The children of Elisabeth Katz grew up hearing bits and pieces about their mother's history, but it wasn't until Marie Hammond, her eldest daughter, took down a narration of her life story that they were able to truly appreciate what their mother had lived through.
Reluctant at first, Katz spoke of her childhood in Buenos Aires, the move to Germany in the 1930s, her mother's death, surviving WWII and the rest of her turbulent upbringing as Hammond scribbled away at the dining room table.
This was in 1995, and they named the book "Memories of a School Girl." Soon after that Katz began her descent into dementia.
She died this month at the age of 87.
Katz was a consummate learner, showed compassion towards the weak, and loved music, , loved ones say.
"She was kind of an anchor, and a loving mother and very tender," said her son, Bill Katz, who lives in Maryland. "I'm sure it took a lot."
Born in 1924 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to German parents, Katz's childhood seemed fairly healthy and happy. One of three children, she wrote about her Bohemian parents with affection - there was music and laughter.
But her mother contracted tuberculosis and eventually the family moved back to Germany in 1933, hoping her health would improve with the aid of German doctors.
It did not, and she died not long after their return. Her father soon went back to Argentina for work, and she would never see him again.
She and her two younger siblings, a sister and brother, stayed with various family members over the remaining years of her childhood. They were ultimately separated, and Katz wound up living many years with grandparents.
Germany under the Nazis
She had moved to Germany at a time when Adolf Hitler was just rising to power. She wrote about not really understanding what he stood for, and she said her immediate family was opposed to his ideologies and refused to join the Nazi Party, though many family members ultimately would join the German army.
The war brought with it many things - including a short marriage to a soldier who proposed just before being deployed to the front lines. She said yes, mainly because she knew she liked him and wanted a change. He died soon after.
This was a detail her own children did not learn until they were well into adulthood, they said.
Elisabeth met Henry Katz, the man she would later marry, at the end of the war.
He was part of the American occupational force and took over the farmhouse in rural Germany in which she had been riding out the end of the fighting. She witnessed strafing raids and ducked from gunfire, but was lucky to reunite with her sister, Rosy.
Kathy Register, her youngest daughter, cherishes the stacks of the love letters they unearthed where her father begged Elisabeth to not change her mind about marrying him. It took about two years for Katz to gain permission to enter the country, and the two were wed in 1947 at the West Point Cadet Chapel.
From that point on Katz's life became quite different from the one she'd known.
She was the wife of an American army officer and the family moved every few years.
Her children say there were times she withdrew, had rather private moments of depression.
"She was anxious," daughter Hammond said. "She would worry about all the suffering in the world."
"When there were cigarette butts in the toilet, she was upset," Bill Katz said.
But in realizing her past, her family finds it remarkable she was able to move from a broken family and war-torn country and create a loving household for her own brood.
"I think that because she had trouble in her childhood she had great sympathy for anyone who suffered," Hammond said.
A constant reader
The war ended her formal education in the eighth grade. But she was one of the most intellectual people her children have ever known. She was constantly reading, studying and seeking knowledge, and at one point or another was fluent in five languages.
She was widowed in 1990, and her friends say she was about as devoted a wife as they've ever seen in the decadelong decline preceding Henry's death.
Shortly before her husband died, she had a brief reunion with her brother, whom she had not seen in 40 years. He died within the same week of Henry.
She would go on to enjoy taking walks with friends along the Eno River, playing her recorder, and enjoying her six grandchildren.
"I really started appreciating and adoring Elisabeth all the more, in an adult way, as my understanding of human nature, relationships, and war transformed from little family snippets and stories, into a broader knowledge gleaned from my own education," her daughter Kathy Register said. "She was a wonderful mother."
