My father, Frederick David, who has died aged 97, was a Holocaust refugee from Vienna who arrived in 1939 in London, the city that became his home. He trained as an economist, joining the manufacturing and distribution company Bunzl where, by the time of his retirement in 1988, he was managing director.
Frederick – known as Friedl – was raised in Josefstadt in central Vienna. The son of Hugo David and Gertrud Spitzer, Friedl grew up in a large family of aunts and uncles – a colourful parade of eccentrics he would describe with customary wit. His family knew many of the celebrated Viennese artists of the time, including Gustav Klimt, Oskar Kokoschka and Egon Schiele, through his great-great uncle Alfred Spitzer, their lawyer.
