Hedy Wachenheimer was born to a Jewish family in Freiburg, and in 1939 fled Nazi persecution via the Kindertransport to England. All but two of her family were killed at Auschwitz concentration camp during the Holocaust. During World War II she worked in munitions factories and joined a group of left-wing German Jewish refugees who hoped to re-introduce democracy in their homeland – "the foundation of my political education which still stands me in good stead today," she said. Some 60 years later, she was interviewed about this experience for the film "".