"When I had completed the first draft of my book "Hitler
Youth: Growing up in Hitler's Shadow," I sought out Rabbi David Geffen at Temple Israel in
Scranton Pennsylvania and asked him if he would be willing
to read my manuscript." Speaking is Dr. Susan Campbell
Bartoletti of Moscow Pennsylvania, the author of seventeen children's
and teenage books. Many of her books have won prizes
and awards, but most of all people love to read them,
enjoy them and learn from them. It was a great honor for me
both to meet her then in 2002 and to continue to be
her friend a decade later.

"After Rabbi Geffen read my draft, he showed me the self-
published memoir, 'On the Run in Nazi Germany,' by his
cousin Bert Lewyn and his daughter-in-law, Bev Lewyn.
Rabbi Geffen emphasized that Bert, a Berlin native,
was the same age as the Hitler Youth I had written about."

Dr. Bartoletti was not really sure what to do. Her research
had been quite extensive even interviewing some Jews from
Berlin who had survived. Over the weekend following her
meeting with me, "she cracked open Bert's book and began
to read." There she found the tale of a Jewish youth in
Berlin which was for Bartoletti a "gem" demonstrating
the uniqueness of Bert's existence in the horror
swirling all about him.

"We never know who will survive a tragedy," Dr. Bartoletti
noted after reading the book. "just as we don't know
who will step up to be a hero - but there is something
in Bert that he drew upon to survive. Was it faith? Divine intervention? Miracles that were presented to him
but not others? There is no easy answer. His survival
is much more complex than that. I saw it as a tale
which rivaled 'The Pianist.' It became most important for me
to include his story in my book."

In 2005 Scholastic Press published "Hitler Youth" by Dr. Bartoletti. Eight years later 140,000 copies have been sold plus the book
has been translated into German and is used as a text
for German high school students.


The story of Bert Lewyn, which he relates poignantly in "On the Run in Nazi Berlin" is what he had to do daily to stay alive in the years from 1942 to 1945, when as a self-described "U-boat," he lived secretly in the homes of kind souls, at times in the guise of an SS man, in bombed-out skeletons of buildings, in a Gestapo prison from which he escaped and then in the home of friends at the end of the war where the greatest "miracle" of all was convincing Russian soldiers that he was a Jew and not a Nazi in hiding.

HOW THE BOOK came into being is itself a story, since Bert was hesitant to discuss his personal history, It. was his first cousin in Jerusalem , also a survivor and noted expert in oral history, Prof. Dov Levin, who in 1980 initiated the process.. During a family visit to the US , Bert spoke; Dov asked the questions; taped the replies.

A decade later, after Bev Saltzman married Marc Lewyn, Bert's son, she, a professional CNN researcher, worked tirelessly with
her father-in-law prying out of his memory facts long forgotten. Then Bev and Bert wrote the book. "Bert was amazing during the
years we spent working on the book," Bev said. "He was incredible in that he could answer any question, no matter how painful."


Who is Bert Lewyn, an Atlanta resident for 64 years? For me personally,, he has special meaning since
he is my cousin. Born in Berlin in 1923, Bert's parents were Johanna and Leopold Lewyn, who were
butchered by the Nazis. Leopold was the nephew of Sara Hene Geffen of Atlanta. Sara Hene was
my grandmother and her sister, Batya Levin of Kovno Lithuania, was , Bert's grandmother. Esther
Sloan Lewyn, Bert's wife for the last 61 years wrote the following.

"Bert remembered his parents corresponding with Rabbi and Mrs. Geffen in the 1930s when
he was quite young. Almost thirty of those letters survived, a testament to deep love of the
rabbi and his wife for their niece and nephew and great nephew." Esther continued." Bert
always thought of the Geffens as the closest thing he had to parents after they
brought him to Atlanta sixty-four years ago. After the war was over, Bert recalls, Rabbi
Geffen was looking for his father and found Bert in a DP camp in Germany." Despite
the efforts of Rabbi Geffen and other relatives, Leopold could not take the step required.


When Kristallnacht occurred in 1938, it was too late for the Lewyn family - no exit visas - no possibilities to escape the Nazi regime. Bert recalled the shock of his family entrapped with little or no hope and Dr. Bartoletti weaves
that terrible memory memory into her "Hitler Youth."

On March 27, 1942, the inevitable knock on the door. Bert let two Gestapo agents enter with their line, "Herr Lewyn, we are here to assist you." This was an "infamous" Gestapo tactic; supposedly "they wanted to help the Jews in these troubling times.

"The Gestapo watched us closely, stone-faced and businesslike. For all they said, they were not there to help us. This day was a culmination of events for their business was the Obliteration of our Race."

They were transported to the Levetzowstrasse synagogue in the Moabit district of Berlin, no longer religious now a massive collection point for hundreds of Berlin Jews. Bert recalled.. "I was in a panic. From somewhere deep within me, I felt the beginnings of a rage, rising and spreading through my body like an electrical current, until I thought I would explode. 'Oh my God,' 'they're going to separate me from my parents'."

Because he was young and healthy and had studied metalworking, Bert was ordered to leave his parents and accompany a Gestapo agent. " My parents were being taken away from me. This might be my only opportunity to say good-bye. My mother was just coming to understand the Gestapo agent's orders. A look of unspeakable horror came over her face. She moaned... my father's eyes were blank, his face broken. We all fell into each others' arms... gripped each other tightly hoping the Nazis would not be able to penetrate.

"It was over. Although I could not have known at the time, I would never see my parents again."

JOHANNA AND Leopold were taken away on March 28, 1942, and sent to Trawniki , Poland . Recently, he received a description of their fate. "From Trawniki station they had to walk as a part of their group 12 kilometers to a ghetto called Piaski. They had to live under horrible living conditions - no proper rooms - only scarce food, no sanitary facilities. In autumn 1942 the SS marched them to Sobibor where they were executed. Their bodies were stuffed into open graves."

Now Bert was on his own. From late March 1942 until May 1945, he used his mind, his stealth, his muscles and his intuition to stay alive and become one of those 1,700 Berlin Jews who survived in the city itself.. He points to three miracles which saved him.

"What were the odds that I would encounter my friend Heinrich on my way to work at the gun factory? That Heinrich would risk severe punishment to tell me that all Jewish workers were being deported... Had I missed him I would have been deported along with the other Jewish workers to a concentration camp." The first miracle for Bert.
"What were the odds that, once I was finally arrested by the Gestapo, I would find myself in a prison where I could make a key to a locked gate enabling me to escape?" Miracle No. 2.

For the third miracle May 1945 as the war ended. Several Russian soldiers burst into the apartment where Bert was staying with a friendly family. The soldiers were about to kill these individuals who they believed were Nazis in hiding. With amazing bravado Bert was able to prove that they were Jews because he had an uncle, Boris Levin, in Moscow, an electrical engineer with published textbooks in the field. One Russian soldier, a Jew and an electrician, had used Boris Levin's materials. He believed Bert and ordered his fellow soldiers not to kill them. Miracle No. 3 now opened the door to freedom as the war ended.

As fate would have it, almost four years were to pass before Bert Lewyn was able to leave Germany and
join Sara Hene and Rabbi Tobias Geffen in Atlanta in June 1949. .Here he married Esther Sloan 61 years ago.

Esther explained how she and Bert met via a shidduch set up by Mrs. Geffen and her mother.
"Several times my mother told me that I had to accept a date with him - I refused." Finally, she agreed
but her basic condition was that she would only see him at her home. "I was not interested in being
seen with an 'undesirable' by my circle of friends. At any rate, he came over. He was handsome, intelligent
and spoke English with practically no accent." Since 1951 they have had a wonderful
life together and raised a very fine family with 5 caring children and 6 grandchildren."

Bert's book has been translated into German, a notable accomplishment. In the summer of 2009, the Ministry of Education of the city of Berlin recommended that history teachers use the volume in the study of modern German history.

"Why is Bert's story of faith, miracles and courage so special to me?" Dr. Bartoletti asks rhetorically.
"Surely, Bert was afraid. And yet, Bert moved through his fear. (Isn't this what we wish for ourselves and
others, to move through our fear?)

"I have a special interest in the agency of young people.
I have a special interest in survivors.
I want to understand the qualties and habits that help human beings survive evil
and thrive afterward as Bert did.
I want to understand courage, resiliency, healing, the will to live, holding on to faith,
and how one survives being a survivor.
These are the things that Bert's story teaches me - and why it is
imperative to pass his story on."