The letters glean some information related to the experience of the Abramowitz family, originally from Halle in Germany. Three of four brothers, including Martin (and his wife Gertrude), Kurt and Hermann sought refuge in South Africa in the 1930s, but their brother Max was arrested on 8 November 1938 and sent to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. He remained incarcerated throughout the war, before eventually being liberated from the Terezin concentration camp in 1945. Their mother, Selma, had gone into hiding and finally settled in South Africa in 1949. Max settled in Soviet East Germany and was never able to visit his family in South Africa.