Brenda Hancock

One of the Lucky Ones--Revised Edition Brenda Hancock

Both Nicole Holland and her younger brother Robert Clary (of "Hogan's Heroes") raved about their childhood in their four-room apartment on Ile St. Louis in Paris, France. Though not wealthy, their youth seemed rich as it was filled with love, laughter, and the joy they experienced with all their friends from Rue Des Deux Ponts. Unfortunately for them, that happy youth was halted when the Germans invaded Paris, demanded they be labeled "Juif" and denied them many of life's former pleasures, like going to the movies. By 1942 their stories veered into totally different directions. Along with members of their immediate family, Robert was arrested and sent in a cattle car to concentration camps. For thirty-one months, he survived incarceration in four different concentration camps. The sole survivor of the thirteen members of their immediate family, Robert told of his survival and his life after the war in his biography, FROM THE HOLOCAUST TO HOGAN'S HEROES. Unlike Robert and their family who were arrested, Nicole escaped from Paris to the south of France where she hid in the open as a Catholic girl named Pierrette Nicodem. Eventually, she joined the Forces Francaises de L'interieur-the French Underground-first as a courier and then joining the men to whom she'd supplied messages, guns, and ammunition as they traveled north liberating towns along the way. Like Robert, Nicole's indomitable spirit helped her survive the war and create a future without hatred, fear, and the devastation of war. ONE OF THE LUCKY ONES is Nicole's inspirational journey through a life she never expected.