NINE

Sub-titled 'The True Story of a Band of Women Who Survived the Worst of Nazi Germany'. Helene Podliasky was the author's great-aunt, the leader of a heroic band of nine former resistance fighters who escaped from a death march out of Ravensbrück concentration camp by rolling into a ditch and then starting on the long and dangerous march through enemy territory to find the advancing Allies, ending their quest at Colditz. The author tells the story of how each of the nine women had ended up at Ravensbrück and the horrors of torture and brutality they endured in the process. Helene joined the resistance in 1943 without telling her parents, breaking off her engineering studies at the Sorbonne. Her job was to organise a reception party for parachute drops, mainly of provisions but occasionally of freedom fighters. Arrested by mistake during an operation in which she was not involved, Helene found the Gestapo had penetrated her cover. She was tortured by waterboarding and then sent to Ravensbrück, where one of her teeth was wrenched out when she strayed into a forbidden area. Several of the nine wrote memoirs of their experiences, and from these Gloria was able to trace them all and tell their stories. Lon was one of the two Dutch women in the group, joining the resistance to join her brother Eric, who perished in a camp. Shortly before the death march Lon's back gave way and she was unable to walk, but Alina, the Polish nurse, got her back on her feet just in time. Zinka had been arrested for helping stranded Allied soldiers to escape, and she gave birth while in prison. After the war Helene helped her to trace her child. The people who sheltered them often genuinely had no knowledge of what was going on in the camps, and time and again on their march they were offered help in return for sex, but they kept together and kept going. 317pp, photos.