THE WAR YEARS

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After three years at Dr. Brauchele’s hospital, she met Rudolf Kroeger, a young man who had just finished his engineering studies. They married three months after their first date. She had a difficult choice to give up a career she loved, since at that time a woman had to give up her job when she got married. But Hanna had fallen head over heels in love, and was ready to start a family. They had two children when Rudolf’s father gave them the down payment to a house and they moved to a small house surrounded by fruit trees, berry bushes, asparagus beds, and a place to grow potatoes, cabbage, and turnips. This property kept them alive during and after the war when they witnessed the starvation, brutal crimes, mind-shattering sadness, and traumatic hostility that are the result of war.
 

Rudolf was drafted in March 1945, two months before peace was finally declared. He was sent to defend Berlin from the Russians, and was captured and enslaved to work in a coal mine in northern Russia for nearly five years. He was finally released in December 1949 because he was too ill to work in the mines. In the meantime, Hanna had to take care of 4 young children by herself with little food, little clothing, and very little fuel for heating and cooking. When Rudolf finally returned, they agreed that they must start a new life in a new country and started preparations to come to America