Mike Bernhardt
Mike Bernhardt
from Nazi Germany. A story I couldn’t stop researching.
WINNER – LOWELL THOMAS AWARD
Published in Hidden Compass
Editor, Voices of the Grieving Heart
IN PROGRESS — THE NOVEL
The Tides of War — A Novel
Drawn from the true story behind the award-winning essays below, The Tides of War follows all four members of the Moser family across five countries and separate fights to survive, after they escaped Nazi Germany believing they were finally safe.
ABOUT MIKE
I write about loss, survival, and resilience — from a collection of grief poetry gathered from eighty contributors who lost loved ones, to the true stories of my wife’s family’s escape from Nazi Germany, now becoming a novel.
More About Me →
PUBLISHED ESSAYS
Featured nonfiction
Two true stories from the same family history, published in Hidden Compass.
LOWELL THOMAS AWARD
Hidden Compass · 2023
The Tides of War
A grandmother’s mysterious seaweed collection leads to a decades-long search to understand her journey as a refugee during WWII—and to discover what happened to her husband.
Hidden Compass · 2026
Trusting the Smuggler's Route
While retracing the harrowing escape of a German-Jewish teen from WWII France to Switzerland, I discover the women who risked their lives to save her and confront a legacy of both bravery and trauma.
RESEARCH NOTES
From the Field
Filtered here to the historical & fiction work; everything else lives on the full Blog.
Retracing the Escape Route
Notes from walking the same coastline Ernst and Margaret crossed.
Lowell Thomas Award
"The Tides of War" wins in Special-Purpose Travel
YouTube interview — coming soon
A conversation about the essay and the novel it's becoming.
Mike Bernhardt
© 2026 Mike Bernhardt. All Rights Reserved.