In December 1942, Goldberg's father was admitted to hospital. The Gestapo, however, raided the hospital and sent him to a Jewish one which had been requisitioned by the Gestapo for use as a prison, from which Jews were taken and sent to Auschwitz. On Christmas Eve, gambling that the guards would be drunk or absent, Goldberg took his father from the hospital. The elder Goldberg was soon back in the hands of the Gestapo, and in April 1943 was summoned for deportation; Werner told him not to show up, and he was again saved. The father and son were the only members of their immediate family to survive the war.