“In Love and War,” by Ernst Hepp and Frances Fulenwider Hepp (Prairie Publishing, $30 hardback, $16.95 paper)
Frances Fulenwider, daughter of a prominent Denver real estate broker, had just started her career as a New York model (her roommate later married Clark Gable) when she met a handsome German journalist, Ernst Hepp. The two married in 1937, and just five years later, when their countries went to war with each other, they were faced with the difficult decision of whether to live in Germany or the United States.
While he opposed the Nazis and Hitler, Ernst believed he could do more good in Germany than the U.S., where he would likely end up in a detention camp. It was a decision he would regret as he faced not only the horrors of the Nazi regime but also the danger he imposed on himself, his wife and their two children.
Ernst wrote his story in 1975, Frances some 25 years later. So “In Love and War” is a dual autobiography, with sections from first one writer, then the other, that make up a compelling, if somewhat overlong, tale.
Thoroughly disillusioned with the Nazis and the war, Ernst nonetheless remained a diplomat in Sweden, where his main goal was to protect his family. Frances and the children lived for two years with Ernst’s parents in rural Germany, but even after they joined him in Sweden, Ernst could not desert.
Nazi policy dictated that the families of defecting officials were to be arrested and sent to concentration camps. His defection would have caused his parents’ deaths. Ernst’s outspokenness nearly led to his arrest on several occasions, and toward the end of the war, when an order came for him to return to Germany and what he was sure would be his own death, Ernst feigned illness. The ruse has an almost Keystone Kops quality to it, but the game was deadly serious.
Ernst’s high position gave him insights into German politics and leaders and his stories and conclusions make for good history. But the most potent part of the book occurs after the war, when Ernst was interned in both English- and American-sector camps. Food and accommodations were inadequate; thousands of Germans died. Moreover, the decision as to whether an incarcerated German should be cleared, sent to prison or hanged was arbitrary. Most of those processed early were given harsh sentences, while later prisoners, even Gestapo members, were generally released.
This is a powerful book for readers interested in World War II, made more interesting by the connection to a prominent Colorado family.
“Coming to Colorado: A Young Immigrant’s Journey to Become an American Flyer,” by Wolfgang W.E. Samuel (University of Mississippi, 352 pages, $32)
As a German boy during World War II, Wolfgang W.E. Samuel watched American airplanes flying overhead, first dropping bombs and, after the war’s end, ferrying food and supplies to war-ravaged Europe. While most Germans in the postwar years dreamed only of their next meal, Samuel had fantasies of becoming a flyer one day.
The first step was to immigrate to America with his mother and her new husband, an Air Force enlisted man from Derby, just north of Denver. The three left Germany for Lowry Air Force Base in 1951, when Wolfgang was about 16. The mother wanted Wolfgang to get a job and help the struggling family, but the stepfather, who hadn’t finished high school himself, insisted that the boy get an education.
So Samuel enrolled in Denver’s Opportunity School, and when he’d learned enough English, he transferred to East High. One of the best parts of the book is Samuel’s comparison of the carefree life at East, filled with proms and convertibles, with the hunger, poverty, brutality and rape that he’d seen in Germany only a few years earlier. The boy rarely discussed his background with his friends. Incidentally, there are some nice recollections of Denver in the 1950s.
“Coming to Colorado” tells about Samuel’s struggle to get an education in a time before student loans. When he ran out of money after a year at CU, Samuel joined the Air Force in the last month that enlisted men were offered the GI Bill. While in the Air Force, he wed a spoiled debutante in what was a short, somewhat bizarre marriage. The author later finished school at CU, then went back into the Air Force and a career in flying.
The sheer determination of the boy against incredible odds makes “Coming to Colorado” a poignant story. You can’t help but be caught up with young Samuel as he faces one obstacle after another to eventually not just survive, but flourish.
In fact, it’s so easy to become enmeshed in Samuel’s autobiography that readers will be disappointed that the author didn’t include an afterword telling what happened to the people in the book.
Sandra Dallas is a Denver novelist who writes a monthly column on new regional nonfiction.
