richardbrook@bruckfamilyblog.com, Author at bruckfamilyblog.com

POST 68: DR. JULIUS BRUCK AND HIS INFLUENCE ON MODERN ENDOSCOPY

UPDATED ON MAY 18, 2021

(UPDATES SHOWN IN RED)

Note: In this post, I talk about Dr. Julius Bruck, my first cousin three times removed, who laid the technical foundations for the development of modern endoscopy through his inventions of the stomatoscope and urethroscope.

POST 101: DR. WALTER WOLFGANG BRUCK: HIS DAUGHTER RENATE’S FIRST HUSBAND, A “SILENT HERO”

Figure 1. Dr. Julius Bruck (October 6, 1840-April 20, 1902)

I first heard about my distant and renowned ancestor, the dentist Dr. Julius Bruck (1840-1902) (Figure 1), from one of my German first cousins, probably in the 1990’s, when we initially met. I also learned he was buried in the Old Jewish Cemetery in Breslau [today: Wrocław, Poland] (Figure 2), and that his grave still exists. At the time, I was unaware of any surviving tombs of Bruck ancestors, although in the years since I’ve discovered others. For reference, two quick points. First, Dr. Julius Bruck’s father was Dr. Jonas Bruck (Figure 3), himself a dentist, whom I introduced to readers in Post 60 as the precocious lad who attended Ratibor’s Gymnasium, high school, in 1819 in its inaugural year. Second, Dr. Julius Bruck was my first cousin thrice removed.

Figure 2. Entrance to the Old Jewish Cemetery in Wrocław, Poland as it looked in 2014

Figure 3. Dr. Julius Bruck’s father, Dr. Jonas Julius Bruck (1813-1883)

Figure 4a. Panel at the entrance to the Old Jewish Cemetery in Wrocław, Poland identifying the location of noted Jews interred there, including Dr. Julius Bruck

Figure 4b. Closeup showing the location of Dr. Julius Bruck’s tomb in the Old Jewish Cemetery

My wife Ann Finan can attest to the numerous cemeteries we’ve visited across Europe seeking discernible proof of my ancestors’ connections to different places. In 2014, during a lengthy 13-week trip exploring cities and towns between Poland and Spain associated with my family, we stopped in Wrocław, Poland and visited Dr. Julius Bruck’s tomb. A photo of the very distinguished dentist is featured on a panel at the entrance to the Old Jewish Cemetery, pinpointing his tomb, alongside other prominent Jews interred there. (Figures 4a-b) Upon touring Julius’ grave, my wife and I discovered he is interred alongside his father Dr. Jonas Bruck (1813-1883), and their respective wives, Rosalie Bruck née Marle (1817-1890) and Bertha Bruck née Vogelsdorff (1843-1917). (Figures 5a-b) At the time, the headstones had fallen into disrepair, although have subsequently been beautifully restored. As an aside, on ancestry.com, I even found Bertha Bruck’s death announcement. (Figure 6)

Figure 5a. The headstones of Dr. Julius Bruck and his father, Dr. Jonas Bruck, and their respective wives in 2014, prior to restoration

Figure 5b. Closeup of Dr. Julius Bruck’s headstone in 2014, prior to restoration

Figure 6. Death announcement for Dr. Julius Bruck’s wife, Bertha Bruck née Vogelsdorff, from 4th of February 1917

Figure 7. Ms. Renata Wilkoszewska-Krakowska, Branch Manager, Museum of Cemetery Art (Old Jewish Museum) in 2014

Seeking to learn more about Dr. Julius Bruck, beyond what is easily retrievable from a web search, I inquired with cemetery personnel and was introduced to the on-site Branch Manager, Museum of Cemetery Art (Old Jewish Museum), Ms. Renata Wilkoszewska-Krakowska. (Figure 7) I learned the Old Jewish Cemetery is a branch of the City Museum of Wrocław, and that Jews, obviously, are no longer interred there. Archivists and museum personnel are naturally curious and intrigued when some foreigner shows up asserting an ancestral connection to someone from their area, particularly when that individual was Jewish. Such was the case in this instance. While obtaining little new information about Dr. Julius Bruck, I’ve learned and explained to readers the value of developing local contacts, so I resolved to stay in touch with Renata. Before parting ways, Renata asked me whether I knew or was related to a Dr. Erich Bruck (Figure 8), also buried in the Old Jewish Cemetery, whose very distinctive picture she gave me a copy of. Beyond having a common surname, I conceded I had no knowledge of this individual. That was five years ago, but in the subsequent post, I will tell readers how I recently stumbled across information about this previously unknown Bruck.

Figure 8. Dr. Erich Bruck shown in his military uniform wearing his Iron Cross, an unknown relative Ms. Renata Wilkoszewska-Krakowska asked me about in 2014, about whom I would later learn much more

Dr. Julius Bruck was born in Breslau on October 6, 1840 and died there on April 20, 1902. He studied dentistry and medicine at the universities of Breslau, Berlin, Bonn and Paris, and received his diploma as dentist from Berlin in 1858 and as Doctor of Medicine from Breslau University in 1866. In 1859, he became assistant to his father Dr. Jonas Bruck, and eventually succeeded him in his practice. In 1871 he was admitted to the faculty of Breslau University as privatdozent, university lecturer, receiving the honorary title of professor in 1891.

Not only was Dr. Julius Bruck one of the most famous dentists of his time, but he was also a fighter for dentists’ education and a very successful inventor. He gained prominence in the mid-1860’s for his inventions of the stomatoscope (i.e., an apparatus for illuminating the interior of the mouth to facilitate examination) (Figure 9) and the urethroscope (i.e., an instrument for viewing the interior of the urethra), both of which laid the technical foundations for the development of modern endoscopy. Through development of the stomatoscope, Julius applied the same successes that had been achieved for treatments of eye, ear, and larynx diseases to oral and dental diseases using better illumination. (Lutze 2017)

Figure 9. The stomatoscope invented by Dr. Julius Bruck in the mid-1860’s which for the first time used an annealing wire to light the mouth

Julius Bruck produced light by using an exposed electrically heated platinum loop, which at the time was the most powerful light source known. He imagined the possibility of placing the source of light in the distal end of an instrument and invented a double glass tube with a water-cooling compartment. This water-cooled apparatus, or diaphanoscope (i.e., an instrument for illuminating the interior of a cavity to determine the translucency of its walls), could transilluminate the bladder by being inserted into the rectum or vagina. (Zajaczkowski & Zamann 2004)

Julius focused on the research of his father in the area of Galvanokaustik, electroplating. In layman’s terms, suffice it to say that, in medicine, electroplating is an operating method that uses galvanic current-generated annealing heat for surgical purposes which is particularly suited for operations in the mouth and rectum. For the first time, Julius used the platinum glow wire, 0.3 to 1 mm in thickness. Julius himself described this method as resulting in the teeth being full illuminated so they were almost translucent; this meant that dental decay and diseases of the mouth could be detected that were invisible to the naked eye. The urethroscope essentially allowed a similar method to be used to illuminate and detect diseases of the bladder.

As previously mentioned, following my and my wife’s visit to Wrocław in 2014, I stayed in periodic contact with Ms. Wilkoszewska-Krakowska. Then, in 2016, Renata sent several photos of the meticulous restoration the City Museum of Wrocław had recently completed of Dr. Julius Bruck and family’s headstones. (Figures 10a-b)

Figure 10a. The headstones of Dr. Julius Bruck and his father, Dr. Jonas Bruck, and their respective wives in 2016, following restoration (compare to Figure 5a)

Figure 10b. Closeup of Dr. Julius Bruck’s headstone in 2016, following restoration (compare to Figure 5b)

Renata and I have recently re-established contact following a lengthy hiatus. While the subject of our more recent communications has been mostly about Dr. Erich Bruck, who as mentioned will be the focus of the ensuing Blog post, we’ve also discussed the fate of Dr. Julius Bruck’s two granddaughters and daughter-in-law. Since Breslau’s Old Jewish Cemetery is a branch of Wrocław’s City Museum, Renata Wilkoszewska-Krakowska regularly conducts walking tours telling visitors what she’s learned about the Jews interred there and contacts she’s in some cases made with their descendants. (Figure 11)

Figure 11. Ms. Renata Wilkoszewska-Krakowska conducting a walking tour in 2019 of Dr. Julius Bruck and his family’s tomb

Julius’s two granddaughters were named Hermine Bruck (1924-1924), who died in infancy, and Renate Bruck, born on the 16th of June 1926. A clue provided by one of my fourth cousins, more closely related to Julius and his son, Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck (1872-1937) (Figure 12), suggests Renate may have emigrated to England during or after WWII; I discovered a Renate Bruck listed in a Willesden, Middlesex, England marriage register, showing she had gotten married there to a man named Harry E. Graham in October, 1948. Uncertain whether this was Dr. Julius Bruck’s granddaughter, I ordered a copy of the marriage certificate from England’s General Register Office. It arrived only days ago, and the certificate confirms this is indeed the granddaughter of Dr. Julius Bruck and the surviving daughter of Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck. (Figure 13)

Figure 12. Dr. Julius Bruck’s son, Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck (1872-1937)

Figure 13. The marriage certificate for Dr. Julius Bruck’s granddaughter, Renate Stephanie Gertrude Bruck, who married her second husband Henry Ernst Graham in Willesden, Middlesex, England on the 18th of October 1948

The marriage certificate provides additional names that has enabled me to partially work out vital events in Renate’s life. Renate’s full name was “Renate Stephanie Gertrude Bruck.” Not only is Renate’s husband’s full name shown, Henry Ernst Graham, but her future father-in-law’s name is also provided, Hermann Gradenwitz (1876-1940) (Figure 14); this confirms that Renate’s husband anglicized his name upon his arrival in England to “Graham.” Both Renate and her husband had previously been married, Renate to a man named Eugen Walter Mehne, and Harry to a woman named Ruth Philipsborn (1914-2003); Henry and his first wife Ruth, I later discovered, married in 1935 in London indicating Henry had already emigrated from Germany by this time. Renate and Henry were married in the presence of a Marie Luise Gradenwitz (1881-1955), whom I later confirmed was Henry’s mother, née Mugdan. Curiously, Hermann Gradenwitz is buried with a Leo Mugdan, possibly his brother-in-law, as readers may be able to detect from their headstone.

Figure 14. Headstone in Berlin’s Zentralfriedhof Friedrichsfelde Cemetery for Hermann Gradenwitz (1876-1940), Renate Graham née Bruck’s father-in-law

Figure 15. 1908 Breslau Address Book listing Renate Bruck’s first husband, Eugen Walter Mehne, identifying him as an “instrumentenmacher,” an instrument maker

With new names in hand, I turned to ancestry.com and MyHeritage hoping to learn more about Renate and her family. Renate’s first husband, Eugen Walter Mehne, is initially listed in a 1908 Breslau Address Book showing he was an instrumentenmacher, an instrument maker (Figure 15); he is listed in a Breslau Address Book as late as 1939, and by then is a geigenbauer, violin maker. While I was unable to learn when or where Eugen was born or died, the fact that he was already in business in 1908, 18 years before Renate was even born, proves she married an older man. Similarly, her second husband, Harry Graham (aka Heinrich Gradenwitz), was significantly older when they married in 1948, he was 43 and she only 22. Harry, I discovered, was born on the 8th of November 1904 in Berlin, and died on the 7th of March 1959 in London.

I refer readers to Blog Post 101 in which I discuss in much more detail the Mehnes listed in the Breslau address books between 1908 and 1939. Suffice it to say, the Eugen Mehne listed as either an instrumentenmacher, an instrument maker, or geigenbauer, violin maker, between 1908 and 1934 is Albert Eugen Mehne, the father of Eugen Walter Mehne listed in 1935, 1936, and 1939 address books, identified as a geigenbauer or geigenbaumeister, master violin maker.

I found evidence of Renate’s third marriage in 1956 to a man named Gary Newman, thus before her second husband passed away in 1959. (Figure 16) A single reference indicates Renate died as Renate Newman on the 3rd of March 2013 in the United Kingdom.

Figure 16. Marriage register listing for Renate S.G. Graham (née Bruck) marriage to a man named Gary Newman in the last quarter of 1956 in Middlesex, England

Figure 17. “German Minority Census, 1939,” found in MyHeritage,” with Renate Bruck and her mother Johanna Bruck née Graebsch shown living in Wrocław at the time and giving their ages

To date, I’ve found no evidence that Renate ever had any children to continue Dr. Julius Bruck’s lineage. However, in the course of writing this Blog post, on MyHeritage, I just discovered that Renate’s mother, Johanna M. E. Bruck née Graebsch, whose fate was previously unknown to me, may also have emigrated to England. I last found evidence of her existence in a “1939 German Minority Census,” showing that she and Renate were registered as living in Breslau in May 1939 (Figure 17), a most dangerous time. I can find no indication she was murdered in the Holocaust, but the fleeting reference I just stumbled upon suggests she too emigrated to England and died there. As we speak, I’ve ordered the death certificate from the General Register Office for this Johanna Bruck to confirm my suspicion. Watch this space for an update.

REFERENCES

Lutze, Kay. “Und im Mund ward Licht!” Zahnärztliche Mitteilungen, Vol . 107, No. 18. 2017.

Zajaczkowski, Thaddaeus and Andreas Paul Zamann. “Julius Bruck (1840-1902) and his influence on the endoscopy of today.” World Journal of Urology, Vol. 22, Issue 4, August 2004: 293-303.

POST 67: THE SUSPICIOUSLY BRUTAL DEATHS OF MY FATHER’S PROTESTANT FRIENDS FROM DANZIG, GERHARD & ILSE HOPPE (PART I)

Note: This post is about two of my father’s former friends, non-Jews, from his time living in the Free State of Danzig in the 1930’s, and information I recently uncovered about their peculiar deaths.

Figure 1. My father, Dr. Otto Bruck, in Winter 1930-1931 in Danzig

Figure 2. My father, Dr. Otto Bruck, as a young dentist in Tiegenhof

My father, Dr, Otto Bruck, received his dental accreditation from the University of Berlin’s Zahnheilkunde Institut, Dentistry Institute, on the 31st of May 1930. This was followed by two brief dental apprenticeships, first in Königsbrück, in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, then in Allenstein, Germany [today: Olsztyn, Poland]. These lasted until about mid-August 1930 according to letters of recommendation written by the two respective dentists. My father did not open his own dental practice in Tiegenhof, Free State of Danzig [today: Nowy Dwór Gdański, Poland] until April 1932, so inasmuch as I can surmise from surviving letters and photos, my father spent the intervening period apprenticing in the Free City of Danzig. (Figures 1-2) He may have been mentored by a Dr. Fritz Bertram, a dentist whom he took pictures of (Figure 3) and who is identified by name in his surviving pocket calendar (Figure 4), the subject of Post 6.

Figure 3. Zahnarzt (dentist) Dr. Fritz Bertram sailing in the Bay of Danzig with friends on the 18th of April 1931; Dr. Bertram may have mentored my father

Figure 4. Page from my father’s 1932 Pocket Calendar listing a few names and phone numbers of business associates, notably, Dr. Fritz Bertram and Dr. Gerhard Hoppe

As a brief aside, my father’s decision to relocate to Danzig from Berlin may have been prompted by the fact he had an aunt and uncle who lived there, and that he was close to at least two of their three children (Figures 5-6), who interestingly I met when I was a young boy.

Figure 5. One of my father’s first cousins, Jeanne “Hansi” Goff née Loewenstein (1902-1986), on the 8th of March 1929 in Danzig, a cousin he may temporarily have stayed with while he was apprenticing there

Figure 6. Another of my father’s first cousins from Danzig, Heinz Loewenstein (1905-1979), brother of Hansi Goff

In any case, a gentleman whom my father befriended in Danzig was named Gerhard Hoppe. (Figure 7) As I discussed in Post 6, I learned from a 1934 Danzig Address Book that, like my father, he too was a dentist, in the adjacent town of Neuteich, Free State of Danzig [today: Nowy Staw, Poland] (Figure 8), 8.8 miles southwest of Tiegenhof. Possibly, Gerhard, who appears from pictures to have been about the same age as my father, may also have been a dental apprentice when he and my father became friends. (Figure 9)

Figure 7. The earliest of my father’s pictures of his former friend from Danzig, Dr. Gerhard Hoppe, with whom he may have apprenticed

Figure 8. Page from the 1934 Danzig Address Book listing dentists in the Free State of Danzig with both my father and Dr. Gerhard Hoppe from Neuteich listed; my father’s first name is erroneously listed as “Heinz” when his actual first name was “Otto” although the address of his dental practice, Markstrasse 8, is correct

Figure 9. Dr. Gerhard Hoppe as a young man

Figure 10. My father with Gerhard & Ilse Hoppe walking along Wollwebergasse in Danzig during the Winter of 1931-1932

Gerhard and his girlfriend Ilse (Figure 10) are among a group of my father’s former friends whose fates I’ve so far been unable to determine; pictures exist of all of them in my father’s surviving photo albums. These friends were non-Jewish, and I refer to them as “former” friends since during the Nazi era they would have been under enormous pressure to disassociate themselves from any Jews and any businesses they might have run. So, in the case of my father, I know that while he still had a few non-Jewish friends who whom he socialized, he no longer had any dental clients by the time he shuttered his practice and left Tiegenhof for good in 1937. The relationship he had with these erstwhile friends may have been more nuanced, but I don’t know this for a fact. Judging from the dates on my father’s pictures, after mid-1936, his circle of friends had narrowed considerably.

I’ve told readers that I periodically recheck these one-time friends’ names in ancestry.com and other ancestral databases. I recently did this again with Gerhard and Ilse, and, astoundingly, uncovered historic documents related to both. I tell myself I should perhaps be less surprised I discover new documents, and more bewildered I did not find them during earlier searches. Regardless, my recent finds have allowed me to sadly put to rest the fate of Gerhard and Ilse Hoppe. But, like most of the mysteries I seemingly resolve, they are like the mythological hydra, lop off one head and two grow in its place.

The search parameters I entered in ancestry.com were simply Gerhard’s first and last name, a place he might have lived, Danzig in this case, and the year I estimated he was born, so 1907, the same year my father was born. I immediately discovered his marriage certificate (Figures 11a-c), and the marriage register with he and his wife’s names, and their respective parents’ names. (Figure 12a-b)

Figure 11a. Ancestry.com cover page of Gerhard Hoppe & Ilse Hoppe née Grabowsky’s marriage certificate showing they were married on the 30th of July 1932 in Marienburg

Figure 11b. Page 1 of Gerhard Hoppe & Ilse Hoppe née Grabowsky’s marriage certificate

Figure 11c. Page 2 of Gerhard Hoppe & Ilse Hoppe née Grabowsky’s marriage certificate with the names of witnesses

Figure 12a. Ancestry.com cover page of marriage register listing for Gerhard Hoppe & Ilse Hoppe née Grabowsky

Figure 12b. Marriage register listing for Gerhard Hoppe & Ilse Hoppe née Grabowsky

The two-page marriage certificate, among other things, provides Gerhard’s complete name: “Gerhard Ludwig Rudolf Otto Hoppe”; his date of birth: 18th of February 1908; the date and place he was married: 30th of July 1932, Marienburg [today: Malbork, Poland] (Figure 13); his wife’s complete birth name: “Frida Charlotte Ilse Grabowsky” (also ending in “i” in some documents); his wife’s date of birth: 3rd of August 1907; and Gerhard’s profession: “Zahnarzt,” dentist. Three things instantly confirmed I had found the “right” Gerhard Hoppe: his date of birth off by one day from the date listed in my father’s pocket calendar (Figure 14), his wife’s name, Ilse, and his profession, dentist. Very likely, my father would have attended Gerhard and Ilse’s 1932 wedding. The second page of German marriage certificates typically list witnesses, but unfortunately my father’s name is not among them.

Figure 13. Photo taken by my father of the Castle of the Teutonic Order in Marienburg, today Malbork, the town where Gerhard & Ilse Hoppe were married in 1932

Figure 14. Page from my father’s 1932 Pocket Calendar showing Gerhard’s Hoppe birthday was on the 17th of February when in fact it was on the 18th of February

I would eventually locate documents for three generations of Gerhard and Ilse’s ancestors.

Now, here’s where things began to seriously stray from my preconceived notion of Gerhard and Ilse’s fates. With Ilse’s maiden name in hand, “Grabowsky,” I was now able to search entries for her. The first document I found for her was her death certificate showing she’d died on the 15th of April 1940 in the Langfuhr borough of Danzig (Figures 15a-b), known today as Gdansk-Wrzeszcz, the most upscale of Danzig’s boroughs, then and now. This document shows she died at less than 33 years of age, somewhat surprising but perhaps not so unusual given wartime realities. Shortly after discovering Ilse’s death certificate, I found Gerhard’s death record, showing he’d died on the 27th of July 1941 (Figures 16a-b), a little more than a year after his wife, also in Danzig-Langfuhr; at the time of his death he was 33, only slightly older than his wife had been. To say I was stupefied learning Ilse and Gerhard Hoppe had died so young, so soon after one another, and outside the theater of war would be an understatement.

Figure 15a. Ancestry.com cover page of Ilse Hoppe née Grabowsky’s death certificate identifying her parents, whom she pre-deceased, as Richard Grabowky(i) & Else Grabowsky(i) née Ehmer

Figure 15b. Ilse Hoppe née Grabowsky’s death certificate showing she supposedly committed suicide on the 15th of April 1940 in Danzig (her cause of death is circled)

Figure 16a. Ancestry.com cover page of Gerhard Hoppe’s death certificate, listing his parents, whom he pre-deceased, as Otto Hoppe & Anna Hoppe née Birkholz

Figure 16b. Gerhard Hoppe’s death certificate showing he died on the 27th of July 1941 in Danzig (his cause of death is circled)

Immediately curious as to whether the death certificates listed their causes of death, I turned to Mr. Peter Hanke. He is a German gentleman from “forum.danzig.de” with whom I’m in touch and who’d recently offered to ask the Polish archive in Malbork, Poland for death certificates for some of my father’s former friends, including Gerhard and Ilse Hoppe. I wanted to let him know I’d found their death certificates and ask if the records stated how they died. The answer left both of us horrified and saddened.

Ilse Hoppe’s cause of death was listed as:

“Todesursache: Durchschneiden der Halsschlagader (Selbstmord)” (Figure 15b)

Cause of death: cutting through the carotid artery (suicide)

And, Gerhard Hoppe’s death was caused by:

“Todesursache: Schädelbruch und komplizierter Oberschenkelbruch links- und rechtsseitig” (Figure 16b)

Cause of death: skull fracture and complicated thigh fracture on the left and right sides

Gerhard and Ilse Hoppe’s deaths leave us with more questions than answers given their extreme violence; they seem more like murders than suicides or health-related deaths.

According to Peter Hanke, an implausible but not impossible explanation as to the cause of Gerhard’s death may relate to the location of his apartment. I mentioned above that a 1934 Danzig Address Book indicates Gerhard was a dentist in Neuteich, Free State of Danzig, although by 1940-1941, a Danzig Address Book shows he’d relocated to Danzig proper and lived at Karrenwall 5 (Figure 17); he is not listed in the 1939 Address Book (Figure 18), suggesting he moved to Danzig in 1940 before Ilse’s death (i.e., Ilse commits suicide in Danzig, not Neuteich). Old German Address Books list people alphabetically as well as by street address and occupation, and, interestingly, in 1940-1941, Karrenwall 5 shows that not only did Gerhard Hoppe reside there but so too did numerous bureaus of the Nazi Party, the NSDAP (Figure 19), a trend that continues into 1942. (Figure 20) Could it be that the Nazi Party wanted Gerhard’s apartment, and was not squeamish about asserting its interests? We may never know. Unfortunately, contemporary Danzig newspapers have not yet been digitized, although by 1941 the news outlets were most assuredly controlled by the Nazis and are not likely to provide an accurate portrayal of what might have happened to Gerhard.

Figure 17. Page from 1940-1941 Danzig Address Book showing Dr. Gerhard Hoppe’s dental office was located at “Theaterplace 30” while his apartment was at “Karrenwall 5”

Figure 18. Page from 1939 Danzig Address Book listing tenants at Karrenwall 5 that year

Figure 19. Page from 1940-1941 Danzig Address Book listing tenants at Karrenwall 5 that year, including Dr. Gerhard Hoppe and various bureaus of the Nazi Party, the NSDAP

Figure 20. Page from 1942 Danzig Address Book, the year following Dr. Gerhard Hoppe’s death, showing Karrenwall 5 still housed various bureaus of the Nazi Party, the NSDAP

There exists a database of displaced Germans refugees from the former province of Danzig-Westpreußen, Germany, now Gdańsk and Bydgoszcz provinces in Poland, referred to as “Heimatortskartei, (HOK)” that include images of a civil register (handwritten and printed works); more than 20 million persons are included in these card files arranged by the town of origin. I discussed this database in Post 38. Peter Hanke checked the name “Hoppe” for Danzig, and, incredibly found HOK cards for Gerhard and Ilse’s daughter, Gisela Hoppe, born on the 24th of November 1939 in Danzig (Figure 21), and for Gerhard Hoppe’s parents, Otto Hoppe and Anna Hoppe née Birkholz (Figures 22a-b), who raised Gisela after her parents’ deaths. The timing of Ilse Hoppe’s supposed suicide less than a year after her daughter’s birth makes the cause of her death even more suspicious.

Figure 21. “Heimatortskartei, (HOK)” (File of Displaced Germans) card for Gerhard & Ilse Hoppe’s daughter, Gisela Hoppe, born on the 24th of November 1939, showing that in 1958 she lived in Bad Harzburg, Germany

Figure 22a. Front side of “Heimatortskartei, (HOK)” (File of Displaced Germans) card for Gerhard’s father, Otto Hoppe, showing his granddaughter Gisela Hoppe’s address in 1958

Figure 22b. Back side of “Heimatortskartei, (HOK)” (File of Displaced Germans) card for Otto Hoppe listing his wife, Anna Hoppe née Birkholz, and granddaughter, Gisela Hoppe

Gisela is shown living in Bad Harzburg, Germany in May 1958. As I prepare to publish this post, just this morning I learned that Gisela, who is about to turn 80 years of age towards the end of November, is still alive. As we speak, I’m trying to establish contact with her and share the multiple images I have of her parents. (Figures 23-24) Watch this space for Part II of the story!

Figure 23. Gerhard & Ilse Hoppe on the beach in Zoppot, Germany [today: Sopot, Poland]

POST 66: DR. WALTER ROTHHOLZ, INTERNEE IN NAZI-OCCUPIED NORWAY

Note: In this post I discuss the internment of Dr. Walter Rothholz, my second cousin once removed, in Nazi-occupied Norway focusing primarily on the historic events surrounding this occupation.

Figure 1. Dr. Walter Rothholz (1893-1978) in 1964

Dr. Walter Rothholz (1893-1978) who I first introduced to readers in the previous post (Post 65) was a lawyer with a Dr. jur. (Doctor juris). (Figure 1) He is my second cousin once removed. Even was I positioned to present a complete biography of Dr. Rothholz that is not my aim, nor would that be of any interest to readers. Where I delve into specific ancestors, my goal is to show how their lives intersected with major historic events of their time, so in the case of Dr. Rothholz, how his life was upended by the Nazi occupation of Norway starting in 1940 and how he barely survived that ordeal.

Figure 2. Else Marie “Elsemai” Rothholz née Bølling (1915-1976) in 1964, Dr. Walter Rothholz’s wife

Dr. Rothholz was born in Stettin, Germany [Szczecin, Poland] in 1893, a place previously discussed where various of my ancestors come from. Rothholz was decorated with the German Iron Cross for his heroism during WWI. Between the first and second World Wars, he was an international law expert who worked for the German Foreign Ministry. In 1936, he married Else Marie “Elsemai” Bølling (1915-1976) (Figure 2), a Norwegian woman, a move that allowed him to emigrate to Norway in 1939 and seemingly escape the Nazi scourge. Students of history will realize this was not to be Dr. Rothholz’s fate.

Briefly, some history. Operation Weserübung (German: Unternehmen Weserübung) was the code name for Germany’s assault on Denmark and Norway during WWII and the opening operation of the Norwegian Campaign. The name comes from the German for “Operation Weser-Exercise,” the Weser being a German river. The German occupation of Norway began on the 9th of April 1940 after German forces invaded neutral Norway. Conventional armed resistance to the Germans ended on the 10th of June 1940. Germany occupied Denmark and invaded Norway, ostensibly as a preventive maneuver against a planned, and openly discussed, Franco-British occupation of Norway.

German occupation of Norway lasted until the 8-9th of May 1945 following the capitulation of the German forces in Europe. Throughout this period, Norway was continuously occupied by the Wehrmacht (i.e., the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945). Civil rule was effectively assumed by the Reichskommissariat Norwegen, which acted in collaboration with Norway’s pro-German puppet government, Vidkun Quisling’s regime, giving us the origin of the word “quisling,” collaborator or traitor. During the “occupation period,” the Norwegian King Haakon VII and the prewar government escaped to London, where they acted as a government in exile.

Dr. Rothholz was interned in Berg prison on October 26, 1942. Berg interneringsleir (Berg internment camp) was a concentration camp near Tønsberg, Norway that served as an internment and transit center for Jews and later political prisoners during the Nazi occupation of Norway; it is located approximately 102km (63 mile) south-southwest of Oslo. Berg was the only prison camp in Norway that had only Norwegian prison guards, whose treatment of prisoners was particularly harsh, so much so that three of them were sentenced after the war to life-long forced labor. What precipitated Rothholz’s internment on October 26th was a message from Berlin received the previous day ordering the arrest of all Norwegian male Jews. Already by the 26th of October, 60 of the first Jews arrested had been gathered in Berg, where they were set up to build the camp.

The Jewish round ups involved both Norwegian police authorities and German Geheime Staatspolizei (abbreviated Gestapo, the official secret police of Nazi Germany and German-occupied Europe); Sicherheitsdienst (SD, the intelligence agency of the SS and Nazi party in Nazi Germany); and Schutzstaffel (SS, the German “protective echelon” founded in 1925 as Hitler’s personal guards). By November 26th, women and children were also arrested for deportation. That same day, the male prisoners were divided into two groups: those who were married to Norwegian women, and those who were unmarried or married to non-Aryan women. The last group was sent to the extermination camps. A total of 227 Jewish men were deported from Berg to the extermination camp of Auschwitz in Oświęcim, Poland. Only seven of these men survived. The few Jews who were married to “Aryans” remained in Berg, as in Dr. Rothholz’s case.

There is a humiliating side story about the Berg internment camp. It was referred to as “Quisling’s chicken farm” because some Jews and other Nazi opponents wore metallic poultry leg bands on their fingers as protest markers against the Nazi authorities and the German Occupation; the pro-Nazi government decided to create a “hen farm” for these “chickens” at Berg. In a speech delivered to the National Assembly on Pentecost 1942, President Vidkun Quisling said, “. . .some people walk around with chicken rings on their fingers. . .we’re going to create chicken farms for them. Here near Tønsberg we will thus be able to get a large hen farm.”

In the Jewish campaigns in Norway, 767 of the approximately 1,800 Jews living there were sent to the German concentration camps in Poland. Only 32 of these survived.

On December 2, 1942 Dr. Rothholz was moved from the Berg internment camp to Grini (Norwegian: Grini fangeleir; German: Polizeihäftlingslager Grini), the Nazi concentration camp in Bærum, Norway, which operated between around June 1941 and May 1945. Bærum is a suburb of Oslo and is located on the west coast of the city. The camp was run by SS and Gestapo personnel. Dr. Rothholz had a good understanding of the geography of Germany so as the noose was slowly closing and the war was ending, he was able to keep his fellow prisoners informed of what the messages from the front meant.

Other than guards, the German occupiers devoted few personnel to the camp. Since many politicians, academics and cultural personalities were detained at Grini, a certain level of internal organization was established by the prisoners. They toiled in manufacturing, agriculture and other manual labor, with much of this work taking place outside the camp. Grini was liberated on the 7th of May 1945, although Dr. Rothholz had apparently already been evacuated to Sweden on the 2nd of May. Walter’s son, also named Walter Rothholz, was born while he was interned. (Figures 3-4)

Figure 3. Dr. Walter & Elsemai Rothholz’s son, Dr. Walter Rothholz, born on April 7, 1943 in Asker, Norway, while his father was interned in Norway’s Grini concentration camp

Figure 4. Dr. Walter & Elsemai Rothholz’s daughter, Dr. Anna Rothholz, born on October 25, 1937

Dr. Rothholz was granted Norwegian citizenship after the war and returned to Germany for a period. He became involved in the refugee situation and other international law issues.

Consequentially, Rothholz testified in 1967, along with other of his fellow prisoners, against Hellmuth Reinhard. Reinhard was the head of the Gestapo in Norway between 1942 and 1945. His ability to largely avoid being punished for his crimes against humanity is a sad commentary and worth a short sidebar.

Hellmuth Reinhard was born Hermann Gustav Hellmuth Patzschke in Unterwerschen, Germany, but changed his name in April 1939 to the more Germanic-sounding “Reinhard.” He joined the SS in March 1933, and soon became a member of the National Socialist German Workers’ Party (German: NSDAP), the Nazi Party. He had a law office at the Reichsführer-SS Sicherheitsdienst in Leipzig from 1935; later served at the SD headquarters of the Reichsicherheitshaumptamt (RHSA, the Reich Main Security Office, an organization subordinate to Heinrich Himmler); then in 1939, transferred to the Sicherheitspolizei (SiPo). From August 1940, he worked in Amsterdam at the central office for Jewish emigration from the Netherlands. Eventually, he came to Norway in January 1942 as head of the Gestapo.

Hellmuth Reinhard was second in command to Heinrich Fehlis in Norway. He had the rank of SS-Hauptsturmführer, corresponding to captain, then became SS-Sturmbannführer, equivalent to major. According to historians, Reinhard had primary responsibility for the deportation of Jews from Norway. Whether Adolf Eichmann gave direct orders to deport Jews from Norway, or whether Reinhard took the initiative based on Hitler’s overall plans for Jews is not clear. Regardless, Reinhard was the individual responsible for notifying the Gestapo in Stettin that 532 Jews were on their way aboard the SS Donau (Danube) on November 26, 1942.

At the end of the war, Reinhard was in the German state of Schleswig-Holstein, where, using his birth name Patzschke, he was released by British occupation authorities, obviously unaware of his SS background. Incredibly, Reinhard reverted to his birth name, resumed contact with his wife and children, then, in 1951 after “Reinhard” was declared dead, remarried his wife who was then officially a widow. It was only later that the German War Crimes Office in Ludwigsburg, investigating the Gestapo commander in Norway, discovered that the “widow” had married a man of the same birth name as Reinhard. He was arrested in December 1964 and brought up on charges in 1967. The charges involved murder and complicity in murder.

The charge against Reinhard that Walter Rothholz and other former Jewish prisoners testified to related to the deportation of the Norwegian Jews. The various witnesses claimed the internment and deportation of the Norwegian Jews could not have happened without Reinhard’s knowledge. Despite the substantial body of evidence supporting Reinhard’s involvement in the Jewish deportations and several murders, on June 30, 1967, he was sentenced to a mere five years for complicity in the murders during a counter-resistance action dubbed “Operation Blumenpflücken.” While Reinhard was also found guilty of deporting Jews, he supposedly could not be sentenced for this crime because the statute of limitations of 15 years for deportations had run out. Unbelievably, Reinhard was released in 1970 having served barely three years.

The trail was followed closely in Norway, and the verdict, once rendered, was characterized by the Norwegian newspapers as “scandalously mild.”

Let me end on a personal note. My father, a German-trained dentist, was never able to convince the American authorities to recognize his German credentials following his arrival here in 1948; they wanted him to redo his dental studies, something he felt he was too old to contemplate. Still, hoping to resume his dental profession in Germany, he travelled there in the mid-1950’s. For reasons that remain unclear and which we obviously never discussed, my father’s return to Germany never happened. I’ve often wondered whether this might have been related to the “hostile” environment he found in Germany where “low-level” German supporters of the Nazi regime had comfortably resumed their lives and reoccupied positions of power, and protected their former co-conspirators? Perhaps, it’s a rhetorical question to which there is no answer. Or, maybe, the mild judgement meted out to the mass murderer Hellmuth Reinhard was a manifestation of Germans disregarding the past. My father was a man with strong moral principles and would have been deeply offended by this dismissal of past sins, particularly since his beloved sister Susanne was murdered in Auschwitz. During our own McCarthy Era, I remember my father abruptly cancelling his subscription to the former “Long Island Press” for their unbridled support of Senator Joe McCarthy, so it would not surprise me that my father could not abide returning to post-war Germany under the prevailing circumstances of the time.

POST 65: GERMANY’S LAST EMPEROR, WILHELM II, PICTURED WITH UNKNOWN FAMILY MEMBER

Note: In this post, I discuss a postcard given to me showing the last German Emperor, Wilhelm II, taken in Doorn in the Netherlands in May 1926, following Wilhelm’s abdication from the throne after Germany’s defeat in WWI, with an unknown member of my extended family standing amidst the Royal family.

Among my father Dr. Otto Bruck’s surviving collection of pre-WWII photos are several unique ones of historic interest. These include a small number replicated in Post 8 showing Field Marshall Hermann Wilhelm Göring, one of the most powerful figures in the Nazi Party, taken in 1935 in Tiegenhof, Free State of Danzig [today: Nowy Dwór Gdański, Poland]; at the time, Göring was participating in a campaign event in support of the slate of Nazi candidates running for office there, and an election parade passed just below the office building in which my father had his dental practice.

An equally fascinating photo, illustrated in Post 17, shows a young Käthe Heusermann, who at the time was working as a dental assistant for my uncle, Dr. Fedor Bruck, in Liegnitz, Germany [today: Legnica, Poland]. In 1933, after my uncle was forced by the Nazi overlords to shutter his dental practice, Käthe relocated to Berlin and was hired by Hitler’s dentist, Dr. Hugo Blaschke, as his dental assistant. Following the end of the war, Käthe Heusermann, was instrumental in helping the Russians identify Hitler’s dental remains, although, as discussed in Post 31, it would be many years before this fact was publicly acknowledged by the Russians. Because Käthe had always attended Hitler’s dental treatments, she was well-positioned to recognize Blaschke’s distinct and outdated periodontal work.

And, apropos of this post with a photo of the last German Emperor Wilhelm II, in Post 15 one of my father’s surviving photos illustrates the Kaiser’s daughter-in-law, the last Crown Princess of Germany and Prussia, Princess Cecilie. (Figures 1-2) She is touring my renowned great-aunt Franziska Bruck’s flower school and shop in Berlin. Duchess Cecilie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin (Cecilie Auguste Marie; 20 September 1886 – 6 May 1954) was the last German Crown Princess and Crown Princess of Prussia as the wife of German Crown Prince Wilhelm, the son of German Emperor Wilhelm II.

Figure 1. Last Crown Princess of Germany & Prussia, Princess Cecilie, visiting my great-aunt Franziska Bruck’s “Schule für Blumenschmuck” (flower school)

Figure 2. Cecilie of Mecklenberg-Schwerin, Crown Princess of Germany and Prussia, daughter-in-law of the last German Emperor, Wilhelm II

The current post is about an intriguing, captioned family photo that was given to me by one of my third cousins (Figures 3a-b), Andreas “Andi” Pauly, whom regular readers will recognize from earlier posts. The photo was part of a collection of family pictures I obtained, so I only came to realize its significance after I had the message translated. (Figure 4) The photo was turned into a postcard, and obviously mailed in a stamped envelope because the postcard has no stamp and address on the flip side, but unfortunately the envelope has not survived so the sender is unknown.

Figure 3a. Postcard of the last German Emperor Wilhelm II, his second wife Princess Hermine Reuss of Greiz (1887-1947), and her youngest daughter by her first marriage, Princess Henriette of Schönaich-Carolath (1918-1972), taken in 1926 in Doorn, the Netherlands. An unknown member of the family is surrounded by the Royal Family’s entourage

Figure 3b. Flip side of postcard faintly dated 28th of May 1926 in lower left, signed “W.B.” in lower right

Figure 4. Translation of postcard’s message

I didn’t comprehend who the people in the photo were until I did an Internet query on “Doorn.” I discovered this is in the Netherlands and is where Germany’s former Emperor, Wilhelm II, went into exile after he abdicated the throne following Germany’s defeat in WWI. I had no reason to recognize Wilhelm II but mention of Royalty led me to ask one of my German cousins who is a historian whether he recognized anyone in the photo, and he confirmed it was Germany’s last Kaiser. My cousin was quite excited by this discovery because it reinforced his belief in our family’s connection to the upper echelons of Prussian society.

Figure 5. Postcard-sender’s wife circled standing behind Princess Henriette of Schönaich-Carolath

The message on the card pinpoints only a young princess, “Carolath,” and the postcard-sender’s wife standing behind her without a hat, with no name given. (Figure 5) Comparing the postcard to known photos of the Royal family, we can identify in the front row, the German Emperor’s second wife, Princess Hermine Reuss of Greiz (1887-1947); her youngest daughter by her first marriage, Princess Henriette of Schönaich-Carolath (1918-1972); and the former German Emperor, Wilhelm II. The writer tells us among the rest of the entourage are some of Princess Hermine’s older daughters, as well as some of the Emperor’s former generals. I’ve not positively been able to identify by name any of Princess Hermine’s other children, nor any of the Kaiser’s generals, although I was able to find a picture on the Internet with only Princess Hermine, Wilhelm II, and Princess Henriette (Carolath) taken at Doorn at about the same time. (Figure 6)

Figure 6. Photo from the Bundesarchiv Bild (102-11383) showing the German Emperor at Doorn with his second wife Princess Hermine Reuss of Greiz and Carolath, her youngest daughter by her first marriage, taken about the same time as the photo on the postcard

What I’ve also been able to learn is that after Princess Henriette’s father died in 1920, her mother, Princess Hermine, remarried in 1922 the former German Emperor, Wilhelm II. Hermine had five young children, but it was decided that only the youngest, Princess Henriette, would come with her mother to live at Doorn. Wilhelm II generally kept out of his stepchildren’s affairs apart from Henriette. He had a genuine affection for her, and when she got engaged to the Emperor’s own grandson, Prince Karl Franz of Prussia, on the 6th of August 1940 at Doorn, Wilhelm II made the official announcement.

The message on the postcard provides clues as to who mailed it and to whom it was mailed and was an obvious starting point for trying to unravel the sender and receiver of the card. Faintly visible at the bottom is the date the postcard was written, the 28th of May 1926. My intimate familiarity with my extended family tree and the fact the photo was given to me by a member of the Pauly family clearly led both Andi and me to conclude the card had been sent to my great-great-aunt, Rosalie “Salchen” Pauly née Mockrauer (1844-1927). (Figures 7-8) Rosalie Pauly was the only one of her Pauly generation still alive in 1926, although she would die the following year.

Figure 7. Rosalie “Salchen” Pauly née Mockrauer, my great-great-aunt as a young woman, the recipient of the postcard mailed in 1926

Figure 8. My great-great-aunt Rosalie Pauly in 1917

Having rather quickly satisfied myself as to the receiver of the postcard, I then tackled the much more challenging task of trying to resolve who sent the card to Rosalie Pauly. Readers will immediately notice the sender only signed his initials, “W.B.,” who, at first, I thought might be a member of my Bruck family; I quickly discarded this theory because the writer tells us that on the 28th of May 1926 his wife is due to give birth in about eight days, thus in early June 1926, and I know of no Bruck offspring related to Rosalie Pauly born in that timeframe.

We know the postcard-writer was male because, as previously mentioned, he identifies his wife in the picture standing behind Wilhelm II’s stepdaughter, Carolath, as he refers to her. It’s not clear whether “Carolath” was a diminutive intended as an affectionate nickname to be used only by close family and friends, or how she was known publicly. It seems odd that a member of my extended family would be photographed amidst the former Royal family in a seemingly intimate setting if they were not readily acquainted in some way. More on this later.

The writer of the postcard tells my great-great-aunt Rosalie that the visit of her grandson reminded him to send her the photograph of the Royal couple; Walter Rothholz senior (1893-1978) (Figure 9), mentioned by name a few lines further down, was Rosalie’s eldest grandson and would have been 33 years of age at the time the card was written.

Figure 9. Walter Rothholz in 1964, Rosalie Pauly’s eldest grandson whose name is mentioned in the postcard

Figure 10. Else Marie “Elsemai” Rothholz née Bølling in 1964, Walter Rothholz’s wife

I have a theory as to the sender of the postcard, so far unprovable but conceivable. Walter Rothholz senior was married to a Norwegian woman, Else Marie “Elsemai” Bølling (1915-1976). (Figure 10) Initially, I considered the possibility that one of Else Marie’s brothers had a prename beginning with the initial “W.” I located a Bølling family tree on Geni.com naming Else Marie’s siblings but none begin with this letter. However, I discovered on this family tree that Else Marie’s father had a brother born in Kristiania (Oslo, Norway) named Wilhelm Henning Bølling (1891-1930), that’s to say her uncle, who would have been the right age to have a young family in 1926; he would have been only two years older than Walter Rothholz. If Wilhelm Bølling was the writer of the postcard, his wife is the one pictured. Her prename was “Ingrid,” although no surname is provided. While the Bølling family tree includes multiple photos of family members, including one of Wilhelm Bølling (Figure 11), none of Ingrid are included making it impossible to compare against the woman on the postcard.

Figure 11. Wilhelm Henning Bølling (1891-1930), Else Marie’s uncle and possible sender of the postcard showing Germany’s last Emperor, Wilhelm II

According to the Bølling family trees on Geni, Wilhelm and Ingrid had a daughter named Wivi Aase Bølling, but no vital data is provided nor is any photo included.

Figure 12. Wilhelm Henning Bølling’s probate record showing he died in the United Kingdom in 1930

Wilhelm Bølling is known to Walter Rothholz’s living son, also named Walter; Wilhelm was a very wealthy shipowner who transported coal. According to Walter, he committed suicide. (Figure 12) Given Wilhelm’s connection to the coal trade and its importance to Germany at the time, it’s imaginable he may have been a business associate of and socialized with the German Emperor during and after his rule. Pending the discovery of a photo of Wilhelm Bølling’s wife or a date for the birth of his daughter Wivi Aase, the question of which family member stands amidst Germany’s last Royal family remains a mystery.

POST 64: MY COUSIN AGNES STIEDA’S FATHER, ART HISTORIAN DR. HANS VOGEL

Note: This is a post about Dr. Hans Vogel, father of my Canadian third cousin Agnes Stieda née Vogel who was the subject of Posts 46 and 63. In this post, I briefly relate a few aspects of Dr. Vogel’s life and highlight one of his major accomplishments.

Figure 1. Undated photo of Dr. Hans Vogel and his wife Susanne Vogel née Neisser, Agnes Stieda’s parents

In the course of doing forensic investigations into my Jewish ancestors, I often learn they were renowned and very accomplished people. Where the forebears are unknown to me, I typically begin by searching their names on the Internet. Since all my father’s immediate ancestors were German, I also search for them on German Wikipedia. This post is the tale of one such individual, Dr. Hans Martin Erasmus Vogel, my third cousin Agnes Stieda née Vogel’s father. (Figures 1-2) Regular readers will recall that Agnes has been the subject of two earlier posts, and that her father has been mentioned in both. It is not my intention to present Dr. Vogel’s biography here, but merely to highlight a few relevant facts that reflect the era in which he lived and one of his major achievements.

I’ve previously told readers of my father’s family ties to Ratibor [today: Racibórz, Poland] in Upper Silesia, but there are other larger Prussian cities to which my extended family was connected, notably, Posen [today: Poznan, Poland], where my Pauly relatives were from, Breslau [today: Wrocław, Poland], and Stettin [today: Szczecin, Poland]. Dr. Hans Vogel was born in Stettin on the 28th of July 1897, and graduated from the Gymnasium, high school, there in 1916. Following his graduation until 1918, he was a Sergeant Major during WWI, and was badly wounded during the war. Upon his recuperation in 1919, he studied political science and in 1923 received his Dr. rer. pol. (Doctor rerum politicarum), Doctor of Political Science. Then, from 1923 to 1925, he studied art history in Marburg and Leipzig, and graduated with his Dr. phil. (Doctor philosophiae), Doctor of Philosophy.

Figure 3. Friedrich Heinrich Prinz von Preußen, member of the House of Hohenzollern, as a young man in his regimental uniform

From 1925 until 1932, Dr. Vogel worked as an art historian. He was a volunteer at the Kunstgewerbemuseum (Museum of Applied Arts) in Leipzig; established an art and local history museum in Zeulenroda in the state of Thuringia; was an assistant at the Städtisches Museum in Moritzburg; and was a lecturer for art history and a librarian at the Staatliche Kunstakademie in Kassel; after the Kunstakademie closed in 1932, he worked as a “wissenschaftlicher Hilfsarbeiter,” an unpaid scientific assistant, at the Gemäldegalerie and Landesmuseum in Kassel. In 1934, Dr. Vogel’s continued employment at the museum in Kassel was no longer possible because of his so-called “mixed marriage” to Agnes’s Jewish or “non-Aryan” mother, Susanne Vogel née Neisser. Between 1934 and 1935, while trying in vain to emigrate, he managed to secure a grant to inventory the building content and art collection of the Hohenzollern in Sigmaringen in southwestern Germany. This work caught the attention of Friedrich Heinrich Prinz von Preußen (Figure 3), who was a Prussian officer and member of the House of Hohenzollern, and led to a project in 1936 cataloging the Prince’s library and copperplate collection; by 1937 though Dr. Vogel was relegated to a clerical position in the property of the Prince.

Figure 4. Friedrich Heinrich Prinz von Preußen (1874-1940) in the 1930’s when Dr. Hans Vogel worked for him on his estate in Kamenz, Prussia [today: Kamieniec Ząbkowicki, Poland]

Figure 5. Another photo of Friedrich Heinrich Prinz von Preußen taken in the 1930’s

Dr. Vogel’s daughter Agnes has fond memories of Friedrich Heinrich Prinz von Preußen (1874-1940) (Figures 4-5), not the least because he protected her family and provided work for her father during the war. Friedrich Heinrich was an interesting character. He studied law at Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität in Bonn; upon graduation he joined the military under a position of à la suite, which was a military title given to those who were assigned to the army or a particular unit for honor’s sake, and entitled to wear a regimental uniform, but otherwise had no official position. However, in early 1907 he was relieved from his position à la suite as a regimental commander because of his homosexuality. He was excluded from the Prussian army for this reason, but at the beginning of WWI he was once again allowed to become a soldier, but only at the rank of Gefreiter, basically a Private First Class, with no opportunity for promotion.

In late 1906, Friedrich Heinrich was nominated by Kaiser Wilhelm II as Lord Master of the Order of St. John as the successor to his late father who’d died earlier that year. The poorly kept secret of Friedrich Wilhelm’s homosexuality, however, caused him to ask the Kaiser to withdraw his nomination, which he did. Eventually, the press learned and published the motive for the change in leadership for the Knights of St. John, “because he [Friedrich Heinrich] suffers from the inherited perversion of the sex instinct.” Having been “outed,” he was urgently advised to leave Berlin. After stays in southern France and Egypt, Friedrich Heinrich lived from then on withdrawn on his Silesian estates where Dr. Vogel worked for him. According to published accounts, Friedrich Heinrich contributed greatly to the economic development of the southeastern part of the county of Glatz [today: Kłodzko, Poland] where his estate was located and was popular among his subjects because of his concern for their well-being.

Dr. Vogel remarked that living in the countryside in a state of complete social isolation left him with much time to continue his private art history studies, which served him well after the war. As the war progressed, Dr. Vogel was increasingly at risk from the Gestapo, on account of his “mixed marriage.” Forewarned in time, he fled to Potsdam, a suburb of Berlin. In Post 46, Agnes described it as such:

My father was responsible for bringing his Unit’s mail to the train, and when he noticed the train was headed to Berlin, he took that opportunity to jump onboard and defect, hoping to find us when he arrived in Potsdam; we had always found shelter there in the apartment of the mother of one my mother’s good friends. By defecting, my father had taken a huge risk since defectors were shot on sight. But he was not discovered and entered Berlin which was aflame.

Following the end of WWII, Dr. Vogel was unable to immediately find employment in a museum, so for a time worked at the local Municipal School Office in Potsdam retraining former teachers and training new ones. Then, in 1946, he was hired as the Director of the Staatlichen Kunstsammlungen Kassel (Museumslandschaft Hessen Kassel). When Dr. Vogel arrived, he found a bomb-destroyed gallery, so the reconstruction of the Kassel Museum after the war was largely his doing. Many of the museum’s monuments and paintings had been moved elsewhere during the war for safekeeping. One of the most important events during Dr. Vogels’s tenure as Director was the return of the so-called “Viennese Pictures” in 1955; this involved the repatriation of 64 very precious paintings including Rembrandt’s “Jacob Blessing the Sons of Joseph,” as well as artworks by Albrecht Dürer, Titian, Rubens and von Dyck. (Figures 6a-b) Given the legitimate hostility countries felt towards Germany after WWII and the prevailing “cold war,” it was certainly not a given all countries would return art work that had been squirrelled away inside their borders; a few might reasonably have viewed retention of these valuable masterpieces as reparations. Regardless, the fact that Dr. Vogel, on behalf of the Museumslandschaft Hessen (Museum of Hessian History (MHK)) (Figures 7a-b), was able to recover the Viennese Pictures certainly stands as one of his most significant achievements, almost a “monuments men” moment.

Figure 6a. Dr. Hans Vogel in 1955 with the paintings he retrieved from Vienna, Austria that had been stored there for safekeeping during WWII

Figure 6b. Dr. Hans Vogel holding Albrecht Dürer’s, the “Portrait of Elsbeth Tucher,” painted in 1499, that was among the so-called “Viennese Pictures” he repatriated from Vienna in 1955

Figure 7a. The “Museumslandschaft Hessen” (Museum of Hessian History) in Kassel, Germany, where Dr. Vogel was the Director between 1946 and 1961

Figure 7b. One of the crated “Viennese Pictures” being carried into the “Museumslandschaft Hessen” in 1955

Dr. Vogel’s professional career, even circumscribed as it was by the Nazi era, was certainly more multi-faceted than the narrow description I’ve provided. MHK houses a diverse collection, carefully organized under Dr. Vogel’s tutelage, including the library and copper cabinet, picture gallery, pre- and early-historical collections, collections of folk art and costumes, the astronomical and physics cabinet, the collection of urban costumes, furniture and ceramics, as well as items from the former landgrave art chamber. On behalf of the museum, Dr. Vogel enriched the Old Masters Picture Gallery by acquiring 20 works by Jacob Jordaens, Thomas de Kayser, and an anonymous student of Rubens, as well as a series of paintings from the Tischbein Circle. He also purchased 14 Rembrandt etchings to form as a counterpart to the Rembrandt paintings hanging in Kassel retrieved from Vienna.

Having little to do with Dr. Vogel’s professional work, among his daughter Agnes’s papers, survives a very touching and simple hand-drawn picture by Dr. Vogel. It shows Dr. Vogel and his wife standing on the shore, depicted as a rabbit and a dog, watching sadly as Agnes, shown as a rabbit, sails aboard an ocean liner headed to Canada from Germany. (Figure 8)

Figure 8. Simple hand-drawn picture done by Dr. Hans Vogel showing his daughter Agnes’s departure from Germany aboard an ocean liner

Following his retirement in 1961, Dr. Vogel and his wife remained in Kassel where they are interred. (Figure 9)

Figure 9. Hans and Suse Vogel’s headstone in Kassel, Germany

POST 63: REMEMBERING SOME ANCESTORS THROUGH MY COUSIN AGNES STIEDA’S PHOTOS

Note: In this post, I recall through a series of sometimes poignant and touching images some of my ancestors, several of whom were murdered in the Shoah. The photos embedded in this post originate with my 92-year old third cousin who knew and was intimately acquainted with these individuals as a young child growing up in Germany before and during the Nazi Era.

Figure 1. Painting of Agnes Stieda née Vogel, granddaughter of Ernst and Margarethe Neisser, who comes from a family of fifth-generation musicians

Figure 2. Agnes’s great-grandmother, Rosalie Pauly née Mockrauer (1844-1927), younger sister of Friederike Bruck née Mockrauer

Figure 3. My great-grandmother, Friederike Bruck née Mockrauer (1836-1924), older sister of Rosalie Pauly née Mockrauer

I first introduced readers to my third cousin Agnes Stieda née Vogel in Blog Post 46. (Figure 1) Our respective great-grandmothers were sisters, Rosalie Pauly née Mockrauer (1844-1927) (Figure 2), and Friederike Bruck née Mockrauer (1836-1924). (Figure 3) I first learned about Agnes from another third cousin who, tired of incessant questions on family matters he couldn’t answer, referred me to her. We became acquainted in February of this year, and ever since we’ve engaged in a very active and lively email correspondence. I wrote about Agnes in Post 46. What’s made our exchanges so fascinating is that Agnes lived through historic events and was close to a few of the people I’ve researched and written about, including some who perished in the Holocaust. This post provides an opportunity to remember through photographs a few of these people seen in the throes of life before they knew what tragedy awaited them, and their lives were abruptly ended.

Figure 4. Agnes Stieda & me in Vancouver, Canada, August 2019

Figure 5. Agnes’s eldest daughter, Nicki Stieda, at her home in Vancouver, Canada

Agnes, I learned, lives in a retirement community in Victoria on Vancouver Island, about an hour-and-a-half west of Vancouver by ferry. Prior to meeting Agnes, my wife and I had already planned a cruise to Alaska departing from Vancouver to see the glaciers before climate-change deniers ensure their disappearance. After months of communication, it was only natural that Agnes and I should get together. (Figure 4) We arranged to meet in person at her eldest daughter Nicki Stieda’s home in Vancouver. (Figure 5) Nicki is the curator of her mother’s personal papers and photos, so upon learning of my upcoming visit, she organized all the items for my convenience. (Figure 6) Given that I neither speak nor read German, I focused on taking pictures of Agnes’s photos. Additionally, thanks to her perfect recall of the people in the images, we spent several enthralling hours talking about Agnes’s memories of them.

Figure 6. Agnes’s personal papers and photos organized by her daughter

Let me provide a little more context. Agnes is the granddaughter of Dr. Ernst Neisser and Margareth “Gretl” Neisser née Pauly, both victims of the Holocaust who committed suicide in Berlin, respectively, in 1941 and 1942; this was the subject of Post 48. Gretl Neisser was one of nine children of Dr. Josef and Rosalie Pauly, all of whom have been discussed in earlier posts and all whose fates I’ve now worked out. Ernst and Gretl Neisser had two children, Agnes’s mother Susanne Dorothea Vogel née Niesser (1899-1984) and Agnes’s uncle Peter Heinrich Neisser (1906-1929).

Figure 7. Agnes’s grandfather, Dr. Ernst Neisser, in 1911 amongst a group of other doctors outside the hospital in Stettin, Germany, where he would later deliver his granddaughter

Dr. Ernst Neisser was a medical doctor in Stettin, Germany [today: Szczecin, Poland], who delivered Agnes. (Figure 7) Another Pauly daughter, Edith “Dietchen” Riezler née Pauly (Figure 8) also lived in Stettin with her husband, Dr. Walter Riezler (Figure 9), who was the Director of the Muzeum Narodowe w Szczecinie, the National Museum, Szczecin; Walter and Edith Riezler were the subjects of Post 53. In writing that post, I communicated with curators at the museum to try and procure photos of Dr. Riezler; I eventually obtained some from my third cousin Andi Pauly that I shared with the museum since they had none at the time. Among Agnes’s photos were yet more of Dr. Reizler that I’ve also sent them.

Figure 8. Edith “Dietchen” Riezler née Pauly (1880-1961)

Figure 9. Dr. Walter Riezler (1878-1965)

Figure 10. An intimate moment between Agnes’s grandparents, Ernst & Margarethe Neisser

Because of Agnes’s family ties to Stettin following her birth in 1927, many of her photos date from this period. They illustrate in intimate fashion the close bond Agnes grandparents had with one another (Figure 10) and with their granddaughter (Figures 11-13). Several also show the deep affection between Agnes and her great-aunt Dietchen Riezler (Figures 14-15); Agnes has particularly fond memories of all three. There are multiple images of Agnes as a child at the beach along the Baltic Ocean, which is about 100km or 60 miles north of Szczecin. This series naturally includes photos of her parents Hans and Suse Vogel. (Figure 16)

Figure 11. Agnes as a toddler with her beloved grandfather, Ernst Neisser

Figure 12. Another image of Agnes with her grandfather

Figure 13. Agnes as a ten-year old with her grandparents, Ernst and Margarethe Neisser, in 1937-38 in Eberhausen near Munich

Figure 14. Agnes with another of her beloved relatives, her great-aunt Edith “Dietchen” Riezler née Pauly

Figure 15. Agnes as a toddler with her great-aunt Dietchen Riezler

Figure 16. Agnes as a toddler at the beach surrounded by her grandparents, her great-aunt, and her youthful parents

Figure 17. Agnes’s father, Dr. Hans Vogel, following WWII when he served as Director of the Hessisches Landesmuseum in Kassel, Germany

Dr. Hans Vogel (Figure 17) will be the feature of an upcoming post. Suffice it for now to note that Dr. Vogel was, among other things, an art historian, and, like Dr. Walter Riezler, also the Director of a museum, the Hessisches Landesmuseum in Kassel, Germany. (Figure 18) In anticipation of writing a future post about Dr. Vogel, I’ve also communicated and shared images of him with them.

Figure 18. The Hessisches Landesmuseum in Kassel, Germany

Figure 19. Wedding photo of Hans & Suse Vogel taken the 31st of July 1926 in Berlin-Charlottenburg

One photo hanging in Nicki Stieda’s home is of her grandparents’ wedding in 1926 in Berlin. (Figure 19) Having learned from a tribute Suse Vogel née Neisser, Agnes’s mother, had written in honor of her father (Dr. Ernst Neisser) that she and Hans had gotten married in the Charlottenburg Borough of Berlin, I was able to track down and order from the Landesarchiv Berlin the original certificate. (Figures 20a-b) Finding a photo linked to a marriage certificate I’d obtained from a completely foreign source is one thing that makes doing forensic genealogy so entertaining.

Figure 20a. Copy of page 1 of Hans & Susanne Vogel’s marriage certificate of the 31st of July 1926

Figure 20b. Copy of page 2 of Hans & Susanne Vogel’s marriage certificate of the 31st of July 1926

Figure 21. Peter Neisser, Agnes’s uncle, as a toddler

Figure 22. Another image of Peter Neisser as a toddler, taken in Stettin, Germany

Figure 23. Peter Neisser, Agnes’s uncle, who died prematurely of septicemia) on the 16th of April 1929

Figure 24. Peter Neisser (1906-1929), Agnes’s uncle

Figure 25. Peter Neisser as a toddler with his grandmother, Julie Neisser née Sabersky (1841-1927)

Particularly poignant images included among Agnes’s papers are some of her uncle Peter Neisser, who died prematurely of septicemia at 23 years of age in 1929 in Heidelberg, Germany as he was training to become a doctor. Photos of Peter span from when he was a toddler (Figures 21-22) to an adult (Figures 23-24), probably shortly before he died; one shows him with his grandmother, Julie Neisser née Sabersky (1841-1927). (Figure 25) I don’t expect readers to remember but I included one picture in Post 45 of a Pauly family get-together, reproduced here (Figure 26), estimated to have taken place around 1895, that included Julie Neisser. In examining Neisser family trees on ancestry.com, I came upon one that used as a profile image a painting of Julie Neisser, the original of which interestingly is in the possession of Agnes’s daughter Nicki Stieda. (Figure 27) This is yet another serendipitous connection.

Figure 26. Large Pauly family get-together, probably in the mid-1890’s, with Julie Neisser née Sabersky’s head circled

Figure 27. Painting of Julie Neisser née Sabersky, hanging in Nicki Stieda’s home in Vancouver

Another of Josef and Rosalie Pauly’s daughters with a connection to Stettin was Elizabeth “Ellchen” Herrnstadt née Pauly who was married to Arthur Herrnstadt (1865-1912); they had two daughters, Aenne Herrnstadt (1896-1942) and Ilse Herrnstadt (1897-1943). While Arthur died in Stettin well before the Nazis ascended to power, his wife and two daughters were all murdered in the Holocaust, at Theresienstadt. (Figure 28) Aenne Herrnstadt, it turns out, was Agnes’s godmother, and several photos survive (Figures 29-30), including the two of them together when Agnes was a toddler. Interestingly, while Aenne and Ilse were only a year apart, Agnes has no recollection of Ilse, and thinks she may have been institutionalized for unknown reasons.

Figure 28. Ilse Herrnstadt’s (1897-1943) death certificate from the Theresienstadt Ghetto, showing she died on the 21st of July 1943 and identifying her parents as Arthur and Elisabeth Herrnstadt

Figure 29. Agnes as a toddler with her godmother, Aenne Herrnstadt (1896-1942), murdered in the Theresienstadt

Figure 30. Another photo of Agnes with her godmother Aenne Herrnstadt

There exists a picture among Agnes photos reproduced here, showing Ellchen Herrnstadt, her daughter Aenne, and Agnes’s mother, Suse Vogel, taken between 1916 and 1918. (Figure 31)

Figure 31. Elizabeth “Ellchen” Herrnstadt née Pauly (left) and her daughter Aenne Herrnstadt (middle), both victims of the Holocaust, with Agnes’s mother, Suse Vogel, in a photo taken between 1916 and 1918

Helene Guttentag née Pauly was yet another of Josef and Rosalie Pauly’s daughters who, along with her husband Dr. Adolf Guttentag, committed suicide in Berlin in 1942 after being told to report for deportation. I told their story in Post 50. They had one son, Otto Guttentag, who escaped to America, served in the U.S. Army during the war, was stationed in Europe for a time after the war, and eventually became a doctor in California. While stationed in Europe, Agnes and Otto Guttentag met (Figure 32); they were first cousins once removed. (Figure 33)

Figure 32. Agnes with Otto Guttentag, her first cousin once removed, while he was stationed as a U.S. soldier in Germany following WWII

Figure 33. Dr. Otto Guttentag later in life

In closing, I concede this post (Figures 34-35) will be of limited interest to many, though I would only add that what may resonate with readers is the process by which they may pursue their own genealogical investigations to track down images and stories of their own ancestors. Admittedly, this can be a challenging though not insurmountable problem.

Figure 34. Agnes, with her husband Chris, as a young mother with her two oldest children, Nicki and Monica (seated on her father’s lap), pregnant with her third child, Vivian

Figure 35. My wife Ann and me aboard the cruise ship departing Vancouver in August 2019 following our visit with my third cousin Agnes Stieda

POST 62: THE FAR-FLUNG SEARCH FOR MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN, HEINZ LUDWIG BERLINER

Note: In this Blog post I detail the extensive efforts I’ve undertaken trying to uncover information on one of my father’s first cousins, a man named Heinz Berliner. In connection with this quest, I’ve communicated with individuals or accessed documents and databases in Poland, Germany, Argentina, Bolivia and Australia, as well as domestically in California, New York and Ohio.

Figure 1. My grandmother Else Bruck née Berliner (1873-1957) in 1925

Berliner was the maiden name of my father’s mother, that’s to say my grandmother, Else Bruck née Berliner (1873-1957). (Figure 1) She had a younger brother, Alfred Max Berliner (1875-1921), who had three children, Peter Hermann Berliner (1910-1977) (Figure 2), Pauline Ilse Berliner (1911-1981) (Figure 3), and another son named Heinz Berliner whose existence I learned about only in 2011. His name was mentioned in a document given to me by my third cousin once-removed, Larry Leyser, written by his grandmother, Kate Leyser née Rosenthal (1903-1992) (Figure 4), discussing various family members; with respect to Heinz, Kate only recorded he’d committed suicide in South America, no year nor place specified.

Figure 2. Peter Hermann Berliner (1910-1977)

Figure 3. My father, Dr. Otto Bruck, with his first cousin, Pauline Ilse Berliner (1911-1981)

Figure 4. Kate Leyser née Rosenthal (1903-1992), my cousin Larry Leyser’s grandmother, the source of the information on Heinz Berliner’s existence

Heinz’s siblings, Peter and Ilse, I’d known about since I was a child, as my parents had infrequent contact with them in New York where they lived; I was easily able to find information on both in ancestry.com, and eventually even located some of their descendants. Regarding Heinz I found nothing, although, in retrospect, knowing he’d wound up in South America, I’m not entirely surprised. I’d hoped that if he’d made his way to the southern hemisphere via New York, there would be some record of this, but such was not the case. To cover myself, I checked the Yad Vashem Victims’ Database, but fortunately there was no indication he’d perished in the Holocaust.

Having established contact with Peter and Ilse Berliner’s offspring, naturally, I asked them if they had any letters, pictures, family lore, etc. that might suggest where Heinz Berliner wound up in South America. The only piece of physical evidence the family ultimately found in February 2018 was a playbill or theatre program with Heinz Berliner handwritten above the stage name he’d apparently used, “Enry Berloc,” showing he performed as a dancer at the “Teatro Municipal” on the 19th of March 1948 (Figure 5); the Teatro Municipal is located in Buenos Aires, Argentina, as it turns out. I’ll return to this later.

Figure 5. March 19, 1948 playbill from the Teatro Municipal in Buenos Aires showing Heinz Berliner’s stage name, Enry Berloc

Knowing Heinz Berliner had a connection to Argentina, I turned my attention to try and find someone in the Jewish community there who might be able to track down evidence of his immigration or death in that country. I started by contacting the Argentine Consulate, then two governmental entities to whom they’d referred me, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Worship of the Argentine Republic (http://mrecic.gov.ar/en), and the Dirección Nacional de Migraciones (Immigration Office in Argentina) (https://Argentina.gob.ar). Next, I emailed Jewish Buenos Aires (contact@JewishBuenosAires.com), who referred me to AMIA (www.amia.org.ar), which is the main institution of the Jewish community in Argentina. Beyond learning from the Immigration Office in Argentina that records through 1953 show no evidence Heinz Berliner ever registered there, the other contacts bore no fruit.

Aware Heinz Berliner, or at least his alter-ego Enry Berloc, had been involved in the arts, I stumbled upon a website developed by Argentina’s Ministry of Culture of the Nation called “El Sur del Sur: Argentina el Pais su Cultura y su Gente,” “The Southernmost South: Argentina, the country, its culture and its people” (https://surdelsur.com/en/sections/people/). I was hoping the staff might point me to a cultural organization that maintains records of past cultural events. While the staff there proved to be exceptionally helpful, going so far as to check the database of the “Centro de Estudios Migratorios Latinoamericanos” (http://cemla.com.buscador) for any Berliners who’d immigrated to Argentina, ultimately this too proved futile. Thus, ended with no positive results around March 2018 my initial flurry of activity trying to track down Heinz Berliner in Argentina.

I resumed my quest again in October 2018 by asking Madeleine Isenberg, my contact at the Los Angeles Jewish Genealogical Society (LAJGS), of which I’m a member, for suggestions on how to proceed. Madeleine suggested I post a message to the Latin-American SIG, https://www.jewishgen.org/InfoFiles/LatAmSIG.html, which is precisely what I did. JewishGen hosts web pages for several “Special Interest Groups” (SIGs), whose interest is a geographic region of origin, or special topic. While Latin-American SIG was able to refer me to a few Berliners living in Buenos Aires, none of them had any known relationship to Heinz Berliner.

In addition to JewishGen hosting Special Interest Groups, they also have the “Family Tree of the Jewish People (FJTP),” where they centralize the collection of Jewish family trees. As of March 2017, they had collected 7,310,620 records from 6,266 family trees. I was able to locate a Berliner family tree, and contacted the family tree manager, who happens to live in Australia. After explaining what I was looking for, the tree manager put me in touch with yet another Berliner living in Buenos Aires, but, again, to no avail.

Let me switch gears for a moment. As readers can ascertain, the discussion above has been focused on my efforts to ascertain where Heinz Berliner emigrated in South America during or following WWII and when he might have died or killed himself. As frustrating as that search turns out to have been, trying to learn when and where Heinz Berliner was born, has been equally challenging.

Figure 6. Alfred Max Berliner’s (1875-1921) headstone from the former Jewish Cemetery in Ratibor

As mentioned above, Peter, Ilse and Heinz Berliner’s father was Alfred Max Berliner, who died in 1921 in Ratibor and was interred in the former Jewish Cemetery there (Figure 6); Alfred’s wife, Charlotte Berliner née Rothe, was murdered in the Holocaust in 1943. I talked about her in Post 18. On ancestry.com, I found Alfred and Charlotte Berliner’s marriage certificate (Figures 7a-c) and discovered they were married the 17th of January 1909, not in Ratibor, Germany, where they lived, but rather in a place called Meseritz, Germany [today: Międzyrzecz, Poland]. In 2015, I found the birth certificates for Alfred and Charlotte’s two eldest children, Peter (Figure 8) and Ilse (Figure 9), among the vital records at the Archiwum Państwowe W Katowicach Oddzial W Raciborzu (“State Archives in Katowice Branch in Racibórz”); these certificates show Peter was born in Ratibor on the 8th of November 1910, and Ilse on the 1st of October 1911, thus about eleven months apart. Oddly, I was never able to locate Heinz’s birth certificate, though I assumed he too had been born in Ratibor.

Figure 7a. Copy of page 1 of Alfred and Charlotte Berliner’s 1909 marriage certificate (downloaded from ancestry.com, duplicate originating from the court in Berlin-Köpenick)

Figure 7b. Copy of page 2 of Alfred and Charlotte Berliner’s 1909 marriage certificate (downloaded from ancestry.com, duplicate originating from the court in Berlin-Köpenick)

Figure 7c. Translation of Alfred and Charlotte Berliner’s marriage certificate

Figure 8. Peter Hermann Berliner’s birth certificate showing he was born in Ratibor on the 8th of November 1910

Figure 9. Pauline Ilse Berliner’s birth certificate showing she was born in Ratibor on the 1st of October 1911

Fast forward. I revisited the State Archives in Racibórz in 2018, and double-checked for Heinz’s birth certificate, with equally disappointing results. Following my visit, Paul Newerla, the Silesian historian from Racibórz who occasionally helps me out, also systematically re-examined the birth records for Ratibor from 1897 through 1918 and likewise came up empty-handed. It became evident Heinz may have been born elsewhere, perhaps in the town of Meseritz where his parents were married in January 1909. Aware this might have happened, I sent an email to Międzyrzecz, Poland, formerly Meseritz, asking whether they could search their archives for Heinz’s birth certificate. They responded telling me their vital records are archived in Gorzów Wielkoplski, Poland [German: Landsberg an der Warthe], and are accessible on-line. Paul and I immediately checked the database and again could not locate any record of Heinz’s birth.

To remind readers, birth records in Poland and Germany are not generally available until approximately 110 years after a person’s birth; at present, birth records for Meseritz are only available through 1907. Even if Heinz was born in 1908 before his parents married, his birth record will not be on-line until 2020. At the time, other possibilities came to mind. Perhaps, Heinz’s father was not Alfred, in which case he would have his mother’s maiden name, Rothe, or alternatively he was born in a place other than Meseritz or Ratibor. Paul and I decided then to wait until 2020 to again check the on-line vital records for Meseritz.

In the course of scrolling through the vital records for Meseritz, I made a mildly interesting discovery. As previously mentioned, I originally found Alfred and Charlotte Berliner’s marriage record in ancestry.com. (Figures 7a-b) Knowing when they got married, I searched for this exact record to test my ability to use the Gorzów database and had no trouble finding it. (Figures 10a-b) However, in comparing the two hand-written versions of the marriage record, I discovered they are slightly different though written by the same hand. I asked Paul Newerla about this. He explained the registration office, Meseritz in the case of the marriage between Alfred Berliner and Charlotte Rothe, kept the original certificate. As a precaution, the registration office was compelled to create a duplicate, which was submitted at the end of the year to the court, likely one in the Berlin borough of Köpenick with jurisdiction over Meseritz. The same thing was true of Ratibor; often original certificates in the registration offices have been destroyed and only copies survive, upon which a note is made to this effect.

Figure 10a. Copy of page 1 of Alfred and Charlotte Berliner’s original marriage certificate from the Gorzów, Poland on-line database

Figure 10b. Copy of page 2 of Alfred and Charlotte Berliner’s original marriage certificate from the Gorzów, Poland on-line database

Hal Bookbinder, former President of JGSLA, recently emailed members reminding them they have free access to MyHeritage, explaining they’ve recently strengthened ship manifest searches to allow queries not only for the names of passengers but for where they were headed. I’ve rarely accessed this database, erroneously assuming it replicates information found in ancestry.com, but decided to run a test using Heinz Berliner’s name. I was utterly astonished, when after all this time searching for him, a page entitled “German Minority Census, 1939” listed a man by the name of Heinz Ludwig Berliner born on the 24th of September 1916 in Ratibor. (Figure 11) While this Heinz was born where I would have expected, two things gave me pause. First, Berliner was not an uncommon surname in Silesia, and, second, neither Paul Newerla nor I had previously found Heinz Berliner’s birth record in the State Archives in Racibórz. Nonetheless, I relayed this information to Paul and armed with a precise date of birth for this Heinz Ludwig Berliner, he offered to reexamine the Ratibor birth records. Yet again, Paul could not initially find Heinz’s name in the register of births, but suspecting something might be amiss, he requested the book with the actual birth certificates. And, there it was, Heinz’s birth certificate confirming his parents were Alfred and Charlotte Berliner and that he’d indeed been born in the same town as his two siblings. (Figure 12)

Figure 11. Page from MyHeritage ancestral database entitled “German Minority Census, 1939,” showing a Heinz Ludwig Berliner born in Ratibor on the 24th of September 1916, living in Berlin-Charlottenburg at the time, having emigrated to Bolivia

Figure 12. Heinz Ludwig Berliner’s birth certificate confirming he was born on the 24th of September 1916 to Alfred and Charlotte Berliner

This has been a long exhaustive search that has not ended with the discovery of Heinz Ludwig Berliner’s birth certificate. Besides providing Heinz’s date and place of birth, the German Minority Census, 1939 report included his middle name and two other previously unknown bits of information; it shows that in 1939 Heinz was living in the Charlottenburg Borough of Berlin and that he emigrated to Bolivia. Thus, began my most recent flurry of activity trying to track down when and where Heinz might have died.

First, I checked the 1939 Berlin Address Book for Heinz Berliner, as well as for his mother and two siblings, operating under the assumption they may all have been forced to live together in this increasingly risky period. Nothing showed up.

Next, I again turned to Ms. Madeline Isenberg, my contact at JGSLA, asking if she could refer me to anyone in the Jewish community in Bolivia, a South American country where I’ve never previously sought any relatives. She suggested I contact the Bolivian affiliate of the World Jewish Congress, Circulo Israelita De La Paz (https://www.worldjewishcongress.org/en/about/communities/BO), which I promptly did. The latter bureau sent a very gracious reply unfortunately informing me that Bolivia does not maintain any immigration records, suggesting I contact AMIA in Argentina, which readers will recall I had previously done. Circulo Israelita also checked Jewish death records for La Paz and Cochabamba, Bolivia, but nothing showed up.

When I again contacted AMIA, they referred me to Agrupación de Genealogía Judeo-Argentina (AGJA), which among other things, “facilitates the linking of the genealogical and historical roots of the Argentine Jewish Community with the global community, facilitating the reunification of disconnected families.” AGJA referred me to multiple websites and organizations, many of which I’d previously checked and reexamined, once more with negative results.

As readers can attest, with the information currently in hand, I’ve taken the search in South America for the fate of my father’s first cousin as far as I can.

I mentioned above the August 1948 dance recital in Buenos Aires in which Heinz Berliner, using the stage name Enry Berloc, performed. I searched for his co-performers, actress and dancer Witha Herm and pianist Kurt Kohn, hoping Heinz might have participated in other recitals with them. I was unable to locate any information on Kurt Kohn. However, Witha Herm (Figures 13-14), also a stage name, died and is interred in North Hollywood, California as Herma Wittmann (1907-1992). Her small claim to fame may be that in 1919, she acted in a German movie, Im Schatten des Glücks, which also starred Marlene Dietrich.

Figure 13. Information from “Find-A-Grave” on Witha Herm, Heinz Berliner’s 1948 co-performer, indicating she was born in 1907, died in in 1992, and is buried in North Hollywood, California

Figure 14. Witha Herm (left) with a friend

There are several take-aways for me from this exhaustive search for Heinz Ludwig Berliner. Because information is constantly being added to the ancestral databases, it is worth checking back every few months or once a year to see whether anything new shows up. Don’t assume, as I mistakenly did, that MyHeritage and ancestry.com replicate information. Searching for one’s Jewish ancestors who wound up in South America will be challenging, time-consuming, and often unproductive. And, the biggest admonition to myself, using a German word Mr. Paul Newerla, my Polish friend, taught me, “don’t act like a ‘besserwisser,’ a know-it-all,” just because you’ve been doing ancestral research for years!

POST 57, POSTSCRIPT: DISAPPEARED WITHOUT A TRACE, MARIA POHLMANN NÉE PAULY—MYSTERY SOLVED!!

Note: In this post I describe how with the assistance of one of my Blog’s readers, I was able to determine when and where my first cousin twice-removed Maria Pohlmann née Pauly died. The place and time of her death was not as I imagined, and I offer a possible explanation as to how I miscalculated Maria’s fate.

Figure 1. Maria Ulrike Pauly, born the 21st of July 1877 in Posen, Germany [today: Poznan, Poland], as a young lady

Regular readers know I’m a retired archaeologist. I’ve previously told followers the enormous pleasure I derive from doing forensic genealogy as it draws upon the same skills I learned and applied in doing field archaeology. In a sense, I’m now digging through archives, documents and on-line databases whereas before I was digging through layers of dirt. It’s humbling when my scientific approach to doing ancestral research fails to yield a satisfactory result. Thus, it was a welcome relief when a German reader of my Blog offered his assistance in helping me determine what fate may have befallen my first cousin twice-removed, Maria Pohlmann née Pauly. (Figure 1) I viewed this offer for help not as a failure on my part, but rather as an opportunity to have a fresh set of eyes re-examine the same evidence I’d looked at.

Figure 2. Closeup of Axel Pohlmann on his wedding day, the 1st of October 1901

Figure 3. Closeup of Maria Pohlmann née Pauly on her wedding day, the 1st of October 1901

Figure 4. Alexander “Axel” Pohlmann and Maria Pauly on their wedding day, the 1st of October 1901 in Posen, Germany, with their guests

Figure 5. My third cousin, Andi Pauly, Maria Pohlmann née Pauly’s grandnephew, in Munich, 2016

Let me briefly review what I discussed in Post 57. Maria Pauly (Figure 2), born on the 21st of July in 1877, and her husband Alexander “Axel” Pohlmann (Figure 3) got married in Posen, Germany [today: Poznan, Poland] on the 1st of October 1901. (Figure 4) Maria’s grandnephew and my third cousin, Andi Pauly (Figure 5), who was the source of her and Axel’s wedding picture and has been the source of most images I have of his Pauly ancestors, was unable to tell me what might have happened to her; she was one of only two of Josef and Rosalie Pauly’s nine children whose fate he did not know. Doing a little research on German Wikipedia, I discovered Maria’s husband had been a very prominent figure, having been the Oberbürgermeister, the Lord Mayor of Kattowitz, Prussia [today: Katowice, Poland] between 1903 and 1920. Following his tenure as Lord Mayor of Kattowitz, until his retirement in 1930, Pohlmann was the Regierungspräsident des Regierungsbezirks Magdeburg, the President of the Government of Magdeburg in the German state of Saxony. Pohlmann passed away in 1952 in Freiburg im Breisgau (German state of Baden-Württemberg).

Given Alexander Pohlmann’s public standing, I was surprised I could learn nothing of his wife’s fate. Aware that Maria was deemed Jewish in the eyes of the Nazis and knowing some of her siblings, their husbands, and their children had been murdered in the Holocaust, naturally, I checked the Yad Vashem Victim’s Database, to no avail to my relief. Following publication of Post 57, I continued my investigations hoping to learn more about Alexander and Maria Pohlmann.

I decided to write to places in Poland, formerly Prussia, and Germany with which Alexander Pohlmann had been associated. First, I contacted the Muzeum Historii Katowic (Museum of History of Katowice, Poland), and received a very gracious reply informing me they had no information on what might have happened to Maria Pohlmann. Next I contacted the Generalagentur für Genealogie (General Agency for Genealogy) in Magdeburg, Germany, and again was told they had no information on Maria. Finally, my Polish friend Paul Newerla, the Silesian historian, suggested I contact the Archiwum Państwowe w Katowicach (State Archives in Katowice, Poland); it took more than a month to hear back from them, but their reply was also in the negative.

Before I could contemplate my next step, Peter Hanke, a German gentleman affiliated with the “forum.danzig.de,” contacted me offering his assistance in helping me find out what might have happened to Maria Pohlmann after reading Post 57. This Forum is a discussion group I stumbled upon in the course of researching Tiegenhof, the town in the Free State of Danzig where my father was a dentist for five years between 1932 and 1937; as discussed in earlier Blog posts related to Tiegenhof, Peter has been inordinately helpful in helping me track down information related to some of my father’s friends and acquaintances from his halcyon days there, and directing me to various on-line databases with information on the town’s former residents.

Given my lack of success finding out about Maria, I was more than happy to accept Peter’s offer of help, knowing that while I might eventually get to the same place without his assistance, his involvement would speed up the process. And, speed it up, it most certainly did. Peter contacted me on the August 26th of this year, and by September 7th he’d received a packet of information from the Kulturamt Stadtarchiv (Cultural Office City Archive), to whom he’d written, in Freiburg im Breisgau, the town in Baden-Württemberg, Germany where Alexander Pohlmann died in 1952.

In the packet of documents, the City Archive included Alexander Pohlmann’s death certificate (Figure 6a-b), confirming he’d died on the 5th of October 1952, as German Wikipedia had indicated. But, of more immediate interest was the inclusion of Maria Pohmann’s death certificate (Figures 7a-b) indicating she too had died in Freiburg, on the 18th of July 1946, pre-deceasing her husband by more than six years; Maria died of diabetes and heart failure. According to the Freiburg City Archive, Alexander and Maria had lived in Freiburg since at least the 1st of October 1936, and they had no offspring. After having hit several dead ends looking for Maria Pohlmann, it was very satisfying to finally determine when and where she died, and particularly gratifying to have one reader of my Blog help me work this out.

Figure 6a. Alexander Pohlmann’s death certificate showing he died on the 5th of October 1952 in Freiburg im Breisgau (page 1)

Figure 6b. Alexander Pohlmann’s death certificate showing he died on the 5th of October 1952 in Freiburg im Breisgau (page 2)

Figure 7a. Maria Pohlmann née Pauly’s death certificate showing she died on the 18th of July 1946 in Freiburg im Breisgau (page 1)

Figure 7b. Maria Pohlmann née Pauly’s death certificate showing she died on the 18th of July 1946 in Freiburg im Breisgau (page 2)

While I would eventually have written to Freiburg asking whether Maria Pohlmann had died there, to be honest, I’d convinced myself her anonymity was a function of dying young, like some of her older sisters had. In retrospect, the fact that she was Jewish may also have played a role in keeping a low profile, although we know from her father Josef Pauly’s memoirs, discussed in Post 56, that several of his daughters had to forego their personal ambitions for the sake of Josef’s only son. For this reason, it’s possible Maria sadly never had the opportunity to become more than a traditional housewife and was “unknown” outside her circle of family and friends.

The past few months have been extraordinarily productive ones in terms of either solving or beginning to unravel the fate of several of my distant relatives. Partially, this is attributable to my own dogged efforts but equally this is the result of contributions by what I’ve referred to as “my boots on the ground.” This may be analogous to good detective work which typically involves a team of people working together to solve knotty, intractable cases. In upcoming posts, I will detail some of these other successes.

POST 61: THE WOINOWITZ ZUCKERFABRIK (SUGAR FACTORY) OUTSIDE RATIBOR (PART IV-GRUNDBUCH (LAND REGISTER))

Note: In this post, I explore some of the information Mr. Paul Newerla, the Racibórz historian, was able to find related to the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik (Sugar Factory) in what is called the “Grundbuch,” or land register, discuss where this information currently resides, and how it rounds out my understanding of the history and ownership of the sugar plant over the years. I also explain to readers that even had I been able to access the land register and backup files on my own, I would have been hard-pressed to make much sense of the materials without the intercession of a lawyer familiar with German real estate law. Mr. Newerla happens to be a retired Polish lawyer who, by virtue of his profession and current study of Silesian history, is well versed in such matters.

Mr. Paul Newerla, my friend from Racibórz, Poland, is a retired lawyer who now specializes in studying and writing about the history of Silesia. Regular readers will recognize his name as I’ve mentioned him in numerous posts related to Ratibor, Germany, the town in Upper Silesia where my father was born in 1907. Perhaps, one of the biggest unintended benefits of having a family history Blog is that Paul stumbled upon it in the course of doing research and reached out to me through Webmail to offer supplementary historical information on the Bruck’s “Prinz von Preußen” Hotel which I’d written about. This family establishment was owned through what I’ve determined to be three generations, from roughly the mid-19th Century through the early 1920’s. Our initial exchanges involved the Bruck’s Hotel but have far transcended this subject.

Figure 1. Silesian historian, Paul Newerla, and me in 2018 standing by the historic statue of John of Nepomuk, located in the middle of a parking lot in Racibórz

I had the pleasure of personally meeting Paul in 2018 on a visit to Racibórz. (Figure 1) As an aside, I realize many fellow genealogists may never have the opportunity nor resources to visit the places one’s ancestors hail from, but I can’t emphasize enough the value of “having boots on the ground,” so to speak, to further one’s ancestral investigations, as this post will illustrate. It’s worth mentioning that Paul does not speak English, nor do I speak German, so we are compelled to use a few on-line translators to communicate, which presents its own challenges but is far better than nothing.

Figure 2. The Woinowitz sugar factory as it looked in the early 1900’s

As I began to research the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik (Figure 2), I naturally turned to Paul to ask him about the sugar plant’s history. He sent me numerous maps and visuals and provided valuable context for understanding the extent of the sugar industry in Silesia and its influence on the development of railroads; I’ve discussed these topics in earlier posts on the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik. I was specifically interested in what Paul might be able to tell me about the sale by or confiscation of the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik from its Jewish owners, the timing, the names of the sellers, and the price for which the business was sold. While he knew little about these matters, coincidentally, during his lawyering days, Paul had handled the legal sale of the former Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik between Polish parties. For this reason, he knew that while the sale of the sugar plant may well have been compelled by the Nazis, the later Polish owners had valid legal rights. Likely, the Nazi overlords wanted to handle the forced sale with a veneer of “legality” by paying the Jewish owners something for their business, even if that payment was vastly below fair market value.

Figure 3. Entrance to the “Archiwum Państwowe w Katowicach Oddział w Raciborzu”

By virtue of Paul’s previous involvement with the sale of the former Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik, he knew that the “Grundbuch,” that is the land register, is archived in the Archiwum Państwowe W Katowicach Oddzial W Raciborzu (“State Archives in Katowice Branch in Racibórz”). (Figure 3) The Grundbuch in Germany, including former parts of Germany that are now within Poland, shows the names of the current and previous owners, third party rights in rem (e.g., mortgages), and the description of the property. Land registers were kept for real estate or land, and included, as will be discussed below, the buildings and structures found on the land.

The land registry is a special division of the local German district court (i.e., Grundbuchamt beim Amtsgericht), and land registers are kept in Poland’s counterpart courts even today. Changes of rights to land do not go into effect until they have been recorded in the land register, although some exceptions apply (e.g. an heir becomes owner of a property even if he or she is not registered in the land register). Unless proven otherwise, the correctness of all titles recorded in the Grundbuch is assumed and a buyer can rely on its accuracy.

The old German land registers have been continued by the Polish court, naturally in Polish, and slightly modified in concept. The basic German land register was a thick book with sections for: I. Directory of Properties, II. Owner(s), III. Rights of other persons (e.g., rights of use, real burdens), and IV. Mortgages. The land registers were kept in court in case they were needed there. The documents justifying the individual entries in the land register were in the so-called “files to the land register,” and were held in the archives of the court; notes were made in the files but in the event of a discrepancy between the land register and the files, the former took precedence. In the 1960’s, Polish land registers were introduced that were organized differently; sections I-IV above were retained except they were kept in individual volumes, and in the back of each volume, the documents justifying the entries were maintained. As a result, files to the land registers in the court archives were no longer needed there so were turned over to the State Archives after several years.

There is one other distinction Paul brought to my attention I need to mention. There is also a “Handelregister,” or commercial register, that is maintained by what are called “Registergerichten,” Commercial Register Courts, that’s to say, regional courts above district courts. The Handelregister records “legal persons” of a company, including Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung (GmbH), a limited liability company, or LLC. The name of the GmbH emphasizes the fact that the owners (Gesellschafter, also known as members) of the entity are not personally liable or responsible for the company’s debts. GmbHs are considered legal persons. The Handelregister for the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik is not available today for reasons that are unclear.

All the above is just background information that will understandably be of scant interest to most readers. Let me continue.

Prior to my queries, Paul had tried for some time to access the land register for the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik. He was aware that German land registers, Grundbucher, are archived at the State Archives in Racibórz. The status of these registers is they have not yet been catalogued and therefore are not available to researchers. My interest in the sugar plant renewed Paul’s attempt to gain access to the plant’s Grundbuch, and, as Paul characterizes it, he finally “was allowed into the camp” to search for it; this was only possible because of his longstanding relationship with the State Archives in Racibórz. Paul found it under the number “Woinowitz Sheet 161.” (Figure 4) Fortunately, the land register includes the supporting files or documentation turned over by the Polish court.

Figure 4. Cover of the Woinowitz Grundbuch Paul Newerla found at the State Archives in Racibórz

Paul photographed and sent me copies of the documents he deemed of greatest value and spent a good deal of time explaining their content and significance. I want to believe that in describing some of what Paul found in the Grundbuch and the auxiliary files, I’ve mostly done justice conveying this to readers, although I welcome readers’ input if I’ve failed in this regard.

Figure 5 shows the size of the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik under the column “Größe.” It was 5.44.10 hectares in size, or 13.44 acres.

Figure 5. The size of the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik shown under the column “Größe, as 5.44.10 hectares, or 13.44 acres

As alluded to earlier, a Grundbuch is kept for land and shows the structural components located on the property. In the case of the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik, the extent of the property and the current value of the structural components is shown on Figure 6. The left-hand column of the table below is a German transcription of the structures listed and the right-hand column provides a rough translation and in a few instances some explanation in brackets:

Figure 6. Page from the Woinowitz Grundbuch listing the structural components of the sugar plant corresponding to the table below

GERMAN	ENGLISH
1. Acker, Weide, Graben, Weg, sowie Hofraum“ – was vom Grundbuch “Polnisch Woinowitz” [der früher Ortsnamen] Blatt 60 abgezweigt wurde. Dieses Blatt 60 umfasste Grundstücke des “Dominiums Woinowitz.”	1. Field, willow, ditch, path/way, courtyard space—which were diverted from the land register “Polish Woinowitz” [the former place name] Sheet 60. [Sheet 60 included plots of land of the “Dominium Woinowitz”]
a. Zuckerfabrik mit Maschinen und Kesselhaus	a. Sugar factory with machine and boiler house
b. Gasanstalt	b. Gasworks
c. Eisenbahnwaagehaus	c. Railway scale house
d. Comptoir (Büro) mit Waagehaus	d. Office with scale house [another scale house where incoming sugar beets and outgoing processed sugar were weighed]
e. Rohproduktionshaus mit Wohnung	e. Raw production house with apartment
f. Rohproduktionshaus	f. Raw production house
g. Stall mit Remise und Werkstätten	g. Stable with drawer and workshops

The table below corresponds to the text on Figure 7, and shows the various names for the sugar factory over time, the owners, and the reason for the acquisition or name change:

Figure 7. Page from the Woinowitz Grundbuch showing the name changes of the sugar plant over time corresponding to the table below

GERMAN	ENGLISH
1. Woinowitz’er Zuckerfabrik Adolph Schück & Comp. zu Woinowitz — Auf Grund der Auflassung vom 24-ten eingetragen am 30-ten Mai 1881 Der Name der Firma ist geändert und lautet jetzt „Woinowitz’er Zuckerfabrik Adolf Schück & Co. Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung zu Woinowitz bei Ratibor O/S.“ [O/S = Oberschlesien] — Eingetragen am 21. Oktober 1910 Nr. 2 statt Nr. 1 nach dem Rezess vom 29. Dezember 1923 eingetragen am 20. Februar 1925. Weihendorfer Zuckerfabrik, Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung Weihendorf Kreis Ratibor — Auf Grund der Firmenänderung eingetragen am 13. August 1938.	1.Woinowitz’er Sugar Factory Adolph Schück & Comp. to Woinowitz — On the basis of the 24th injunction on 30th May 1881 The name of the company has been changed and is now “Woinowitz’er Zuckerfabrik Adolf Schück & Co. Gesellschaft with limited liability to Woinowitz near Ratibor O/S.” [O/S = Upper Silesia] — Registered on 21st October 1910 [FIGURE 8] No. 2 instead of No. 1 registered on 20th February 1925 after the recess of 29th December 1923. Weihendorfer Zuckerfabrik, limited liability company Weihendorf district Ratibor — Due to the change in the company registered on 13th August 1938.
2. Die Ratiborer Zuckerfabrik, Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung in Ratibor — Aufgelassen am 26. Februar 1942 und eingetragen am 25. Februar 1943.	2.The Ratibor Sugar Factory, limited liability company in Ratibor — Abandoned on 26th February 1942 and registered on 25th February 1943.
3. Die Landwirtschaftliche Warenzentrale Oberschlesien /Raiffeisen) eGmbH in Oppeln — Aufgelassen am 11 Dezember 1942 und eingetragen am 25. Februar 1943.	3. The Agricultural Goods Centre Upper Silesia /Raiffeisen) eGmbH in Opole — Abandoned on 11th December 1942 and registered on 25th February 1943.

Figure 8. Letterhead from the time the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik was known as the “Woinowitz’er Zuckerfabrik Adolf Schück & Co. GmbH”

Paul provided some additional explanation about the land register and the auxiliary files. He’d hoped to find documents there about the possible expropriation of the sugar plant from the Schück family. However, Paul discovered the files relate only to the actual entries in the land register, and because no mention of the forced sale of the plant by the Nazis is found in the original land register, therefore, no documentation exists in the land register’s backup files.

The land register recorded changes of ownership; in the case of private sales, the purchase contract would be found in the files of the land register. However, because the Zuckerfabrik was a GmbH or an LLC, changes in ownership were recorded in the Handelregister, the commercial register, and the courts notified of such changes via a letter. The change in the name of the LLC could result from new ownership or possibly new shareholders that came into a company. Regardless, a change in the company’s name in the commercial register of the GmbH (LLC) also caused a change in the name of the company in the land register.

Let me provide an example as this may be confusing to readers. If Adolph Schück individually owned a plot of land, it was recorded in the land register under his name. If, on the other hand, Mr. Schück formed a GmbH, which he eventually did and could do even as a single person, he could transfer that property as a non-cash deposit into the GmbH which would then be recorded in the Handelregister. Adolph Schück’s name was also then deleted from the Grundbuch and the GmbH registered in place of his name as the owner of the property. The obvious advantage, as previously mentioned, was that Mr. Schück was no longer personally liable or responsible for the company’s debts.

From earlier posts on the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik, readers may recall that Sigmund Hirsch was Adolph Schück’s partner in the sugar plant. I was even able to read his name on several pages Paul sent from the State Archives in Racibórz, so asked whether he was an equal partner. Paul reminded me this information and the size of Sigmund’s investment would be found in the commercial register, which we don’t have access to. However, Paul drew my attention to a four-page document he found at the State Archives, dated the 15th of January 1908, which indirectly answers my question. (Figures 9a-d) Initially, the capital shares owned by Schück and Hirsch were unequal. According to this document, Sigmund Hirsch was obliged to use his annual dividends, which exceeded 27,000 Reichmarks (RM), to increase his capital share of the business until they were equal partners. Additionally, because there was such a large difference in the number of shares owned by the two men, Sigmund Hirsch obtained a security mortgage in the amount of 400,000 RM payable to Adolph Schück.

Figure 9a. First page of four-page document last dated January 15, 1908 spelling out the terms of payments to bring Sigmund Hirsch’s shares in the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik equal to those of Adolph Schück

Figure 9b. Second page of four-page document last dated January 15, 1908 spelling out the terms of payments to bring Sigmund Hirsch’s shares in the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik equal to those of Adolph Schück

Figure 9c. Third page of four-page document last dated January 15, 1908 spelling out the terms of payments to bring Sigmund Hirsch’s shares in the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik equal to those of Adolph Schück

Figure 9d. Last page of four-page document last dated January 15, 1908 spelling out the terms of payments to bring Sigmund Hirsch’s shares in the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik equal to those of Adolph Schück

In addition to official partners, Paul explained there were also “silent” partners. They invested their money, presumably reaped a portion of the sugar plant’s profits, but were not recorded in the commercial register. Often, these silent partners were members of the Board of Directors or agents of the company.

Naturally, I was curious whether the land register and/or the backup files indicated in which year the Nazis forced the sale of the Zuckerfabrik and was reminded this information would also be found in the Handelregister. Yet again, however, one document from the State Archives gives an indirect clue; it shows that on the 26th of September 1938, the company name changed to “Weihendorfer Zuckerfabrik GmbH” without “Adolf Schück & Co.” (Figure 10), likely corresponding to the end of the Schück family’s stake in the sugar plant. To remind readers, less than three months later December 18, 1938, Erich Schück, Adolph’s son and probable managing director of the sugar plant, killed himself in Berlin. I don’t think the timing is coincidental.

Figure 10. Letterhead from the time the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik was known as the “Weihendorfer Zuckerfabrik GmbH” without the name “Adolf Schück & Co.”

As to the value of the sugar plant in 1938, I remarked to Paul that its value of 189,800 RM seemed low. (Figure 11) He pointed out that while a 1943 letter from the tax office used roughly this same value for that plot of land, it also showed “assets and working capital” of 2,269,351 RM minus unspecified “deductions” of 1,247,223 RM. (Figures 12a-b) To remind readers, in January 2017, a 1937 Reichsmark would have been worth approximately $4.30. Clearly, the income generated by the Zuckerfabrik was significant, and it’s very likely the Jewish owners sold at a significant loss and the heirs never adequately compensated.

Figure 11. Letter dated 30th of August 1938 indicating the “unit value” of the then-named “Weihendorfer Zuckerfabrik” as 189,800 Reichmarks

Figure 12a. First page of letter from the “Finanzamt Ratibor,” Ratibor Tax Office, dated the 22nd of January 1943

Figure 12b. Second page of letter from the “Finanzamt Ratibor,” Ratibor Tax Office, dated the 22nd of January 1943, showing the value of the sugar factory, as well as its “assets and working capital” (i.e., 2,269,351 RM) minus unspecified “deductions” (i.e., 1,247,223 RM)

Suffice it to say, at the risk of presenting information that would be of no interest to most readers, there are many more documents in the files to the land register that seemingly relate to contracts and financial matters.

I’ve previously alluded to the fact that knowing someone who is familiar with the “landscape” of archival and documentary resources available for an area one’s ancestors originated from can significantly expand one’s understanding of things. I erroneously assumed the land register for the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik from the State Archives in Racibórz was the extent of documentary information available; what I initially failed to comprehend is that the original land register for the sugar plant still exists and is retained by the local district court in Poland.

Paul accessed the original Grundbuch and was able to glean additional information not available from the copy of the land register and files in the State Archives. He confirmed that Adolph Schück originally purchased in 1881 only arable land and meadows where the sugar plant, gas station, etc. would eventually be built. (Figure 13) The ownership titled was recorded in the land register on the 27th of March 1881 as “Woinowitzer Zuckerfabrik Adolph Schück & Comp. in Woinowitz.” (Figure 14) At the time, the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik was not yet a GmbH or LLC. On the 21st of October 1910, the name of the company changed to “Woinowitzer Zuckerfabrik Adolph Schück & Co. Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung [Gmbh] zu Woinowitz” (Figure 14), at which time the company became an LLC. Then, on the 13th of August 1938, the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik underwent an ownership change becoming the “Weihendorfer Zuckerfabrik, Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung Weihendorf Kreis Ratibor.” (Figure 14) Presumably, this corresponded to the time the Schück and Hirsch heirs were forced to sell the sugar plant.

Figure 13. Page from the original land register at the District court confirming that Adolph Schück originally purchased arable land and meadows where the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik would eventually be built

Figure 14. Page from the original land register at the District court showing the ownership title was recorded on the 27th of May 1881 as the “Woinowitzer Zuckerfabrik Adolph Schück & Comp. in Woinowitz”; subsequent name changes are also shown

Subsequent changes are also noted in the Grundbuch. On the 26th of February 1942, the factory was taken over by the “Ratiborer Zuckerfabrik GmbH in Ratibor,” and later that year, on the 11th of December 1942, the factory named changed to “Raiffeisen.” (Figure 14)

Thus, the original land register for the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik clarifies a few things: we learn the year Adolph Schück purchased the land (1881); the fact that he purchased land and meadows with no structures on them; the year the firm became a GmbH or LLC (1910); and the date the Schück family ceased to be owners (1938).

Paul was unable to find the Grundbuch for the Woinowitz estate (i.e., “Polnisch Woinowitz“) from which Adolph Schück purchased the land in 1881, so no conclusions can be drawn about the previous property owners. Just to be crystal clear about this, Figure 6 above, the page from the files of the Woinowitz Grundbuch, indicates that Adolph Schück purchased a “field, willow, ditch, path/way, courtyard space” which was “detached” from what was referred to as the Polnisch Woinowitz and this sale was noted in the land register for that estate. Paul was unable to find the Grundbuch for this estate at the District court, although possibly it may eventually turn up at the State Archives in Racibórz.

Let me apologize to readers for the ponderous nature of this post. I’ve gone to such lengths to understand and explain the source of the data related to the Woinowitz Zuckerfabrik and the timeline for the benefit of a select audience. As explained, because the Grundbuch’s auxiliary files are not catalogued, they are basically inaccessible to the average individual. However, even if they were generally available, it would still require comprehension of German and an understanding of German land law to make sense of their contents and its significance. This said, for the few readers whose Jewish ancestors may have held property in Germany they were compelled to sell during the Nazi era, there may be a few tendrils of useful information in this post.

POST 60: 200 YEARS OF THE ROYAL EVANGELICAL HIGH SCHOOL IN RATIBOR & A CLUE TO THE BRUCK FAMILY

Note: In this post, I talk about the Royal Evangelical Gymnasium (High School) in Ratibor, celebrating its 200th anniversary in 2019, and briefly discuss a contemporary publication from 1820 confirming my family’s connection to the city at that time.

Figure 1. Cover of the 1820 publication entitled “Denkschrift über die feierliche Eröffnung des Königl. Evangel. Gymnasium zu Ratibor am 2. Juni 1819” written by Dr. Carl Linge, first director of Ratibor’s Gymnasium

This year Racibórz, Poland celebrates “200 Jahre der Königlichen Evangelischen Gymnasium zu Ratibor,” 200 Years of the Royal Evangelical Gymnasium (High School) in Ratibor. Around Easter, my friend Mr. Paul Newerla, retired lawyer and current Silesian historian, presented a lecture at the Muzeum w Raciborzu on this subject. In researching the school’s history, Paul discovered an old book published in Ratibor in 1820 upon the school’s opening, archived at the British Museum, entitled “Denkschrift über die feierliche Eröffnung des Königl. Evangel. Gymnasium zu Ratibor am 2. Juni 1819. . .,” “Memorandum on the solemn opening of the Royal Evangelical High School in Ratibor on June 2, 1819. . .” (Figure 1) Prior to Paul’s discovery, this publication was unknown to local historians.

This 1820 book contains an alphabetical listing of the students enrolled at the time the Gymnasium was opened, that, interestingly, includes two of my earliest ancestors (Figure 2):

“J. Bruck, aus Ratibor”
“S. Bruck, aus Ratibor”

(J. Bruck and S. Bruck from Ratibor)

Figure 2. Page from Dr. Linge’s 1820 publication with the names of my ancestors “J. Bruck” and S. Bruck” shown as enrolled in Ratibor’s Gymnasium when the school first opened in 1819

Figure 3. A photo believed to be of my great-great-granduncle, Jonas Bruck (1813-1883)

Figure 4. My great-great-grandfather Samuel Bruck (1808-1863), original owner of the Bruck’s “Prinz von Preußen” Hotel

These ancestors were brothers Jonas Bruck (1813-1883) (Figure 3) and Samuel Bruck (1808-1863) (Figure 4), sons of Jacob Nathan Bruck (1770-1832). In Post 11, I told readers the original owner of the family hotel in Ratibor, the Bruck’s “Prinz von Preußen” Hotel, had been my great-great-grandfather, the Samuel Bruck who attended the Ratibor Gymnasium. Previously, I’d known my family’s connection to Ratibor extended back to at least 1850, which corresponded to the approximate time when Samuel Bruck purchased the family hotel. However, Mr. Newerla brought to my attention information proving the Bruck family’s association with Ratibor in fact extended back at least one more generation to Samuel’s father. In Post 11, I reported that according to land registers from the city of Ratibor from the time of Jacob Bruck, he had been an arrendator, a leaseholder, on two properties within Ratibor. These were located, respectively, on Jungfrauenstraße and Stockhaus-Gasse, shown on an 1812 city map sent to me by Mr. Newerla. (Figure 5) How much earlier my Bruck family may have arrived in Ratibor, and from which Silesian town, remains unknown. Regardless, the list of the students enrolled at the Royal Evangelical Gymnasium in 1819 confirms an early 19th century connection to Ratibor by my ancestors.

Figure 5. 1812 map of Ratibor showing location of parcels owned by Jacob Bruck along Jungfrauenstraße & Stockhaus-Gasse, and location of “Odertor,” the city gate atop which the Bruck’s Hotel was built after the city walls were demolished

Let me provide some brief historical background on the Royal Evangelical Gymnasium in Ratibor to help readers better understand the origins of the school, its locations, the age of the students, and their religious makeup.

Following a decision by the Royal Prussian Government on the 1st of October 1817, Ratibor became the seat of the Higher Regional Court of the Province of Upper Silesia. This coincided with the arrival of about twenty lawyers who discovered that Ratibor, then the largest city in Upper Silesia, had no grammar school for their children. Notably, those high schools that existed elsewhere at the time in Upper Silesia were all run by Catholic institutions or were in monasteries and were Catholic. The judges of the Higher Regional Court, as well as many other representatives of the intelligentsia, however, were Protestant. Thus, the President of the Regional Court of the Province of Upper Silesia appealed for the establishment of an Evangelical grammar school in Ratibor, which the King of Prussia granted on the 5th of June 1818. He appropriated 2,500 Reichtalers from the treasury for the maintenance of the new school and gave it the very spacious monastery of the Holy Ghost Dominican Church (Figure 6), which had been secularized in 1811. The monastery was located adjacent old city walls at the end of Jungfrauenstraße, coincidentally along the very street where Jacob Bruck leased property. Because the monastery buildings had to be renovated for school purposes, the Gymnasium was housed for a time in the former Franciscan monastery along Brunken (Figure 7), then located outside the city walls. Ratibor’s city walls, towers and gates, surrounding the town, were only demolished in 1828, after which the Prinz von Preußen was constructed at the corner of Oderstraße and Bollwerkstraße, eventually becoming the Bruck’s Hotel in the mid-19th Century.

Figure 6. A line drawing of Ratibor’s Gymnasium as it looked in 1820 with the adjacent tower of the former Holy Ghost Dominican Church; at the time, the entrance to the school was located on its south side

Figure 7. 1933 plan map of Ratibor showing Brunken, the Gymnasium’s location between 1819-1827; the Gymnasium’s current location; and the location of the Protestant church after 1909

When the Ratibor Gymnasium first opened its doors in the former Franciscan monastery, 114 students had passed an entrance examination and been admitted. Even though the high school was Protestant, paying students from all religious denominations could attend. The first class consisted of 40% Protestants, 50% Catholics, and 10% Jews. After only a few years the percent of Jewish students was at 20%, and never dropped much below this level, even though Ratibor’s Jewish population never exceeded 10%. This attests to the importance Jews attached to education.

The renovation of the grammar school on Jungfrauenstraße was not completed until 1827; the renovation included demolition of the east and north wings of the monastery, along with the removal of the city wall near the west wing, as it darkened the school rooms in this wing. Between 1819, when the grammar school opened, and 1827, when renovations were completed, the King of Prussia had issued an edict on January 16, 1821, giving the monastery church adjacent the Gymnasium to the Protestant parish (Figure 8) because their church located elsewhere in Ratibor was in danger of collapse on account of an unstable foundation.

Figure 8. On the right the tower of the Protestant Church located adjacent Ratibor’s Gymnasium between 1821 and 1909

By 1904, the Protestant parish had purchased a plot of land elsewhere in Ratibor on which to erect a new church. The plan had been to sell the former monastery church next to the Gymnasium to the Prussian State, dismantle the church, and use the parcel for the expansion of the grammar school. Even though essential components of the monastery dated to the 14th Century, the Conservator of the Provincial Burgermeister, essentially the Province of Silesia’s executive council, deemed the monastery to be of “insignificant monumental value.” This decision highlighted the power of Ratibor’s Protestants even over the General Conservator of the Province. It was only the refusal by the Prussian State to purchase the monastery that prevented its destruction and allows the facility to exist today as part of the Muzeum w Raciborzu. As a historic preservationist, I find it fascinating how serendipitous the survival of this noteworthy structure is.

Figure 9. View of the north side of Ratibor’s Gymnasium after a western extension was added

By the 1870’s Ratibor’s Gymnasium numbered in excess of 700 students, so an approval and allocation of funds for an extension was obtained that was completed by 1881. (Figure 9) A third floor was eventually added to the high school. (Figure 10)

Figure 10. 1925 view of Ratibor’s Gymnasium after a third level was added and the entrance moved to the western side of the school

Attendance in kindergarten was optional. At the age of six one was admitted to elementary school. Schools were denominational until 1873, after which such religious schools were abolished. Compulsory education existed in Prussia since 1765, although unconditional compulsory education for boys and girls was not introduced until 1907. The school year started on the 1st of April, effectively after Easter. Following the fourth grade of elementary school, one could be admitted to high school with passage of an entrance exam, thus around the age of ten.

In the case of Samuel and Jonas Bruck who show up in 1819 as enrolled students in Ratibor’s Gymnasium, their attendance was no doubt due to passage of the entrance exam. Still, Jonas’ attendance at the precocious age of only six, he was born in 1813, seems early. There is no doubt, however, as to the year Jonas was born because he is buried along with one of his renowned sons and their respective wives in the Old Jewish Cemetery in Breslau [today: Wrocław, Poland], and his headstone provides his date of birth. (Figures 11a-b) Paul Newerla sent me one page of the register of students admitted to Ratibor’s Gymnasium along with their ages, and most were between 9 and 13 years of age. (Figure 12) This log still exists today, and, as we speak, Paul is working on having it donated to the Archiwum Państwowe W Katowicach Oddzial W Raciborzu (“State Archives in Katowice Branch in Racibórz”). Regardless of whether Paul is successful in this endeavor, he is working to access the log to check for other Bruck relatives who may have attended Ratibor’s Gymnasium over the years.

Figure 11a. The large, stately Bruck Family tomb at the Old Jewish Cemetery in Wrocław, Poland where Jonas Bruck, his renowned son Julius Bruck, and their respective wives are all interred

Figure 11b. A closeup of Jonas Bruck’s headstone showing his birth and death dates

Figure 12. One page from the log of students admitted to Ratibor’s Gymnasium

The names of the classes in the 9-year high school were taken from Latin. The lowest class was labeled “Sexta” (sixth), the next “Quinta” (fifth), then “Quarta.” The next three classes, “Tertia” (third), “Sekunda” (second), and “Prima” (first), each consisted of lower and upper grades, for example, “Untertertia” or “Obersekunda” (“unter” means lower, “ober” means upper). After completing the “Oberprima,” you could take the matriculation exam, the “Abitur,” that if passed allowed you to attend a university.

One other thing of passing interest regarding the Ratibor Gymnasium were its collections. In 1938, these consisted of a teacher’s library with 17,000 books, a student library with more than 2,000 volumes, as well as more than 200 books printed before 1600, and 28 incunabula, that is, books printed before 1501. The Ratibor Gymnasium also preserved collections considered useful such as minerals, plant specimens, seeds, mollusks and birds, as well as valuable numismatic collections. (Figures 13-14) When the Museum Raciborzu was founded in 1927, these collections were handed over to the museum. Unfortunately, the museum’s natural science collection, which was in the former Protestant rectory, burnt down in 1945 and has been completely lost.

Figure 13. Collections of the Gymnasium in their museum (1936)

Figure 14. More collections of the Gymnasium in their museum (1936)

Figure 15. Baron Anselm von Rothschild (1803-1874) who donated the Egyptian mummy to the Ratibor Gymnasium in 1864

One unusual exhibit, given to the Royal Evangelical Church in 1864 by the wealthy Jewish banker baron Anselm von Rothschild (Figure 15), lord of Chałupki and Szilerzowice, survives today in the Muzeum Raciborzu. As an archaeologist, I find this story fascinating. Around 1860, Anselm von Rothschild went on a journey to Egypt and brought back numerous souvenirs, among them a complete burial of an Egyptian woman which he intended as a wedding gift for his fiancée. The peculiar gift was rejected. Oddly, in Rothschild’s palace in Szilerzowice, in the presence of invited dinner guests, the two sarcophagi were opened, the cartonnage undone, and the embalmed corpse unwrapped from its bandages.

In 1864, the baron decided to rid himself of the mummy and donated it to the Antiquity Department of the Royal Evangelical Gymnasium. Along with the other collections preserved by the Gymnasium, the mummy was formally taken over by the Muzuem w Raciborzu when it was founded in 1927. The half-bandaged mummy, sarcophagi, and richly ornamented cartonnage as well as three canopic jars to keep the viscera of corpses, purchased from the Museum of Antiquity in Berlin before the war, today are the greatest attraction of the Muzeum w Raciborzu. (Figure 16) Scientific analysis on the mummy revealed it was an Egyptian woman who lived during the 12th Dynasty (946-722 B.C.) named Dzed-Amonet-ius-anch, meaning “goddess Amonet said she would live.” She was a wealthy married woman, probably the daughter of a priest and barber from Thebes, who apparently died of complications from pregnancy.

Figure 16. The mummy of Dzed-Amonet-ius-anch from Egypt’s 12th Dynasty (946-722 B.C.) on display at the Muzeum w Raciborzu

The Ratibor Gymnasium is still standing today and is currently used as an economic middle school. (Figure 17) According to Paul Newerla, this middle school is where the volume with the names of students enrolled in the former Gymnasium was once kept, along with portfolios of graduation certificates. As we speak, Paul is trying to track down the current provenience of these materials to access their contents and see what more they can tell us about my Bruck relatives.

Figure 17. The Ratibor Gymnasium as it currently looks, now an economic middle school

REFERENCE

Linge, Dr. Carl

1820 Denkschrift ueber die feierliche Eroeffnung des Koenigl. Evangel. Gymnasium zu Ratibor am 2. Juni 1819 nebst den dabei gehaltenen Reden des Consistorialrath Dr. Wachler und des Dr. Linge und anderen Beilagen, Ratibor.