Anita Lasker was born into a professional Jewish family, one of three sisters (Marianne and Renate). Her father was a lawyer; her mother a fine violinist. They suffered discrimination from 1933 but as their father had fought at the front in the First World War, gaining an Iron Cross, the family felt some degree of immunity. Marianne, the eldest sister, fled to England in 1941. In April 1942, Anita's parents were taken away and are believed to have died at Isbica, near Lublin, in Poland. Having been initially arrested in Breslau for aiding the escape of French forced labourers, Anita Lasker-Wallfisch was later able to survive Auschwitz by playing the cello in the Auschwitz prisoners' orchestra. Towards the end of the war the sisters were transferred to Bergen Belsen where they remained for up to a year after liberation. During this time Anita was a witness at the Lüneburg trial where camp guards and Kapos were tried for their war crimes.
From the guide to the Lasker-Wallfisch, Anita: personal correspondence, 1939-1945, (Wiener Library)
