Willy Adler papers

Willy Adler was born in 1920 in Hamburg, Germany, to Mordko "Max" Adler and Beila Teller Adler, both German immigrants. Max Adler had been born in Poland, Beila Teller in Romania. Willy Adler attended a Jewish school until 1936, when, as a consequence of the Nuremburg Laws, Jews were prevented from using public transportation. In 1937, after hearing that a Gestapo raid was coming, the Adlers went into hiding with a Christian family. One of Adler's two brothers went back home to retrieve something he had forgotten and never returned.

After arguing with someone who had called him a Jew in the market, Willy Adler was arrested by the Gestapo and sent to a labor camp in Kofu, outside of Hamburg. He was released when he explained that his family was registered at the American Consulate. His cousins in the Bronx, New York, had sent papers to help get the family out of Germany. Adler was taken to Fuhlsbuttel and given a ticket for passage to the United States. His older brother, David, had already immigrated to the United States, and his parents were hidden by a Christian family in Hamburg before they also immigrated.

After arriving in New York in 1939, Adler worked with his brother David in a furniture store. Adler joined the U.S. Army and served as a German translator during World War II. At various times, he was stationed in Spartanburg and Charleston, South Carolina. In 1980, he and his wife, Irma, moved to Charleston.