After losing his film distribution company in Leipzig, the Jewish businessman Max Krakauer moved to Berlin with his wife Ines in 1939. They had to perform forced labor there. On January 29, 1943, they narrowly escaped deportation. Hans Ackermann, a Christian acquaintance, took them to Pastor Wilhelm Jannasch, who put them in touch with other pastors in Pomerania. Hans Ackermann provided his expired postal identity card, replacing his own photo with one of Max Krakauer. Using this primitive forgery, on March 9, 1943, the Krakauers embarked on a dangerous journey; police often carried out checks on trains.
When they could find no further hiding places in Pomerania, they returned to Berlin in the summer of 1943. Pastor Theodor Burckhardt, in whose house in Berlin they stayed for a week, sent them on to his colleague Kurt Müller in Stuttgart, who was building an aid network there. More than 40 Swabian pastors took the Krakauers into their homes, under the names Hans and Grete Ackermann. They were “passed on” after a few weeks or days. They were liberated by the U.S. Army in Stetten on April 21, 1945.