My father Kurt Wellisch was a practicing lawyer in Vienna, Austria at the time of the Anschluss, March 12, 1938.   Shortly after the Anschluss, the Nazis purged Jews from the professions and my father was ordered to appear before the Gestapo.  The diary he kept and that is displayed here shows the dates of his appointments with the Gestapo and his ultimate arrest on May 4, 1938. He was incarcerated for six weeks, including during the first anniversary of his marriage to my mother Frieda Wellisch.  They corresponded with each other and she spent much of that time securing exit visas for both of them.   She was successful and they left Vienna on July 30th. They spent a year and a half in Zurich, following which they immigrated to the United States in 1940, settling in Miami, Florida.  He became a lawyer and CPA in the United States. After his death in 1982, I inherited his diary, the jail correspondence between them and many other documents pertaining both to their escape as well as the unfortunate death of my maternal grandparents after their deportation from Vienna to Lodz in October 1941. My paternal grandparents survived and also settled in Miami, Florida. 

– Fred A Wellisch

Relationship:  Child of im/migrant Child of im/migrant