Destined to Witness: Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany [Hardcover]

Hans Massaquoi (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 20, 1999

A great deal of Holocaust survival stories revolve around disguise--many Jews were forced into impersonation by the desperateness of their plight. Imagine if a person, by the accident of birth, was deigned a target of Nazi hatred but hadn't an option of disguise.

The son of a well-to-do African and a white German nurse, Hans lived a privileged toddler's life befitting the grandson of a diplomat. Concern for Hans's frail health caused his mother to remain with him in Germany when his grandfather and father were compelled to return to Liberia. He and his mother become part of Hamburg's poor working class, forced to live in a cramped attic apartment without hot water and electricity. But their change in social status was to be only the beginning of their hardships.

For twelve agonizing years following Hitler's rise to power, Hans, like all non-Aryans, was dehumanized and devalued by the Nazis. Living in constant fear of death, by either the Gestapo executioners or Allied bombs, Hans's existence became increasingly precarious until liberation by British troops in 1945.

What sets Hans's story apart from other memoirs of the Holocaust era is that his high visibility made him an easily recognizable target, stranded without the comfort of a racial community of any sort. Destined to Witness is a memoir filled with courage, feeling, and intelligence that will touch readers everywhere.A great deal of Holocaust survival stories revolve around disguise--many Jews were forced into impersonation by the desperateness of their plight. Imagine if a person, by the accident of birth, was deigned a target of Nazi hatred but hadn't an option of disguise.

The son of a well-to-do African and a white German nurse, Hans lived a privileged toddler's life befitting the grandson of a diplomat. Concern for Hans's frail health caused his mother to remain with him in Germany when his grandfather and father were compelled to return to Liberia. He and his mother become part of Hamburg's poor working class, forced to live in a cramped attic apartment without hot water and electricity. But their change in social status was to be only the beginning of their hardships.

For twelve agonizing years following Hitler's rise to power, Hans, like all non-Aryans, was dehumanized and devalued by the Nazis. Living in constant fear of death, by either the Gestapo executioners or Allied bombs, Hans's existence became increasingly precarious until liberation by British troops in 1945.

What sets Hans's story apart from other memoirs of the Holocaust era is that his high visibility made him an easily recognizable target, stranded without the comfort of a racial community of any sort. Destined to Witness is a memoir filled with courage, feeling, and intelligence that will touch readers everywhere.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In a unique addition to the literature of life under the Third Reich, Massaquoi, a former managing editor of Ebony magazine, chronicles his life as the son of a German nurse and Al-Haj Massaquoi, the son of the Liberian consul general to Germany. Soon after his birth in Hamburg in 1926, the author's father returned to Liberia to bolster his family's failing stature in national politics, leaving his wife and son to grapple with everyday life amid the rise of fascism in Germany. The Reich's racial politics were so steadfastly drummed into German schoolchildren that the young Hans quickly acquired an anti-Semitic outlook only to realize that he was also subject to discrimination as a non-Aryan. He sought intellectual escape from German nationalism through reading books by Jules Verne, Arthur Conan Doyle and James Fenimore Cooper; in his idealization of African-American athletes Joe Lewis and Jesse Owens; and by learning how to play jazz and his involvement with the "swingboys" officially condemned as purveyors of "degenerate" music and dance. Massaquoi and his mother survived both Nazi rule and the devastating 1943 British bombing of Hamburg. He tells of life after the war, of befriending black American soldiers, of moving to Liberia in 1948 and of his subsequent move to America in 1950, where he came to feel that racism was as prevalent as it had been under the Third Reich. Thoughtful and well written, Massaquoi's memoir adds nuance to our comprehension of 20th-century political and personal experience.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Massaquoi, the retired managing editor of Ebony, presents an unusual perspective on the Nazi era. The son of an "Aryan" mother and an African diplomat, he grew up in Germany on the wrong side of Nazi racial ideology, confronting not only the bigotry of his countrymen but the danger of Allied bombs on a nearly daily basis. Even after his postwar immigration to the United States and service with the U.S. Army in Korea, the author sees his life as one of witness to racial inequality. His journey from Nazi Germany to the post-Civil Rights United States makes for interesting reading, recounted with an eye for detail and a humanity that is appealing. Although there were many individuals like Massaquoi, few took the path he did, and probably few could write about it with such force. Recommended for public and academic libraries.AFrederic Krome, Jacob Rader Marcus Ctr. of the American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 464 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow; 1st edition (October 20, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0688171559
• ISBN-13: 978-0688171551
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (75 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #372,945 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

48 of 51 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Witness, August 19, 2001

By 

Ron Hunka (Austin, TX United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Destined to Witness: Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany (Hardcover)

Destined to Witness Hans Massaquoi ISBN 0-688-17155-9 1999

"Destined to Witness" is the story of the son of a black Liberian diplomatic official and a white German woman growing up in Nazi times in Germany. Were this story not so convincingly told, one would have to question that the events of Mr. Massaquois life could have really taken place. But they did take place. Not only did the author survive the Hitler years without being killed by the Nazis, but he survived 200 British and American bombing raids that destroyed half of the Hamburgs homes, including his own, and killed 41,000 civilians.

From this book, one learns not only about Massaquois experience with racism in Germany in the Hitler era but about British and French colonial racism in Africa and racism in the United States in the South and in Chicago after the war. Hans Massaquoi would have us understand that these instances of racism were not unrelated.

This book begins with Hans Massaquois early schoolboy experiences growing up in Hamburg. It recounts the terrible racial taunting of pro-Nazi classmates and teachers. In one of his worst school episodes he tells how one teacher told him that after the Nazis had finished with the Jews they would take care of the likes of him. Massaquoi, growing up in the German culture, wanted to be like the other boys to a certain extent. At one point, he was rejected for admission to the Hitler Youth Corp on the basis of his race. Although initially Hitler was a hero to him, later he came to understand more clearly what Hitler represented.

This book describes a number of interesting historical events that Massaquoi witnessed. For example, one was the day the airship Hindenburg flew over his neighborhood in Hamburg, casting its giant shadow over the street on which he lived and all the people who gathered there to see it. In another place, the author describes the aftermath of Kristallnacht in November 1938, the first, Nazi-ordered, countrywide rampage against the Jews. Sidewalks along Hamburgs main shopping avenue, on both sides, for miles, were covered with broken glass in front of windowless stores where all the merchandise had been looted.

The author attributes his own survival through this period to the fact that there were few blacks in the Germany of that time, and Hitlers executioners initially focused their efforts on the Jews. Fortunately, Hitler was defeated before he could finish his ultimate goal of racial purification. Also, Mr. Massaquoi attributes his survival to the fact that, even in these dark hours, there were many Germans who retained their decency after it had gone totally out of style. To these people, whose refusal to go along with the prevailing racism of the day, he gives recognition.

Massaquoi eventually came to the U.S. after the war, served in the army, attended college on the G. I. bill, marched with Martin Luther King, served as the managing editor of "Ebony" magazine and met American presidents.

This book presents a unique opportunity to look inside Nazi times in Germany, not through the eyes of an historian, but through the eyes of someone who lived in them, and as the title suggests, as a witness to history. I highly recommend this unusual book. It is extremely interesting reading. I believe some of those who travel this road will come away with the feeling that they have been changed by the journey.

32 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hans J. Massaquoi Growing up as a Black in Nazi Germany, February 25, 2000

By 

Cornelia (Royal Oak, Maryland) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Destined to Witness: Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany (Hardcover)

What a wonderful book I truly enjoyed reading it. I am German, 44 years, my son is German 25 years with a Afro American father. I raised him in Germany and he is a true black German.We experienced together racism and I saw ourselves a lot in this book.Today we live in the USA and sadly he learned much more about racism here than ever before in his life.I am saddened by the thought that his goal is to go back to Germany because of these reasons - this is just to show you how times have changed. I hope for all of us that my beautiful brown babies my grandchildren that I will have one day never will have to experience anything like Hans or Frederick Douglass.

22 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Unusual memoirs, November 7, 1999

By 

Christine (Hamburg, Germany) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Destined to Witness: Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany (Hardcover)

I live in Hamburg, Germany and have read this book in german. It is poignant, and at times very funny. It's also an inspiring book, for it offers the rather unique glimpse of an intelligent boy who is confronted with rampant racism and learns to survive it.