Trek: An American Woman, Two Small Children and Survival in World War II Germany

By Mary Hunt Jentsch

Book Overview

Trek is a poignant memoir of one American woman's struggle in Germany during World War II. Separated from her German husband, Mary Hunt Jentsch was forced to protect her two children, surviving nightly air raids, rooftop fires, hunger, and the invading Red Army. Including a foreword by Jentsch's grandson, this moving account is an invaluable testament to the difficulties of wartime.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0975561855
• ISBN13: 9780975561850
• Release Date: October 2008
• Publisher: McWitty Press
• Length: 250 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

A Compelling History

A fascinating memoir of wartime survival, most interesting in the vivid description of life in the Silesian countryside and the Pommeranian farm village where Mary Jentsch's daughter was put to work herding sixty geese to pasture every day, and where Frau Pastor Schwartz and her five children lived a life of domestic drama surrounded by refugees from the East. A tale flight, of close calls, friendships and betrayals. Amid the grim realities of war were moments of of joy and even a love affair. I could not put this book down!

One woman's tall endeavor of survival against the odds

The struggle to survive is the roughest struggle of all. "Trek: An American Woman, Two Small Children, and Survival in World War II Germany" tells the heroic tale of Mary Hunt Jentsch who had to go through hell and high water to escape the Germans, the oncoming Russians, the allied bombings, all so much that made simple survival to the next day impossible. Many people went through such experiences at the time, but Jentsch's tale was made particularly heroic by the fact of dealing her two small children. "Trek" is a highly recommended memoir, telling of one woman's tall endeavor of survival against the odds.

Stepping into a new perspective of WW II

This is an entirely new perspective on life in wartorn Germany. Mary Jentsch gives us an unvarnished look at the struggle to survive as an American with two young children in her adopted country during WW II. Her writing is clear, balanced and engaging. She shows us rural Germany under seige, with its people both kind,generous and otherwise. As she and her children trek from village to village, enduring strafing, hunger, all the vicissitudes of war, still she gives us beautifully drawn portraits of the Germans she comes to know with their dignity, failings and their idiosyncracys. Helpful notes at the beginnings of chapters, by her grandson, Stephen Mumford, put us solidly in the context of the times and the places.