This will include additional details about some of the people we’ll meet during our time in Germany.
Cox, Geoffrey, born 1910 in New Zealand
Graduated from Oxford in 1935. Worked with News Chronicle and Daily Express covering the Spanish Civil War, British Expeditionary Force in France, and Finland during the Winter War. He joined the New Zealand Army and served on Crete and North Africa, before being assigned to the Embassy in Washington DC.
Goldschmidt, Gunther born 1914 in Oldenburg
He studied music during the final years of Weimar but was expelled in 1933 on account of his Jewish heritage. Fleeing to Sweden in 1935 he returned to Germany to marry his sweetheart. They will eventually flee the Reich together.
Haffner, Sebastian born 1907 in Berlin.
He was a young man living in the German capital when the Empire collapsed and the Weimar Republic rose. He attended university and had a successful career as a lawyer. He fled to Britain in 1938 with his fiancée. There he became a notable journalist.
Photo Credit: OFTW, Berlin. Unedited.
Hamilton, Cicely born 1872 in London.
This woman had an eventful life. An actress, author, suffragist in the UK. She is best known for writing How The Vote Was Won (1909). During the First World War she worked as a nurse in France. After the war she worked as a freelance journalist. Her play, Just to Get Married, was recently staged in London for the first time in 100 years.
Photo Credit: Wikimedia. Link Source. Unedited.
Shirer, William born 1904 in Chicago.
CBS correspondent in Berlin from 1937 to 1940, when Nazi security police informed him he had to leave Germany. He smuggled his manuscript out when he left. Authored: Berlin Diary (1941), Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (1960), and more.
Photo Credit: Wikimedia. Link Source. Unedited.
Smith, Colonel Truman born 1893 in New York.
Joined the Army in 1916 and participated in the German occupation in 1919-1920 before serving as assistant military attaché in Berlin 1920-1924. He met Adolf Hitler in 1922 and called him a “marvelous demagogue”. He served as military attaché from 1935-1939.
Ordinary Lives, Extraordinary Times 