans shared an exclusive bond, mother and son, not inviting or requiring any intrusion into their well-established domestic intimacy. She only had eyes for one man, her son. My coming had dramatically upset their daily routine. Maybe their established place in the small Westcliff community was threatened by my arrival. I wondered how many other Westcliff families would be harbouring innocent and harmless German refugees. Hans was a dentist and practised for the local population so presumably they would have enjoyed considerable respect and the benefits of some standing in this small seaside town.
Their intolerance towards my presence and their indifference to my physical and emotional wellbeing was totally unexpected, after all they were my relations. I had anticipated a place of safety and the security of familial care. My great-aunt clearly could not bring herself to verbalise her dissatisfaction with this change in domestic circumstances – her barely disguised scorn and derision being directed at me – after all, she did have a family obligation.
I felt vulnerable and was particularly sensitive to her growing and begrudging resentment, especially palpable at mealtimes. Her barely contained animosity was no more apparent than at the arrival of my large cabin trunk which contained clothing meant for all weather conditions and to stand me in good stead for the next few years of my life – clearly my mother expected further growth from my barely average stature.
I will never forget Aunt Bertha’s overreaction …
‘I can’t have this monstrous thing in my house!’ she roared. ‘There’s nowhere to put it.’
‘There’s enough space in my room,’ I ventured.
Her rage was out of all proportion to the slight inconvenience my forwarded luggage imposed, but this inanimate object containing my personal effects and baggage of my life so far bore the brunt of her anger for the duration of my stay in her house.
Although she abhorred the sight of it she insisted it remain in the kitchen continually to be the object of her disgust; maybe the epitome of what had gone wrong in her own life. She demanded that I sit on the trunk at mealtimes, perched lower in profile, silently but gratefully eating the meals prepared by her. It would have been a good opportunity to practise my English but the only communication I received was disapproving looks at my obviously deficient table manners. At these times I was cheered by memories of laughter and chatter, remembering the harmonious evening meals with my own family – everyone interested in each other’s daily happenings.
I could still feel where the cold metal lock on the front of the cabin trunk had pressed against my right calf, aware of all my worldly belongings contained beneath me, my hopes and feelings likewise also locked up inside my bewildered and grieving mind.
The incident with the trunk was the most obvious way in which Lutz’s great-aunt Bertha let her displeasure be known. He felt he wasn’t acceptable to them, that he had disturbed their cosy domesticity.
After Lutz was given refugee status in England, his uncle immediately set about helping him secure suitable employment, not locally, but in a jeweller’s shop in Hatton Gardens in London (renowned then for its gold and jewellery industry and trade). Later he wondered if it was because they didn’t want him to become established in their own neighbourhood. Hans accompanied him on his first trip to London, where their first stop was the US embassy in Grosvenor Square. Lutz registered his application for a US visa, and then they travelled by double-decker bus to 11 Hatton Garden where they met Mr Kaymann of N.K. Watchcase