Name: Michelle Boyea's review of The Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith H. Beer
Item: The Nazi Officer's Wife
Rating: 5
Author: Michelle Boyea

Edith H. Beer

Susan Dworkin

#1 New York Times Bestseller Edith Hahn was an outspoken young woman in Vienna when the Gestapo forced her into a ghetto and then into a slave labor camp. When she returned home months later, she knew she would become a hunted woman and went underground. With the help of a Christian friend, she emerged in Munich as Grete Denner. There she met Werner Vetter, a Nazi Party member who fell in love with her. Despite Edith's protests and even her eventual confession that she was Jewish, he married her and kept her identity a secret. In wrenching detail, Edith recalls a life of constant, almost paralyzing fear. She tells how German officials casually questioned the lineage of her parents; how during childbirth she refused all painkillers, afraid that in an altered state of mind she might reveal something of her past; and how, after her husband was captured by the Soviets, she was bombed out of her house and had to hide while drunken Russian soldiers raped women on the street. Despite the risk it posed to her life, Edith created a remarkable record of survival. She saved every document, as well as photographs she took inside labor camps. Now part of the permanent collection at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., these hundreds of documents, several of which are included in this volume, form the fabric of a gripping new chapter in the history of the Holocaust—complex, troubling, and ultimately triumphant.

How One Jewish Woman Survived The Holocaust

The Nazi Officer's Wife

Michelle Boyea

Sahi K

I have mostly read novels and only a couple of nonfiction books about WWII but this might be the first memoir. It doesn’t really talk about concentration camps and atrocities committed on the prisoners but about the human side of the survivors and people who helped them on the way.

Edith is from a loving Jewish family in Vienna studying to be a lawyer. When the Nazi’s come, she is denied her degree, forced out of her home into a ghetto and finally sent to labor camp. She works almost eighty hour work weeks while starving and her only hope being the letters and packages that she received from her mom and Pepi. After her mother is deported to Poland, she refuses to report to the authorities and after managing to secure false papers, moves to Munich. There she meets a Nazi party member Werner who falls in love with her and they get married.

There were some comments about Edith’s life that demeaned her for surviving as a German Nazi wife. But that’s the whole point of this book. In times of war, when living is the only matter of concern, is it really worth it to judge a woman for setting up a false identity and surviving under the enemy’s nose. Edith is a smart, intelligent woman who is deprived of everything – her education, dignity, a future, even basic food and shelter – and when all doors close for her freedom, she chooses the one way that she finds. She lives in constant fear of being caught, every minute of her existence, but still manages to carve out a life and family for herself. She suppresses her witty intelligent personality to become a meek submissive wife of a Nazi because all she wants is to live; because that’s the only thing she has left. Finally, when the occupation ends, she gets a chance to resume her true identity, even become a lawyer and judge to help the people who have lost everything in the war.

But this book is not just about Edith. It’s about all the people who chose to help her. Her friend Christl, a German who gave Edith her original papers at great peril to herself. Maria Niedarall, another German who provided her all the encouragement and resources to escape. Pepi, her eternal love whose letters provided her great relief and hope during the whole ordeal before her escape. Even Werner in some ways helps her because despite being his aggressive self and knowing Edith’s truth, he never betrays her.

This book is about humanity – how seemingly good people can turn their backs on friends for personal safety and well-being while at the same time, people from unexpected quarters risk their lives to help their fellow citizens. I think this book is a must read for anyone who thinks living in wartime and surviving is a black and white. Because it is most definitely not.

Edith Hahn was an outspoken young woman in Vienna when the Gestapo forced her into a ghetto and then into a labor camp. When she returned home months later, she knew she would become a hunted woman and went underground. With the help of a Christian friend, she emerged in Munich as Grete Denner. There she met Werner Vetter, a Nazi Party member who fell in love with her. Despite Edith's protests and even her eventual confession that she was Jewish, he married her and kept her identity a secret. In wrenching detail, Edith recalls a life of constant, almost paralyzing fear. She tells of German officials who casually questioned the lineage of her parents; of how, when giving birth to her daughter, she refused all painkillers, afraid that in an altered state of mind she might reveal something of her past; and of how, after her husband was captured by the Soviet army, she was bombed out of her house and had to hide while drunken Russian soldiers raped women on the street. Yet despite the risk it posed to her life, Edith created a remarkable record of survival. She saved every document and set of papers issued to her, as well as photographs she managed to take inside labor camps. Now part of the permanent collection at the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., these hundreds of documents, several of which are included in this volume, form the fabric of a gripping new chapter in the history of the Holocaust -- complex, troubling, and ultimately triumphant.

How One Jewish Woman Survived the Holocaust

libby g

I was worried this was going to be an information heavy, sluggish read but I found it engaging both due to the beautifully written prose and the stories the author has to tell. 

Beer captivates the reader's attention through heart wrenching anecdotes and by explaining things in a way that really puts things into perspective. Whether it be trying to understand the limitations of the past--socially and technologically--or in terms of hardship and disadvantage, she is extremely successful in sharing this part of her past.

Michelle Boyea &
The Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith H. Beer

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The Nazi Officer's Wife by Edith H. Beer