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Ludwig Koch |
Siberia taught restaurateur to value life
FRIENDS of Ludwig Koch, the owner of Charlotte’s Restaurant and Charlotte’s Guesthouse in West Hampstead, who died in January, have spoken about his life.
Mr Koch, who died aged 84, was sent to Siberia after he was captured by Russians while fighting for the German army in World War II.
Gary Kastly, who worked for Mr Koch, said he came to England in the 1950s from Germany and bought Charlotte’s in West End Lane with compensation money from the German government for his eight years in Siberia.
It was a coffee shop when he bought it and he built it into a successful restaurant, although he had to give it up in 1996 when he was priced out. A “relentless” saver, he went on to buy at least nine houses in his lifetime, all in Sumatra Road.
He was born in Bad Konig in 1922, and swept up in the rise of Nazism in the 1930s. He joined the Hitler Youth in his teens and was conscripted into the army.
He fought on the Russian frontline, but after capture spent his 20s in the work camp, where he was tortured. One of only 8,000 from 85,000 soldiers who survived Siberia, he only talked about it in his final years.
He never married and had no children. Friend Gerald Holm, 77, who was a regular at the guest house, said: “He had occasional girlfriends but his business was his life.”
Maintenance worker Mr Kastly, 44, who was given his first job washing dishes for Mr Koch 30 years ago, described him as hard worker who was “married to Charlotte”.
Many of Mr Koch’s staff had worked for him for 30 years, despite his eccentric attitude towards pay and holidays. “Everyone loved him but he drove them crazy,” said Mr Kastly.
For holidays, he enjoyed travelling back to his home town in Germany for school reunions.
He was generous towards strangers and would often give beggars money on the condition that they spent it on soup rather than cigarettes. He ate soup everyday: a habit he picked up in concentration camp.
“He told me he knew it was Christmas because he would get a potato in his soup,” said Mr Kastly.
An early riser, he always got up at 6.30am to count last night’s takings.
Mr Koch would only ever drive a “banger”, and didn’t see the sense in forking out for expensive motors. “You’re the only German who doesn’t have a Mercedes,” Mr Kastly would tease him.
His nephew, Gunter Hoffard has taken over Charlotte’s.
CHARLOTTE CHAMBERS |
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