Source : Yad Vashem Archive O3/6273 [Henry Meyer was born in Dresden in 1923. From 1936 to 1939, he lived in Prague, where he studied music. He returned to Germany after the Germans occupied Czechoslovakia.]
My parents attempted to contact whatever relatives they knew in America and we were registered at the American Embassy as candidates for leaving Germany. The family in America wrote back that they are in no financial position to sponsor us and send us an affidavit. The American Embassy told us that we and my mother, who was born near Dresden, would both be included in the German quota. My father, who was born in Bytom, which was the part of Silesia which always fluctuated - once it was Poland and then it was the other - would have to be registered under the Polish quota, which meant at this time that we probably would have gotten our visa in time and he would have to stay behind and find a way to go to another country - Cuba or South America - and perhaps join us later. In any case, since nothing else happened, we began to wait it out. Everybody in those days thought this was in any case a hoax that would go away and we would soon return to our normal lives…. My mother was very successful in business there, both before and at this time, and wouldn't let go. She thought she could hold out and then everything would be fine again. And then, of course, it became much too late, it cost too much money from personal fortunes and things like that only to keep the stores and perhaps sell at the last minute when immigration was imminent which was not forthcoming… I was very popular at school I was a good student. My other classmates liked me…. I was the Klassenpresident (class president) for a while and it is so grotesque that students knowing very little at this time what was going on in Germany…. When my term as class president was finally terminated, they showered me with presents and among them was a photo of Hitler, very nicely framed. They thought I would have some use for it. It shows a certain amount of ignorance from the students. I also did not know, of course, what was in store for me, but I already felt that some of the students who had been friends of mine had now turned away from me, that teachers made hidden remarks because they couldn't very well say something about me….
