ABSTRACT
Georg Bergeraque (1924–89) 1 was born in the Klausener Platz quarter in Berlin’s Charlottenburg district in 1924. His father, a disabled World War I veteran, was a carpenter and a communist trade union official. His mother worked as a housewife and took care of her only and invalid son. 2 After leaving school in 1938, Bergeraque attended a commercial college and found a position in 1940 as a factotum at the EHER Publishing Company, which put out the fascist publications Völkische Beobachter and Angriff. He was a member of the Hitler Youth despite his disabilities, took pride in his uniform, and felt accepted and integrated in a way he had rarely experienced at school and with his playmates. He was exempted from compulsory labour and military service and joined the communist youth movement in 1945, following an easy denazification procedure. Through the trade union (FDGB—Freier Deutscher Gewirtschaftsbund or Free German Trade Union Federation) he joined the Communist Party.
