When the Nazis invaded Yugoslavia in April 1941, her step-father (whom Flory referred to as her father) put 16-year-old Flory on a train to Split using false identity papers and removing the Jewish star from her coat. On the train she played her accordion ("hamoniku" in Serbo-Croatian) all the way to Split (at that time controlled by the Italians), with other passengers and even the conductor singing along; she was never asked for her ticket. Her parents joined her in Split several days later, and after a brief sojourn there they and other Jews who had escaped the Nazis were moved to various islands off the Croatian coast. Flory and her parents were sent to the island of Korčula, where they lived until fall 1943. Following the Italian capitulation, Jews on Korcula left by fishing boats for Bari, Italy, which had recently been liberated by the British army. While in Italy, she met and fell in love with an American soldier named Harry Jagoda. She arrived in the United States as a war bride in 1946, going first to Harry's hometown of Youngstown, Ohio, and later moving to Northern Virginia.