Herbert Silbermann grew up in a wealthy Jewish family in Berlin-Wedding. He set up his own store in 1924. After the “Nuremberg race laws” were decreed in 1935, he could no longer marry his non-Jewish partner Luise Mallwitz. At the end of 1937, the couple were summoned by the Gestapo under suspicion of “racial defilement” and subjected to severe repressions after their release.
Herbert Silbermann lost his business and had to perform forced labor. He evaded arrest in the major raid at the end of February 1943 and went into hiding, as did his sister Adelheid Silbermann on the same day. His fiancée hid him and provided him with food. Her apartment was bombed in May 1944 and Herbert was buried under rubble, since he had to stay in the apartment during air raids.
The couple married shortly after their liberation, on June 19, 1945. They and their son Edmund emigrated to the United States in 1949.
