Category Archives: Germany

Sprintz Blumenfeld, Part I: My Fourth Great-Aunt

Posted on by
Reply

In August 2021, I began writing about my Blumenfeld family, starting with my four-times great-grandparents Abraham (Katz) and Geitel (Katz) Blumenfeld and then their oldest child, Moses Blumenfeld. Since then, I have been writing about the children and later descendants of Moses Blumenfeld. That has taken more than four and a half years, and Moses Blumenfeld had only three children. Having now finished writing about the youngest child of the youngest child of the youngest child of Moses’ daughter Gelle Blumenfeld Rothschild, I am finally ready to move on to the second child of Abraham and Geitel Blumenfeld, their daughter Sprintz.

This is where I am in the overall Blumenfeld branch of my family tree:

It seems I’ve hardly made a dent!

Sprintz had six children—twice as many as her brother Moses. That could mean it will take me more than eight years to research and write about all her descendants! I will be in my 80s by then, and I will still have the younger siblings of Sprintz and Moses to cover. Fortunately, one of those siblings, my 3-x great-grandmother Breine Blumenfeld Katzenstein, has already been covered when I wrote about her husband Scholem Katzenstein and all of their descendants.

But that still leaves three more children of Abraham and Geitel: Hannah, Meier, and Jakob. I am relying on my cousin Richard Bloomfield to cover the family of his ancestor Jakob Blumenfeld in his wonderful blog, Blumenfeld Family Stories. But that still leaves me with Sprintz, Hannah, and Meier. I hope I live long enough to do them all a decent job of honoring their memories, but it is feeling more than a bit overwhelming.

But onward I go, starting with Sprintz. Although I do not have a birth record for her, her death record (see below) indicates that she died on March 26, 1863, at the age of eighty, meaning she was born in about 1783, presumably in Momberg where her parents were living. Her death record also identifies her husband’s name as Samuel Frank, which is consistent with other trees and her children’s records. I have no marriage record for Sprintz and Samuel, but since their first child was born in about 1816, presumably they were married before that year. Samuel was born on August 8, 1788, in Adelsberg, Bavaria. According to the LAGIS entry for Samuel’s gravestone, he was a mohel, or the ritual circumciser, in Momberg, as well as a merchant.1

As stated above, Sprintz and Samuel had six children, five daughters and one son. Their first-born was Sarah/Sarchen, who was likely born in 1816 in Momberg, based on her death record, which records her age as 77 when she died in January, 1894.2 Next came Bertha/Breine, whose death record says she was 95 when she died in April 1914, meaning she was likely born in about 1819 in Momberg.3 The third daughter was Feilchen/Veichen, according to several secondary sources including Geneanet.org, but I do not have one actual record showing her birth, marriage, or death. Those secondary sources say that she was born July 1, 1819,4 meaning that Bertha/Breine must have been born no later than October 1818, unless Feilchen and Bertha/Breine were twins or Bertha/Breine was not 95 when she died in April 1914.

The fourth daughter of Sprintz and Samuel was apparently named Fradchen, and as with Feilchen, I have no primary sources for her. Geneanet.com reports that she was born on December 22, 1822 in Momberg.5 The last two children, Roschen and Abraham, were twins born on August 29, 1825, in Momberg, and fortunately, I do have records for both of them showing those birth dates.

Roschen Frank birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hessen, HHStAW, 365, 628, p. 4

Abraham Frank birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hessen, HHStAW, 365, 628, p. 3

As you can see, I have my work cut out for me trying to establish with any degree of reliability the bare facts about this family. For the most part I need to rely on the records of the next generation and some death records to fill in the gaps.

I do, however, have some records for the deaths of Sprintz Blumenfeld and her husband Samuel Frank. Sprintz died on March 27, 1863, in Momberg, and is buried at the Neustadt Jewish cemetery. She was reportedly eighty years old.

Sprintz Blumenfeld death record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 609, p. 5

Here is her gravestone, which says:6

Here rests
the worthy woman, Mrs.
Sprintz, wife of Mr.
Samuel from Momberg.
She died on the 7th of Nisan [5] 623
AH (= 27.3.1863). May her soul be bound up in the bond of life until she is resurrected at the resurrection of the dead.
Amen.

“Frank, Sprinz née Blumenfeld (1863) – Neustadt (near Marburg)”, in: Jewish Graves < https://lagis.hessen.de/de/personen/juedische-grabstaetten/alle-eintraege/5298_frank-sprinz-geborene-blumenfeld-1863-neustadt-bei-marburg > (accessed on 20.03.2026)

Her husband Samuel Frank died ten years later on May 28, 1873, in Momberg. He was 84 years old. He is buried with Sprintz in the Neustadt Jewish Cemetery.

Samuel Frank death record, Arcinsys Archives of Hessen, HHStAW, 365, 609, p. 5

“Frank, Samuel (1873) – Neustadt (near Marburg)”, in: Jewish Graves < https://lagis.hessen.de/de/personen/juedische-grabstaetten/alle-eintraege/5325_frank-samuel-1873-neustadt-bei-marburg > (accessed on 21.03.2026)

His gravestone reads:

Gravestone
of the man, Mr. Samuel
Frank from Momberg, who
walked the path of the good and upright.
He brought many (children) into the covenant
of Abraham. He died at a very advanced age and
in good repute on Wednesday, the 2nd of Sivan,
and he was buried on Friday, the 4th of the same
[5] 633 ndkZ (= May 28, 1873).
May his soul be bound up in the bond of life.

The posts to follow will tell the stories of their descendants as best I can.

Now available through Amazon! The Women Before Us, my newest family history novel tells the stories of eight women, all inspired by my research and my family stories, all of whom moved far from their own mothers and then saw their daughters move far from them. It’s a love story—love between mothers and daughters and love between those women and the men they married. Please check it out! It’s available as a paperback, ebook, and audiobook. If you enjoy it, please leave a review on Amazon and Goodreads and elsewhere! Thank you!!

 

 

  1. Samuel Frank, Register of Males Living in Momberg and Neustadt, Arcinsys Archives of Hessen, HHStAW, Dept. 365, No. 631, p. 20; “Frank, Samuel (1873) – Neustadt (near Marburg)”, in: Jewish Graves < https://lagis.hessen.de/de/personen/juedische-grabstaetten/alle-eintraege/5325_frank-samuel-1873-neustadt-bei-marburg > (accessed on 21.03.2026) ↩
  2. Sarchen Spier, Maiden Name Frank, Gender weiblich (Female), Death Age 77
    Birth Date abt 1817, Death Date 14 Jan 1894, Death Place Frankfurt am Main, Hessen (Hesse), Deutschland (Germany), Civil Registration Office Frankfurt am Main,
    Father Samuel Frank, Mother Sprintz Frank, Certificate Number 138, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Signatur: 10472; Laufende Nummer: 903, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958 ↩
  3. Breine Levi, Maiden Name Frank, Gender weiblich (Female), Death Age 95, Birth Date abt 1819, Death Date 26 Apr 1914, Death Place Neustadt Hessen (Neustadt), Hessen (Hesse), Deutschland (Germany), Civil Registration Office Neustadt (Hessen), Father Samuel Levi [sic Frank], Mother Sprintz Frank, Certificate Number 9, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 6581; Laufende Nummer: 915, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958 ↩
  4. See information on Geneanet.com at https://gw.geneanet.org/faberh?n=frank&oc=&p=veichen&_gl=1*1c0swom*_gcl_aw*R0NMLjE3NzM5MjU1OTMuQ2owS0NRand2ZTdOQmhDLUFSSXNBTFp5OUhWTF9JNXNxSVdfNXh4aVU4NlBiYk9QUXVaUloxRk9QYUhFM1NEMTlhdmROOXRMMzlIX2xYWWFBcktPRUFMd193Y0I.*_gcl_dc*R0NMLjE3NzM5MjU1OTMuQ2owS0NRand2ZTdOQmhDLUFSSXNBTFp5OUhWTF9JNXNxSVdfNXh4aVU4NlBiYk9QUXVaUloxRk9QYUhFM1NEMTlhdmROOXRMMzlIX2xYWWFBcktPRUFMd193Y0I.*_gcl_au*MTg3MjQ1NDM3OS4xNzY4MTM5NTU1*_ga*NDA0NjMwMzI3LjE3MjEzMjI4ODE.*_ga_LMK6K2LSJH*czk4NjZlYmZiLTUzYTMtNGE1ZC04ZmE4LWJlMjViNjI3ZTZkMiRvOTgkZzEkdDE3NzQxMTE2MzIkajQwJGwwJGgw&#160;↩
  5. See information on Geneanet.com at https://gw.geneanet.org/faberh?n=frank&oc=&p=fradchen&_gl=1*zkxnzj*_gcl_aw*R0NMLjE3NzM5MjU1OTMuQ2owS0NRand2ZTdOQmhDLUFSSXNBTFp5OUhWTF9JNXNxSVdfNXh4aVU4NlBiYk9QUXVaUloxRk9QYUhFM1NEMTlhdmROOXRMMzlIX2xYWWFBcktPRUFMd193Y0I.*_gcl_dc*R0NMLjE3NzM5MjU1OTMuQ2owS0NRand2ZTdOQmhDLUFSSXNBTFp5OUhWTF9JNXNxSVdfNXh4aVU4NlBiYk9QUXVaUloxRk9QYUhFM1NEMTlhdmROOXRMMzlIX2xYWWFBcktPRUFMd193Y0I.*_gcl_au*MTg3MjQ1NDM3OS4xNzY4MTM5NTU1*_ga*NDA0NjMwMzI3LjE3MjEzMjI4ODE.*_ga_LMK6K2LSJH*czk4NjZlYmZiLTUzYTMtNGE1ZC04ZmE4LWJlMjViNjI3ZTZkMiRvOTgkZzEkdDE3NzQxMTE3MTYkajI4JGwwJGgw&#160;↩
  6. “Frank, Sprinz née Blumenfeld (1863) – Neustadt (near Marburg)”, in: Jewish Graves < https://lagis.hessen.de/de/personen/juedische-grabstaetten/alle-eintraege/5298_frank-sprinz-geborene-blumenfeld-1863-neustadt-bei-marburg > (accessed on 20.03.2026) ↩

Meier Rothschild, Part VI: Anna Rothschild Hamberg

Posted on by
8

The youngest child of Meier Rothschild and Bertha Lorge was their daughter Anna. And unlike with her older siblings, I was able to learn where she and her family were in the 1930s and 1940s. I found the Palestine immigration files for Anna, her husband (and my cousin) Julius Hamberg, and for two of their three children, Alice and Ernst, on the Israel State Archives website. They all had immigrated from Germany to Palestine in 1934 when Alice was twelve, Hans Leo was eleven, and Ernst was eight. Here are two pages from Julius Hamberg’s application that show their date of immigration.

Julius Hamberg, Palestine immigration file found at the Israel State Archives, https://www.archives.gov.il/

Among the interesting things I learned from these immigration files is that Julius listed his occupation as a “commission agent,” meaning most likely a broker who handled commercial sales for sellers and buyers, Alice was a children’s nurse, and Ernst was an agricultural laborer.

Here are the photos of them from their immigration files:

Anna Rothschild Hamberg, found at https://www.archives.gov.il/

Julius Hamberg, found at https://www.archives.gov.il/

Alice Hamberg, found at https://www.archives.gov.il/

Ernst Hamberg, found at https://www.archives.gov.il/

I was not able to find a Palestine naturalization file for Hans Leo Eliezer Hamberg, but he was mentioned in his father Julius’ file when Hans later sought immigration to Israel in 1990 under the Law of Return and had to establish his Jewish identity to qualify. Although I cannot find him elsewhere, I assume Hans Leo Eliezer must have come to Palestine in 1934 with his parents since he was just a young boy; he perhaps left Palestine/Israel at some point and then wanted to return in 1990.

Hans Leo (Eliezer) Hamberg mentioned in Julius Hamberg’s immigration file, found at https://www.archives.gov.il/

As an aside, the fact that Anna Rothschild Hamberg and her family arrived in Palestine in 1934 helps to understand how Helene/Hana Rothschild, Berthold’s daughter, was more able to come to Palestine in 1937 without her sister or her father (her mother had died). She had an aunt, her father’s sister, living there so did have family already established in the country.

Returning to the family of Anna Rothschild Hamberg, a letter in her daughter Alice’s file from when she was applying for naturalization in 1941 includes the sentence: “The applicant came to Palestine together with her parents and on the ppt [passport] of her father, whose whereabouts she does not know.” Alice was nineteen at that time, and her family had been in Palestine since 1934. Where could Julius have gone? Or is the writer of the letter referring to her father’s passport and its whereabouts? I think that seems more likely, but the sentence is certainly poorly drafted.

Letter in Alice Hamberg’s Palestinian immigration file, 1941, found at https://www.archives.gov.il/

On IGRA I found the marriage record of Alice Hamberg to Fritz Shalom Mayer on February 10, 1947, in Tel Aviv, Israel. Fritz was 35 at the time, Alice was 24. Fritz was the son of Gerson Leo and Alza Sara Mayer, according to the marriage record.

Alice Hamberg and Fritz Shalom Mayer marriage record, found at https://genealogy.org.il/AID/

At this point I have not found any further records for Anna, Julius, or any of their children. Perhaps a descendant will find me and fill in the gaps.

This brings me to the end (for now) of my attempt to learn about the children of Meier Rothschild and Bertha Lorge. There is so much I still don’t know. What I do know is that all five of their children and all of their grandchildren survived the Holocaust, except Berthold’s ex-wife Sarah, who died in a sanatorium in Germany.

Berthold himself ended up in South Africa where he died in 1964, and his daughter Adelheid survived the concentration camp at Celle/Bergen Belsen and ended up in Israel after the war. His daughter Helene/Hana escaped to Palestine in 1937.

Theodor Rothschild and his wife Bettina ended up in Monaco, and their daughter Doris died in France. I don’t have further records for their daughter Ellen.

As for Gertrud Rothschild Neuhahn and her husband Gustav and daughter Ruth, I know they were in Tel Aviv for some time, but Ruth and her children ended up in Mexico later on.

Siegfried and his wife Gisela are buried in Israel, their son Zeev died in British Columbia, and their son Gunther Michael lived in the United States.

Finally, Anna Rothschild Hamberg and her husband and children immigrated to what was then Palestine in 1934.

So Meier and Bertha’s children and grandchildren were not killed by the Nazis, but they ended up spread to all corners of the earth: Israel, France, Monaco, Mexico, Canada, South Africa, and the United States. They may have survived the Holocaust, but their family was torn apart forever. They also were therefore all victims of the Holocaust.

With this final chapter in story of the children of Gelle Blumenfeld and Simon Rothschild, I have also closed the chapter on Gelle’s father Moses, the first of the six children of my four-times great-grandparents Abraham Blumenfeld and Geitel Katz. I started this particular chapter of the Blumenfeld family over four years ago, and now I can finally move on to the second child of Abraham and Geitel, their daughter Sprintz.

 

Meier Rothschild’s Son Berthold And An Important Lesson about AI

Posted on by
15

Although I had a fairly easy time locating the names, birth dates, marriages, and children of the five children of Meier Rothschild and Bertha Lorge and I knew that all five lived beyond World War II, I have had a much harder time finding information about how they survived the Holocaust—did they leave in time or did they get sent to the camps? And where did they go after the war?

Each of those five children presented some research challenges because it appears that none of them ended up in the same place and almost all ended up somewhere other than the United States. So the records are harder to locate—if they exist at all. But I will do my best to trace their histories during the 1930s and thereafter.

Starting with the oldest child, Berthold Rothschild, his wife Sarah Adler, and their daughter Adelheid, one fact I was able to establish was that Sarah died on May 15, 1937, when she was only 43. The death record says she died in Herborn, which is a small town about 60 miles from Frankfurt, where the death record states she was living. So why was she in Herborn and not Frankfurt where Berthold lived? What caused her death? Was it related to the persecution of Jews by the Nazis? I didn’t know.

Sarah Rotschild, Maiden Name Adler, Gender weiblich (Female), Death Age 43, Birth Date Abt 1894, Death Date 15 Mai 1937 (15 May 1937), Death Place Herborn, Hessen (Hesse), Deutschland (Germany), Civil Registration Office Herborn, Certificate Number 74, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 4139; Laufende Nummer: 911, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

I thought that perhaps there was more information in the parts of the death record that I could not read and asked in the GerSIG group on Facebook for help. Ralf, a member there, provided me with this translation:

The management of the state sanatorium has announced that Sara Rothschild, née Adler, without occupation, 43 years old, resident of Frankfurt am Main, born in Rüsselsheim, district of Gross-Gerau, divorced, died in the state sanatorium in Herborn on the afternoon of the fifteenth of May 1937 at five and a half o’clock.

I added the emphasis to two parts here. First, Sarah’s marital status was reported as divorced. I went back to the marriage record for Berthold and Sarah and now saw there was a marginal comment that in fact says that they were divorced as of August 22, 1927.

From the marriage record of Berthold Rothschild and Sarah Adler, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903
Source Information
Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Then I looked a little further and learned that there was (and is) a psychiatric hospital in Herborn known then as Landesheil- und Pflegeanstalt Herborn (State Healing and Nursing Institution Herborn).  I was disgusted when I learned that this hospital was a place used by the Nazis for forced sterilization; 561 women and 623 men were forcibly sterilized, many after a diagnoses of “feeblemindedness.”  Patients slept on straw sacks instead of mattresses. Later, after Sarah’s death, Jewish patients were deported from the hospital to the concentration camps. I don’t know what circumstances caused Sarah to be sent to Herborn, but I imagine that the conditions there and the Nazi control of the facility were factors in her early death at 43.

As for her ex-husband Berthold, I have not been able yet to locate his whereabouts before 1943. As seen below, I know that in 1943 he was living in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, and in 1957 he traveled from Port Elizabeth, South Africa, to England, reporting that he was a photographer. The passenger manifest indicates that he planned to stay in England permanently.1

But he died on May 17, 1964, in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, not in England. The death certificate reported that he was a photographer, a widower, and wanted to be buried in Jerusalem, Israel. Unfortunately, I have not found any further information yet. I don’t know when he left Germany, when he ended up in South Africa, or anything else about his life between his divorce in 1934 and his travels in 1959 and then his death in 1964.

Berthold Rothschild death certificate, “South Africa, Civil Death Registration, 1953-1967”, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:6Z3Z-F3SN : Wed Jan 15 15:31:44 UTC 2025), Entry for Berthold Rothschild, 17 May 1964.

As for Berthold and Sarah’s daughter Adelheid, I also only have random pieces of information about her life.  I have inferred that she was sent to Westerbork sometime during the Nazi era—that is, the detention camp outside of Amsterdam where Jews were sent before being transported to the death camps. A record on the WieWasWie site includes the marriage certificate of Adelheid Rothschild and Manfred Samson. They were married on November 22, 1943, in the Westerbork camp.

Marriage record for Adelheid Rothschild and Manfred Samson, found at https://www.wiewaswie.nl/nl/detail/111087321

I asked ChatGPT, having been told that AI can be helpful on translations, to transcribe and translate this marriage record. And this is a warning to anyone else who relies on ChatGPT for this type of inquiry. It made several errors. This was the first translation it produced.

Record No. 116. On Thursday, 23 December 1943, before me, Registrar of Civil Status of the municipality of Westerbork, appeared for the purpose of entering into marriage:

Manfred Samson, aged  29, merchant, born in Leipzig, Germany, residing in Westerbork, son of Sami Samson and Berta Samson, both residing in Bielefeld.

Adelheid Rothschild, aged 29, without occupation, born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, residing in Westerbork, daughter of Siegfried Rothschild, merchant, residing in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, and Paula Rothschild, without occupation, residing in Baden.

After the required announcements and with no impediment having appeared, they declared that they accepted one another as husband and wife.

I knew that the information in bold could not be correct. On the WieWasWie page itself, it had different information based on the same record. After several inquiries about this to ChatGPT, it admitted it had read the handwriting incorrectly and made the changes. The translation now reads:

Manfred Samson, aged  19, merchant, born in Leipzig, Germany, residing in Westerbork, son of Josef Samson and Zerlina Hoelzer, both residing in Bielefeld.

Adelheid Rothschild, aged 22, without occupation, born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, residing in Westerbork, daughter of Siegfried Rothschild, merchant, residing in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, and Sarah Adler, deceased.

Thus, a word of caution to those relying on ChatGPT or any other AI tool for transcribing records: DO NOT TRUST THEIR WORK!!!

But one thing that I did learn from the translation is that Berthold was already in South Africa in 1943 when his daughter Adelheid was married in Westerbork. Why had she gone to the Netherlands instead of to South Africa with her father? I wish I knew.

Manfred Samson was born on December 2, 1923, in Leipzig and was a student of agriculture and horticulture.2 A record in the Arolsen Archives indicates that Manfred left Leipzig for Holland on November 28, 1938. He was sent to Westerbork on November 7, 1942.3

Manfred Samson registration as Jew in Leipzig, Arolsen Archives, 7 Archival records of microforms (new material / document acquisition) / 7.5 Document acquisition in Germany / 7.5.4 Leipzig, Archiv der Israelitische Religionsgemeinde /Mitgliederkartei, Reference Code
754003

Other Arolsen Archives records, one for Manfred and one for Adelheid, both contain the notation “BB 11.1.44,” I wondered whether that meant that Adelheid and Samson were deported to Bergen Belsen on January 11, 1944.

Manfred Samson, Arolsen Archives, 1 Incarceration Documents / 1.2 Miscellaneous / 1.2.4 Various Organizations /Documents with names from SALOMONS, Eva, Reference Code
01020402 220

Adelheid Samson Arolsen Archives, 1 Incarceration Documents / 1.2 Miscellaneous / 1.2.4 Various Organizations /Documents with names from ROSIANSKI, Jozef, Reference Code
01020402 217

Fortunately both Adelheid and Manfred survived the camps. They are both listed on several documents created after the war by the Joint Distribution Committee that identify Jews who were liberated from the Celle/Frankfurt an der Oder camp.4

I had never heard of this camp before but learned that it was located eleven miles north of Bergen-Belsen, so that reinforces my assumption that BB stood for Bergen Belsen and that Celle was just another way of referring to Bergen-Belsen or a satellite camp nearby.

For a long time I could find no clue as to where Manfred and Adelheid went after being liberated from the camp. Then I saw the reverse of one of the Arolsen Archives documents and noticed this:

Manfred Samson, Arolsen Archives, 7 Archival records of microforms (new material / document acquisition) / 7.5 Document acquisition in Germany / 7.5.4 Leipzig, Archiv der Israelitische Religionsgemeinde /Mitgliederkartei, Reference Code 754003

From this document it appears that Manfred (and perhaps Adelheid) ended up in a kibbutz in Israel. But I haven’t found any other records for them on either the IGRA website or the Israel State Archives website. Kibbutz Schluchoth was the first kibbutz created after the formation of the State of Israel, according to their website, and was founded primarily by Holocaust survivors from Germany and Austria. I sent them an email asking if they had information about Manfred and Adelheid Samson, but have not received a response.

It took hours of work to string together this information about Berthold and his family, and I wish I knew more. But perhaps the biggest lesson I learned from this research is NOT to rely on ChatGPT to transcribe and translate documents accurately.

  1. Berthold Rothschild, passenger manifest, The National Archives in Washington, DC; London, England, UK; Board of Trade: Commercial and Statistical Department and Successors: Inwards Passenger Lists; Class: Bt26; Piece: 1382; Item: 67, Month: Jun, Ancestry.com. UK and Ireland, Incoming Passenger Lists, 1878-1960 ↩
  2.  Arolsen Archives; Bad Arolsen, Germany; Record Group 1 Incarceration Documents; Reference: 1.2.4.2, Ancestry.com. Germany, Incarceration Documents, 1933-1945; https://www.wiewaswie.nl/nl/detail/111087321&#160;↩
  3. Arolsen Archives, 1 Incarceration Documents / 1.2 Miscellaneous / 1.2.4 Various Organizations /Documents with names from SALOMONS, Eva, Reference Code
    01020402 220 ↩
  4. E.g., Adelheid Samson, Manfred Samson, Arolsen Archives; Bad Arolsen, Germany; Registration of Liberated Former Persecutees at Various Locations (F18 lists); Reference: DE ITS 3.1.1.3 DE, Reference Number: 008804350, Ancestry.com. Registration of Liberated Former Persecutees, 1945-1950 ↩

Meier Rothschild, Part I: Marriage and Children and Grandchildren

Posted on by
8

Returning to the Blumenfeld saga, I am now up to the youngest child of Gelle Blumenfeld and Simon Rothschild, their son Meier, born in Zimmersrode, Germany, on May 9, 1861.

Meier Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 32

On January 6, 1889, Meier married Bertha Lorge, the daughter of Salomon Lorge and Hannchen Eichenberg in Harmuthsachsen, Germany, where Bertha was born on April 14, 1863.

Meier Rothschild and Bertha Lorge marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 923, Year Range: 1889, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Meier and Bertha had five children, all of whom not only survived to adulthood but survived the Holocaust, just as their first cousins, the children of Meier’s sister Sarah, also survived the Holocaust. But unlike Sarah’s children, Meier’s did not all end up in the United States but spread throughout the world.

Unfortunately, the birth records for those children are not yet available online. I found their birth dates on their marriage records and/or elsewhere.

Their first child was Berthold; he was born on December 5, 1889, in Hoof, Germany. He married Sarah Adler on December 30, 1919, in Frankfurt. She was the daughter of Leo Adler and Adelheid Stern and was born on June 29, 1893, in Russelsheim, Germany.

Berthold Rothschild and Sarah Adler marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903, Year Range: 1919, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Berthold and Sarah had one child, a daughter Adelheid Gertrud Rothschild, born on December 10, 1920.1

Meier and Bertha’s second child was another son, Theodor; he was born March 16, 1891, also in Hoof. He married Bettina Schiff on July 17, 1918, in Kassel, Germany. Bettina was born on February 25, 1893, in Gladenbach, Germany, to Isaak Schiff and Dora Strauss.

Theodor Rothschild and Bettina Schiff marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 910, Year Range: 1916-1918, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Theodor and Bettina had two children, a daughter named Doris, born in Kassel on February 6, 1920,2 and a daughter Ellen, born March 7, 1929, in Kassel.3

Meier and Bertha’s third child was a daughter, Gertrud Louise, born in Hoof on March 29, 1893. She married Gustav Neuhahn in Hoof on May 16, 1919. Gustav was the son of Selig Neuhahn and Bertha Marcussohn, and he was born on May 11, 1886, in Grebenstein, Germany. Gustav had been injured fighting for Germany during World War I.4

Gertrud Rothschild and Gustav Neuhahn marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Signatur: 5258, Year Range: 1919, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Gertrud and Gustav had one child, a daughter Ruth born on March 18, 1920, in Kassel.5

A fourth child Siegfried Friedrich was born to Meier and Bertha in Hoof on September 11, 1895. He married Gisela Katz on June 11, 1924, in Nienburg, Germany. Gisela was the daughter of Salli Katz and Rosa Arenberg and was born in Nienburg  on August 12, 1902.

Siegfried F Rothschild and Gisela Katz marriage record, Stadt- und Kreisarchiv Nienburg; Nienburg, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Heiratsregister; Signatur: Nbg H; Laufendenummer: 51, Year Range: 1924, Ancestry.com. Nienburg, Germany, Marriages, 1874-1937

Siegfried and Gisela had two children. I don’t have birth records for their two sons, Zeev and Gunther Michael, but established their relationship and birth dates from other records. What I have for Zeev is a death certificate that names his parents as Frederick Rotem (Rotem is presumed to be the surname Zeev adopted to replace Rothschild) and Gisela Katz. His death record indicates that he was born April 22, 1927, in Wesermunde (now Bremerhaven), Germany.6

I established Gunther Michael’s birth and relationship to Siegfried and Gisela through the Social Security Applications and Claims Index on Ancestry where he lists his parents as Sigfried F Rothschild and Gisela Katz and his birth date as March 11, 1931, in “Werezmunde, Germany.”7

The last child born to Meier Rothschild and Bertha Lorge was their daughter Anna. She was born on March 10, 1900, in Hoof. She married my third cousin, twice removed, Julius Hamberg, the son of Salomon Hamberg and Helena Blum, on February 26, 1921, in Hoof. Julius was the great-grandson of Samuel Hamberg, whose brother Moses Hamberg was my 3x-great-grandfather. Julius was born in Volksmarsen, Germany, on May 11, 1887.

Anna Rothschild and Julius Hamberg marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Signatur: 5260, Year Range: 1921, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Anna and Julius had three children, all born in Volksmarsen in the 1920s: Alice, Hans Leo Eliezer, and Ernst. Alice was born on March 2, 1922, Hans Leo on April 19, 1923, and Ernst on July 19, 1926.8

So as of 1931, Meier Rothschild and Bertha Lorge had ten grandchildren. Unfortunately, Meier did not live to see the birth of the last grandchild, Gunther Michael, because Meier died on August 4, 1930, in Grebenstein, Germany.9

His widow Bertha died less than a year later on March 19, 1931, in Kassel, just eight days after the birth of Gunther Michael Rothschild, the last grandchild.

Berta Rothschild, Maiden Name Lorge, Gender weiblich (Female), Death Age 67, Birth Date 14 Apr 1863, Death Date 19 Mär 1931 (19 Mar 1931), Death Place Kassel, Hessen (Hesse), Deutschland (Germany), Civil Registration Office Kassel I, Certificate Number 280, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Signatur: 5627; Laufende Nummer: 910, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

Meier and Bertha were thus spared from living through the Nazi era, but miraculously all of their children survived it.

To be continued.

  1. Marriage record of Adelheid Rothschild and Manfred Samson, found at
    https://www.wiewaswie.nl/personen-zoeken/zoeken/document/srcid/111087321&#160;↩
  2.  Doris Sara Rothschild, Birth Date 06 Feb 1920 (6 Feb 1920), Birth Place Kassel
    Last Residence Kassel, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA); Washington, DC; Name Index of Jews Whose German Nationality Was Annulled by the Nazi Regime (Berlin Documents Center); Record Group: 242, National Archives Collection of Foreign Records Seized, 1675 – 1958; Record Group ARC ID: 569; Publication Number: T355; Roll: 7, Mosbacher, Eduard – Schafranek, Bruno, Ancestry.com. Germany, Index of Jews Whose German Nationality was Annulled by Nazi Regime, 1935-1944 ↩
  3.  Ellen Gerda Sara Rothschild, Birth Date 07 Mär 1929 (7 Mar 1929), Birth Place Kassel, Last Residence Kassel, National Archives and Records Administration (NARA); Washington, DC; Name Index of Jews Whose German Nationality Was Annulled by the Nazi Regime (Berlin Documents Center); Record Group: 242, National Archives Collection of Foreign Records Seized, 1675 – 1958; Record Group ARC ID: 569; Publication Number: T355; Roll: 7, Mosbacher, Eduard – Schafranek, Bruno, Ancestry.com. Germany, Index of Jews Whose German Nationality was Annulled by Nazi Regime, 1935-1944 ↩
  4. Gustav Neuhahn, Residence Year 1914, Residence Country Deutschland (Germany), List Date 14 Mai 1918 (14 May 1918), List Number 1894, Volume 1918_XVI, Ancestry.com. Germany, World War I Casualty Lists, 1914-1919 ↩
  5.  Ruth Neumann, Nationality Israeli, Arrival Age 40, Birth Date 18 Mar 1920, Birth Place Kassel, Germany, Record Type Arrival, Arrival Date 2 May 1960, Arrival Place Miami, Florida, USA, Flight Number 150, Airline Guest Aerovias Mexico, The National Archives in Washington, DC; Washington, DC, USA; Series Title: Passenger and Crew Manifests of Airplanes Arriving At Miami, Florida.; NAI Number: A3995; Record Group Title: Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, 1787-2004; Record Group Number: 85, Ancestry.com. Florida, U.S., Arriving and Departing Passenger and Crew Lists, 1898-1963 ↩
  6. Zeev Rotem death certificate, Birth Circa 1927, Death Nov 20 1973, Vancouver, British Columbia, Age at death 46, Registration # 1973-09-016282, BCA microfilm # B13328, GSU microfilm # 2050141, Canada, British Columbia death records, found at https://www.myheritage.com/research/record-20459-596398/zeev-rotem-in-canada-british-columbia-deaths?s=OYYV67OZ5BWBQ5GHZXDK3ZTZXZLZYQY  It is unlikely Zeev Rotem was his birth name, but since the death certificate includes his parents’ names, I feel confident that this was their son. ↩
  7. Michael Rothschild, [Gunther Michael Rothschild], [G Rothschild], Gender Male
    Race White, Birth Date 11 Mar 1931, Birth Place Werezmunde, Federal Republic of Germany, Death Date 10 Oct 2007, Father Sigfried F Rothschild, Mother Giseca Katz
    SSN 078284849, Notes Aug 1952: Name Listed As Michael Rothschild; Nov 1952: Name Listed As Gunther Michael Rothschild; 21 Jun 2005: Name Listed As G Michael Rothschild; 22 Dec 2007: Name Listed As G M Rothschild, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007 ↩
  8. Their birth dates and places were all found on their Palestine immigration papers found at the Israel State Archives at https://www.archives.gov.il/&#160;↩
  9. Meier Rothschild, burial record, found at the Jewish Online Worldwide Burial Registry on JewishGen.org at https://www.jewishgen.org/databases/cemetery/jowbr.php?rec=J_GERMANY_0045635   I was unable to locate the death record for Meier in the Ancestry database for Hesse deaths or on JewishGen or elsewhere. ↩

Update on Lotte Nathan: Thanks to the Genealogy Village

Posted on by
8

Back in late October 2025, I wrote in two blog posts about my attempts to learn more about Bertha Katzenstein, my grandmother’s third cousin. Bertha, as I wrote then, was born in New York on April 23, 1892, and her mother (also named Bertha) died shortly thereafter. Bertha and her father and stepmother moved to Europe, and in 1913, Bertha married Hermann Nathan in Harburg, Germany. They divorced six years later in 1919. For seven years that was all I knew about Bertha.

Then last fall I was contacted by Ines Weber, who had located a second marriage for Bertha. On January 14, 1921, Bertha married Friedrich “Fritz” Wilhelm Langebartels in Hamburg, Germany. They left Germany for the US in 1926, and in 1927 Bertha applied for naturalization.1

Bertha Katzenstein Nathan marriage to Friedrich Wilhelm Langebartels, Landesarchiv Berlin; Berlin, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Heiratsregister, Register Year or Type: 1921 (Erstregister), Ancestry.com. Berlin, Germany, Marriages, 1874-1940

On her naturalization form, I learned that Bertha had had a daughter Lotte during her marriage to Hermann Nathan and that that daughter was still living in Germany. Lotte was born on May 1, 1915.

Bertha Katzenstein Langebartels Weber petition for naturalization, The National Archives and Records Administration; Washington, D.C.; Petitions For Naturalization From the U.s. District Court For the Southern District of New York, 1897-1944; Series: M1972; Roll: 542
Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Naturalization Records, 1882-1944

As I wrote back on October 22, I had and still have had no luck locating Bertha after that 1927 petition for naturalization. But I had more luck locating her daughter Lotte. As I wrote on October 29, 2025, Lotte Nathan married Emil Fischbein, and on September 8, 1936, they left Germany and immigrated to Palestine. Their son Hanan was born on August 11, 1937, in Haifa. I learned from Hanan’s grandson that Lotte left Emil and Hanan when Hanan was a child and went to England with an English soldier. Other records showed that Lotte married Ronald Francis George Buchanan and died in England in 1971.

That was all I knew when I posted Lotte’s story on October 29, 2025. Then a woman named Jutta posted a comment in German on that post on December 7, 2025, saying that her mother was a half-sister to Lotte Nathan. She explained that Hermann Nathan had remarried after he and Bertha Katzenstein divorced in 1919 and that he had two daughters with his second wife, one of whom was Jutta’s mother.

Jutta and I have now emailed numerous times since then, and she has even shared some photographs of Lotte. Here are two photographs:

Lotte’s half sister, her stepmother, Lotte, and her father Hermann Nathan
Courtesy of the family

 

Lotte Nathan (left) and her two half-sisters. Courtesy of the family

Jutta also knew that Lotte had ended up in England where she died in 1971 from multiple sclerosis. Teresa of the Writing My Past blog encouraged me to send away for Lotte’s death certificate, which I did. It confirmed what Jutta said and what I’d seen on other trees: that Lotte Buchanan was born Lotte Nathan on May 1, 1915, in Germany, that she died on November 21, 1971, in Aspley, Nottingham, England. Her cause of death was respiratory failure and “disseminated sclerosis,” which Google tells me is another name for MS.2

From Jutta I learned that her grandfather, Lotte’s father, Hermann Nathan committed suicide in early 1945 rather than be sent by the Nazis to the concentration camps. His second wife and his daughters were Christian so did not feel as endangered by the Nazis, but Jutta said that her grandmother stood by Hermann until his death.

Although I still haven’t found any further evidence as to what happened to Bertha Katzenstein, Lotte’s mother, I feel I do have some closure on Lotte herself, thanks to the genealogy village: Ines, Teresa, Gil, and now Jutta.

 

  1. As that blog post discussed, because she had married a foreign national before 1922, she had forfeited her birthright citizenship. ↩
  2. Unfortunately, I forgot to scan the death certificate before leaving for Florida, so it is home in Massachusetts. I will add it here when I get back home. ↩

Sara and Moses Adler’s Younger Children: The Chicago Five

Posted on by
9

As of 1933 when Hitler came to power in Germany, five of Sara Rothschild and Moses Adler’s surviving children were still living in Germany: Caroline (Grete), Malchen, Emmi, David Theodore, and Betty. Their oldest three children—Louis, Sigmund, and Julius—had long ago emigrated to the United States. Fortunately, all five of those still in Germany were able to leave in time.

Interestingly, Betti, the youngest of those still in Germany, was the first to leave. She, her husband Marx Regenstein, and their two children Lucie and Erich sailed from Cherbourg, France, on April 29, 1936, and arrived in New York on May 6, 1936. Notice that all the first names were changed on the manifest. Marx became Max, Betti became Jenny, and Lucie was no longer Johanna, Erich no longer Siegfried. Max listed his occupation as a merchant on the ship manifest. They listed their destination as Leavenworth, Kansas, identifying Betti/Jenny’s brother Louis Adler as the person they were going to.

Regenstein family passenger manifest, The National Archives in Washington, DC; Washington, DC, USA; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at New York, New York, 1897-1957; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715; RG Title: Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, 1787-2004; RG: 85, Ship or Roll Number: Berengaria, Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957

Regenstein family passenger manifest p 2

I found it heartwarming to learn that Louis, who had left his family behind in 1900 when he was fifteen, was still in touch with his siblings back home. Just as he had taken in his brother Julius after Julius lost his first wife, Louis once again seemed to take on the role of assisting a sibling. In January 1938, when Betty declared her intention to become a US citizen, she and her family were still living in Leavenworth, Kansas.

Betti Jenny Regenstein Declaration of Intention, National Archives at Chicago; Chicago, Illinois; ARC Title: Petitions For Naturalization, 1906-1991; NAI Number: M1285; Record Group Title: Records of District Courts of the United States, 1685-2009; Record Group Number: Rg 21, Petitions, V· 1243-1245, No· 309401-309950, 1944, Ancestry.com. Illinois, U.S., Federal Naturalization Records, 1856-1991

But two years later in 1940, Betti (now listed as Jennie), Marx (now Max), and their children Lucie and Eric were living in Covert, Michigan, where Max was working as a farmer. I don’t know what drew them to that location. In 1935 they’d been living in Chicago, according to the census report. At first I thought it was Betti/Jenny’s brother Sigmund who had drawn them to Michigan since at one point he had been living in Ishpeming, Michigan, but that is very distant from Covert, and besides, by 1940 Sigmund was living in Connecticut.

Regenstein family, 1940 US census, Year: 1940; Census Place: Covert, Van Buren, Michigan; Roll: m-t0627-01822; Page: 3A; Enumeration District: 80-13, Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census

The next Adler siblings to leave Germany were Caroline Grete and Malchen. They sailed together from Cherbourg on April 14, 1937, with Malchen (Mally)’s husband Fritz Apolant and Caroline (Karoline) Grete’s son Kurt. Caroline’s husband Albert Mandelstein had died on October 20, 1934, in Grebenstein; he was 79.1 Fritz listed his occupation as a manufacturer’s agent, and Kurt Mandelstein, who was twenty, listed his as a merchant. Like Betti before them, they all listed Leavenworth, Kansas, as their destination, and Louis Adler as the person to whom they were going.

Mandelstein and Apolant passenger manifest, The National Archives in Washington, DC; Washington, DC, USA; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at New York, New York, 1897-1957; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715; RG Title: Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, 1787-2004; RG: 85, Ship or Roll Number: Queen Mary, Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957

I have to confess that until I saw this ship manifest, I’d had no idea that Sara Rothschild and Moses Adler had a daughter named Caroline Grete. Somehow in my initial search for their children, Caroline had eluded me. It was only when I saw her listed on that ship manifest that I realized I’d missed a child and went back and found her records.

I don’t know whether or not Caroline or Malchen ever actually went to or lived in Leavenworth, Kansas. When Caroline filed her declaration of intention on October 20, 1937, just six months after arriving in New York on April 19, 1937, she and her son Kurt were living in Chicago, Illinois.

Similarly, when Malchen’s husband Fritz Apolant filed his declaration of intention on October 14, 1937, they were living in Chicago.

Fritz David Apolant declaration of intention, National Archives at Chicago; Chicago, Illinois; ARC Title: Petitions For Naturalization, 1906-1991; NAI Number: M1285; Record Group Title: Records of District Courts of the United States, 1685-2009; Record Group Number: Rg 21
Petitions, V· 1079-1081, No· 268890-269400, 1942, Ancestry.com. Illinois, U.S., Federal Naturalization Records, 1856-1991

I don’t know what drew them to Chicago, but I did notice that one of the witnesses on Malchen’s naturalization papers was a man named Benjamin “Nandelstein.” Perhaps that was really Mandelstein, as the signature appears to be, and this was a relative of her sister Caroline’s deceased husband Albert Mandelstein.

Affidavit of Witnesses for Malchen Apolant naturalization, National Archives at Chicago; Chicago, Illinois; ARC Title: Petitions For Naturalization, 1906-1991; NAI Number: M1285; Record Group Title: Records of District Courts of the United States, 1685-2009; Record Group Number: Rg 21, Petitions, V· 1192-1195, No· 297765-298328, 1943, Ancestry.com. Illinois, U.S., Federal Naturalization Records, 1856-1991

In any event, in 1940, Fritz, Malchen (Mally), Caroline (Grete now), and Kurt were all living together in Chicago, and all four were working. Fritz was an egg salesman, Mally a nurse for a private patient, Grete a cook in a private home, and Kurt a clerk in a retail grocery store.

Apolant and Mandelstein on 1940 US census, Year: 1940; Census Place: Chicago, Cook, Illinois; Roll: m-t0627-00929; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 103-268, Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census

The next sibling to arrive in the US was Emmi Adler Speier. Like her older sister Caroline Grete, Emmi was a widow when she immigrated to the US. Her husband Robert Speier had died on May 15, 1937, in Guxhagen, Germany; he was only 47 when he died.2 Emmi and her two children, Ilse/Elsie and Senta, and her sister-in-law Lea Speier all sailed from Easthampton, England, on June 29, 1938. They arrived in New York on July 4, 1938, an auspicious date to arrive in the US. Like her other sisters, Emmi listed her brother Louis as the person she was going to and Leavenworth, Kansas, as her destination. She listed her brother T. [Theodore] Adler as the person she left behind.

Speier family passenger manifest, The National Archives in Washington, DC; Washington, DC, USA; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at New York, New York, 1897-1957; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715; RG Title: Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, 1787-2004; RG: 85, Ship or Roll Number: Queen Mary, Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957

But Emmi and her children also did not end up in Leavenworth for long, if at all. By November 19, 1938, she also was living in Chicago, as were her two daughters.

Emmi Adler Speier declaration of intention, National Archives at Chicago; Chicago, Illinois; ARC Title: Petitions For Naturalization, 1906-1991; NAI Number: M1285; Record Group Title: Records of District Courts of the United States, 1685-2009; Record Group Number: Rg 21
Petitions, V· 1180-1183, No· 295150-295735, 1943, Ancestry.com. Illinois, U.S., Federal Naturalization Records, 1856-1991

In 1940, Emmi was living in Chicago with Ilse and Senta, along with three lodgers. Ilse was working as a dressmaker.3

Finally, the last sibling to arrive was the remaining son of Sara Rothschild and Moses Adler, their son David Theodore Adler. He sailed without his wife Emma on April 30, 1939, arriving in New York on May 8, 1939. He listed his wife Emma as the person he had left behind and his brother Louis Adler in Leavenworth, Texas, as the person he was heading to; his occupation was a dealer.4 David did in fact go to Leavenworth, where on September 29, 1939, he filed his declaration of intention. He listed his occupation as a farmer.

David Theodore Adler declaration of intention, National Archives at Chicago; Chicago, Illinois; ARC Title: Petitions For Naturalization, 1906-1991; NAI Number: M1285; Record Group Title: Records of District Courts of the United States, 1685-2009; Record Group Number: Rg 21
Petitions For Naturalization, V· 1224, No· 305251-305500, Ca· 1943-1944, Ancestry.com. Illinois, U.S., Federal Naturalization Records, 1856-1991

But in 1940, like his other siblings Grete (Caroline), Malchen, Emmi, and Betty, David Theodore (now just using Theodore) was living in Chicago, working as a laborer doing odd jobs.5

All five of the younger children of Sara Rothschild and Moses Adler were reunited in one city. What would their lives in America bring for them and their children?

To be continued.

 

  1. Albert Mandelstein, Gender männlich (Male), Death Age 79, Birth Date abt 1855
    Death Date 20 Okt 1934 (20 Oct 1934), Death Place Grebenstein, Hessen (Hesse), Deutschland​​​ (Germany), Civil Registration Office Grebenstein, Spouse Grete
    Certificate Number 27, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Signatur: 3080; Laufende Nummer: 909, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958 ↩
  2. Robert Speier, Death Age 48[sic], Birth Date 15 Sept 1889, Death Date 15 Mai 1937 (15 May 1937), Death Place Guxhagen, Hessen (Hesse), Deutschland (Germany, Civil Registration Office Guxhagen, Certificate Number 12, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 2869; Laufende Nummer: 920, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958 ↩
  3. Emmi Speier, 1940 US census, Year: 1940; Census Place: Chicago, Cook, Illinois; Roll: m-t0627-00929; Page: 4A; Enumeration District: 103-267, Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census ↩
  4. David Adler, passenger manifest, The National Archives in Washington, DC; Washington, DC, USA; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at New York, New York, 1897-1957; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715; RG Title: Records of the Immigration and Naturalization Service, 1787-2004; RG: 85, Ship or Roll Number: New York, Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957 ↩
  5. Theodore Adler, 1940 US census, Year: 1940; Census Place: Chicago, Cook, Illinois; Roll: m-t0627-00930; Page: 7A; Enumeration District: 103-303, Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census ↩

Sara and Moses’ Five Younger Children Back in Germany

Posted on by
2

[FYI—this post should have preceded the one posted yesterday. Sorry about that! I will blame being in Florida…]

We have seen that the oldest three children of Sara Rothschild and Moses Adler—Louis, Sigmund, and Julius—all came to the US around the turn of the century as teenagers. But what about their younger siblings? And their parents?

Back in Germany, Caroline Grete Rothschild, the second oldest daughter, married Albert Abraham Mandelstein on October 23, 1911, in Grebenstein. Albert was born in Grebenstein on June 2, 1855, to Berr Mandelstein and Sarchen Katzenstein. He was 56 years old when he married Caroline while she was only 22. (Albert was a widower.) Caroline and Albert had one child, a son Kurt Siegfried Mandelstein, born on July 15, 1916, in Kassel, Germany.1

Caroline Adler and Albert Mandelstein marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Signatur: 2997, Year Range: 1911, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

The next child to marry was the third oldest daughter Emmi. She married Robert Speier on August 26, 1919, in Grebenstein. Robert was born on September 15, 1889, in Guxhagen, Germany to Levi Speier and Mina Lange. Emmi and Robert had two children, Senta, born on September 7, 1920, and Elsie, born August 23, 1931.2

Emmi Adler and Robert Speier marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Signatur: 3005, Year Range: 1919, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Less than three months after Emmi’s wedding, her mother Sara Rothschild Adler died in Grebenstein on November 10, 1919, at the age of sixty.

Sara Rothschild Adler death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Signatur: 3065; Laufende Nummer: 909, Year Range: 1919, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

The next child to marry was the oldest daughter Malchen. She married Fritz David Apolant on December 24, 1920, in Grebenstein. Fritz was born on December 23, 1880, in Stettin, Germany (now a city in Poland). I am not certain of his parents’ names; one unsourced tree on Ancestry records their names as Samuel and Minna Apolant, but I don’t know if that is accurate. Malchen and Fritz did not have any children.

Malchen Adler and Fritz David Apolant marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Signatur: 3006, Year Range: 1920, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

David Theodore Adler, the eighth of Sara and Moses’ children, married Emma Suss, on February 7, 1921, in Watzenborn-Steinberg, Germany. Emma was the daughter of Joseph and Johanna Suss and was born on September 19, 1894, in Watzenborn. Emma and David Theodore (known later primarily as Theodore) had two children, Kurt, born October 25, 1922, and Lydia, born August 15, 1927, both in Watzenborn.3

David Theodore Adler and Emma Suss marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 905; Laufende Nummer: 1407, Year Range: 1915-1925, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Finally, the last child to marry was Bettt Adler. She married Marx Regenstein on June 24, 1921, just a few months after her brother David Theodore was married. Marx was born September 5, 1895, in Leeheim, Germany, to Joseph Regenstein and Johannette Wolf.4 Bettt and Marx had two children, Lucie Johanna, born March 31, 1923, and Eric, born March 3, 1926, both in Grebenstein, Germany.5

Betti Adler and Marx Regenstein marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Signatur: 3007, Year Range: 1921, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Moses Adler died in Grebenstein on June 21, 1927.5 He was 69. He had outlived his wife Sara Rothschild and two of his ten children.  By 1927, all eight of his surviving children were married (three in the US, five in Germany) and almost all of his grandchildren were born.

Moses Adler died before Hitler came to power and disrupted all of their lives. He and Sara didn’t live to know that their five children still in Germany would escape from Nazi Germany and join their brothers in the United States as Americans. They didn’t know that all of their children and almost all of their grandchildren would survive the Holocaust.

Those stories continue in the next post.

  1. Kurt Ste Mandelstein, Gender Male, Race White, Birth Date 15 Jul 1916, Birth Place Federal Republic of Germany, Death Date 16 Sep 1988, Father Albert Mandelstein, Mother Greta Adler, SSN 360014041, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007; Caroline Grete Mandelstein, Declaration of Intention, National Archives at Chicago; Chicago, Illinois; ARC Title: Petitions For Naturalization, 1906-1991; NAI Number: M1285; Record Group Title: Records of District Courts of the United States, 1685-2009; Record Group Number: Rg 21, Petitions, V· 1079-1081, No· 268890-269400, 1942, Ancestry.com. Illinois, U.S., Federal Naturalization Records, 1856-1991 ↩
  2. Emmi Adler Speier, Petition for Naturalization, National Archives at Chicago; Chicago, Illinois; ARC Title: Petitions For Naturalization, 1906-1991; NAI Number: M1285; Record Group Title: Records of District Courts of the United States, 1685-2009; Record Group Number: Rg 21; Petitions, V· 1180-1183, No· 295150-295735, 1943, Ancestry.com. Illinois, U.S., Federal Naturalization Records, 1856-1991 ↩
  3. David Theodore Adler, Petition for Naturalization, National Archives at Chicago; Chicago, Illinois; ARC Title: Petitions For Naturalization, 1906-1991; NAI Number: M1285; Record Group Title: Records of District Courts of the United States, 1685-2009; Record Group Number: Rg 21, Petitions, V· 1223-1226, No· 305014-305575, 1944, Ancestry.com. Illinois, U.S., Federal Naturalization Records, 1856-1991 ↩
  4. Marx Regenstein birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 906; Laufende Nummer: 346, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901 ↩
  5. Moses Adler, Death Age 69, Birth Date abt 1858, Death Date 21 Jun 1927
    Death Place Grebenstein, Hessen (Hesse), Deutschland​​​ (Germany), Civil Registration Office Grebenstein, Certificate Number 31, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Signatur: 3073; Laufende Nummer: 909, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958 ↩ ↩

Sara Rothschild Adler, Part I: Ten Children in Seventeen Years

Posted on by
11

Having completed the story of Malchen Rothschild Rosenblatt, I will now move on to the tenth child of Gelle Blumenfeld and Simon Rothschild, their daughter Sara. Fortunately her family has happier stories than those of some of her siblings.

Sara Rothschild was born on either January 6, 1859, or January 3, 1860, in Waltersbrueck, Germany. Her marriage and death records indicate the January 3, 1860, date, but there was no record of her birth on that date in the archives for Waltersbrueck. The birth record below, however, appears to be for Sara (Sarchen) and shows a birth date of January 6, 1859. It’s difficult to read, but the baby’s name is Sarchen, and in very faint letters you can see that the father is Simon and the mother’s name is Gelle Blumenfeld of Momberg. You will need to click on the image and zoom in to see the writing.

Sara Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hessen, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 30, found at https://digitalisate-he.arcinsys.de/hhstaw/365/893/00030.jpg

Sara married Moses Adler on December 26, 1883, in Waltersbrueck. He was the son of Selig Adler and Amalie Winkler and was born in Desenberg, Germany, on April 25, 1858. (Notice the January 3, 1860 birthdate for Sara.)

Sara Rothschild and Moses Adler marriage record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 8409, Year Range: 1883, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Sara and Moses had ten children. Their first was Louis, born December 4, 1884, in Niedermeiser, Germany.

Louis Adler birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 909; Signatur: 7410, Year Range: 1884, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-190

Then came Siegmund, born March 10, 1886, in Niedermeiser.

Siegmund Adler birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 909; Signatur: 7412, Year Range: 1886, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

The third child was Joseph, born July 28, 1887, in Niedermeiser. Joseph proved to be a real challenge to track down later, as we will see.

Joseph Adler birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 909; Signatur: 7413, Year Range: 1887, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

After three sons, Sara and Moses next had a girl, Caroline (also known as Grete), born on August 13, 1889, in Niedermeiser.

Caroline Adler birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 909; Signatur: 7415, Year Range: 1889, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Sara and Moses’ second daughter Malchen was born on March 15, 1891, in Niedermeiser.

Malchen Adler birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 909; Signatur: 7417, Year Range: 1891, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Then came another daughter, Emmi, born in Niedermeiser on September 4, 1892.

Emmi Adler birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 909; Signatur: 7418, Year Range: 1892, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Their seventh child was Tekla, born November 23, 1893 in Niedermeiser. Tekla died when she was only twelve years old on June 17, 1906 in Grebenstein, Germany.

Tekla Adler birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 909; Signatur: 7419, Year Range: 1893, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Tekla Adler death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Signatur: 3052; Laufende Nummer: 909, Year Range: 1906, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

Another boy was born next. David (also known as Theodore) was born on July 2, 1895, in Niedermeiser.

David Adler birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 909; Signatur: 7422, Year Range: 1895, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Then came Betty (also known as Jenny), born on September 20, 1898, in Grebenstein, so the family must have relocated to Grebenstein sometime between July 1895 and September 1898.

Betti Adler birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Signatur: 2954, Year Range: 1898, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Sara and Moses’ last child was Adolph/Adolf Adler, and he died when he was nine months old in Grebenstein on February 25, 1902. I couldn’t locate a birth record, but I can infer from his death record that he was probably born in May, 1901. UPDATE: Richard Bloomfield found in the Arcinsys Archives of Hessen a database of headstone inscriptions from the cemetery in Grebenstein that included information from Adolph’s headstone indicating that he was born on May 11, 1901.

Arcinsys Archives of Hessen, HHStAW, 365, 378, p. 6, found at https://digitalisate-he.arcinsys.de/hhstaw/365/378/00006.jpg

Adolf Adler death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Signatur: 3048; Laufende Nummer: 909, Year Range: 1902, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

Of the ten children born to Sara Rothschild and Moses Adler, eight survived to adulthood: Louis, Siegmund, Joseph, Malchen, Caroline, Emmi, Tekla, David, and Betty Jenny. Miraculously, all eight survived the Holocaust, and all ended up in the United States. Some came long before Hitler came to power, some came after. But they all survived. I will tell all of their stories in the posts to come.

 

 

 

Lotte Nathan: Carrying and Passing on Family Trauma

Posted on by
15

Although I couldn’t find out what happened to Bertha Katzenstein Nathan Langebartels, I learned from her naturalization papers that Bertha had had a child with her first husband, Hermann Nathan, named Lotte. Lotte, according to the naturalization petition, was born on May 1, 1915, in Hamburg, Germany. She would have been only eleven years old when her mother and stepfather immigrated to the US in 1926, but she did not come with them. The naturalization petition stated that she “lives in Germany.” The petition also indicated that Friedrich and Bertha had last resided in Hamburg before coming to the United States. I hoped to find Lotte as another way of learning what happened to her mother.

Bertha Katzenstein Langebartels Weber petition for naturalization, The National Archives and Records Administration; Washington, D.C.; Petitions For Naturalization From the U.s. District Court For the Southern District of New York, 1897-1944; Series: M1972; Roll: 542
Description
Archive Roll Descriptions: (Roll 0542) Petition No· 124777-Petition No· 125042
Source Information
Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Naturalization Records, 1882-1944

My hunch is that Lotte stayed behind with her father Hermann Nathan, but I can’t be certain. But I do know that sometime during or before 1936 Lotte married Emil Fischbein because on September 8, 1936, they left Germany and immigrated to Palestine as a married couple.1 Emil was born in Duisburg, Germany, on September 15, 1912, but was of Polish nationality, according to his Palestine immigration documents; one tree on MyHeritage created by his great-grandson Gil reports that Emil’s parents were Isaak and Esther Fischbein, both born in what is now Poland. German law at that time provided that children born to non-German parents were not considered German.

Emil and Lotte’s Palestine immigration documents also include Lotte’s passport,2 which was issued as a Fremdenpass, or a passport issued by the German government to non-Germans living in Germany. Lotte was not eligible for a regular German passport—either because she had married a “foreigner” or because she was Jewish. Jews whose citizenship had been revoked also were granted Fremdenpasses, not regular German passports.

Lotte’s passport was issued on August 15, 1931, from Koeln (Cologne), which suggests that she was living in the German state of North Rhine Westphalia in 1931, not in Hamburg where she was born and where her mother and stepfather had been living before going to the US. It also appears that Lotte’s father Hermann Nathan was not living in North Rhine Westphalia; he was born in Wittingen3 and in 1939 was living in Hildesheim, both of which are located in the German state of Lower Saxony. Emil, however, was born in Duisburg, which is in North Rhine Westphalia, so perhaps that is where they connected with each other.

By October 15, 1940, when Lotte and Emil obtained Palestinian citizenship, they were living in Haifa and had a son, Hanan, who was born on August 11, 1937, in Haifa.4 Through MyHeritage, I located one of their descendants to learn more about Lotte and her family. Gil is Lotte’s great-grandson; his grandfather was Hanan, the baby born in Haifa in 1937. He told me that family lore is that Lotte left Emil and Hanan when Hanan was a child and went to England with an English soldier.

Some trees on Ancestry and MyHeritage indicate that she married Ronald Francis George Buchanan and died in England in 1971. There is a death record on Ancestry for  Lotte Emma B. Buchanan born on May 1, 1915, the day Lotte Nathan was born; the index indicated that she died in the fall of 1971 in Nottingham, England.5 Another record on Ancestry indicates that she died on November 21, 1971, and was cremated in Nottinghamshire on November 24, 1971.6

Lotte Nathan Fischbein Buchanan had a family history and personal history that was difficult. Her grandmother Bertha Metz died from complications of childbirth just two weeks after giving birth to Lotte’s mother Bertha Katzenstein in New York. Bertha Katzenstein was then taken by her father Adolf to Germany, away from her mother’s family.

Then Lotte’s mother Bertha married Hermann Nathan and had Lotte in 1915, only to be divorced from Hermann in 1919 and to marry Friedrich Langebartels in 1921. In 1926 Bertha and Friedrich came to the US and were there at least long enough to file for US citizenship in 1927, leaving Lotte behind in Germany at eleven years old. I don’t know what happened to Bertha after 1927 or whether Lotte ever reunited with her mother.

We know that there is truth to the concept of generational trauma—how the traumas and tragedies suffered by earlier generations are passed down to the children, grandchildren, and so forth of those earlier generations. Bertha Katzenstein grew up without a mother and was taken from the US to Germany as a child by her father, far from her maternal relatives. We don’t know how that trauma affected her, but in some ways her daughter Lotte suffered a similar trauma when her mother Bertha divorced her father, remarried, and left Lotte behind after moving to the US with her second husband. And then Lotte inflicted a similar trauma on her son Hanan, leaving him behind when she remarried and moved to England.

How tragic it is that the scars of one generation can be so easily passed on to the later generations.

 

  1. Emil and Lotte’s application for citizenship in Palestine in 1940 was found at the Israel State Archives website, temporarily found at https://search.archives.gov.il/, after a cyberattack on their main site. ↩
  2. See Note 1, supra. ↩
  3. Hermann Nathan and Bertha Katzenstein marriage record, Year Range and Volume: 1913 Band 01, Ancestry.com. Hamburg, Germany, Marriages, 1874-1920 ↩
  4. See Palestine immigration documents above. ↩
  5. Name Lottie Emma B Buchanan, Death Age 56, Birth Date 1 May 1915, Registration Date Oct 1971, [Nov 1971] [Dec 1971], Registration Quarter Oct-Nov-Dec, Registration District Nottingham, Inferred County Nottinghamshire, Volume 3c
    Page 1274, General Register Office; United Kingdom; Volume: 3c; Page: 1274, Ancestry.com. England & Wales, Civil Registration Death Index, 1916-2007 ↩
  6. Name Lottie Emma Bertha Buchanan, Register Type Cremation, Death Date 21 Nov 1971, Burial or Cremation Date 24 Nov 1971, Burial or Cremation Place Nottinghamshire, Deceased Online; Kettering, England, UK; Deceased Online Burial Indexes, Ancestry.com. Web: UK, Burial and Cremation Index, 1576-2024 ↩

Malchen Rothschild Rosenblatt, Part III: How I Found Her Great-Grandson Julio

Posted on by
16

Although the three daughters of Malchen Rothschild and Daniel Rosenblatt were all murdered in the Holocaust, their two surviving sons Felix and Siegmund were able to escape Nazi Germany as was their daughter-in-law Julchen Rosenblatt Rosenblatt, the widow of their son Juda/Julius.

I did not have a great deal of information about Felix or Siegmund because they escaped to Argentina, and I have limited resources for research there. I could not find them or their children on the CEMLA website for ships going to Argentina. All I had were burial records for some of them from the Jewish Online Worldwide Burial Registry (JOWBR) at JewishGen.org.

But some of the bricks in this wall crumbled a bit. In looking at the Pages of Testimony for Thekla Rosenblatt and Julie Rosenblatt Wolf, I noticed that both were filed by someone named Julio Rosenblatt. No relationships were given by the submitter, and I had no one in my tree with that name. Julio submitted the pages fairly recently–in 2017–and he lived in Montevideo, Uruguay.

Thekla Rosenblatt page of testimony, found at https://collections.yadvashem.org/en/names/13324460

Julchen Rosenblatt Wolf page of testimony, found at https://collections.yadvashem.org/en/names/13324463

So I googled his name and found two links that helped me figure out who he is and how is he related to the other Rosenblatts and to me. The first page I found was an interview with Julio Rosenblatt of Uruguay that revealed that Julio is the author of several children’s books in the “Max y sus desafíos” series (translated either as Max and His Questions or Max and His Challenges). The books tell the story of Julio’s family in Nazi Germany. “Max” is Julio’s middle name, and he was named in memory of his grandmother’s brother Max. But who was his grandmother? The interview did not reveal.

So I kept digging. And then I found the second website about Julio Rosenblatt, Judische Leben in Beisefoerth, or Jewish Life in Beisefoerth, which was the town where Daniel Rosenblatt was born and where the first two of Daniel and Malchen’s children were born. Seeing that confirmed that I was on the right track. The website had a detailed telling of Julio’s trip to Beisefoerth and his search for his family history there. And from that page I learned Julio’s ancestry and how he is related to me. The page describes his trip to the Jewish cemetery in Haarhausen with Hans Peter Klein, the same man who took me there in 2017. This is what they saw there (see photo accompanying quote below):

Five generations of Julio Rosenblatt’s ancestors from Zimmersrode and Waltersbrück are buried there; the oldest grave of his four-times [sic] great-grandfather, Simon Rothschild from Waltersbrück, dates back to 1811. Julio and his wife Ana were particularly touched by the grave of his grandfather Julius Rosenblatt, who died in 1920 at the age of just 36 and just a few months after the birth of Fredi Rosenblatt, Julio’s father.

Now I know exactly who Julio is. He is my fifth cousin, the four-times great-grandson of Abraham Blumenfeld I and Geitel Katz, my four-times great-grandparents. His father was the baby born to Julius Rosenblatt and Julie Rosenblatt, Manfred; his great-grandmother was Malchen Rothschild Rosenblatt, his great-great-grandmother was Gelle Blumenfeld Rothschild, his great-great-great-grandfather was Moses Blumenfeld I, the older brother of my great-great-great-grandmother Breune Blumenfeld Katzenstein.

Julio’s paternal grandmother was Julie Rosenblatt, the widow and first cousin of Julius Rosenblatt. And Julie had a brother Max Rosenblatt who was killed in the Holocaust and became the name of the character in Julio’s books. But Julie survived and immigrated to Uruguay with her son Manfred (or Fredi), and Julio was born there.

I have gotten in touch with Julio and learned more about the Rosenblatts who survived the Holocaust in South America. Once again connecting with a cousin has allowed me the privilege of better understanding and appreciating my family history.

On top of that, a cousin of Sigmund Rosenblatt’s family, Ellie, found me through the blog, and she has been updating me on that branch of the family.

To be continued in September. My family will be visiting for the next two weeks, so I will see you after Labor Day!