As World War II commemorations often focus on the battlefield and the Holocaust, the human story of Germany's postwar crisis remains largely absent from history books, movies, and documentaries. In 1945, the country faced political fragmentation, economic collapse, and profound social upheaval. For the German people, the end of the war did not mean an end to hardship—it marked the beginning of a struggle to survive amid uncertainty and loss. That gap in collective memory is now addressed by a new memoir, Trauterose, which brings the daily realities and psychological toll of those years into sharp focus through the eyes of a child.
Elisabeth Haggblade, the author, was orphaned at birth during World War II and spent her first eleven years in the household of a former SS officer and his family. Her first-person testimony offers an intimate view of postwar Germany, shaped by lived experience and the demands of survival, adaptation, and grief. The book has earned the 2024 IndieReader Discovery Award in the Memoir category and First Place Non-Fiction in The Authors Show 2024 Book Cover Awards.
More than a personal account, Trauterose illuminates a pivotal historical moment through the details of everyday life, revealing how instability and deprivation shaped the choices people faced. Haggblade's testimony conveys the physical and psychological scars of war, both in her own life and in the lives of those she encountered. Against a backdrop of fragile institutions and scarce resources, even ordinary routines demanded resilience. Yet her narrative also shows how faith and community helped people endure.
Haggblade writes of the late Pope Benedict XVI, then known as Herr Joseph Ratzinger, who taught her catechism in the 1950s. After he left her school, he sent a handwritten letter spelling out the proper path to follow in growing up: 'If one buttons one's coat the wrong way, one would have to undo all of it and start over again to make it right. So it is with life,' admonishing us 'to choose the right beginning.'
In a recent talk for AAUW book club members in Santa Barbara, California, Haggblade described the challenges of that era. 'One had to make an effort to establish a routine, to bring some kind of order into one's life,' she said. 'What was it like to get up in the morning, trying to find soap, comb, toothbrush, warm water—not a small task in those times. We had to find food and ways to cook it. One still had to go to school, without public or private transportation, in all seasons. Find a place to do homework. Find proper clothes and shoes to wear; gear for rain, clothes for winter; find thread for mending clothes. And we had to deal with sickness and death in the family. All the while, people still had to suffer the usual annoying indignities of adolescence, middle age crises, old age problems.'
Haggblade stated she wrote the book as a reaction to glamorous portrayals in German magazines of the postwar years and to positive comments she heard from Americans about their understanding of that time. 'Both impressions were in contrast to my experience growing up and those I came in contact with,' she said. 'They told only one side of the story.' She added, 'By looking back, we learn how Germany has reckoned with its past. We can trace the changes the country has undergone and what it has become politically, sociologically, and economically on account of its size and influence in Europe and in the world today. Baruch Spinoza exhorts us: To understand, not judge.'
Reviewers have praised Trauterose. Craig Jones of IndieReader called it 'an uncompromising, moving, and elegiac memoir of a deprived childhood in postwar Germany.' Midwest Book Review noted, 'Libraries seeking powerful, personal memoirs that hold political and social lessons and insights will find Trauterose a study in adaptation, survival, and growth.' Amazon reviewers have called it 'extremely well written' and 'an unforgettable window into a time and place that few Americans know about.'
The book is available in print, ebook, and audiobook formats at Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Elisabeth-Haggblade/author/B0CTRXLF9G. More information is available at https://www.trauteroseauthor.com. In short, Trauterose is the account of one person's search for humanity in existence—a cautionary tale on the inherited guilt created by rampant nationalism, and a painfully honest and often humorous view of the world through the eyes of a young woman who found her way to freedom and purpose.
