As it was 1938 bis 1954 Germany

Heinz Friese

Narrator: Heinz Friese

Born 14 February 1904 in Berlin, Heinz established a poultry farm in the mid-1930s in Rathenow/Brandenburg. In 1942 he was drafted into the German army where, with his farming background, he was put in charge of livestock which consisted mostly of pigs. Near the end of the war, he ended up a captive in both American & Russian prisoner-of-war camps. Here he was often on the lookout for a loophole to escape and often found one. Finally returning to his home in 1947, he became a successful supplier of day-old chicks to the region, despite encountering endless problems with the local communist authorities. In November of 1952 he secretly escaped with his family via Berlin to eventually find himself in South Africa. Heinz Friese died on 15 July 1993 in Margate, South Africa.

Christian Friese

Narrator: Christian Friese

Christian tells how he experienced the war and after-war years on a farm 70 kms from Berlin. As his father Heinz was a soldier in Hitlers army, he barely knew his father during those years.
The Russians are coming, the Stalin Orgel is pounding. Everything is unhinged. The remembrances are many-sided, often gripping but in spite of the hardships of the time, often humorous as well.