Alice GLAS

Liesl, as she was known in the family was a toddler of three years of age when her mother Johanna died in Vienna. Her aunt Charlotte THORSCH took on the role of mother though she didn't marry Liesl's father Jakob Moses Lichtblau who died when Alice was only 29 years old. Charlotte born in Brno moved to Vienna and lived near her sister Johanna Lichtblau and her baby girl Alice. So Liesl was without parents by nearly 30. However her aunts Charlotte and Franziska were both in Vienna .

Alice married Michael GLAS a colleague from the Viennese Creditanstalt bank in Islington, a suburb of London in August 1939 after she and her younger cousin Hilda STOESSEL fled to the UK in August 1938 and were accepted as temporary domestic servants. The two women worked as domestic servants on a pheasant farm in Heretfordshire. Alice was the cook and Hilda the maid. They arrived in Dover in October 1938 after fleeing Nazi occupied Vienna.

Her fiancée Michael GLAS took a holiday from his senior position at the bank- Creditanstalt- in Vienna where they both worked and he followed her to England to marry her in 1939.

She was interned on Rushen camp on the Isle of Man while her husband Michael was deported as an enemy alien (after being in Warners camp as an internee first) to Australia on the infamous ship The Dunera HMT. He was interned in Tatura camp, Rushworth in northern Victoria near Shepparton Victoria and was released to join the Australian Army on 1942 based in Melbourne. He served in the 8th Employment company a non fighting unit.

In May 1945 before the end of the Pacific war he took a ship from Sydney back to London where he and Alice were reunited. They left England in September 1946 for Vienna and then Stockerau settling in his family home where they lived until their deaths. The rest of his family who survived also returned to find the house ransacked. The Russians chased Michael's sisters and they were terrified of being raped or attacked during the occupation.

Alice worked in a library in Vienna commutng daily from Stockerau. Michael returned to work at the bank and became a high up manager. They had no children. He predeceased her by about 20 years. They are buried together in the local Stockerau cemetery. Their correspondence which is voluminous during the time he was in Australia is lodged at the National Library of Australia.

Alice gave the suitcase full of their letters and cards to Michael's niece Edith before she died. Edith passed it on to Daniela Torsh, a second cousin of Alice's and she donated it on behalf of the family to the National Library of Australia in Canberra.

Her niece by marriage said that Jacob Moses LICHTBLAU - Liesl's father worked in a shop in Vienna selling textiles. Edith also said Michael always wanted to return to Australia and only returned to Austria because of his mother Eugenia.

After they returned to Austria, Michael went back to work at the Creditanstalt and Alice worked in the American Library at USIS. She commuted to work in Vienna from Stockerau. She spoke good English and returned to UK to visit her cousins Hilda DOWSETT nee STOESSEL and Gertie KEMP nee STOESSEL more than once. Hilda visited her in Vienna too said her son Peter Dowsett.

The Isle of Man museum has a record of Alice's internment. She was interned at Rushen camp from 1940-41 and her number was 903. She arrived 30 May 1940 having landed at Port Erin on the far south of IoM. The internees were sent by train from London and across the Irish Sea to Port Erin. Alice gave her occupation as a cook and her last known address was Vienna, 7 Stueckgasse 13/11. Her German passport was number 32649 issued Vienna 24 September 1938. She landed in England at Dover with her younger cousin Hilda Stoessel.

A tribunal judged her as a refugee from Nazi oppression. She was given a permit to travel to Douglas the capital of the island to appear before the Home Office Advisory Cttee at 9.45am on Tuesday 31 December 1941. That was a typo it must have been 1940 as she was exempted from internment from 31 December 1940. On 27 May 1941 she left IoM for 22 Highfield Close, Amersham, Bucks. Bucks is an abbreviation of Buckinghamshire, a county south east of London. That is most likely the address of Hilda Farago whose father was a partner in Max LICHTBLAU's furniture business in Vienna. Max was Liesl's uncle. The FARAGO family and the LICHTBLAU family had been close friends and partners in business in Vienna.

When Alice died 1992 her nephew Peter Dowsett attended the Stockerau funeral with his mother Hilda DOWSETT. Hilda was living at Woking in UK at that time. The family arranged for a Rabbi to bury Alice who had left the Jewish faith and then later returned to it. But she wanted to be buried with her husband so they are buried together in the local council cemetery. Hilda inherited Liesl's family heirlooms.