llse Lewin was active in the Communist Youth Federation from a young age. She joined the KPD in 1932.
In 1933 she married the non-Jewish August Haak pro forma, in order to give up her Jewish-sounding surname. They were divorced a year later. Before Ilse Haak had to perform forced labor for Siemens from 1940, she worked in youth services for the Jewish Agency’s Palestine Office. Her attempt to emigrate to Palestine herself failed, however. Her mother was deported to Theresienstadt in September 1942.
Haak’s non-Jewish friend Gretha Schellworth worked as a pediatrician at the police hospital. She warned Ilse Haak at the end of February 1943 of the upcoming “Operation Factory.” Ilse Haak went into hiding to evade deportation. Acquaintances obtained forged papers for her under the name of Vera Freyer. After changing accommodation several times, she found shelter in Berlin-Prenzlauer Berg, where she experienced the end of the war.
After the war, she married the communist Günter Stillmann and they lived in East Berlin. From 1945 to 1949, Ilse Stillmann worked for the main committee for official Victims of Fascism. She went on to work for the German Economics Institute and later as an editor at a children’s publishing house.