Four Girls from Berlin: A True Story of a Friendship That Defied the Holocaust

Four Girls from Berlin tells the unique story of Lotte and her three courageous friends, Ilonka, Erica, and Ursula, vividly describing what life was like in Hitler's Germany and examining the Holocaust's complex and painful legacy for its survivors. Written by Lotte's daughter, Marianne, this moving memoir is richly illustrated with the rescued photos, mementos, and letters that now preserve her prominent Jewish family's history. With the help of these objects and the recollections of Lotte, Erica, Ursula, and others, Marianne pieces together stirring images of the people and the way of life that Hitler was determined to destroy.

She describes the fearlessness and defiance of the four friends as they tried to focus on music studies in a city rife with spies, anti-Semitism, and Nazi fervor. Piece by piece, the details of Ilonka, Erica, and Ursula's unwavering devotion to Lotte's family emerge. Marianne also offers glimpses of earlier, happier times in her mother's family home, where Lotte's stepmother, Paula, cooked incredible meals, and her science professor father, affectionately called "Der Alte Fritz" (Old Man Fritz), hosted a lively succession of students, prominent Berliners, and international visitors.

In seeking to come to terms with the Holocaust's looming shadow over her own life, Marianne shares her struggle to discover her identity, honor her lost German family, and find her own future. Poignant and beautifully written, Four Girls from Berlin offers a unique perspective on the Holocaust and the desire to understand what led some people to risk their lives to stand up for what was right when so many others did not.

Pieces of well-worn family jewelry.

More than a thousand documents, letters, and photographs

Lotte Meyerhoff's best friends risked their lives in Nazi Germany to safeguard these and other treasured heirlooms and mementos from her family and return them to her after the war. The Holocaust had left Lotte the lone survivor of her family, and these precious objects gave her back a crucial piece of her past. Four Girls from Berlin vividly recreates that past and tells the story of Lotte and her courageous non-Jewish friends Ilonka, Erica, and Ursula as they lived under the shadow of Hitler in Berlin.

Written by Lotte's daughter, Marianne, this powerful memoir celebrates the unseverable bonds of friendship and a rich family legacy the Holocaust could not destroy.

"What a delightful book, and important, too. It gives us the courage and inspiration to utterly reject the fatalistic idea that fratricide, polemic, and enmity between Christians and Jews is inevitable and unchangeable. Finally, it reminds us never to forget or fail to appreciate those forces of light that bear witness to, and instill hope for, mankind and our world."

—Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein, President, International Fellowship of Christians and Jews

"Four Girls From Berlin is an evocative story of friendship, challenged in the most sinister environment. For Christians, it echoes the words of Jesus, 'greater love hath no man than to lay down his life for his friends.' The friendship of these four women, three Christians and a Jew, speaks of a greater humanity that in the face of the Nazi horror could not be broken. I strongly recommend men and women of all faiths to learn from it."

—The Venerable Lyle Dennen, Archdeacon, London, England

Prologue.

1 Glimpses of a Shattered Past.

2 The Past Disinterred.

3 Benny and Daddy.

4 Hands across the Holocaust.

5 A Tale of Til.

6 Erica in Berlin.

7 Lotte’s Love.

8 Rena.

9 London.

10 Rena’s Class and the Voyage of the St. Louis.

11 A New Direction.

12 "Wiedersehen," Not Good-bye.

13 The Family Namgalies.

14 An Interview with Jochen.

15 An Interview with Erica.

16 Heidelberg.

Epilogue.