An U.nlikety Journey To Judaism
with the stranger in tow. Her mother was whispering furiously with Frau Lauder, a nosy old woman who rented one of the Steffens' rooms. They stopped when her new friend entered. Immediately, Liesel felt the stranger stiffen behind her. She sensed her mother and the man with the funny hat had met before.
Liesel started to explain the fantastic thing her father had done, but before she could finish Frau Lauder scooped her up and rushed out of the room. Liesel was dumped unceremoniously in her bedroom and the door was locked from the outside. Liesel banged against it angrily for a few moments, and then she scrambled onto the windowsill. She watched in silence as the straiiger hurried down the street, his head bent and shoulders sagging.
Finally her mother opened the door. "Don't you ever bring people like that into our house againr she screamed, red-faced.
Liesel was completely bewildered. "People like what?" she asked.
Her mother sputtered in anger, and Liesel was suddenly overc»me by the awful suspisdon that her parents were somehow connected with the stranger's terrible story.
"Mm#i," she said slowly. "What did we do during the war? Did we not save this man?"
Mrs. Steffens grabbed her little daughter and shook her until her teeth rattled. "Your father was a good man! He believed right! Why should he have saved a Jew!"
It took a moment for her mother's words to sink in. Liesel stared at her in disbelief Her generous, loving, wonderfiil parents were part of those evil stories people whispered in which children were cooked in ovens and torn from their mommies and daddies? Suddenly, she wanted to be as far from her family as possible.
Liesel never stood up to her mother before, but now she turned on her hatefully. "You are murderers!" she spat. "Don't you ^ ever touch me again!" She raced to her room and slammed the door.
^ "It was the end of my child-=° hoed," liesel remembered sadly. ^ *I never touched her or called her g ^mother'again."
UJ
CO
Liesel spent youth tense feelings anger
the rest of her betv^reen in-
Many other Nazis' sons and dau^^rs suffered throu^ similar experiences. In 1991, former Wall Street lawyer Gerald Pos-ner publishai, Hitler's Children: Sons and Daughters of Leciders of the Third Reich Talk About Their Fathers and Themselves. The book articulated the struggles of Rolf Mengele, son of the notorious "Angel of Death" Dr. Josef Mengele; Wolf Hess, son of Deputy Fiihrer Rudolf Hess, Ursula Donitz, daughter of Adolf Hitler's hand-picked successor, Karl Donitz, and others.
Although some adamantly defended their parents' innocence, many children fought to cope with paial}^-ingni^tmares and guilt. Rolf constantly apologized to Holocaust Survivors for his father's cruelty, and Polish Grovemor General Hans Frank's son, Norman, decided not to have children so his family's tainted name would not continue. Most also considered it their "special obligation" to prevent another Adolf Hitler from rising to power.
Children of the most prominent Nazis, such as Dr. Mengele, were subjected to the worst public stigmas. Rolf described being taunted in school as "the little Nazi" and "SS Mengele" and wishing he had another father. But Mr. Posner concluded the of^pring of less well-known criminals, fike Liesel, were not at all spared the inner torment that came with their heritage.
"[Holocaust Survivors and their families] should know that we, the children of these men who are guilty of crimes, that we don't just forget about the Holocaust," Dagmar Drexel, daughter of convicted Nazi war crimioal Max Drexel, told Mr. Posner. "Instead, we tiy to do our little part to prevent it from happening ever again."
Unfortimately, in 1951 Liesel did not realize others were having the same reactions. For her, life in Germany was unbearable. She spent endless hours alone in her room studying boolcs about the Holocaust or writing in her diary. She was horrified to be
the crimes she read about.
"I was surrounded by evil," she said. "I would look at people I saw in school or the streets and wonder what they had done during the war. I wouldn't let anyone reach me. I knew exactly how to hurt my mother and I made life very uncomfortable for her."
Mrs. Steffens was convinced her sweet little girl would forget her anger, but the situation only got worse. Soon Liesel took to running away to the forest. The
But she was not really alone, part ofthe nation that carried out
happy hours she had spent there with her father seemed like another lifetime. Now, she would sleep in old cars and ignore the sharp hunger pangs for as long as she was able.
When she was 10 years old, she swallowed most of a bottle of rat poison, "Why did you do it?" Mrs. Steffens b^^d when Liesel reluctantly opened her eyes days later in the hospital. But Liesel just gave her a withering look li^ fore she turned her face to the waU.
Mrs. Stefiens was deteimined to repair her relationship with her daughter. But afrer many frustrated attempts, she finally agreed to enrol her in an expen-
sive Dusseldoif all-girls boarding school. While Liesel was there, a friend chopped off her fingers and two cousins committed suicide out of shame over their families' Nazi history.
"Many of us felt the burden," Liesel said. "But no one talked about it. For many years it was like it had never happened at alL" As she grew older, Liesel briefly found happiness with a German boy she met in Dussel-dorf. But when he proposed to her when she was 17, she fled in the middle of the night with a small suitcase and $20.
"I suppose I would have had an easier life if I had married him," Liesel reflected. "I still keep in touch with him — he's very well-to-do. But I couldn't get serious with a Grerman. I always knew I had to get away at the earliest opportunity."
Liesel arrived at Victoria Station in London and spent the night alone in a cheap hotel. She drifted penniless from place to place, refusing to touch the large inheritance her father had lefl; her. She changed her name to lisa Soot-land and spoke only English to obliterate the last of her German ties.
Soon she met George Browne, a local black musician. Liesel felt she had foimd a kindred soul and they were married shortly after.
"The one thing we had in common was we were both running from our identities," Liesel said. "He didn't like being black, and I didn't like being Gennan. There was this tremendous void in our Hves."
Through George, Liesel became deeply involved in Amnesty International and the anti-apartheid movement. She fought endlessly for racial equality in the growing African nations and becmne one of the few white people the black leaders trusted. She spent months living among African tribes and even finsuic^ the education of a young member with sonie of her savings.
"I thought of myself as a free-spirited human being with no prejudices whatsoever," Liesel said. "I tried to make up for what happened in Germany by help-
mg as many omer people as possible. I thought I had to be
outspoken on the right side o things and I could never let up.
^e even became a vegetariai because she could not bear th< thought of another Uving beini suffering because of her.
For awhile, Liesel's life on© again seemed charmed. She ani George owned several successfli healdi food restaurants in Eng land and mixed in preminent sc cial circles. She gave birth to son, Hugh, in 1964 and a daugli ter, Aimette, in 1970.
Occasionally Liesel retume to Germany to visit her mothei but almost always with a tas waiting outside. She rare! brought her children with hei and she made up fantastic stc ries about her parents* heroi past to anyone who asked. One Mrs. Steffens read about Liesel human rights endeavors in German newspaper. Althoug she could barely walk, she trai eled for an entire day to see h€ beloved daughter change plane for Kenya at the Frankfurt ai port. Liesel barely glanced in h( direction.
"I thought I was doing th ri^t thing," Liesel said. *Sut no I realize I had become what I d spised. I hated all intolerance, bi I was very intolerant. Forgiv< ness and facing the truth abo\ others is what really sets us free In 1980 Liesel moved her fan ily to Palm Beach. She was reac for a change, and she thought tl warm Florida sunshine would 1 good for her sickly daughte Unfortimately, the Brown< smacked into the heart of tl racial prejudice still common: the United States. People bo; cotted the restaurant she and h husband opened and garbai men left their trash lying in t! street. Their black cook was sh as he left work late one night, "When I look up fix>m my di ner, I don't want to see a nigge] one man told her coldly.
Ever the social activist, Lies wanted to fight the iiyustice h family suffered. But George hi other ideas. Divided over wheth ixi battle the prejudice, their 2 year marriage crumbled. Lies fled to California with h daughter and George returned England. Depress^, lonely ai burdened by the dark secrets si hid, suicide again seemed Liesel lilte the easiest solutior But after a second botched i tempt, Liesel stumbled upon three-day seminar on emotic ai healing and transformation 1986. One of the speakers w Rachel, the daughter of Ho] caust Survivors. She poured o her frustration about her paren obsession with the past.
"How could I forget? It's a s for me to feel good, to enjoy r work, to date a man, I can't allf