In God's Hands

In God’s Hands: A Noblewoman’s Struggle for Survival in War and Revolution has been called “a European Gone with the Wind” and a “story of the great upheavals of the 20th Century, of the changing face of European history, and of the universal strength of the human spirit.” This gripping memoir, by Ellen von zur Muehlen, chronicles her life from her birth in 1892 into a family of the Baltic German nobility in Tsarist Russia, to her life in Germany, Poland, and London, England. She later emigrated to America, where she died in 1985 at the age of 92. She writes about the violent changes in her life during World War I, the Bolshevik revolution in Russia and World War II, finally fleeing in 1945 with her family through the burning ruins of Berlin during the last days of Nazi Germany. Her daughter, Gisela Ives, offers her own commentary about these events, following her birth in 1931 on her father’s estate in Latvia. She met and later married in London an American Naval officer from North Carolina where they now reside. They have four children and four grandchildren. Ellen’s example of human courage and faith- for she fervently believed that she was in God’s hands and that He guided her to make the right decisions for survival- has been an inspiration for all of her family.