Two Sisters Who Were Second Cousins Married Brothers: More Twists in the Goldschmidt Family Tree

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This post and the ones that follow will focus on Jacob and Jettchen’s fourth child, Mayer Goldschmidt,  who, like his brother Julius, married a first cousin. On August 30, 1895, he married Hedwig Goldschmidt, who was born on January 1, 1877, to Falk Goldschmidt and Babette Carlebach, in Frankfurt.

Marriage record of Mayer Goldschmidt and Hedwig Goldschmidt, Certificate Number: 1392
Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903,  Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Hedwig’s father Falk Goldschmidt was Jacob Meier Goldschmidt’s younger brother, so Mayer and Hedwig were first cousins on their paternal sides. Hedwig was seventeen years younger than Mayer and only eighteen when she married him; he was 35.

The annotation on the left margin of the marriage record was translated by Matthias Steinke of the German Genealogy Group on Facebook:

Frankfurt am Main, at the 24th November
To the signing registrar came today, the personally known salesman Marcel Goldschmidt, residing in Frankfurt am Main, Fichtestrasse 18, and showed a permission of the royal district-president in Wiesbaden, dated 7th November 1902, P. I A. 9406 wherein he was permitted, to change his firstname from Mayer into Marcel.
Readed, confirmed and signed
Marcel Goldschmidt

Thus, Mayer changed his name from Mayer to Marcel in 1902 when he was 42 years old.

Marcel and Hedwig had four children, Jacob, Nelly, Else, and Grete.

Jacob Goldschmidit (named for his grandfather and to be referred to as Jacob Goldschmidt II) was born on July 1, 1896, in Frankfurt.

Jacob Goldschmidt II birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903; Signatur: 903_9170, Year Range: 1896, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Their second child was named Nelly Goldschmidt. She was born on July 16, 1898, in Frankfurt:

Nelly Goldschmidt, birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903; Signatur: 903_9206, Year Range: 1898, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Else Goldschmidt was born on October 2, 1902, in Frankfurt.1 Then Marcel and Hedwig had a third daughter and fourth child, Grete Goldschmidt, born on September 25, 1904, in Frankfurt.2

Because Marcel and Hedwig were first cousins, their four children were not just siblings, but also second cousins to each other. All three daughters married in the 1920s. Amazingly, none married a cousin. But two of them married men who were brothers.

Nelly Goldschmidt married Moritz Gutmann on August 2, 1920, in Frankfurt.  Moritz was born on June 1, 1892, in Stuttgart, Germany. Some sources say his parents were Hermann Gutmann and Jettchen Ries, but I have not found a record to verify that since the marriage record does not include the names of his parents.

Marriage record of Nelly Goldschmidt and Moritz Gutmann, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903, Year Range: 1920, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Nelly and Moritz had one child, a son Karl Hermann Gutmann, born on May 4, 1923, in Frankfurt.3

Nelly’s younger sister Else Goldschmidt married Nelly’s presumed brother-in-law Siegfried Gutmann on May 15, 1922, in Frankfurt. He was born April 28, 1886, in Stuttgart, to Hermann Guttmann and Jettchen Ries. Siegfried was sixteen years older than Else and had served in World War I for Germany.4

Marriage record of Else Goldschmidt and Siegfried Gutmann, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903, Year Range: 1922, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Else and Siegfried had one child, Hermann Guttmann, born February 28, 1923, in Frankfurt.5 He later changed his name to Dennis John Goodman.

The third sister Grete Goldschmidt married Berthold Heimerdinger on January 18, 1924, in Frankfurt.6 Berthold was the son of Moritz Heimerdinger and Leontine Seligmann; he was born on September 20, 1890, in Wiesbaden, Germany. Berthold was slightly wounded while serving in World War I for Germany.7

After marrying, Grete and Berthold settled in Wiesbaden, where their daughter Gabrielle Heimerdinger was born on December 16, 1924.8

Marcel (Mayer) Goldschmidt lived long enough to see his three daughters married and several of his grandchildren born, but then died on November 2, 1928, in Koenigstein im Taunus, Germany. He  was 68.

Marcel Goldschmidt, death record, Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 908; Laufende Nummer: 1933, Year Range: 1928, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

I was curious about the location of his death since Marcel was a resident of Frankfurt. According to Wikipedia, Koenigstein im Taunus, located about 15 miles northwest of Frankfurt, was “famous as “Jewish spa” mainly due to the high proportions of Jewish guests …. who stayed in the internationally famous sanitarium Dr. Kohnstamm … and Hotel Cahn, which offered kosher food. For these reasons, Königstein was an attractive city to visit for a day trip for many Jews in Frankfurt. Königstein became even more easily accessible from Frankfurt am Main in 1906, when the railway between Königstein and Frankfurt was built.”

Koenigsburg im Taunus, Brion Vibber / CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)

Life was thus very good for Marcel, Hedwig, and their children and grandchildren up through the 1920s. Much would change in the 1930s.

  1. Else Goldschmidt, Gender: weiblich (Female), Age: 19, Birth Date: 2 Okt 1902 (2 Oct 1902), Marriage Date: 15 Mai 1922 (15 May 1922), Marriage Place: Frankfurt am Main, Hessen (Hesse), Deutschland (Germany), Civil Registration Office: Frankfurt am Main, Spouse: Siegfried Gutmann, Certificate Number: 561, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930 ↩
  2. Grete Goldschmid, Birth Date: 25 Sep 1904, Birth Place: Frankfurt, Federal Republic of Germany, Father: Marcel Goldschmidt, Mother: Hedwig Goldschmidt
    SSN: 064167857, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007 ↩
  3. Karl Herrmann Gutmann, Birth Date: 4 May 1923, Birth Place: Frankfurt, Federal Republic of Germany, Father: Moritz Gubmann, Mother: Nelly Goldschmidt, SSN: 067180184, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007 ↩
  4. Siegfried Gutmann, Residence Year: 1914, Residence Country: Deutschland (Germany), List Date: 21 Nov 1918, List Number: 2218, Volume: 1918_XVI, Ancestry.com. Germany, World War I Casualty Lists, 1914-1919 ↩
  5. Dennis John Goodman, Gender: Male, Marital status: Single, Birth Date: 28 fev 1923 (28 Feb 1923), Birth Place: Frankfort, Arrival Date: 1949, Arrival Place: Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Father: Sigfried Goodman, Mother: Elsa Goodman
    Traveling With Children: No, FHL Film Number: 004564017, Ancestry.com. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Immigration Cards, 1900-1965 ↩
  6. Grete Goldschmidt Heimerdinger naturalization papers, The National Archives at Philadelphia; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; NAI Title: Declarations of Intention for Citizenship, 1/19/1842 – 10/29/1959; NAI Number: 4713410; Record Group Title: Records of District Courts of the United States, 1685-2009; Record Group Number: 21, Description: (Roll 478) Declarations of Intention for Citizenship, 1842-1959 (No 355901-357000), Ancestry.com. New York, State and Federal Naturalization Records, 1794-1943 ↩
  7. Berthold Heimerdinger, Residence Year: 1914, Residence Country: Deutschland (Germany), List Date: 22 Sep 1917, List Number: 1637, Volume: 1917_XVI, Ancestry.com. Germany, World War I Casualty Lists, 1914-1919 ↩
  8. Gabrielle Joan Heimerdinger, Birth Date: 16 Dec 1924, Birth Place: Wiesbaden, Federal Republic of Germany, Father: Berthold Heimerdinger, Mother: Grete Goldschmidt, SSN: 102185390, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007. According to Cibella/Baron, Grete and Berthold had two other children, but they did not have any dates for these other two, and I found no records for any other children born to Grete and Berthold. ↩

35 thoughts on “Two Sisters Who Were Second Cousins Married Brothers: More Twists in the Goldschmidt Family Tree”

  1. I’m sitting on my back porch enjoying the smell of the roses and the wonderful sunshine while catching up on your last two weeks of posts. What would we do without our genealogy programs to calculate relationships? You are doing such a good job, Amy. Keep up the great work!

    Liked by 1 person

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  3. This is a great coincidence – I would most likely not have noticed that you were getting really close to my research and also personal territory if Gau-Algesheim came up….
    I will let you know more soon, so much now: The Heimerdinger family was the closest partner to my friend Gaby’s family’s jewelry business (in NYC : Gaby Glückselig) and “related” to my oldest Jewish friend from Wiesbaden Heinz (in NYC: Henry) Salfeld, born 1902 in Wiesbaden, his mother was a Heimerdinger.

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  4. I am bit astonished about the name changes. What may have motivated Marcel to change his first name? Life was good for his family. It can mean only one thing that he was relatively well off since he could afford to visit the famous spa in Königstein. The Great Depression hit Germany even harder since the country went from one economic and political crisis to another after World War I.

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  5. Hard to keep track of all of the relationships here but you are managing that well. I wonder what Marcel was doing at the time of his death – my 2x great grandfather went to a hot springs “for his health” and ended up dying there.

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  6. I get quite anxious over your posts that relate to 1930s Germany, but am glad you are doing this research and sharing it. Now more than ever we cannot afford to forget the past.

    I’d never heard of Jewish spas, but watched a documentary a couple of nights ago called The Last Goldfish (https://www.thelastgoldfish.com/) where a spa in Ulm (I think) was mentioned. It’s a fascinating documentary about a woman born in Trinidad, searching for her father’s family, most of whom were murdered by the Nazis.

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  7. Hi Amy, wow, there’s a lot going on in this post. I’m interested in the Königstein spa photo as it
    resembles Wiesbaden somewhat from the top of the hill, both very fashionable at the turn of the 20th century for taking the waters. I note Mayer changed his first name too? Maybe he was a bit of a disguise merchant with an alter ego or in a mid-life crisis! Interesting……

    Liked by 1 person

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    • Hi Shirley, Mayer did change his first name but not his last name (as far as I’ve seen), and I assume it was because he was known as Marcel. Most Jews had both Hebrew names and secular names so maybe he just wanted his secular name to be his official name. Or maybe there were too many Mayer Goldschmidts? I don’t know!

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    • Königstein was much smaller than Wiesbaden – which for some decades was the residence of a Duke. But since Königstein was close to Frankfurt was a popular place for a second residence for families who could afford a fancy mansion surrounded by a park-like garden…..

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  9. Pingback: Marcel Goldschmidt’s Children: The Two Who Survived | Brotmanblog: A Family Journey

  10. Pingback: Marcel Goldschmidt’s Children: The Two Who Did Not Survive | Brotmanblog: A Family Journey

      • I keep my tree on Ancestry, but sync it to Family Tree Maker so that I have a copy on my computer, not just in the cloud. FTM also allows me to create charts and to link to Charting Companion, which provides additional charting options. One tool I use a lot on FTM is the relationship calculator—something you can’t do on Ancestry. Ancestry will only tell you the relationship to the home person on your tree whereas FTM allows me to enter any two names on my tree and then calculates the relationship. That’s where I get all those relationship charts that I put in my blog posts.

        Liked by 1 person

      • When you sync it does it sync docs and photos or just info? About a year or more ago I bought Legacy and never used it! I started monkeying around one day, but I just never have the time to put into it to see what’s what :(.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Yes, you get downloads of the documents that you find through ancestry and attach to your tree. I don’t attach photos so I don’t know about that. It’s really very easy to operate if you use it as I do—a way to sync and to create charts—as opposed to using it to create the tree and do research. Many people do that, but I was so accustomed to Ancestry that I just use it to sync.

        Liked by 1 person

  12. Pingback: The Children of Falk Goldschmidt and Clara Babetta Carlebach | Brotmanblog: A Family Journey

  13. Pingback: Another Update from Another Cousin! The Story of Karl Gutmann | Brotmanblog: A Family Journey

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