The last remaining trunk of three has been donated to the Imperial War Museum and forms part of an exhibition documenting the events of the First World War through to the present day.

Jewish parents, Leonhard and Clara Wohl, had been subjected to persecution in Germany since 1933 and had finally decided to leave and start a new life. They applied for visas to travel to Chile. They sent their two youngest daughters, Eva and Ulli, 16 and 13, to the safety of England just before the outbreak of war planning to join them. They packed their most treasured possessions into three trunks and sent them to Chile, planning to follow them as soon as they could. But on the day they planned to leave, war was declared and their Visas were no longer valid. The trunks reached their destination but sadly, Leonhard and Clara were transported to Auschwitz where they died.

It was only after the war that the two children discovered what had happened and in 1947 the three trunks were delivered to Eva in London, by a removal company in Suffolk. Their parentslifetime and their childhood memories were all contained within those three trunks. The family had no idea how the trunks had found their way to them but were overjoyed to discover the contents, school reports, photographs, hand stitched tablecloths, their father’s briefcase. Many sentimental and irreplaceable items documenting their family history. Some of the household items were used to ease their situation as the girls had arrived in England with little financial support, but many have been cherished over the years.

The trunk forms part of an exhibition documenting the preparations for the Second World War, and is displayed alongside the ill-fated Munich Agreement of 1938 and a Merlin aero engine. It symbolises one family’s personal preparation and their desperate attempt to survive.