The painter Gertrude Sandmann was banned from working as an artist in 1935, as a “non-Aryan.” She refrained from emigrating to England because she did not want to leave her mother alone. Her father had died in 1917. When her mother died shortly after the war began, emigrating was no longer possible.
Gertrude Sandmann was due to be deported on November 21, 1942. She staged a fake suicide by leaving a farewell letter in her apartment. Her partner Hedwig Koslowski helped her to go underground and arranged hiding places and food for her.
Charlotte and Reinhold Großmann took the artist into their home in Berlin-Treptow. The area was often subject to air raids. When this made the situation too dangerous in June 1944, Hedwig Koslowski asked her friend Hedwig Plener for help. She made her parents’ garden shed available, on the edge of Berlin.
In October 1944, however, the unheated shed became too cold. Hedwig Koslowski took Gertrude Sandmann into her apartment until the end of the war. After her liberation, Gertrude Sandmann was able to return to work as an artist, despite severe damage to her health.