Trudy Bandler Scaramuzzi

"Let me tell you something about my family. My family was quite well off. My grandparents had a big house in the very centre of Pilsen, opposite the main post office on the main square, and they had a leather shop on the ground floor. In the 19th century, it was not quite unusual to sell leather, from which shoes were then sewn. In 1800, there was no industry, no craftsmen to make these things in bulk. My grandfather began working in this industry by walking with his backpack and cart through small villages and towns, selling skins to shoemakers and those who sewed bags and suitcases. He brought them all the material they needed. Well, he started to do quite well, so he opened a small shop in Pilsen. Then my father was born, who was the last of three sons. His two brothers emigrated around 1928; one went to America and the other to Shanghai, I think it was Shanghai in China. And my father, who was the youngest, stayed in Pilsen and continued his grandfather's work, taking care of the leather trade. Then he married my mother. A lady came to the store for help and they started to make items, bags, belts, shoes from leather. They did quite well financially."

"In 1945, the school was closed, the war ended and many children returned to Czechoslovakia. Now I have to recall a sad thing. We were all children from Jewish families, and 80 percent of the parents of these children did not return from the concentration camps, so these children returned as orphans. Moreover, after their return, the Czech children did not behave very nicely to them, saying that we were on holiday in England and they had to stay in Czechoslovakia. I was very lucky because my parents survived the war in Italy. It was not easy, they had to face many difficulties and especially fear, but in 1946 my mother came to England for me. I remembered her a little, and my uncle told me about her and sometimes showed me some photos of her, but the meeting was weird. She didn't speak English and I only spoke English. What was even worse for me was that she took me to Italy. I was thirteen, it's such a complicated age, and she took me straight from London to Bari. Can you imagine Bari at that time? It was a completely different world, such a difference to England, in every aspect of life, and of course the climate. There was so much sun in Italy, I was used to the colder English climate. Plus, I didn't know a word of Italian."