Frederick Hugh Edwards was born Fritz Ludwig Eduard Meyer in 1922 the son of the assimilated Jewish businessman, Wilhelm Meyer and Käthe Friderike née Hecht in Düsseldorf, Germany. He had one brother, Klaus, born 1924 or 1925, who was killed in a hit and run accident in 1934 (see death certificate 1925/1/2). It is not known what, precisely, Wilhelm’s business was in Germany. It is thought that he was able to bring his family to the UK with sufficient funds some time in the mid 1930s. Freddie was enrolled in the private boarding school, Weymouth College, where he obtained a school certificate in July 1939. It appears that he was interned on the Isle of Man (see certified copy of attestation 1925/1/12) and later joined the British Pioneers Corps where he reached the rank of Sergeant, by which time he had formally changed his name to Frederick Edwards.

There is evidence that Freddie returned to Germany after the war (see driving licence dated, 1952- 1925/1/22). This is corroborated anecdotally by the donor, a good friend of his. He is known to have worked as an interpreter at the Nuremberg war Crimes Trials. That said, he wouldn’t have remained long and by all accounts spent the rest of his life at the same house in North London, which his father had bought in the 1930s. Freddie is thought to have worked in some capacity in the textile trade eventually setting himself up as a textile agent. He didn’t have a family of his own. He died 20 August 2015.