Hannah Elisabeth Pick-Goslar (born Hanna Elisabeth Goslar; 12 November 1928 – 28 October 2022) was a German-born Israeli nurse and

Holocaust survivor Holocaust survivors are people who survived the Holocaust, defined as the persecution and attempted annihilation of the Jews by Nazi Germany and its allies before and during World War II in Europe and North Africa. There is no universally accep ...

best known for her close friendship with writer

Anne Frank Annelies Marie "Anne" Frank (, ; 12 June 1929 – )Research by The Anne Frank House in 2015 revealed that Frank may have died in February 1945 rather than in March, as Dutch authorities had long assumed"New research sheds new light on Anne Fra ...

. The girls attended the 6th Montessori School (named after Anne Frank in 1957) in Amsterdam and then the Jewish Lyceum. They met again at

Bergen-Belsen concentration camp Bergen-Belsen , or Belsen, was a Nazi concentration camp in what is today Lower Saxony in northern Germany, southwest of the town of Bergen near Celle. Originally established as a prisoner of war camp, in 1943, parts of it became a concentra ...

. Goslar and her young sister were the only family members who survived the war, being rescued from the Lost Train. Both

emigrated to Israel Aliyah (, ; he, עֲלִיָּה ''ʿălīyyā'', ) is the immigration of Jews from Jewish diaspora, the diaspora to, historically, the geographical Land of Israel, which is in the modern era chiefly represented by the Israel, State of Israel ...

, where Hannah worked as a nurse for children. They shared their memories as eyewitnesses of

the Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

Early life

Hannah Elisabeth Goslar was born in Berlin-Tiergarten, on 12 November 1928, the eldest child of and Ruth Judith Klee. Her father was deputy minister for domestic affairs, and the ministry's chief of public relations (''Leiter der Pressestelle'') in Germany until 1933, and her mother was a teacher. Both of her parents were observant

Jews Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

. In 1933, after the election of Hitler and the

Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...

to the Reichstag and Hitler's appointment as Chancellor, Hans Goslar was forced to resign his governmental job. After an abortive attempt to move to England, where he could not find work that would allow him to stay home on the Shabbat, the Goslars moved to

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population of 907,976 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban ar ...

, Netherlands, in 1933. The Goslar family lived close to the Frank family, and she met Anne when both girls went shopping for groceries with their mothers in 1934. Both girls attended the 6th Montessori School and became best friends, Hanna being called Hanneli by Anne. Later, they attended the . They were also close friends with Susanne "Sanne" Ledermann, who lived in the same area but attended a different school, and later with Ilse Wagner and

Jacqueline van Maarsen Jacqueline Yvonne Meta van Maarsen (; born 30 January 1929) is a Dutch author and former bookbinder. She is best known for her friendship with diarist Anne Frank. Jacque's Christian mother was able to remove the ''J'' (Jew) signs from the family ...

. In the diary, Anne described Hannah's house as a great sight to see. Anne mentioned that Hannah was a shy girl who was usually reserved and quiet, but would speak her thoughts too. It is also listed in the diary, that Ilse Wagner was considered to be Hannah's best friend. After the release of a 2021 movie based on Anne and Hannah's friendship, confusion rose in the media, but was later explained that Hannah thought of Anne as her best friend, and Ilse thought of Hannah of her own best friend. After Frank has a dream of "Hanneli" in suffering and asking for help from Anne in Frank's ''

Diary of a Young Girl ''The Diary of a Young Girl'', also known as ''The Diary of Anne Frank'', is a book of the writings from the Dutch-language diary kept by Anne Frank while she was in hiding for two years with her family during the Nazi occupation of the Nether ...

.'' Frank adds multiple entries, elaborating how she feels empathy for her friend in captivity. Hanna's sister Rachel Gabriele ("Gabi") was born in Amsterdam on 25 October 1940. Her mother died in 1942 giving birth to her third child; the baby also died.

Arrest and concentration camp

In June 1943, Hannah, her father, her maternal grandparents, and her younger sister were arrested and sent to the

Westerbork transit camp Camp Westerbork ( nl, Kamp Westerbork, german: Durchgangslager Westerbork, Drents: ''Börker Kamp; Kamp Westerbörk'' ), also known as Westerbork transit camp, was a Nazi transit camp in the province of Drenthe in the Northeastern Netherlands, d ...

, where her grandfather died in November 1943 of a heart attack. The family was taken to

in February 1944. Hannah was in a privileged section of the camp because her family had Paraguayan passports with them. Sometime between January and February 1945, she was briefly reunited with Anne Frank, who was a less privileged prisoner at the other side of the camp. After the war Hannah said she spoke to

Auguste Van Pels Anne Frank (12 June 1929 — February 1945) was a German-born Jewish girl who, along with her family and four other people, hid in the second and third floor rooms at the back of her father's Amsterdam company during the Nazi occupation of the N ...

through the fence, finding out that Anne was on the other side. Hannah threw a package with some food over the barbed wire fence for Anne, but another prisoner caught it and did not give it to Anne. Hanna came to the fence one more time a few days later with a package with some bread and socks in it over a hay-filled barbed wire fence dividing the two sections. Hannah and Anne had three total meetings. The meeting at which Anne eventually caught the package was the last time Hannah ever saw her. Hans Goslar died on 25 February 1945, and his mother-in-law, Therese Klee, on 25 March 1945. The girls survived fourteen months at Bergen-Belsen. They were rescued along with the other survivors of the Lost Train. The sisters, sick and undernourished, found temporary refuge in the home of the mayor of

Schilda Schilda is a municipality in the Elbe-Elster district, in Lower Lusatia, Brandenburg, Germany. It is also the source of inspiration for Bach's Brandenburg concerto. History From 1815 to 1947, Schilda was part of the Prussian Province of Brandenbu ...

Later life and death

Russian authorities allowed Americans to register Goslar and her sister at the end of June 1945, and they returned to Amsterdam. She was hospitalized until the end of September, and sent to Switzerland for recovery in a sanitarium in December. She then finished school in Basel. In May 1947, she received

a certificate The Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) is a statutory film-certification body in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting of the Government of India. It is tasked with "regulating the public exhibition of films under the provision ...

to go to Palestine, where she arrived on 30 May. She lived there for the first three months in a home for children, working for half of the day, and learning Hebrew the other half, which was required to begin training to be a nurse. She began the training in Jerusalem to be a nurse for children in October, and worked as a nurse at the Bikkur Holim Hospital. Goslar married Dr. Walter Pinchas Pick; the couple had three children and settled in Jerusalem. She had eleven grandchildren and more than 31 great-grandchildren. She returned to places in Germany, also with her sister, and told students about her memories of the Holocaust. She supported the German initiative ''Zeichen gegen Rassismus und Antisemitismus'', planting a tree in memory of Anne and the

Anne Frank tree The Anne Frank tree ( nl, Anne Frankboom or, incorrectly, ''Anne Frank boom'') was a horse-chestnut tree (''Aesculus hippocastanum'') in the city center of Amsterdam that was featured in Anne Frank's ''The Diary of a Young Girl''. Anne Frank d ...

in Uedelhoven in 2019. She was an eyewitness in the Zeitzeugen association. Pick-Goslar died at home in Jerusalem, on 28 October 2022, at age 93.

Legacy

Pick-Goslar was featured in several documentaries related to

, first in the 1988 Emmy Award winning documentary by Willy Lindwer ''

Laatste Zeven Maanden van Anne Frank ''Laatste Zeven Maanden van Anne Frank'' (English title: ''The Last Seven Months of Anne Frank'') is a 1988 Dutch television documentary directed by Willy Lindwer about the last seven months in the life of diarist Anne Frank. Seven different women, ...

'' (''The Last Seven Months of Anne Frank''). She helped with information to the 1995 documentary ''

Anne Frank Remembered ''Anne Frank Remembered'' is a 1995 British documentary film produced and directed by Jon Blair about the life and posthumously published diary of the German-Jewish diarist, Anne Frank, who spent most of her life in the Netherlands. The film w ...

'' and the 2008 documentary ''Classmates of Anne Frank''. The 1997 book ''Memories of Anne Frank: Reflections of a Childhood Friend,'' by Holocaust author

Alison Leslie Gold Alison Leslie Gold is an American author. Her books include ''Anne Frank Remembered'', ''Clairvoyant: the Imagined Life of Lucia Joyce'', ''The Devil's Mistress'', and ''Memories of Anne Frank''. She has written literary fiction as well as books ...

, is based upon extensive interviews with Hannah. The 2009 television film '' Mi Ricordo Anna Frank'' is based on this book. A fictionalized account of Pick-Goslar's life and close friendship with Anne Frank, titled '' My Best Friend Anne Frank'', was released in 2021.

References

External links