“Farewell, my Paulinka. I love you!” “Goodbye, my dearest Papa... I love you so!” I kiss my father’s face and hands, separated from him by the wrought iron rungs of the police courtyard gate in Anderlecht, rue Georges Moreau. I then watch him tenderly kiss my mother, as best they can, given the bars. We shall never lay eyes on him again. Perhaps mercifully, my mother and I don’t know that, and most certainly neither does he. It is Friday, May 10, 1940, the first day of the war for us in Brussels, and my father is under Belgian arrest for being Austrian -- ironically a privilege his country of birth denies him, for back “home” he is nothing more than ein Jude!, ein Untermensch! -- a Jew, not quite a human being...
That very morning we had awakened to pandemonium in the streets below, people rushing about every which way. Huge crowds, sheer and utter chaos. Black dots in the sky. Men being called up to rejoin their regiments. WAR: THE “BOCHES” ARE COMING! Later that morning, a persistent and loud knocking on our combination bedroom-living room door. Belgian police, gleaming white helmets and black capes. Some plainclothesmen too. Papers, sheaves of paper. “Friedrich Schwarzbart! In the name of the King, you are under arrest, as a potential enemy of the Belgian State. Your country (of origin) is at war with us.” You must immediately accompany us!” We were dumbfounded and completely beside ourselves. What had we just heard? Was it real? Or was it a bad dream? It was real: they went on to inform us that he would immediately be taken to the Rue Georges Moreau police station. We were allowed, perhaps even encouraged, to come there and bring him some spare clothing. And without further ado down the stairs they marched, surrounding my poor forlorn-looking Papa. After composing herself with the greatest difficulty, Mutti made up the suggested bundle. Papa’s best suit (why, for God’s sake, why?), shirts, underwear, socks, shoes. And handkerchiefs, of course, ample handkerchiefs. We rushed to the police station, only a few streets away. And that bundle was ever so painstakingly squeezed, pushed and pulled between the bars into his waiting hands...
Papa softly admonishes me not to worry, that he will return as soon as this “gross mistake” is discovered, for a gross mistake it must indeed turn out to be; in the meantime, however, I am the man of the family and have to take good care of Mutti until he can, once again, resume his rightful responsibilities as head of our family. The little man he is thus addressing had just turned seven, not quite a month ago, but I should most assuredly protect my mother. So much love in his beautiful dark eyes, so much courage in his handsome face. And so much disbelief. No visible tears. The enormity of the occurrence undoubtedly escapes all of us, for who can truly comprehend what is actually happening here? We have been temporarily separated before, but no one in his right mind could have anticipated or even imagined the ramifications of this particular nightmare. No true precedent exists. We are Jews fleeing the Germans, fleeing for our lives. How can my dear father be arrested for anything, let alone as an anti-Belgian Germanophile, possibly even a fifth columnist? And untold thousands along with him, victims of the same horrible and irrevocable blunder. Sheer madness! It’s all a terrible, terrible mistake, and the Belgian authorities will realize it presently, won’t they? No indeed! They will not. Instead, they will compound the atrocity, in close complicity with their more-than-willing neighbors, the French.