Author(s): Paul Kraus

General

Giving birth in a Nazi forced labour camp was one thing but slipping out through the wire, with two infant children, in April 1945 made Clara Kraus's survival extraordinary. She had survived the bombing of her home in Belgrade in 1941 and been captured by the Germans. After her escape, just ahead of the SS, she and her children had to survive a cross-country trek to her home in Budapest, also occupied by Germany, to see out the end of the war. It was a bonus that her husband, Emery, who had been taken to the notorious Mauthausen concentration camp, also survived. In 1948, the family, wanting to turn their backs forever on Europe, migrated to Australia and, after a hellish voyage on a decrepit Greek ship, SS Derna, arrived in Victoria on Melbourne Cup Day 1948. They settled in Chatswood where Clara set up a dressmaking salon and for a time was the main breadwinner.