Der Unbeugsame — Ein Leben zwischen Verfolgung und „Wieder­gut­machung“

In the organizer's words:

Reading and discussion with Elfriede Brumsack

Organized by the Alliance for the Remembrance of the Victims of National Socialism.

"Der Unbeugame" is a Jewish story of resistance and resilience, of joining in and looking the other way. And against the backdrop of the resurgence of anti-Semitism, it is depressingly topical.

In 1939, 24-year-old Julius Brumsack manages to escape to England under adventurous circumstances. He enlisted in the British army and fought against the Germans from spring 1940. After the war, he returned to north-west Germany as a British occupying soldier and tried to find out what had happened to his family in his home town. He begins a decades-long, exhausting search for truth and justice; he encounters resistance from the population and all the authorities, but he also comes up against his own limits.

His daughter-in-law Elfriede Brumsack presents a very personal and moving account of an extraordinary life. Selected private letters, diaries, notes and a large number of documents on restitution and compensation processes, correspondence with perpetrators, witnesses and institutions form the basis of the story.