WELCOME TO ERNST MICHAELIS OBITUARY SITE

Ernst Michaelis
October 1926 to April 2020

Our father, Ernst Michaelis was a quiet man, hard-working and with a fascination for engineering
which lasted his whole life. He was also immensely proud of his family, even regaling the nurses with
the exploits of his grandchildren a couple of days before he died. For many years he did not talk to
us about the trauma of his childhood or what happened to his family. Ernst was born in Berlin in
1926 and escaped to the UK in August 1939 on the Kindertransport. His older brother Werner was due to come a few weeks later but never made it. Only in recent years did we find out the fate of his immediate family. Werner and his parents Teresina and Walther were transported by train with 950 others to Riga in October 1942 and shot in the woods nearby. His grandmother Lina (or Caroline) was deported a few weeks earlier to Theresienstadt and died the following February. It was after the birth of his
grandchildren, Emma, Ben, Tom and Kiera that Ernst started to talk about his childhood.

Here is a portion of that story in his own words. We have chosen to focus on this as a powerful reminder of the terrible harm that people can do. Even in the face of such dangers his family were helping other people. His full and active adult life and the supportive and stable environment that he provided to us, his children and grandchildren, is testament to the good that can come from even the most difficult circumstances.