Category Archives: Germany

Seligmann Simon Rothschild’s Tragic and Short Life

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In 1861, Gelle Blumenfeld Rothschild gave birth to her eleventh and last child, Meier, as we saw in my earlier post. Two of those eleven children had died before their third birthdays, but the other nine were still living although for one of those children, Isaac, born in 1850, I have no records after his birth record.1 Thus, I can only report on what happened to the remaining eight children. I will tell their stories one at a time, starting with the oldest child of Gelle Blumenfeld and Simon Rothschild, Seligmann Simon Rothschild.

Seligmann Rothschild was 28 when he married Gelle Karoline Rosenberg on November 7, 1871, in Zimmersrode, Germany; she was the daughter of Jacob Rosenberg and Belle Kauffman and was born on September 11, 1850.2

Seligmann Rothschild marriage record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 884, p. 15

Seligmann and Gelle had two children. Moses (Max) Rothschild was born on January 18, 1874, in Waltersbrueck, Germany, and his brother Emiel (or Emil) Rothschild was born there on April 27, 1875.

Moses Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 40

Emiel Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 42

Sadly, Gelle Rosenberg Rothschild died less than two years later on August 26, 1876, in Waltersbrueck. She was only 25 years old and left her husband Seligmann with two children under three years old.

Gelle Rosenberg Rothschild death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 8453; Laufende Nummer: 920
Year Range: 1876, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

Seligmann did not wait too long to remarry. On January 8, 1878, in Waltersbrueck, he married Emma Ernestina Rothschild, the daughter of Moses Rothschild and Caroline Baum. Emma was born on September 2, 1848, in Angenrod, Germany.

Seligmann Rothschild marriage to Emma Rothschild, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 8404, Year Range: 1878, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

One question nagging at me is whether Seligmann Rothschild, son of Simon Rothschild, was related to his new bride Emma Rothschild, daughter of Moses Rothschild. Emma and her family were from Angenrod, which is only 22 miles from Waltersbrueck where Seligmann lived. I have tried to trace back the lineage of Moses Rothschild and Simon Rothschild, but so far have not found any overlap. Yet it seems somehow likely that these two families were related and that when Seligmann’s first wife died, Emma was selected to help him raise his two little boys. But I have no proof so it remains just speculation.

Emma and Seligmann had two children together. Leopold Rothschild was born on March 20, 1880, in Waltersbrueck, and his brother Hugo was born in Waltersbrueck on July 5, 1882.

Leopold Rothschild birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 8382, Year  Range: 1880, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Hugo Rothschild birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 8384, Year Range: 1882, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

And then tragedy struck the family again when Seligmann, only forty years old, died on May 25, 1884, leaving Emma alone to raise the four little boys, the first two the children of Seligmann’s first wife Gelle, the other two Emma’s children. When Seligmann died, Moses Max was ten, Emil was nine, Leopold was four, and Hugo was two. It’s hard to imagine how Emma managed to cope with so much loss and with four little heartbroken children.

Seligman Rothschild death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 8461; Laufende Nummer: 920, Year Range: 1884, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

Seligmann’s mother Gelle Blumenfeld Rothschild lived to see the births of all four of these grandsons, but also had to endure the heartbreak of losing her first-born child, Seligmann, who was the third of her eleven children to predecease her. Gelle died in Waltersbrueck on December 2, 1887, when she was 65 years old.3

Gelle Blumenfeld Rothschild death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 8464; Laufende Nummer: 920, Year Range: 1887, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

Rothschild, Gelle nee Blumenfeld (1887) – Haarhausen”, in: Jewish Graves <https://www.lagis-hessen.de/de/subjects/idrec/sn/juf/id/2291&gt; (as of June 5, 2012 )

Gelle was spared the heartbreak of seeing that Seligmann’s second child, Emil, died when he was only eighteen on December 13, 1893, in Alsfeld, Germany, where he was then living and working as a merchant. I don’t know what his cause of death was, but when I think of all he’d endured—loss of his mother when he was one, the remarriage of his father and births of two half-brothers, the loss of his father when he was nine, and then the loss of his grandmother three years after that—I have to wonder what impact all that had on his physical and mental well-being.

Emiel Rothschild death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 27; Laufende Nummer: 921, Year Range: 1891-1894, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

Two years later Seligmann Rothschild’s father Simon Rothschild died on July 21, 1895, in Zimmersrode. He was 82

Rothschild, Simon (II) (1895) – Haarhausen”, in: Jewish Graves <https://www.lagis-hessen.de/de/subjects/idrec/sn/juf/id/2213&gt; (as of June 5th. 2012)

The futures of the three surviving sons of Seligmann Simon Rothschild will be discussed in the next post.

  1. There is a notation on Isaak’s birth record that says, “war noch nicht eingetragen, geschieht nachtraeglich,” which translates to “Not yet registered, will happen later.” Someone on Facebook pointed out that Isaak’s birth record is out of chronological order in the register and so was recorded months after his birth. ↩
  2. Gelle Rosenberg Rothschild death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 8453; Laufende Nummer: 920, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958 ↩
  3. She also lived to see the births of nine other grandchildren, but we will get to those other grandchildren in later posts. ↩

Gelle Karoline Blumenfeld Rothschild, Part I: Eleven Children in Eighteen Years

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It’s been quite a while since I have written about my Blumenfeld relatives. Other things—photos, a photo album, updates from cousins—have filled my blog. But today I can finally return to the Blumenfeld tree. And it’s time for a new branch of that family.

After a year and a half researching and writing about Isaak Blumenfeld I and his large family, I can now turn my attention to Isaak’s younger sister Gelle (Karoline) Blumenfeld, the third child of my three-times great-uncle Moses Blumenfeld. To give you a sense of where I am in telling the story of my Blumenfeld family, here are two charts.

The first one shows where I am in writing about all the descendants of my earliest known Blumenfeld ancestors, Abraham Katz Blumenfeld and Giedel Katz Blumenfeld, my four-times great-grandparents.

The second one shows where I am in my writing about Moses Blumenfeld I, their oldest child–not quite two thirds done.

Now on to the third and last child of the oldest child of Abraham and Giedel, my first cousin, four times removed, Gelle Karoline Blumenfeld.

Gelle was born in about 1822 in Momberg, Germany.1 She married Simon Rothschild on November 15, 1842, in Neustadt, Germany, when she was twenty years old. Simon was the son of Seligmann Rothschild and Terz Gutheim, and he was born in Waltersbrueck, Germany, in June 1813.2

Marriage of Gelle Blumenfeld and Simon Rothcchild. Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Abt. 365 Nr. 629, S. 6

Gelle and Simon had eleven children together. Although the birth records for the children are listed in the records for the town of Zimmersrode, a larger town close to the very small village of Waltersbrueck, I assume based on later records that the family lived in Waltersbrueck and that the children were actually born there. But their births were registered in Zimmersrode.

First born was Seligmann Rothschild II on September 9, 1843.

Seligmann Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Hesse Archives, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 15

Seligmann was followed by Abraham, born December 22, 1844; sadly, Abraham lived just a few months. He died on February 16, 1845.

Abraham Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 17

Abraham Rothschild death record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 896, p. 16

A third son was born on August 23, 1846. His name was Levi.

Levi Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 18

He was followed by yet another boy, Moses, born August 30, 1848.

Moses Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 20

Then came Isaak, born January 15, 1850.

Isaak Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p.23

Finally, Gelle gave birth to a daughter, Gitel, on January 7, 1852, but Gitel lived just a little over a year, dying on February 11, 1853.

Gitel Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 24

Gitel Rothschild death record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 896, p 21

Gelle and Simon’s seventh child was another girl, Beschen, born June 22, 1853. Fortunately, she survived and became the oldest living daughter in the family.

Beschen Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 25

Another boy followed Beschen. Gerson was born May 1, 1855.

Gerson Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 27

The ninth child was Malchen, born March 3, 1857.

Malchen Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 28

Sara, the tenth child, was born on January 6, 1859.3

Sara Rothschild birth record, Arcinsys Archives of Hesse, HHStAW Fonds 365 No 893, p. 30

And finally, Gelle gave birth the eleventh and last time to another son, Meier, born on May 9, 1861.

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

Gelle was 21 when she gave birth to her first child Seligmann in 1843 and 39 when she gave birth to her last child Meier in 1861. She had been having babies for almost twenty years, sometimes in consecutive years. I am not sure how she did it, especially enduring the loss of two of those children at such young ages while raising all the others.

But fortunately, at least eight of the other nine children lived to adulthood, and I will be telling their stories in the posts to come.

  1. Rothschild, Gelle geborene Blumenfeld (1887) – Haarhausen“, in: Jüdische Grabstätten <https://www.lagis-hessen.de/en/subjects/idrec/sn/juf/id/2291&gt; (Stand: 5.6.2012) ↩
  2. „Rothschild, Simon (II) (1895) – Haarhausen“, in: Jüdische Grabstätten <https://www.lagis-hessen.de/en/subjects/idrec/sn/juf/id/2213&gt; (Stand: 5.6.2012). ↩
  3. Although Sara’s marriage record gives her a different birth date (January 3, 1860), I am assuming that this birth record, though difficult to read, is more accurate. See Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 8409, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930 ↩

The Legacy of Thekla Blumenfeld Gruenbaum: Family Photos

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I mentioned in my last blog post that I have recently connected with another cousin, Robin Kravets, the great-granddaughter of Thekla Blumenfeld Gruenbaum. Robin is my fifth cousin, once removed. We are both descendants of Abraham Blumenfeld and Geitel Katz, Robin through their son Moses and me through their daughter Breine.

Robin has generously shared with me a collection of photographs of her family, and I am delighted to be able to share them with you. All the photos in this post are courtesy of my cousin Robin. I am providing a summary of what I posted two years ago about Robin’s direct ancestors to provide context to the photos and to add some additional insights Robin shared with me. The blog posts from 2021 contain more details and my sources.

Salomon Blumenfeld, Robin’s great-great-grandfather, first married Caecilie Erlanger, but she died when she was only 24 years old, leaving behind two very young children: Thekla (Robin’s great-grandmother), not yet two, and Felix, just seven months old. Two years after his first wife Caecilie died, Salomon married Emma Bendheim and had a third child, Moritz, in 1877. And then sometime within the next five or six years, Salomon left Germany for Spain with Emma and Moritz, leaving his first two children, Thekla and Felix, behind. As best I can tell, Thekla and Felix, still both young children, must have been raised by their mother’s family, the Erlangers, in Marburg.

I had wondered whether Salomon or his son from his second marriage, Moritz, had remained in touch with Thekla and Felix. Robin provided this photograph of Moritz with his half-niece Cecilie, Thekla’s daughter, and another unidentified woman, so there is some evidence that at least Moritz had some contact with his half-sister Thekla and her family.

Moritz Blumenfeld and Cecilie Gruenbaum (with unknown woman on the left)
Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

This is the oldest photograph in Robin’s collection. It shows Thekla as an infant with her mother, Caecilie Erlanger Blumenfeld and must have been taken in about 1872 when Thekla was born. Thank you to Ava Cohn, aka Sherlock Cohn, The Photogenealogist, for pointing out the correct dating of this photograph.

Caecilie Erlanger Blumenfeld with Thekla Blumenfeld, c. 1872 Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Here are two beautiful photographs of Thekla as a young woman.

Thekla Blumenfeld, courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Thekla Blumenfeld, courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Thekla married Max Gruenbaum in 1894. Here is a photograph of them taken in 1895.

Thekla Blumenfeld and Max Gruenbaum 1895
Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Thekla and Max had four children: Cecilie (1895), Curt (1897), Franz (1899), and Rosemarie, Robin’s grandmother (1912).

Cecilie, Curt, and Franz Gruenbaum c. 1908 Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Cecilie, Franz, Rosemarie and Curt Gruenbaum, 1918  Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Thekla’s brother Felix married Thekla Wertheim in 1902, and they had two sons, Edgar (1903) and Gerhard (1906). Robin had just a few photos of Felix; he appears to be in uniform during World War I in these first two. The caption on the first translates as “to commemorate the first nailing of the Zaitenstock.” I am not sure what that means, but Wikipedia explains (as translated by Google) that zaitenstocke were part of the pipe systems used to carry water into the cities.

Felix Blumenfeld, 1915 Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

detail from photo above

Felix Blumenfeld, 1916
Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

detail from photo above

As I wrote in my earlier posts, both Felix and his sister Thekla lost their spouses at relatively young ages. Thekla’s husband Max Gruenbaum died in 1917, and Felix’s wife Thekla died in 1923.

But even more tragically, both Felix and Thekla were among the six million who were killed in the Holocaust, Felix by suicide in 1942, as detailed here, when he was in despair and had no hope in surviving, and Thekla at Treblinka in 1943.

Felix Blumenfeld
Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Thekla had refused to leave Germany, and her daughter Cecilie would not leave her mother behind. Robin wrote that “[Cecilie] was very smart and saw the writing on the wall but her mother would not leave.  I remember my family talking about them having tickets on a boat somewhere. But the boat was cancelled.”1 Fortunately, Cecilie’s children were safely in England.

But Cecilie and her husband Walter Herzog were sent to the concentration camp in Riga in 1941. Walter did not survive, but against all odds, Cecilie did even after being sent to Stutthof, a camp where the conditions were truly horrible, as I wrote about here. When I asked Robin whether she had any information as to how Cecilie had survived, she wrote that “since she was trained as a nurse during WWI, she used her skills to help people in the camps. I have always believed it gave her a purpose to survive. The story I heard as a child was that when the Allies liberated the camp, she knew she had to get west. She collected a group of people and helped them make their way west. As a nurse, she knew that they needed to be very careful about overeating after being in the camps and made sure they did not die from bloating.”2 As was not uncommon with Holocaust survivors, Cecilie never wanted to talk about her experiences.

Cecilie Gruenbaum Herzog Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

The other children of Thekla Blumenfeld Gruenbaum and Felix Blumenfeld had all managed to escape Germany before it was too late, as I wrote about here. Robin’s grandmother Rosemarie, the youngest of Thekla’s children, had married while still in Germany. In fact, as Robin explained, she had married her husband Ernest Heymann in absentia as Ernest was in England at the time, having gone there on business and then realizing it was not safe to return. I’d never heard of being married in absentia, but apparently Rosemarie’s nephew stood in as a surrogate groom.3

Rosemarie was able to get out of Germany and join Ernest in London where their first child, Robin’s mother, was born. After the war started, Ernest was one of the many Jewish refugees who was sent to an internment camp as a “enemy alien.” He was interned from June 21, 1940, until October 17, 1940.

Ernst Heymann, he National Archives; Kew, London, England; HO 396 WW2 Internees (Aliens) Index Cards 1939-1947; Reference Number: Ho 396/178
Piece Number Description: 178: German Internees Released in Uk 1939-1942: Hertzke-Hoj
Ancestry.com. UK, World War II Alien Internees, 1939-1945

After he was released, he and Rosemarie and their daughter immigrated to the US and settled in New York. They had another child in New York after the war.

Rosemarie’s sister Cecilie made it to the US in 1946 and went to live with Rosemarie and her family in New York. The two sisters lived together for the rest of their lives and remained close to their brothers Curt and Franz (later known as Frank), who visited them often from Massachusetts.  Cecilie lived to 95, dying in 1990, and Rosemarie to 91, dying in 2004.3

The story of Thekla Blumenfeld Gruenbaum is tragic: motherless as toddler, left behind by her father, widowed at a young age, and then killed by the Nazis. The fact that Thekla’s two daughters Cecilie and Rosemarie lived together and survived into their 90s is quite a tribute to the strength their mother must have had and that they both had.

Thekla with her daughter Rosemarie Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Thekla Blumenfeld Gruenbaum  Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

Thekla Blumenfeld Gruenbaum  Courtesy of Robin H Kravets

 

 

 

  1. Email from Robin H. Kravets, September 10, 2023. ↩
  2. Ibid. ↩
  3. Emails from Robin H. Kravets, September 10, 2023, and October 27, 2023. ↩ ↩

Friederike Blumenfeld Schoen, Part III: Her Son Moses Escapes to America

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I have been unable to do any new research in these last few weeks since the horrendous massacre in Israel by Hamas on October 7. I just can’t seem to focus on research right now. Fortunately I had several blog posts ready in my queue and will publish those, including this one. Perhaps the best way I can support Israel right now is to educate and remind people about the long history of persecution of Jews and antisemitism so that they best understand why Israel exists and why it must survive.

Although Friederike’s oldest child Jakob died in 1937 and his widow and daughter were killed by the Nazis, her other three surviving children all managed to escape the Nazis.

Friederike’s son Moses, more commonly known as Moritz, wanted to leave Germany quite early. As described by his son Kurt Leopold Schoen in the oral history interview he did with the US Holocaust Memorial and Museum, Moritz had had a successful wholesale and retail shoe business in Kassel, but once the Nazis came to power the business suffered. Non-Jews boycotted the store, and Moritz had to close the business and work as a shoemaker.1

But leaving Germany was difficult. The family needed affidavits from someone in the US to get a visa to enter the country, and the relatives in the US were reluctant to sponsor a family with three young children. Fortunately, Moritz and Else’s fourteen-year-old daughter Alice was given an opportunity to leave when the National Council of the Jewish Women in the US organized a rescue mission that brought many children out of Germany.2 Alice came to the US on May 13, 1938, and was sent to live with a Jewish family in San Antonio, Texas, the Rosenbergs, as seen on the 1940 US census.3

Alice Schoen passenger manifest, The National Archives and Records Administration; Washington, D.C.; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at and Departing from Ogdensburg, New York, 5/27/1948 – 11/28/1972; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715, 1897-1957
Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957

The website for the Holocaust Memorial Museum of San Antonio reported that Abe and Bella Rosenberg “took [Alice] into their lives as if she were a long lost relative. The Rosenberg children, Miriam and Stanley, and a host of aunts, uncles, and cousins who treated her with affection and kindness made her adjustment to a new life easier.” In his oral history interview, Alice’s brother Kurt mentioned that the Rosenbergs were a very nice family, but nevertheless Alice was naturally very homesick.  She did not see her family again until 1940.4

But Alice was able to get help from the Rosenberg family to bring her father Moritz to the US from Germany. As reported on the website for the Holocaust Memorial Museum of San Antonio, they signed affidavits pledging financial support for him.

Once he had an affidavit from the Rosenbergs, Moritz was able to go to the US consulate in Germany and receive a visa. But before he could leave, he was arrested during the Kristallnacht riots in November, 1938. According to his son Kurt, Moritz was not sent to Buchenwald like so many other Jewish men were after Kristallnacht because he already had a visa to leave Germany. He was released within a day or two from police custody in Kassel and prepared to leave for the US.5

Moritz arrived on December 3, 1938, seven months after Alice’s arrival, and settled in New York City. His ship manifest lists his wife Else as the person he was leaving behind in Kassel, Germany, and his sister-in-law Betty Lutz (born Babette Freimark) as the person he was going to in the US. He listed his occupation as a shoemaker.6

Meanwhile, back in Germany, Else and her two young sons Manfred and Kurt moved to Frankfurt; the boys were sent to a Jewish orphanage and Else moved in with one of her sisters. Kurt described the orphanage as a place where he and his brother were well treated. They went to school and learned English. Finally in April 1939, they were released and reunited with their mother and allowed to leave Germany for the US. Kurt, who was eleven at the time, recalled that the Nazis tore through their luggage and stole everything Else had packed except one small teapot.7

Else arrived in New York with Manfred and Kurt (listed as Kurt Leopold Israel on the manifest) on May 19, 1939.

Else Schoen and children, passenger manifest, The National Archives and Records Administration; Washington, D.C.; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at and Departing from Ogdensburg, New York, 5/27/1948 – 11/28/1972; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715, 1897-1957
Ship or Roll Number: Deutschland, Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957

The family moved into a small apartment riddled with bed bugs; Moritz worked doing shoe repairs and barely made a living. But as Kurt said, they were happy to be out of Germany and safely living in New York. They moved frequently from one apartment to another in order to get the benefit of one or two free months of rent being offered by landlords. Manfred and Kurt started school where they quickly learned English and rose from the lower levels of their grade to the highest within a year.8

Alice was reunited with her parents and brothers sometime in 1940 when the Rosenberg family brought her to New York after taking a trip to Canada to see the Dionne Quintuplets. She married just three years later when she was nineteen, according to her brother Kurt.9 Her husband, Albert Bernhard Schwarz, was born on October 22, 1922, in Busenberg, Germany, to Alfred Lazarus Schwarz and Berta Levy. Like Alice, he was refugee from Germany; he had arrived on August 13, 1938.10 He was the only member of his family to survive. His parents and all his siblings were killed by the Nazis.11

Albert entered the US Army on March 26, 1943, listing his marital status as single.12 He and Alice must have married later that year. According to one biography of Albert, he was assigned to Camp Ritchie in Maryland and trained for military intelligence. As a Ritchie Boy, as they were known, Albert was trained to interrogate German prisoners of war. Starting in October 1944 he was with the 7th Armored Division of the II English Army in France and the northern part of Belgium. On November 5-6, 1944, during the Battle of the Bulge, Albert’s jeep hit a German mine near a bridge over the Meuse River. Albert suffered severe head injuries from which he suffered the rest of his life. He was in a coma for over a month in a English military hospital and remained there until February, 1945. He returned to the US in the spring of 1945, but was hospitalized until July. On Aug. 02, 1945, he was discharged from military service at Camp Edward, Massachusetts.13

Alice and Albert had three children born after the war. In 1950 they were living in New York City, and Albert was working as a butcher.14 Alice’s parents Moritz and Else Schoen and her brothers Manfred and Kurt (listed as Leo here) were also living in New York City. Moritz now owned his own shoemaking business. Manfred was an industrial engineer, and Leo/Kurt was a chemist in a cosmetics company.

Morris Schoen and family, 1950 US census, National Archives at Washington, DC; Washington, D.C.; Seventeenth Census of the United States, 1950; Year: 1950; Census Place: New York, New York, New York; Roll: 3572; Page: 9; Enumeration District: 31-2294, Ancestry.com. 1950 United States Federal Census

Meanwhile, Moritz’s two remaining siblings had survived the war in Shanghai, China. More on that in my next post.

  1. Many of the personal details in this post came from Kurt Leopold Schoen’s interview with the USHMM. Kurt L. Schoen, July 24, 2004 interview, Accession Number: 1997.A.0441.512 | RG Number: RG-50.462.0512, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Gratz College Holocaust Oral History Archive, found at https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn566135.  Although Kurt is listed as Leopold or Leo on many US records, he used the name Kurt for most of his adult life in the US and will be referred to here as Kurt for that reason. ↩
  2. See Note 1, supra. ↩
  3. Alice Schoen, 1940 US Census, Year: 1940; Census Place: San Antonio, Bexar, Texas; Roll: m-t0627-04201; Page: 61A; Enumeration District: 259-6, Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census ↩
  4. See Note 1, supra. ↩
  5. See Note 1, supra. ↩
  6. Moses Schoen, passenger manifest, The National Archives and Records Administration; Washington, D.C.; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at and Departing from Ogdensburg, New York, 5/27/1948 – 11/28/1972; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715, 1897-1957, Ship or Roll Number: Hamburg, Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957 ↩
  7. See Note 1, supra. ↩
  8. See Note 1, supra. ↩
  9. See Note 1, supra. ↩
  10. Albert Schwarz, Declaration of Intention, The National Archives at Philadelphia; Philadelphia, PA; 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
    Description: (Roll 610) Declarations of Intention For Citizenship, 1842-1959 (No 481301-482200), Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., State and Federal Naturalization Records, 1794-1943 ↩
  11. Family history of Schwarz family, Arbeitskreis Judentum im Wasgau, Elisabeth & Otmar Weber, Schillerstraße 10b, 66994, found at /https://judentum-im-wasgau.de/images/geschichte/jugemeinden/jufbusenberg/02_schwarz_jakob_hauptstr_49_bu.pdf ↩
  12. Albert B Schwarz, Race White, Marital Status Single, without dependents (Single)
    Rank Private, Birth Year 1922, Nativity State or Country Danzig or Germany, Citizenship Not Yet a Citizen, Residence New York, New York, Education 2 years of high school
    Civil Occupation Stock clerks, Enlistment Date 26 Mar 1943, Enlistment Place New York City, New York, Service Number 32874464, Branch No branch assignment, Component Selectees (Enlisted Men), National Archives at College Park; College Park, Maryland, USA; Electronic Army Serial Number Merged File, 1938-1946; NAID: 1263923; Record Group Title: Records of the National Archives and Records Administration, 1789-ca. 2007; Record Group: 64; Box Number: 05772; Reel: 241, Ancestry.com. U.S., World War II Army Enlistment Records, 1938-1946 ↩
  13. See Note 11, supra. ↩
  14. Albert Schwarz and family, 1940 US census, National Archives at Washington, DC; Washington, D.C.; Seventeenth Census of the United States, 1950; Year: 1950; Census Place: New York, New York, New York; Roll: 6203; Page: 6; Enumeration District: 31-1913, Ancestry.com. 1950 United States Federal Census ↩

Friederike Blumenfeld Schoen’s Son Jakob: Another Family Lost in the Holocaust

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Friederike Blumenfeld Schoen died in 1927, as we saw, leaving behind her four surviving children, Jakob, Auguste, Moses, and Isaac, and her grandchildren. Thus, she was spared from experiencing the Holocaust and seeing what would happen to her children and their families.

Her oldest child, Jakob, was living a good life with his wife Hannah Freimark (sometimes known as Johanna, sometimes as Maria Anna.) Their daughter Ruth was born on New Year’s Day in 1924, as seen in this birth announcement published in Der Israelit newspaper in Frankfurt on January 3, 1924.

Der Israelit, 3 January 1924, page 7

Thank you once again to my cousin Richard Bloomfield who located this notice and the others in this post and translated them for me. The birth announcement says, “Jakob Schön and wife Hanna, née Freimark are delighted to announce the healthy [lit. happy, successful] birth of a daughter. Frankfurt am Main, Baumweg 22, 1 January 1924 / 24. Tebet 5684.”

Jakob was working as a successful butcher in Frankfurt. The ad below says, “Wanted for my store, closed on Shabbat and holidays, a young journeyman. Meat Market Jakob Schön, Frankfurt am Main, Uhlandstrasse 50.”

1925-08-27 Der Israelit, page 7

And then his life was cut short when he died on June 22, 1937, at the age of 52. His daughter Ruth was only 13 years old.

Jakob Schoen death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Signatur: 11071; Laufende Nummer: 903
Year Range: 1937, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

Jakob’s obituary reflects how well loved he was by his family and his  community. Richard Bloomfield, who located this obituary as well as the ads and notices above, graciously translated the obituary for me as follows:

Der Israelit, July 1, 1937, p. 11

Suddenly and without warning Jakob Schön’s successful and industrious life came to an end. Together with his wife and daughter a large circle of friends mourns this dutiful man known for his unbending character and his scrupulous business practices. With hard work and great zeal Jakob Schön and his like-minded wife built up his meat market from its small beginnings into a remarkably prospering business which brought him the complete trust of the rabbinate and the supervisory board of the IRG, as well as the respect and friendship of his customers. The Reichsbund Jüdischer Frontsoldaten [National Association of Frontline Soldiers] loses with Jakob Schön an active and faithful member. In earlier years the deceased was a valuable member of the Synagogue Choir of the Jewish Community who gladly gave of his time and energy for the enriching of the worship services. May the family’s intense grief be alleviated by knowing that his memory will last and his S’chus [merit] will live on forever.

It appears that Jakob died suddenly, perhaps of a heart attack or stroke. Although there is nothing in the obituary discussing this, I wonder what effect Nazi oppression and the Nuremburg Laws had on his business and on him personally. Did the stress of dealing with persecution contribute to his sudden death? Was Jakob an uncounted victim of the Holocaust?

In any event, at least he was spared knowing what would happen to his wife and daughter in the years to come. They did not leave Germany in time, and both were murdered by the Nazis. They were deported from Frankfurt to Theriesenstadt on September 15, 1942, and then to Auschwitz, where they were murdered on October 12, 1944. Hannah was 56, and Ruth only twenty years old.

Johanna Freimark Schoen Page of Testimony, found at https://yvng.yadvashem.org/nameDetails.html?language=en&itemId=1414651&ind=1

May their lives be remembered. May we never forget.

 

 

 

 

Friederike Blumenfeld Schoen, Part I: Her Life and Her Children

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In my telling of the Blumenfeld saga, I am now up to Friederike Blumenfeld, the eighth child of Isaac Blumenfeld I and his second wife Gelle Strauss. Friederike was born November 2, 1858, in Momberg. Since Isaac and Gelle’s ninth child, Sara, died as a young child, Friederike was the youngest of their children to survive to adulthood, and her story is the final chapter in the story of the family of Isaac Blumenfeld I.

Friederike Blumenfeld birth record, Geburtsregister der Juden von Momberg (Neustadt) 1850-1874 (HHStAW Abt. 365 Nr. 608)AutorHessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, WiesbadenErscheinungsjahr1850-1874, p. 5

Friederike married Mannes Schoen on January 28, 1884, in Niederurff, Germany. Mannes, the son of Wolf Schoen and Sarah Wallach, was born in Bischhausen, Germany, on May 14, 1852. Mannes was living in Niederurff at the time of their marriage.

Marriage of Friederike Blumenfeld and Mannes Schoen, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 6193, Year Range: 1884
Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Friederike and Mannes had five children, four sons and one daughter.

First born was Jakob, born on January 22, 1885, in Niederurff.

Jakob Schoen birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 6170, Year Range: 1885, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

The only daughter, Auguste, was born in Niederurff on August 29, 1886.

Auguste Schoen birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 6171, Year Range: 1886, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Friederike and Mannes’ third child Willy was born April 10, 1888, in Niederurff. Sadly, he died on July 16, 1895, when he was only seven years old.

Willy Schoen birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 6173, Year Range: 1888, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Willy Schoen, death record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Personenstandsregister Sterberegister; Bestand: 6246; Laufende Nummer: 920, Year Range: 1895, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Deaths, 1851-1958

Moses, the fourth child, was born in Niederurff on July 6, 1890.

Moses Schoen birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 6175, Year Range: 1890, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

And finally, the last child was Isaak, born June 25, 1893, also in Niederurff.

Isaak Schoen birth record, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 6178, Year Range: 1893, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Births, 1851-1901

Their father Mannes died on July 7, 1913, in Niederurff. He was 61 years old.

Mannes Schoen death record, Standesamt Niederurff Sterbenebenregister 1913 (HStAMR Best. 920 Nr. 6264)AutorHessisches Staatsarchiv MarburgErscheinungsortNiederurff, p 7

World War I started the following year when Jakob would have been 29, Moses 24, and Isaak 21. Although I have no military records to establish that the sons served in the war for Germany, Moses Schoen’s son Kurt stated in an interview with the United States Holocaust Memorial and Museum that his father had served in World War I and was awarded an Iron Cross.1 In addition, Richard Bloomfield located an obituary for Jakob Schoen that mentioned his membership in the Reichsbund Jüdischer
Frontsoldaten [National Association of Jewish Frontline Soldiers], indicating that he also served for Germany in World War I.2  Perhaps their brother Isaak also served, but I’ve yet to locate any evidence of his service.

None of the children married until after the war ended. Jakob was the first to marry. He married Maria Anna (later identified as Johanna or Hannah) Freimark on June 10, 1919, in Frankfurt. Maria Anna was born in Homburg am Main on October 3, 1888, to Leopold Freimark and Frieda Lustig.

Marriage record of Jakob Schoen and Maria Anna Freimark, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903, Year Range: 1919, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Jakob and Maria Anna had one child, a daughter Ruth, born in Frankfurt on January 1, 1924.3 If there were other children, I’ve yet to locate records for them.

Jakob’s sister Auguste married Willi Speier on November 26, 1920, in Niederurff. Willi, son of Julius Speier and Jettchen Rosenbach, was born September 24, 1893, in Kassel, Germany.

Marriage record of Auguste Schoen and Willi Speier, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 920; Laufende Nummer: 6226, Year Range: 1917-1924, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Auguste and Willi had one child, a son Julius, born August 10, 1922, in Niederurff.4 As with Jakob, if there were other children born to Auguste and Willi, I’ve yet to locate records for them.

Moses (also known as Moritz) Schoen married Else Freimark on February 13, 1923, in Kassel, Germany. Moses and Else had three children. Alice was born on January 14, 1924, in Kassel. Manfred was born on September 13, 1926, in Kassel. And Leopold (later known as Kurt Leopold) was born on December 14, 1927, in Kassel.5

Trees on Ancestry and Geni and a genealogy that Richard Bloomfield located done by a local Homburg historian named Dr. Leonhard Scherg have Else listed with the same parents as Jakob’s wife Maria Anna Freimark, Leopold Freimark and Frieda Lustig, meaning Moses married his brother Jakob’s sister-in-law. But Richard and I have not yet found any primary sources to corroborate that with absolute certainty.

However, Richard and I feel confident that Else was in fact Maria Anna’s younger sister and the child of Leopold Freimark and Frieda Lustig based on a few inferences. First, Leopold Freimark died on October 18, 1926. In the oral history interview Else’s son Kurt did for the USHMM,6 he mentioned that his maternal grandfather died shortly before he was born. As noted above, Kurt was born December 14, 1927.

In addition, Else and Moses’ third child was named Kurt Leopold, and given that in accordance with Ashkenazi Jewish tradition a child should be named for a close relative who has died, it would make sense that Else would have wanted her new son named for her recently deceased father. Also, Else’s daughter Alice later named one of her children Frances, perhaps for her grandmother Frieda Lustig.

And finally, on Else’s petition for naturalization, one of her supporting witnesses was Betty Kutz.7 In addition, on his 1938 ship manifest Moses Schoen listed his sister-in-law Betty Kutz as the person he was going to in the US. Betty Kutz was born Babette Freimark and was a daughter of Leopold Freimark and Frieda Lustig; thus, Betty would have been Else’s older sister.8

Thus, there seems to be several good reasons to believe that Else Freimark, wife of Moses Schoen, and Maria Anna Freimark, wife of Jakob Schoen, were also sisters. An actual record would be wonderful, but for now I am comfortable with that assumption.

The youngest child of Friederike and Mannes, Isaak, did not marry as far as I’ve been able to discover.

Friederike Blumenfeld Schoen died on May 25, 1927. Richard not only located her death record, but also a page describing her gravestone.

Friedericke Blumenfeld Schoen death record, LAGIS Hessian Vital Records,Standesamt Treysa Sterbenebenregister 1927 (HStAMR Best. 920 Nr. 8076)AutorHessisches Staatsarchiv MarburgErscheinungsortTreysaErscheinungsjahr1927, p. 44

The German inscription on her gravestone says:

Hier ruht:

Franziska Schön

geb. Blumenfeld,

geb. 2. 11. 1856,

gest. 25. 5. 1927.

This translates to

Franziska Schön

born Blumenfeld,

born November 2, 1856

died May 25, 1927.

(The birth date is incorrect as she was born on November 2, 1858, and that error is noted in the commentary on the page.)

The Hebrew inscription translates as follows:

a dear and pure woman,

perfect all their days:

Freidche, daughter of Yitzchak ha-Kohen.

She went into her eternity (on) 23.

Ijjar 687 ndk Z. (=25.05.1927).

Your soul is bound in the bond of life.

Friederike was 68 years old when she died; her death record states that she died in the Hephata Hospital in Treysa.  She was survived by her four surviving children, Jakob, Auguste, Moses, and Isaak, their spouses, and at least five grandchildren. They all  had to face the rise of the Nazis in the following decade, as we will see.

TO BE CONTINUED

  1. Oral History interview with Kurt L. Schoen, July 24, 2002, Accession Number: 1997.A.0441.512 | RG Number: RG-50.462.0512, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of the Gratz College Holocaust Oral History Archive, found at https://collections.ushmm.org/search/catalog/irn566135 (hereinafter referred to as Kurt Schoen Oral History Interview). ↩
  2. Der Israelit, July 1, 1937, p. 11 ↩
  3. Entry at Yad Vashem, found at https://yvng.yadvashem.org/nameDetails.html?language=en&itemId=11628404&ind=1 ↩
  4. Julius Speier, Social Security Number 079-24-2442, Birth Date 10 Aug 1922, Issue year Before 1951, Issue State New York, Last Residence 33162, Miami, Miami-Dade, Florida, USA, Death Date 22 Nov 1992, Social Security Administration; Washington D.C., USA; Social Security Death Index, Master File, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014 ↩
  5. Moses Schon, Declaration of Intention, The National Archives at Philadelphia; Philadelphia, PA; 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
    Description: (Roll 555) Declarations of Intention For Citizenship, 1842-1959 (No 433201-434100), Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., State and Federal Naturalization Records, 1794-1943 ↩
  6. See Note 1, supra. ↩
  7. Else Schoen, Petition for Naturalization,  “New York, U.S. District Court Naturalization Records, 1824-1991”, database with images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:QP76-DQ6K : 8 March 2021), Else Schoen or Freimark, 1940. ↩
  8. Moses Schoen, passenger manifest, The National Archives and Records Administration; Washington, D.C.; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at and Departing from Ogdensburg, New York, 5/27/1948 – 11/28/1972; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715, 1897-1957, Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957. See also marriage record for Betty Freimark and Bernhard Kutz, “New York, New York City Marriage Records, 1829-1938”, database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:243L-8BP : 20 June 2023), Bernhardt Kutz and Betty Freimark, 1912. ↩

Guest Post: My Cousin Miki Katzenstein’s Trip to Jesberg and Munich—Retrieving History and Honoring the Past

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A few months ago I wrote about how I had connected with my cousin Miki Katzenstein Dror from Israel. Miki is a daughter of Aryeh Katzenstein, who was murdered in a terrorist attack in Munich, Germany, in 1970, when he was just 32 and Miki was a young child. Aryeh gave his life to save the lives of others, including the life of his father, Heinz Katzenstein. The city of Munich is now planning to install a memorial to Aryeh on the grounds where the attack occurred in collaboration with a corporation called BrainLab, which now owns the land where Aryeh was killed.

In preparation for this memorial, Miki and her brother Ofer and their spouses recently traveled to Germany to meet with the people there who are working on the memorial. In addition, Miki made a trip to Jesberg, the small village where our mutual Katzenstein ancestors once lived and where Miki’s grandfather Heinz Katzenstein lived until he left for Palestine in the 1930s. I asked Miki if she would share her thoughts on her visit to her grandfather’s childhood home in Jesberg and also on her trip to Munich, and she has graciously done so. All photos are also courtesy of Miki.

Miki wrote:

For many years I dreamed of traveling to Germany with my grandfather, Heinz Katzenstein, to see the districts of his childhood. I hadn’t heard much about his childhood in Germany, except for the simple facts he told me; he said that he was born in Kassel, immigrated to Palestine in 1933, and had managed to return to Germany in 1936 to take his parents and siblings to his new home. My grandfather often returned to Germany to go to Baden-Baden, but always refused to travel with me to the region where he grew up. I thought it was because it would have been hard for him to see again the home he ran away from so many years ago.

After my grandfather passed away, it became clear to me that although he always talked about Kassel, he actually was born and raised in the village of Jesberg, a really small village about a 40-minute drive from Kassel. Maybe it was easier for him to talk about a more well-known city. I became even more curious, and when the municipality of Munich invited us in June 2023 to preparatory meetings for the establishment of the memorial site for my late father, Aryeh Katzenstein, I decided to combine a roots trip to Jesberg with the meetings in Munich.

I started the preparations with the help of my cousin Amy Cohen, whose blog I found when I was looking for information about Jesberg online. Thanks to her, I met a lovely man named Heinz Hildebrandt, who volunteered to guide me in the village along with his wife Erika. I told him a little about our family, and he told me not to worry – he would already know what to show me. We set a date, and I waited anxiously. In the meantime, I had a lot of preparatory work for the meetings in Munich, and time was running out.

On June 16th my husband and I took off to Frankfurt; from there we went to Kassel and walked around the city for two days. On June 18, we met with the Hildebrandt family in Jesberg at 9 am, as prearranged. I will never forget the Jesberg welcome. Heinz and his wife Erica, Mrs. Regina Ochs, Herald England, Mayor Heiko Mans, and Pastor Reinhard Keller all accompanied us for the visit, and we ended up staying with them until six in the evening. Hans-Peter Klein and his friend Irina also came especially to meet us. It was one of the most exciting days of my life.

Miki and her husband with the mayor of Jesberg

Amy, my cousin, had given me a piece of advice: imagine the life your grandfather lived in the village while visiting there. This is what I did: we saw the tower overlooking the village and the surrounding agricultural area, we saw the well-kept village and all the Jewish houses that remained mostly in their original form, including the ancient synagogue that is now used as a residence. 

Overlooking Jesberg with Miki, her husband, and their guide Heinz Hildebrandt

We even managed to enter the house where my grandfather was born and raised, thanks to the current owner, Michael Jung. It was very emotional for me; the house is in need of repairs and is about to be completely renovated. But I could easily see its beauty, size, and even glory. The ceiling is spectacular. In some ways the house reminded me of my grandfather’s home in Haifa, with all the wooden hand-crafted furniture.

Miki standing in front of the house where her grandfather lived in Jesberg

We said Kaddish at the well-preserved grave of Levi Katzenstein and Jeanette Bendheim, my grandfather’s grandparents, and we saw a gravestone for the victims of the First World War from which the name of our relative Max Katzenstein had been erased during the Nazi era; his name was returned to that memorial a few decades ago. A fascinating presentation was prepared for us that dealt with the history of the Jewish families in the village and in the region, especially the story of our Katzenstein family. It amazes me to think that if my grandfather could have remained in Jesberg undisturbed, my children would have been the 11th generation in the village.

The grave of Levy Katzenstein, Miki’s great-great-grandfather

World War I memorial in Jesberg where you can see that Max Katzenstein’s name was removed and then later restored

My grandfather loved Germany all his life and missed it endlessly. There wasn’t a year he didn’t go there. It also became clear to me from records Mrs. Ochs shared that a year before his death he even came to Jesberg, but without me.

The second part of this busy week was no less emotionally difficult. We went to Munich for three days where we met my brother and sister-in-law who came from Israel and were hosted by the people of the municipality, whom we were very happy to meet after about three years of seeing them only on the small screens of Zoom in our conference calls. The program was very busy, and the terrible heat and the fact that there was no air conditioning made it very difficult. The truth is that even there we were shocked by the welcome we received.

The project to commemorate my father, which started from a humble initiative of family friends, Michael Weidenhiller and Werner Haberkorn, has developed into a huge project that combines our family, the municipality of Munich, and the high-tech company BrainLab. We were invited to lunch with the mayor of Munich, with the head of the Jewish community in Munich, and with the Israeli consulate there. We visited BrainLab’s amazing offices and met with the CEO, Stefan Fieldsmeier, his employees, and the artist chosen to create the artwork that will be erected on the site. We participated in a press conference where the launch of the project was announced, and millions of German residents were exposed to it.

Miki at the press conference in Munich

The site where the memorial to Aryeh Katzenstein will be installed

The highlight for me and my brother was the visit that was organized for us at the municipal archives, where we were exposed for the first time to four huge files of evidence that were prepared for the trial of the three terrorists who murdered my late father. Those files were never used because the terrorists were released without a trial three months later when a Pan Am jet was hijacked and the German government agreed to release those three terrorists in exchange for the safe release of the three hundred passengers on that plane.

The files from the Munich Archives about the 1970 terrorist attack

[For more on this exchange and its historical significance, here is one writer’s views.]

Our faithful translator translated for us from German into Hebrew the testimonies of my grandfather, who was interrogated right after the terrorist incident while he was injured in the hospital, of Hana Maron, the Israeli actress who was seriously injured in the attack, of Uri Cohen, the heroic captain who fought the terrorists with his bare hands, and the bus driver who drove the passengers from the terminal to the plane.

The pictures were very difficult to see but important. We saw drawings of the terminal and timeline of the chain of events. We read what they found with my father after his death: coins, a horseshoe-shaped gold necklace that I really remember as a child, a list my mother sent with him of things to buy in Germany including Pantene diaper cream and decorations for a Purim party they were planning to throw for their friends, and a picture of us – his three children.

We left with tears in our eyes and a heavy heart. On the other hand, we now know much more than we knew before the visit, we met lovely people who tried to help with infinite sensitivity, and we are waiting for the launch of the memorial website, which will be in 2024.

Thank you, Miki, for sharing this with me and my readers. We will always remember the story of your father and the lessons we all must learn about the destructive consequences of hatred in all forms.

 

Isaak Rosenberg: A Family With No Survivors

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The youngest child of Rebecca Blumenfeld and Mendel Rosenberg was their son Isaak. As we saw, Isaak was born in Rosenthal, Germany, on June 15, 1892, and on December 22, 1922, he married Bella Gans, daughter of Jacob Gans and Esther Ehrenreich, in Niederaula, Germany.

Isaak and Bella had one child, a daughter Rita Rosenberg, born on April 29, 1924 in Frankfurt.

Unfortunately, all of them—Isaak, Bella, and Rita—were murdered by the Nazis. According to Yad Vashem, Isaak was deported from Frankfurt on August 10, 1942, and sent to the concentration camp in Majdanek, Poland, where he was murdered. His wife Bella’s nephew Israel Gans filed this Page of Testimony at Yad Vashem in his memory. The Hebrew written where it says “circumstances of death” merely says “perished in the Holocaust.” (Thank you to Hanna Gafni of Tracing the Tribe on Facebook for translating this line on this Page and the two below.)

The information available regarding the fates of Bella and Rita is far less specific. The Gedenbuch (Memorial Book) only reports that Bella was deported to Poland and killed there; perhaps she was deported on the same date as Isaak and to the same camp, but that isn’t stated. Nor does the Page of Testimony filed at Yad Vashem by Bella’s nephew Israel Gans provide any further details. The line for “Circumstances of Death” translates as “deported to Poland. Her fate is not known. Perished in the Holocaust.”

The information about Rita is even more limited. The Gedenbuch doesn’t even have information about where she was deported to or killed nor does her cousin Israel Gans’ Page of Testimony for her. The Hebrew written where it says “circumstances of death” says “perished in the Holocaust.”


This may be the first time that I have learned of family members who were killed in the Holocaust for whom there are no recorded details of their fates. Did Bella and Rita accompany Isaak to Majdanek? Or was the family separated? The lack of information somehow makes their deaths sting even more. The fact that the Nazis didn’t even document their murders makes it more likely that those deaths would have been somehow swept under the rug. So it is my task here to make sure that their lives and their murders are not forgotten.

That brings me to the end of the story of Rebecca Blumenfeld Rosenberg, the seventh child of Isaak Blumenfeld I and Gelle Strauss. Although Rebecca lost one son, Willi, as a young adult, and her son Isaak and his family were all murdered in the Holocaust, she was survived by seven grandchildren and has descendants still living today in Israel and the United States.

Next I turn to Rebecca’s younger sister, Friederike Blumenfeld, the eighth child of Isaak Blumenfeld I and Gelle Strauss and the last of their children to live to adulthood.

Genealogy Fun: How My Friend and I Discovered We Have Mutual Cousins

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One of the first people I ever met who did genealogy research is my friend Amanda Katz Jermyn. I met Amanda through mutual friends over thirty years ago, and we have been members of the same small havurah group for many years now. When Amanda long ago described her genealogy research and the connections and stories she had found, I was amazed. She helped to inspire me to start my own journey.

Amanda and I both have paternal ancestry from Germany, and over the years we’ve wondered whether we would ever find an overlap in our German Jewish ancestry. Well, I finally found one, although it is very attenuated and only by marriage. Nevertheless it was fun to find this connection.1 Here’s the story of my third cousin, twice removed, Moritz Rosenberg, and his wife Berta Blum, Amanda’s third cousin, once removed.

As we saw in my earlier post, Moritz, the third child of Rebecca Blumenfeld and Mendel Rosenberg, was born on September 15, 1887, in Rosenthal, Germany, and married Berta Blum on August 10, 1919, in Frankenau, Germany. Berta was born on September 5, 1896, in Frankenau to Elias Blum and Amalie Katz.

Marriage of Moritz Rosenberg and Berta Blum, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Signatur: 3254, Year Range: 1919, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Moritz and Berta had two children, Jacob (later Theodore), born on January 17, 1921,2 and Rebecca (later Ruth), born on January 4, 1925, both in Rosenthal, Germany.3

Moritz and his family were among the very fortunate ones who all were able to escape safely from Nazi Germany. Moritz, Berta, and their 13-year-old daughter Rebecca arrived in New York on September 15, 1938. Moritz listed his occupation as a butcher. Berta’s cousin Herman Blum was listed as the person they knew in the US.4

It took me longer to find out when Jacob arrived in the US because I was searching for him as Jacob, as that is how he was listed on Moritz’s naturalization petition. But the 1940 census has him identified as Theodore (and Rebecca as Ruth),5 and that gave me the necessary clue to find Jacob a/k/a Theodore’s naturalization petition. He arrived in the US as a 16-year-old on May 15, 1937. And on his 1942 petition he used his newly adopted name, Theodore.

Moritz Rosenberg, Declaration of Intention, (Roll 548) Declarations of Intention For Citizenship, 1842-1959 (No 426401-427400), Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., State and Federal Naturalization Records, 1794-1943

Theodore Jack Rosenberg a/k/a Jakob Teo Rosenberg, Declaration of Intention, The National Archives at Philadelphia; Philadelphia, PA; 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 561) Declarations of Intention For Citizenship, 1842-1959 (No 438701-439600), Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., State and Federal Naturalization Records, 1794-1943

The date of his arrival helped me locate Theodore’s ship manifest, where he identified his father as the person he was leaving behind, and his uncle, Herman Blum, as the person he was going to in the US. He is identified as Teo Rosenberg. (See the last line on the image below.)

Teo Rosenberg, ship manifest, The National Archives and Records Administration; Washington, D.C.; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at and Departing from Ogdensburg, New York, 5/27/1948 – 11/28/1972; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715, 1897-1957, Ship or Roll Number: Manhattan, Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957

In 1940, Moritz, Berta, and both of their children were living in New York City. Moritz and Berta were both working as salespeople for a wholesale dress business, and Theodore was a handyman for a venetian blinds company. They also had four lodgers living with them.

Moritz Rosenberg and family, 1940 US Census, Year: 1940; Census Place: New York, New York, New York; Roll: m-t0627-02670; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 31-1885, Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census

But while I was searching for information about Theodore/Jacob, I found Moritz and Berta and their children on an Ancestry family tree called the 2020 Jermyn Tree, owned by someone with a memorable name, James Bond. I might have thought that that name was a pseudonym, but fortunately I knew that my friend Amanda had a distant cousin with that name. So seeing the title with her surname and the name of the owner, I assumed there had to be some connection between my relative Moritz Rosenberg and his family and my friend Amanda.

Although Amanda’s name wasn’t revealed on the tree since she is still living, I knew her parents’ names, and they were on the tree. The connection appeared to be through Moritz Rosenberg’s wife Berta Blum, whose mother was Amalie Katz, but I couldn’t quite sort out how Robert Katz, Amanda’s father, was related to Amalie Katz.

I contacted Amanda, and she confirmed the connection and said that Berta Blum was in fact her relative—her third cousin, once removed, through Berta’s mother Amalie Katz and Amanda’s father Robert Katz. Even better, Amanda had been in touch with Moritz and Berta’s daughter Ruth (born Rebecca) and was able to provide me with more information about Ruth and her brother Theodore and their children.

For example, Amanda shared that Ruth had told her that her brother Theodore had enlisted in the US Army in the intelligence division and that the army had him change his surname from Rosenberg to Rogers since he was being sent to Germany. This helped me locate Theodore’s draft registration, which I had had trouble locating when searching for Theodore Rosenberg.

Theodore registered for the draft on February 15, 1942, and was still working for the venetian blinds company at that time. As you can see, he crossed out Rosenberg on his draft registration and inserted Rogers as his surname.

Theodore Rosenberg/Rogers, World War II draft registration, National Archives at St. Louis; St. Louis, Missouri; Wwii Draft Registration Cards For New York City, 10/16/1940 – 03/31/1947; Record Group: Records of the Selective Service System, 147, Ancestry.com. U.S., World War II Draft Cards Young Men, 1940-1947

Ruth Rosenberg married Henry Hammer (born Hammerschlag) after the war; their New York City marriage license is dated June 12, 1945.6 Henry was born on March 29, 1919, in Giessen, Germany.7 In 1950, Ruth and Henry were living in New York City, and Henry was working as a salesman for wholesale dry goods company. Ruth and Henry would have two children.8

Meanwhile, in 1950, Moritz, Berta, and Theodore were living together (along with Berta’s mother Amalie Blum) in New York City. Moritz and Berta now were in the wholesale liquor business together, and Theodore was continuing to sell venetian blinds.

National Archives at Washington, DC; Washington, D.C.; Seventeenth Census of the United States, 1950; Year: 1950; Census Place: New York, New York, New York; Roll: 4547; Page: 3; Enumeration District: 31-1731, Ancestry.com. 1950 United States Federal Census

Theodore didn’t marry until 1960 when he was 39 years old.9 His wife was Sylvia Kapp (originally Kappenmacher), born on February 20, 1938, in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, to Willi Kappenmacher and Erna Wolf. Sylvia and her parents had immigrated to the US on June 8, 1946,10 and were living in New York City in 1950. Theodore and Sylvia had two children born in the 1960s.

Sadly, those children lost their father when they were very young as Theodore died on November 13, 1971, at the age of fifty.11 He was survived not only by his wife and children, but also by both of his parents and his sister Ruth and her family.

Fortunately, Theodore’s father and especially his mother and sister were graced with very long lives. Moritz Rosenberg died on September 22, 1976, five years after his son. He had turned 89 years old just a week before.12

Berta Blum Rosenberg achieved a remarkable distinction—living to 112 years and becoming the oldest living Jewish person in the world at that time, as reported in her obituary in the January 30, 2009, Hackensack (NJ) Record:

Berta Blum Rosenberg obit

The Record Hackensack, New Jersey • Fri, Jan 30, 2009 Page L6

Berta died on January 28, 2009, in New York.13 She was survived by her daughter Ruth and her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Her daughter Ruth also lived a long life. She died on March 8, 2021, at the age in 96; her husband Henry Hammer had predeceased her by many years, having passed away on May 17, 1986, at the age of 67.14 Ruth was survived by her children and grandchildren as well as the children and grandchildren of her brother Theodore.

Those children and grandchildren of Ruth and Theodore create a link between my friend Amanda and myself. They are our mutual cousins—the descendants of my cousin, Moritz Rosenberg, and Amanda’s cousin, Berta Blum.

Isn’t genealogy fun?

  1. Amanda also shares some DNA with my husband, but given the different ancestral homes of each of them and the very small amount of DNA shared, it is likely just endogamy. ↩
  2. Theodore Jack Rosenberg a/k/a Jakob Teo Rosenberg, Declaration of Intention, The National Archives at Philadelphia; Philadelphia, PA; 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 561) Declarations of Intention For Citizenship, 1842-1959 (No 438701-439600), Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., State and Federal Naturalization Records, 1794-1943 ↩
  3. Moritz Rosenberg, Declaration of Intention, (Roll 548) Declarations of Intention For Citizenship, 1842-1959 (No 426401-427400), Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., State and Federal Naturalization Records, 1794-1943 ↩
  4. Ibid. ↩
  5. Moritz Rosenberg and family, 1940 US Census, Year: 1940; Census Place: New York, New York, New York; Roll: m-t0627-02670; Page: 1A; Enumeration District: 31-1885, Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census. See image below. ↩
  6. Ruth R Rosenberg, Gender Female, Marriage License Date 12 Jun 1945
    Marriage License Place Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA, Spouse Henry M Hammer. License Number 14437, New York City Municipal Archives; New York, New York; Borough: Manhattan; Volume Number: 21, Ancestry.com. New York, New York, U.S., Marriage License Indexes, 1907-2018 ↩
  7. Henry Hammerschlag World War II draft registration, National Archives at St. Louis; St. Louis, Missouri; Wwii Draft Registration Cards For New York City, 10/16/1940 – 03/31/1947; Record Group: Records of the Selective Service System, 147, Ancestry.com. U.S., World War II Draft Cards Young Men, 1940-1947 ↩
  8. Henry Hammer and family, 1950 US census, National Archives at Washington, DC; Washington, D.C.; Seventeenth Census of the United States, 1950; Year: 1950; Census Place: New York, New York, New York; Roll: 4377; Page: 19; Enumeration District: 31-2183, Ancestry.com. 1950 United States Federal Census ↩
  9. Theodore Rogers, Gender Male, Marriage License Date 1960, Marriage License Place Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA, Spouse Sylvia Kapp, License Number 11021, New York City Municipal Archives; New York, New York; Borough: Manhattan, Ancestry.com. New York, New York, U.S., Marriage License Indexes, 1907-2018 ↩
  10. Kappenmacher, ship manifest, The National Archives and Records Administration; Washington, D.C.; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at and Departing from Ogdensburg, New York, 5/27/1948 – 11/28/1972; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715, 1897-1957, Ship or Roll Number: Marine Tiger, Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957.  Erna Kapp, SSACI, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007. ↩
  11. Theodore Rogers, Birth Date 17 Jan 1921, Death Date 13 Nov 1971, SSN 116105571, Enlistment Branch ARMY, Enlistment Date 3 Mar 1943, Discharge Date 23 Dec 1945, Ancestry.com. U.S., Department of Veterans Affairs BIRLS Death File, 1850-2010 ↩
  12. Moritz Rosenberg, SSDI, Social Security Administration; Washington D.C., USA; Social Security Death Index, Master File, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014. Headstone at Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/36414768/moritz-rosenberg: accessed 07 August 2023), memorial page for Moritz Rosenberg (15 Sep 1887–Sep 1976), Find a Grave Memorial ID 36414768, citing Cedar Park Cemetery, Paramus, Bergen County, New Jersey, USA; Maintained by dalya d (contributor 46972551). ↩
  13. Berta Rosenberg, SSDI, Social Security Administration; Washington D.C., USA; Social Security Death Index, Master File, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014 ↩
  14. Henry Hammer, Age 67, Birth Date 29 Mar 1919, Death Date 17 May 1986
    Death Place North Bergen, Hudson, New Jersey, USA, New Jersey State Archives; Trenton, New Jersey; New Jersey, Death Indexes, 1904-2000, Ancestry.com. New Jersey, U.S., Death Index, 1848-1878, 1901-2017 ↩

Rebecca Blumenfeld Rosenberg’s Daughter-in-Law Bella: An Admirable Woman

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Rebecca Blumenfeld and Mendel Rosenberg’s second child was their son Joseph. As we saw, Joseph was born on February 4, 1886, in Rosenthal, Germany, and married Bella Oppenheim on February 21, 1913, in Bad Hersfeld, Germany. Bella was born there on June 8, 1891, to Aron Oppenheim and Hannchen Klebe. Bella’s sister Emma Oppenheim had married Meier Blumenfeld III on April 5, 1905, in Bad Hersfeld. Meier, the son of Giedel Blumenfeld and Gerson Blumenfeld, her first cousin, once removed, was thus Joseph Rosenberg’s first cousin, since their mothers Giedel and Rebecca were sisters.

Joseph and Bella had one child, Kurt, born in Sobernheim, Germany, on April 20, 1914.1 As I wrote in my earlier post, Sobernheim is not in the Hesse region where both Joseph and Bella were born and raised and where they married, but over 160 miles away in the Rhine Palatinate region.

Tragically, as we saw, Joseph, who was a doctor, died on May 4, 1922, at the age of 36, and was buried in Frankfurt, so perhaps he and his family had relocated from Sobernheim. His son Kurt was only eight years old when he lost his father.

Bella remarried a year after losing Joseph. Her second husband was Arthur Marx, born in Kempten, Germany, on August 4, 1890. They married in Frankfurt on June 22, 1923, in Frankfurt, and were living in Frankfurt.

Marriage of Bella Oppenheim Rosenberg to Arthur Marx, Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv; Wiesbaden, Deutschland; Bestand: 903, Year Range: 1923, Ancestry.com. Hesse, Germany, Marriages, 1849-1930

Kurt immigrated to the United States on October 16, 1937, when he was 23.2 His mother Bella and stepfather Arthur left Germany for the United States on May 27, 1938, and arrived in New York on June 2, 1938.

Arthur and Bella Marx passenger manifest, Year: 1938; Arrival: New York, New York, USA; Microfilm Serial: T715, 1897-1957; Line: 5; Page Number: 142, Ship or Roll Number: Europa, 
Ancestry.com. New York, U.S., Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957

Bella Oppenheim Rosenberg Marx then played a pivotal role in saving her niece Ruth Blumenfeld, the daughter of Emma Oppenheim and Meier Blumenfeld III, as I wrote about here. According to Ruth’s grandson Matthew, Bella, Ruth’s aunt, sponsored Ruth’s entry into the United States on March 4, 1940. Ruth was the only member of Emma and Meier’s family to survive the Holocaust. Her parents and her two sisters and their families were murdered by the Nazis. Matthew shared this photograph of Bella with her niece Ruth and Ruth’s husband Leo Friedman.

Bella Oppenheim Marx, Leo Friedman, and Ruth Blumenfeld Friedman. Courtesy of Matthew Steinhart

On the 1940 census, Bella and Arthur were living in Brooklyn, New York, and Arthur was working as a bank clerk and Bella as a practical nurse. They had two boarders living with them in addition to a niece (not Ruth), but not their son Kurt.

Arthur Marx and family 1940 US census, Year: 1940; Census Place: New York, Kings, New York; Roll: m-t0627-02580; Page: 4B; Enumeration District: 24-1310, Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census

Kurt, like his father Joseph, had become a doctor and was residing at Boulevard Hospital in Queens, New York, at the time of the 1940 census.2 He registered for the draft on October 16, 1940.

Kurt Rosenberg World War II draft registration, National Archives at St. Louis; St. Louis, Missouri; Wwii Draft Registration Cards For New York City, 10/16/1940 – 03/31/1947; Record Group: Records of the Selective Service System, 147, Ancestry.com. U.S., World War II Draft Cards Young Men, 1940-1947

After the war Kurt married Gertrude Stein,3 and in 1950 they were living in Queens and Kurt was practicing medicine.4 Kurt and Gertrude would have three children.

Unfortunately, like his father before him, Kurt died too young. He was 56 years old when he died suddenly on January 28, 1970, at the hospital where he worked as a gynecologist in Queens, New York. He was survived by his wife and children as well as his mother Bella.5

Bella died at the age of 94 on December 22, 1985.6 She had outlived her first husband Joseph Rosenberg and then her second husband Arthur Marx, who died on November 14, 1963, as well her son Kurt.7 She also had outlived her niece Ruth Blumenfeld Friedman, whose life she had helped to save back in 1940. Although she was only related to me by her marriage to my cousin Joseph Rosenberg, I feel a deep respect and a connection to her because of the life she lived and the things she endured along the way.

  1. Kurt Rosenberg, World War II draft registration, National Archives at St. Louis; St. Louis, Missouri; Wwii Draft Registration Cards For New York City, 10/16/1940 – 03/31/1947; Record Group: Records of the Selective Service System, 147, Ancestry.com. U.S., World War II Draft Cards Young Men, 1940-1947 ↩
  2. Kurt Rosenberg, 1940 US census, Year: 1940; Census Place: New York, Queens, New York; Roll: m-t0627-02721; Page: 7A; Enumeration District: 41-105, Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census ↩ ↩
  3.  New York City Municipal Archives; New York, New York; Borough: Queens, Ancestry.com. New York, New York, U.S., Marriage License Indexes, 1907-2018 ↩
  4. Kurt Rosenberg and family, 1950 US census, United States of America, Bureau of the Census; Washington, D.C.; Seventeenth Census of the United States, 1950; Record Group: Records of the Bureau of the Census, 1790-2007; Record Group Number: 29; Residence Date: 1950; Home in 1950: New York, Queens, New York; Roll: 4301; Sheet Number: 10; Enumeration District: 41-1012, Ancestry.com. 1950 United States Federal Census ↩
  5. Obituary for Kurt Rosenberg, Daily News, New York, New York, Thu, Jan 29, 1970
    Page 318. Kurt Rosenberg, Gender Male, Birth Date 20 Apr 1914, Death Date Jan 1970
    Claim Date 7 Mar 1970, SSN 072164680, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007 ↩
  6. Bella Marx, Social Security Number 079-22-4508, Birth Date 8 Jun 1891, Issue year Before 1951, Issue State New York, Last Residence 11375, Flushing, Queens, New York, USA, Death Date Dec 1985, Social Security Administration; Washington D.C., USA; Social Security Death Index, Master File, Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014; Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/77845632/bella-marx: accessed 29 May 2023), memorial page for Bella Marx (unknown–22 Dec 1985), Find a Grave Memorial ID 77845632, citing Mount Hebron Cemetery, Flushing, Queens County, New York, USA; Maintained by Athanatos (contributor 46907585). ↩
  7. Arthur Marx, Age 73, Birth Date abt 1890, Death Date 14 Nov 1963, Death Place Queens, New York, New York, USA, Certificate Number 14536, Ancestry.com. New York, New York, U.S., Death Index, 1949-1965 ↩