Gerhard Beck and his twin sister Margot grew up in Berlin. Their father was Jewish; their mother converted to Judaism for her wedding.
From the spring of 1940, 16-year-old Gerhard Beck prepared for a life in Palestine at a hakhshara camp near Königs Wusterhausen. He was unable to emigrate, however, for health-related reasons. He had to perform forced labor in a cardboard factory from 1941. He was an active member of the Zionist youth organization HeChalutz and gave himself the Hebrew name of Gad.
In 1941 he fell in love with Manfred Lewin, who was deported in the fall of 1942. Gad Beck joined the covert youth group Chug Chaluzi and concentrated more and more on its underground work. After Jizchak Schwersenz’s emigration, Gad Beck became the head of Chug Chaluzi. From the spring of 1944, he passed on financial aid from the HeChalutz office in Geneva to up to twenty Jews in hiding.
Gad Beck went underground in 1944 and hid with various acquaintances in Berlin. In March 1945 he was arrested in an apartment by two Jewish informers to the Gestapo, known as “catchers,” and two SS men. He survived the end of the war in Schulstraße prison.
The twins Gerhard and Margot Beck, Berlin, 1937. Source: Privatbesitz/Private
Meeting in hiding on the Jewish holiday Shavuot, June 1943. From left to right: Gad Beck, Jizchak Schwersenz, Edith Wolff (concealed), Zvi Abrahamsohn (Aviram), Leopold (Jehuda) Chones, David Billard, and Miriam Beck. Source: Wichern-Verlag GmbH, Berlin
Poem “To those without courage” by Gad Beck, written for the birthday of Jizchak Schwersenz, one of the founders of Chug Chaluzi, May 30, 1942. Source: Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand, Album „Juden im Widerstand“/Bibliothek
Groninger (formerly Utrechter) Str. 50, Chug Chaluzi headquarters. Gad Beck and Zvi Abrahamsohn were arrested here on March 2, 1945. Berlin, 1993. Source: Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand, Album „Juden im Widerstand“/Bibliothek
