Although Mina and Wolf’s oldest daughter Rosa had left me with many unanswered questions (that were soon answered with the help of Aaron Knappstein), I had greater success with their second oldest child, Karoline.
Karoline was born on March 30, 1861, in Frankenau.
She married Heineman Blumenfeld on October 10, 1884, in Frankenau. He was born in Momberg on October 8, 1854, to Abraham Blumenfeld and Giedel Straus. (There is another intrafamily relationship between the Blumenfelds and the Katzensteins, as Barbara Greve explained to me yesterday, but for now, I won’t confuse the narrative. I need to be sure I understand it first!) (UPDATE: So it turns out that Heinemann Blumenfeld was my second cousin, three times removed. More on that at some later point.)
Karoline and Heineman had three children. Their oldest, Toni, was born on September 21, 1885, in Momberg:
She married Moritz Schuster on October 5, 1912, in Momberg; he was born on June 20, 1883, in Sterbfritz, Germany, the son of David Schuster and Bertha Schuster:
Toni and Moritz had two children born in Sterbfritz: Kathryn/Kaete (1913) and Alfred (1915).
The second child of Karoline and Heineman Blumenfeld was their son Moritz (also Moses and later Morris). He was born on October 7, 1887, in Momberg.
He married Sophie Spier on December 23, 1924, in Momberg. Sophie was born in Momberg on June 28, 1894.
Moritz and Sophie Blumenfeld had three children: Ursula, Ruth, and Werner.
The youngest child of Karoline and Heineman Blumenfeld was their daughter Bella. She was born May 23, 1890:
She married Hermann Stein on January 23, 1922. Hermann was born in Burgsinn, Germany, on September 22, 1884, the son of Julius Stein and Regina Heil. Bella and Hermann did not have any children.
Fortunately, the Blumenfeld family decided quite early in Hitler’s reign to start emigrating from Germany. On October 5, 1934, the two children of Toni Blumenfeld and Moritz Schuster arrived in the US; Alfred Schuster was 18, his sister Kathryn was 21. They had been living in Sterbfritz and were going to a cousin named Hermann Livingston in Bloomington, Illinois, although the manifest notes that they were instead discharged to an uncle, Sid Livingston of Chicago.
Karoline and Heinemann Blumenfeld did not live long after their grandchildren departed for the US. Karoline died on January 25, 1935, in Momberg. She was 73 years old. Her husband Heinemann died the following year on August 31, 1936; he was 81.
It was not long after their parents’ deaths that the three children of Karoline and Heinemann escaped from Nazi Germany to the United States. Bella left with her husband Hermann Stein on August 24, 1937. The manifest indicates that they had been living in Burgsinn before emigrating. Hermann was a merchant. The manifest also reports that they were going to a cousin named Sigmund Livingston in Chicago, presumably the same individual who had picked up Alfred and Kathryn.[i]
Bella’s sister Toni and her husband Moritz Schuster arrived a little over two years later on December 21, 1939. According to Toni Schuster’s obituary, her husband Moritz had spent some time in a concentration camp before escaping with Toni to the US. The manifest listed their son Alfred in Bloomington as the person they were going to, but that entry was crossed out and replaced with the name of a nephew, Milan (?) Schuster, in the Bronx.
It also appears that Moritz and Toni were detained for one day until December 22, 1939, because they were seen as LPC—likely to become public charges. I wonder whether that is why the person they were released to was someone in the New York City area instead of their son in Bloomington, Illinois.
Finally, the remaining members of the Blumenfeld family arrived on March 18, 1940—Moritz Blumenfeld and his wife Sophie and their three young children. They also reported that they were going to their cousin, Sid Livingston of Chicago.
All the Blumenfeld siblings and their spouses and children were living together in Bloomington, Illinois, in 1940, according to the census. Alfred Schuster, who was only 24, was listed as the head of the household. He was working as a salesman at a department store. His sister Kathryn was a clerk at a department store. Their father Moritz Schuster did not have any employment listed nor did their mother Toni. Bella’s husband, Hermann Stein, was working as a tailor, and Moritz Blumenfeld, who is listed here as Morris Bloomfield, a surname change that was adopted by his wife and children as well, was working as a janitor in a tailor shop, presumably with his brother-in-law Hermann.
In 1942, according to his draft registration Morris Bloomfield was working for Advance Cleaners in Bloomington. His brother-in-law Hermann Stein reported on his draft registration that he was working for a different cleaning company, Broleen’s Cleaners. Toni Blumenfeld’s husband did not identify any employment when he registered for the draft in 1942, but according to his obituary, he had owned a furniture store in Bloomington until 1944. “Morris M, Schuster,” The Pantagraph (13 Aug 1964, p. 22)
After settling in Bloomington, all the Blumenfeld siblings and their spouses stayed in the Bloomington/Peoria region for the rest of their lives. Toni Blumenfeld died on October 2, 1964, just two months after her husband Moritz Schuster died on August 10, 1964; they had been living in Peoria at the time of their deaths and are buried in the Peoria Hebrew Cemetery. “Morris M, Schuster,” The Pantagraph (13 Aug 1964, p. 22); “Mrs. Schuster, Nazi Germany Escapee, Dies,” The Pantagraph (7 Oct 1964, p 5).
Toni’s brother Morris Bloomfield died on May 14, 1966, three years after his wife Sophie. They also are buried in the Peoria Hebrew Cemetery. Finally, Bella Blumenfeld Stein lost her husband Hermann in 1954; she died in 1984 in Chicago, but was buried with her husband and siblings in the Peoria Hebrew Cemetery.
When Karoline Katzenstein and Heinemann Blumenfeld died in 1935 and 1936, respectively, they must have been deeply concerned about the future of their family under Nazi rule; after all, two of their grandchildren had already left Germany. I imagine that Karoline and Heinemann would be greatly pleased to know that all three of their children escaped from Germany and spent the remainder of their lives living close to one another and are even buried near each other in Peoria, Illinois.
____________
[i] Since Sigmund Livingston was identified as family on all the manifests for the Blumenfeld family, I assumed that he was somehow related to the Blumenfelds, and indeed, research uncovered that his mother’s name was Dora Blumenfeld. She was the sister of Heinemann Blumenfeld, so Sigmund was in fact the first cousin of Toni, Moritz, and Bella Blumenfeld. Dora and her husband Meyer Loewenstein had immigrated to the US by 1871, and their son Sigmund was born in the US in 1872. Sigmund and his siblings changed the surname from Loewenstein to Livingston.
So happy that they got out of Germany when they did!
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So am I! Thanks!
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My favorite posts are the ones where the whole family escapes! Do you know what the writing on their gravestones above their names says?
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I can read their Hebrew names, but not the rest. I should probably get it translated for me. Usually it’s the Hebrew date of death, but some of these might be more statements about the people. I will ask someone to translate them for me! Thanks, Katie!
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I can’t read any of it, so wasn’t sure if I was missing something important!
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Probably not, but now you’ve piqued my curiosity! I will report back. 🙂
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I look forward to it!
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So…in two of the three, it just has their Hebrew names and Hebrew dates of death. On the third one for Bella and Hermann Stein, it says that she was a woman of valor (Eishat Chayil) and he was a truthful and honest man. Those are fairly common phrases of praise on Jewish headstones. Thanks for asking, Katie!
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Sofie geb. Spier means geboren, born as, so her maiden name was Spier. Sophie daughter of Yechiel?
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Yes, that’s what I have in the blog for her maiden name, right? Thank you!
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Amy, her marriage record reads Sophie Spier, not Soffia.
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Really? That crazy German script—it sure looks like Soffia to me! Thanks—I will make the changes. I thought Daniel was referring to her last name.
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I’m so glad they all escaped and were able to be together. Just yesterday I found my first reference to the Nazis with my ancestors – I’m almost scared to research any farther. In this particular case, I know he ended up in America but I don’t know anything about his family. Gulp.
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I remember my first encounter with family murdered by the Nazis. It was a shock and remains one each time I find another. It always takes my breath away, no matter how many I have found.
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Amy, were you at all surprised to find out how Sigmund Livingston was related to the Blumenfeld family? It seems to be an ongoing theme in your families that someone who was already well established in America was willing to help the newcomers.
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No, not at all since he was described as an uncle or cousin on the ship manifests. I thought the name Livingston must have been changed from something else though! And yes, those with families in the US fared much better than those who had no one to sponsor them. Thanks for the comment and question, Cathy!
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This is heart warming and heart breaking both; having said that, I love to read stories of when people escaped. Also, imagine the pressure on Alfred at age 24 to be responsible for all those people…and any one of us would do the exact same thing under those circumstances. They ALL were men and women of honor. ❤
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Thanks, Karen. Yes, I’d imagine that Alfred did carry quite a lot of responsibility. I wonder if there was a reason that his father did not work and for the government to worry that he would be a public charge. But it appears his family took care of him.
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The father may have been unable for some reason rather than unwilling. Glad they could all be together in that awful time.
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Yes, that’s what I mean—unable because of a health issue of some kind.
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Alfred was my grandfather. I miss him dearly.
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Thanks, Suzanne, for reaching out. I’d love to know more about your grandfather. I will email you.
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Hi. It’s so nice that I found this. Kaete (Schuster) Schwabacher was my grandmother, who passed away in 2008 and is in the same cemetery.
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Hi Michael—I am so glad you found my blog. We are, after all, cousins, although quite distantly. I will email you. Thanks!
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