A FAMILY is mourning the death of a remarkable man who survived a Nazi concentration camp, was conscripted into the German army, and then fought alongside Allied forces in a key Second World War battle.

Polish-born Gerhard Czapla’s extraordinary life saw him sent to a concentration camp aged 14, then forced to enlist in the German army.

He eventually escaped to join a Polish regiment which saw action at the 1944 Battle of Monte Cassino in Italy.

After the war, Gerhard made Braintree his home and died there days before his 84th birthday and his 63rd wedding anniversary.

He was born in the Polish village of Imielin, near Auschwitz. His father worked to help Jews escape from concentration camps in a similar way to Oscar Schindler and was arrested and later died in the Auschwitz death camp. His mother committed suicide after her husband’s death, and her eldest son disappeared.

Gerhard – known as Gerald to his wife and “Patch” to his grandchildren – ended up in another concentration camp as a teenager, with his younger brother, Walter.

While in the camp, Gerhard contacted tuberculosis and the Nazis sent him to a German sanatorium for six months. His wife Kathleen said he never understood quite why they spared his life.

She said: “It was the thing that puzzled him. He could never understand why the Germans sent him there. Usually they just let them die.”

At 16, Gerhard was forced into the German army, where he was deprived of food, and survived by foraging peaches and other fruit.

His wife said after the war, he refused ever to eat a peach again.

After running away from the German army he was interrogated by the Americans and eventually allowed to join Allied forces in Italy.

He met Kathleen at Warner’s Mill, Braintree. He was 22 and she 19. They married six months later.

Mrs Czapla said her husband was fond of joking to their children he had been washed up on a beach, where his wife found him.

The couple had six children, and adopted a seventh and had 29 grandchildren and 32 great grandchildren.

His wife described her husband, who died on New Year’s Eve, as “a wonderful husband and wonderful father, with a great sense of humour”.