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Outlook: Discovering my mother's heroic past

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Compilation of two old images of Eva Taylor and her mother Sabine on top of blurred handwritten letters

14/04/2022 GMT

Discovering my mother's heroic past

BBC World Service - Outlook, Discovering my mother's heroic past

A box of letters revealed the secret and extraordinary life of Eva Taylor's mother

Eva Taylor always accepted her mother was absent and uninvolved. But her mother’s behaviour made sense when Eva discovered a hidden past of bravery, resilience and resistance.

When Germany invaded the Netherlands in 1940, Sabine Zuur joined the Dutch resistance movement and hid people from the German authorities. She was betrayed and sent to three different concentration camps, but managed to survive. Her daughter Eva Taylor remembers her mother as troubled and often absent. But after her mother’s death, Eva discovered an archive of documents that revealed the details of her mother’s extraordinary life, changing how Eva understood and loved her mother. Eva Taylor has written a book called Sabine's War: The Incredible True Story of a Resistance Fighter Who Survived Three Concentration Camps.

A South African game reserve called Thula Thula was set up by Françoise Malby-Anthony and her husband, Lawrence. They adopted a herd of elephants that had been traumatised by poaching, and were being very destructive. Lawrence and Françoise formed an incredible bond with the elephants, and when Lawrence died in 2012, Françoise noticed the elephants started behaving in an unusual way. This interview was first broadcast in July 2018. 

Get in touch: outlook@bbc.com

Presenter: Jo Fidgen

(Photo: Eva Taylor and her mother Sabine. Credit: Eva Taylor)

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