Some people ask me how did you come to terms with it? How did you cope with being in the war? My answer is that I more or less quite quickly came to see it as my duty to dedicate myself, to apply myself to the task as best I could because, after all, we had been brought up in a patriotic tradition. This had already started when we were young, I remember it all very clearly.

I, Günther Kluge, was born in Königsberg, East Prussia, on June 28, 1935. We grew up quite comfortably there, apart from the air raids which we were exposed to every day, sometimes even several times per day until finally, in 1944, or at the beginning of 1945, Königsberg was completely destroyed by bombs. The city was virtually bombed out. More than a hundred thousand people were killed. I don't know the exact number. But Königsberg had been devastated. And since the Russians were already getting quite close at this stage, it was obvious that we had better get out of there too.

So my name is Hedwig Künneke. I was born in Münster on March 7, 1913 and I spent my youth here in Münster. I agree to this documentary being released. I studied in Münster and I wanted to become a technical teacher. As a student I became familiar with national socialism, and I was also exposed to it through conversations and interaction with my fellow students and during this time I witnessed some quite ugly things here in Münster. The indications were not exactly favourable - there was rioting in the city. One evening I came across one of these brawls myself and I only found my way out again with the protection of the police. The city was often a very upsetting place. All kinds of political parties with differing views encountered one another and had street brawls. Then national socialism somehow made itself known to us young people and promised improvements, peace and so on. One evening I took part in a midsummer party which we young people were very enthusiastic about. Nothing political was mentioned, so we weren't actually confronted with the idea of national socialism, but I didn't like it. I was sceptical and the whole thing made me even more so. We heard about Munich and other cities and heard that they were reacting in the same way. We heard about the storm troopers, but not about the SS at that stage, and I didn't really know what it was all about.

My name is Anni Menne. I live in Münster, in Andreas Hofer Street. I have had a nice apartment there for 17 years now with what they call "In-Home Care". We can always call on help.

Oh yes, in summer you had to be indoors by 10 pm, or even earlier. In winter you had to be in before it got dark. People who did shift work when the war broke out, the Jews, that is, who did forced labour, had special passes. The Gestapo came into the house to check if you were home. You weren't allowed to have a radio or telephone any longer. It was 1940 or early 1941. I travelled to Münster to school every day until July 1941. I wasn't wearing the star then, but then it came shortly after that and I worked in a factory in Osnabrück, so I left school in Münster in July of 1941 and then worked in a factory until the deportation in December.

I will now talk about my time as an apprentice with my father. My father was a wonderful man. He refused to join the party. We had our workshop in Friedrich-Ebert Street, renamed Industry Road during the Nazi years. The union building was quite nearby and a little further along on the corner of Hafenstraße there was a tobacco products wholesaler and retailer run by Mr Alexander, who was Jewish and lived with his mother - just the two of them in the building. We got along with them very well and we always bought our tobacco there. It was the same with the union functionaries from the union building, who always brought their business to us. I should explain that a galvaniser's workshop is in the business of making nickel, chrome and above all copper plating as well as enamelling. So tube frames, car bumper bars and so on were processed.

Those of us living on the Lower Rhine were always denounced as not being true Germans. This was unfair because despite the fact that we lived so close to the border we always had very Prussian qualities and were very connected to land and country. And so we were rather terrified when the empire ended and the emperor flew to Holland. The worst, however, was that he took what was really our money and in this way all our money was gone. Then inflation came. And during inflation our money became utterly worthless so that we had to start again from scratch.

I left school at the age of fourteen and a half and went on to a cadet school in 1941. Actually, this school was called a preparatory college for non-commissioned officers because on enrolment you signed up for 15 years of military service. It was called preparatory college because, apart from military training, the first three years were mainly dedicated to schooling. And this academic training was very good for me because I had been to a village school. There were quite a lot of things I had to learn anew or had never been taught at that village school. It was in 1941 that I went to this cadet school, my first post or rather school was in Geldern on the Lower Rhine. It was a boarding school where about 600 boys, some of them my age, were instructed. This included military and academic training. For me this was all quite extraordinary since I was one of those boys who had never been away from home before.

I started at the Berlin-Dahlem grammar school in 1934 and remained there until 1941. Then in the 8th grade I signed up for the navy. I didn't want to go to the army or the air force. Even as a child I was interested in the navy because I had a childhood friend with whom I always played navy games. He was in the navy Hitler Youth and I was in the regular Hitler Youth. That was the way it was. We were all just sort of drawn in and in a practical sense the interest was in the navy. I was accepted and signed up before doing my school leaving certificate. It was on September 30, 1941. We had to go to Buxtehude and we were there for a couple of days, but officially our time began with the company of recruits in Roosendaal in the south of The Netherlands. Time passed and until Christmas of 1941/42, up to the Christmas and New Year holiday period, we were there in Roosendaal.