Ludwig Bauer – Eyewitness to the Nazi horror

In school and daily life Ludwig Bauer (1926 - 2023) experienced discrimination and hate time and time again. In the Pogrom Night, as a twelve-year-old, he was forced to witness the storming and desecration of the synagogue. At that time the Bauer family were living in the teacher’s apartment above the prayer room. The parents and their son hid in the attic, but to no avail. Father and son were arrested and locked up. A traumatic experience for Ludwig. His father Anton Bauer was taken to the concentration camp at Dachau. After his release Bauer, a veteran of the First World War made every effort to obtain exit permits for himself and his family. They managed to escape to Australia where relatives of the mother were living.

Later Ludwig Bauer studied chemistry. He emigrated to the USA, founded a family there and taught at the University of Illinois. He could never forget the horror of the Nazi period. It was only in his old age that he decided to publish his traumatic childhood experiences in the form of an eyewitness account.