The family moved to Vienna as Dorothea was showing a lot of musical talent on the piano and it would further her career and studies. Her father was offered a job there as the head of a special needs institute for speech impediments and the deaf and dumb, so the move went ahead.

Once the war began, it was forbidden to write in any other language than German so letters to friends in England had to be sent through Switzerland. It was also very risky to be writing her diary (which was in English), let alone travel with it.

As Max and Dorothea were children, when they went to Vienna they traveled on their father's documents, so were never registered as individuals in Austria.

As people were starving, her Aunt sent her potatoes from Switzerland but by the time they reached Dorothea and her family, the potatoes had been stolen and were replaced with rocks.

Dorothea was the only child at the Academy, and was a contemporary friend of conductor George Sell and the pianist Rudolf Serkin.

Dorothea returned to England around 1918/1919 and escorted orphaned children back on the train. On return, her and Max changed their names from Friedeberger to Fraser due to antisemitism at the time. They chose Fraser because Max was born in Edinburgh and it was a Scottish name.

She met Simon on a holiday in the Lake district. Initially, she knew his sister by teaching her children the piano and was invited on holiday by his grandmother, where she met him.

Max returned to England before Dorothea. They had rented out their house on Woodchurch Road when they moved to Vienna and on the return it was in a state as it had been rented by some Germans.

Moses' family were from a little village called Shrim, in Posen. They were very orthodox and Moses was sent to the local Cheder where he was incredibly bored. Moses was a very bright child and persuaded his father to send him to the local grammar school and would have done very well there if it weren't for antisemitism, as he was constantly marked down for being Jewish. When it came to his matriculation, he borrowed the work of a high-achieving student from the previous year, handed it in and was marked a fail. He showed it to the headmaster, explaining why he had done it but was still kicked out and ended up leaving home at 14.

When Moses left home, he traveled through Europe and eventually received a doctorate from Switzerland's Bern University. On his travels, he used to receive hospitality from Jewish families and in Gottingen, he stayed with the Hahn family and met their daughter Rosalie. He ended up going to England around 1890 and continued to exchange letters with her. He did not speak a word of English at the time, despite speaking Hebrew, Latin, Greek and German so he would teach children Hebrew in the East End and learn English from his students. In July 1893, he returned to Gottingham and married Rosalie before moving to Scotland and settling in Edinburgh.