David Baddiel Tries To Reclaim Ancestor's Brick Factory | Who Do You Think You Are
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David visits Königsberg, home to generations of David's mother's family - the Fabians. He retraces his grandfather's footsteps and tries to track down and reclaim his brick factory.
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As a child, comedian David Baddiel felt a strong emotional connection with his maternal grandfather, Ernst, a German Jew who fled his native land just weeks before the Nazi regime invaded Poland. Now David is a father himself, he regrets not asking Ernst more about his early life.
“Because my family experience is one of immigration and ‘refugee-ism’, you’re never entirely sure how you ended up here,” says David. Belatedly learning more about his family, David finds a story of lost wealth and wartime internment, in addition to discovering a branch of his family he never knew existed.
David begins his research at the home of his parents, Sarah and Colin. Sarah was just five months old when her own parents, Ernst and Otti Fabian, escaped Germany. To discover more, David heads to his grandfather’s former home, Königsberg, formerly German territory but now an exclave of Russia bordered by Lithuania and Poland. Before David leaves, his mother drops a bombshell: Sarah suspects she may have been her uncle Arno Radbil’s daughter, adopted by Ernst and Otti in order to get her out of Germany.
Königsberg is now called Kaliningrad and was heavily damaged during the Second World War. Yet before Europe descended into conflict, it was a vibrant university town. As owners of a brick factory, the Fabians were wealthy and central to the city’s cultural life.
The rise of the Nazism changed the family’s fortunes. At the end of a muddy track, David goes to visit the site of the family’s brickworks, but there’s now little to see beyond a few desultory ruins. “This makes me feel as if my past has been blown out of existence,” he says.
At least Ernst got out; just three weeks before the Nazis invaded Poland, paying £1,000 (£40,000 today) for a visa to England. David’s great-uncle Arno, who seems unlikely to have been Sarah’s father judging by a letter that David finds amongst Ernst’s papers, wasn’t so lucky. Instead, he was last heard of in Warsaw but David can find no clues to Arno’s fate in the city. Did he starve in the infamous Warsaw Ghetto or die violently in the 1943 uprising against the Nazis? David will never know.
Not that coming to England was in itself the end of Ernst’s problems. In 1940, like many others from Eastern Europe, Ernst was sent to an internment camp amidst fears there might be spies amongst the refugees. Apparently, though, Ernst quite enjoyed the experience. His ‘camp’ was a converted hotel on the seafront in the Isle of Man. He shared his captivity with a remarkable five Nobel laureates. In April 1941, Ernst was released.
Ernst isn’t the only traveller in David’s family tree. His Latvian paternal great-grandfather, Barnett Baddiel, was one of 120,000 Eastern European Jews who came to the UK at the turn of the century to escape persecution. Barnett had a brother, Harry, and David discovers that Harry’s descendants, Osher and Clive, are noted teachers.
Harry’s descendants are religious Jews and David heads to Golders Green to learn more. There he meets another David Baddiel in the street by chance, a distant cousin who describes himself as a rebel. However, David’s research into his father’s family ends here: he wants to meet his family only with the cameras there, they want to meet only without the cameras present.
As David’s mother threatens to torch his house by lighting an alarming number of candles on a birthday cake, his journey into the past is at an end. One lingering question remains unresolved: even if Sarah wasn’t Arno’s daughter, could she nevertheless have been adopted? It’s a question that says much about the upheavals caused by the Second World War, but one that will probably never be answered.
Пікірлер: 52
Ruth looks amazing for 81 years; seems very active and strong. Good for her; she's lovely.
It's very touching to see twenty-first century Germans, Jews and Soviets coming together to uncover their past. It's such an important thing to do.
A gift to my father after his death - 🥰
The thing I love about this show is the history you get. It's amazing how far flung people's families get just a couple of generations back, and the history you get from their stories is amazing.
Must be from the 2000's. The number 4 tram is long gone by now and the whole city looks so much better and brighter now! I do sort of remember that the city used to look sort of grim and poor back then, but in the spring and summer it was so green that everything else just didn't matter.
i would have cried to see the ruins of my families home/factory.. i would have taken a brick as a cherished memento and heirloom
@WhoDoYouThinkYouAre
3 жыл бұрын
David did actually take some mementos, stay tuned for the upcoming video.
6:30 “Can you tell them that it was my Grandfather’s factory” 😩😂
The cement story was so lovely. In that day Ruth’s father could have gotten away with simply walking away from his debt. I enjoy hearing about honorable people in vile times, I think we need a deluge of these simple stories of goodness!
David’s Great grandfather was highly thought of by the elderly woman’s father and herself.
My great-grandmother was born in Königsberg in the 1870s, and in pictures it looked amazing at the time. Now it looks dreary and dead. Many of the records have been lost too.
@baltasarnoreno5973
Жыл бұрын
Agreed. Modern Kaliningrad looks like a terrible place. The Soviets really rebuilt the place in their own image.
Quite possible that there are photographs of the brick works somewhere in a German archive. Hope he investigated that opportunity while he was there. A factory large enough to be indicated on a map might have been surrounded by town or hotel or rail line. Local post office or library? Really hope he took a brick with him, and if nothing else had his photo taken at the site with the lovely woman who went well out of her way to participate in this family search.
@agatakowalik9457
3 жыл бұрын
This is a very special strongly military region of the Russia since 1945 - almost everything German traces probably were erased as fascistic and conected with enemy, even city name’s Königsburg was forbidden (now Kaliningrad). They used map from 30’ because the streets are now changed. The city was hevaly bombarded. Hole Germans was expelled ( it was large city with medieval history, I.Kant was born there). But during II war Germans were erased 4000 Jews from Konigsburg. The Synagogue was destroyed, Jews were deported to Teresin and Auschwitz. Nobody cared about papers.
Would take a brick from it and take home with me.
@GlobetrotterBR
3 жыл бұрын
I would do the same.
@merseywhogirl3430
3 жыл бұрын
@@GlobetrotterBR Ditto!!!
@lightyagami3492
3 жыл бұрын
Same!
I thought David was quite lovely to the elderly lady.
So much history...
My goodness Ruth looks exactly the same. Such a beautiful lady
0:23 the city of Konigsberg was flattened by the RAF in the last months of the war - rather than by the USSR who would have probably flattened it anyway with artillery as they did with most places they so-called "liberated".
Interesting...
The Soviets took it all back to Rusia brick by brick
This was great! I'm glad Ruth told this important story about her father's assistance in 1937....he could've been thrown in Dachau if caught helping Jews.
I’m sorry they got rid of the brick factory.
The ending statement is so poignant.
My first time in Berlin 5 years ago ..travelled towards Eastern side...found the people subdued and didn't trust...and spoke to a few and now I totally understand why...IRON CURTAIN...it will take them at least another generation to trust...😪😪
@Hastur876
Жыл бұрын
I spent a week in East Berlin in 2001, it wasn't like that at all. It was more like Brooklyn.
David really seemed a bit cold to the lovely older lady who traveled so far to tell him that story.
@celiabarker
3 жыл бұрын
She deserved more, I hope she got more off camera.
@exdus235
3 жыл бұрын
@@celiabarker 👍👍👍⚘
@krissee6961
3 жыл бұрын
😄they show only minutes of what was hours spent together. He didn't seem cold at all.
@gozerthegozarian9500
3 жыл бұрын
He seemed a bit reserved, but not cold, really...And 'a bit reserved' is actually the way we Germans prefer to be approached, it's how we tend to approach people as well. We usually need some time to warm to people.
@Mina-gm3pg
3 жыл бұрын
David behaves like many males..never thankful, and often lacking in depth of understanding, compassion of others lives in the period. Everyone thinks they would behave differently...but that is not the truth.
This German town
@dunkelrot9915
3 жыл бұрын
Not much left of the German town. It is polish since dacades.
@agatakowalik9457
3 жыл бұрын
Dunkel Rot It is military zone of Russia since 1945.
@sisuguillam5109
2 жыл бұрын
Not really.
my god its absolutely insane how the entire city was just completely eradicated from earth, with the descendants now all living in several countries. What the Russians have done to that city is an absolute travesty.