Author: richardbrook@bruckfamilyblog.com

POST 71: A DAY IN THE LIFE OF MY FATHER, DR. OTTO BRUCK–22ND OF AUGUST 1930

Note: In this post I recreate what may have happened on one day of my father’s life, the 22nd of August 1930, when he was a dental apprentice in the Free State of Danzig in the practice of Dr. Fritz Bertram.

Related Posts:

Post 16: Tracking My Great-Aunt Hedwig Löwenstein, Née Bruck, & Her Family Through Five Countries

 

Figure 1. My father, Dr. Otto Bruck, in Danzig in the Spring of 1932 before moving to Tiegenhof

 

Growing up, my father infrequently spoke of the roughly seven years between 1930 and 1937 when he lived in Danzig [today: Gdansk, Poland] (Figure 1) and Tiegenhof [today: Nowy Dwór Gdański, Poland] in the Free State of Danzig. No doubt my father would have characterized these years as the halcyon days of his life because he led a charmed life, albeit briefly. He took multiple pictures, which survive, of his time in the Żuławy region, the alluvial delta area of the Vistula River in the northern part of what is today Poland, so I can often precisely pinpoint where he was and what he was doing on specific dates. But I want to focus on one day in 1930, the 22nd of August, a Friday, no pictures of which exist, which was the day of a tragic family happening. To relate this tale, and it may be nothing more than a fictional, imagined account, I must begin in the present.

In earlier posts, I’ve introduced Mr. Peter Hanke, a gentleman I became acquainted with through an online forum, “forum.danzig.de.” Peter has tracked down historic documents I would have been unlikely to find on my own and been particularly helpful solving mysteries on the fate of some of my father’s family, friends, and acquaintances. This post is about one such puzzle.

Figure 2. Page from the Leo Baeck Institute’s “Pinkus Family Collection” with the names of my great-uncle “Robert Samuel Bruck” and “Rudolf Löwenstein” (married to my great-aunt Hedwig Bruck) circled showing their vital statistics

 

Recently, Peter and I were discussing one of my great-uncles, Robert Samuel Bruck (1871-1887), who I thought had died as a child in Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland], only to eventually learn that he bafflingly died in Braunschweig, Germany, 445 miles west-northwest of Racibórz, as a teenager. I learned of Robert’s survival to adolescence from a page in the Pinkus Family Collection (Figure 2), archived at the Leo Baeck Institute, which I shared with Peter. The mention of Braunschweig caught Peter’s attention because this town is located only 21 miles southwest of where Peter lives near Wolfsburg, Germany.

Another name caught Peter’s attention on this same page, namely, that of Rudolf Löwenstein, my great-aunt Hedwig Bruck’s husband, who it was noted died on the 22nd of August 1930 in Danzig. (Figure 2) To remind readers, in Post 16, I was able to confirm Rudolf Löwenstein’s death on this date in the Mormon Church’s microfilm records for Danzig, Microfilm Roll No. 1184408. (Figure 3) Peter was unable to locate Rudolf’s death certificate in online records from Danzig but was curious whether I’d be interested in having him seek other documents related to Rudolf; I told him I was, particularly since I had no idea how Rudolf had died. Naturally, I assumed it was of natural causes, which I soon learned was not the case. Having strangely been unable to find Rudolf Löwenstein’s death certificate, Peter presciently wondered whether he might have died somewhere other than Danzig.

Figure 3. Rudolf Löwenstein’s death register listing, 22 August 1930 (Source: Microfilm Roll # 1184408, LDS Church)

 

In a very short time, by accessing Danzig Address Books available online, Peter was able to track Rudolf and his family’s addresses and occupations between 1903 and 1933, summarized below:

1903—Director of the tobacco factory RUMI—Weidengaße 48

1904—Merchant—Weidengaße 48 (with a widow LÖWENSTEIN)

1905-1907—Merchant, representative of the advertising expedition Rudolf Mosse and Paul Stabernick, Heilige Gastgaße—Weidengaße 48 (Figure 4)

1909-1919—Hansaplatz 3

1920—Sandgrube 27b

1921-1929— Rennerstiftsgaße 11 (Figure 5)

1931—widow Hedwig (i.e., Rudolf’s wife)—Rennerstiftsgaße 11

1933—Heinz Löwenstein (i.e., Rudolf’s son)—Hauptstraße 51 (Figures 6a-b)

Figure 4. Page from 1905 Danzig Address Book showing Rudolf Löwenstein was a general representative of the advertising expedition Rudolf Mosse and Paul Stabernick, Heilige Gastgaße—Weidengaße 48
Figure 5. Page from 1927 Danzig Address Book listing Rudolf Löwenstein as a “kaufman” (merchant) for “Annoncen Expedition und Reklamebüro” (Advertising Expedition and Advertising Office) Rennerstiftsgaße 11

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 5. Page from 1927 Danzig Address Book listing Rudolf Löwenstein as a “kaufman” (merchant) for “Annoncen Expedition und Reklamebüro” (Advertising Expedition and Advertising Office) Rennerstiftsgaße 11
Figure 6b. Separate page from 1933 Danzig Address Book, following Rudolf Löwenstein’s death in 1930, shows his son Heinz Löwenstein following in his father’s footsteps

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Peter’s findings related to Rudolf’s fate transcend what the Danzig Address Books of the day reveal. He was able to track down four newspaper accounts from two newspapers, the “Danziger Allgemeine Zeitung (DAZ)” and the “Volksstimme,” from August 23rd and August 25th, the days immediately following Rudolf’s recorded death date.

 

TRANSCRIPTION

(“Danziger Allgemeine Zeitung (DAZ)” article from Saturday the 23rd of August 1930) (Figure 7) 

Figure 7. “Danziger Allgemeine Zeitung (DAZ)” article from Saturday the 23rd of August 1930 discussing plane crash that killed Rudolf Löwenstein

Passagierflugzeug abgestürzt
10 Tote

In der Nähe von Friedrichsdorf bei Iglau stützte, wie aus Prag gemeldet wird, Freitag nachmittag 4 Uhr ein Flugzeug ab, das auf der Strecke Prag-Preßburg verkehrte. In dem Flugzeug befanden sich 13 Personen, von denen bei dem Absturz vier auf der Stelle getötet wurden. Von den schwer verletzten Personen sind kurz nach der Einlieferung in das Iglauer Krankenhaus vier weitere gestorben. Ferner sind zwei Passagiere schwer und einer leicht verletzt worden. Unter den Getöteten befindet sich der Ingenieur Bernhard EIMANN aus Dresden. Das Flugzeug war vom Typ Ford und stand bei den tschechoslowakischen staatlichen Aerolinien seit Frühjahr vorigen Jahres in Dienst. Es vermochte 14 Passagiere und zwei Mann Besatzung zu fassen. Das Flugzeug ist anscheinend in eine Gewitterzone geraten.


Die Flugzeugkatastrophe bei Iglau hat nach neueren Meldungen 10 Todesopfer gefordert, da von den im Krankenhaus eingelieferten Verletzten sechs gestorben sind. Unter den Toten befinden sich zwei Ausländer, außer dem bereits genannten Ingenieur EIMANN aus Dresden, ein Passagier namens Ködenstein aus Dänemark. Man vermutet, dass der Pilot im Sturm die Orientierung verlor, unter die Wolken herabging und das Flugzeug infolge eines Windstoßes abglitt. Ein Teil des Flugzeugs bohrte sich in die Erde ein, der andere geriet in Brand.

TRANSLATION

“Passenger plane crashed
10 deaths

As reported from Prague, a plane, which operated on the Prague- Preßburg route, crashed near Friedrichsdorf near Iglau, at 4 o’clock on Friday afternoon. The plane contained 13 people, four of whom were killed immediately in the crash. Of the seriously injured, four others died shortly after being transferred to the hospital in Iglau. Two passengers were also seriously and one slightly injured. Among those killed is engineer Bernhard EIMANN from Dresden. The plane was of the Ford type and had been in service with the Czechoslovakian state airlines since spring of last year. It was capable of carrying 14 passengers and two crew members. The plane apparently got into a thunderstorm zone.


According to recent reports, the air disaster near Iglau has claimed 10 lives, as six of the injured who were hospitalized have died. Among the dead are two foreigners, apart from the already mentioned engineer EIMANN from Dresden, a passenger named Ködenstein from Denmark. It is suspected that the pilot lost his orientation in the storm, went down under the clouds and the plane slipped as a result of a gust of wind. One part of the plane drilled into the ground, the other caught fire.”

 

TRANSCRIPTION

(“Volksstimme” article from Saturday the 23rd of August 1930) (Figure 8)

Figure 8. “Volksstimme” article from Saturday the 23rd of August 1930 discussing plane crash that killed Rudolf Löwenstein

10 Tote bei einem Flugzeugunglück
Flugzeug stürzte auf ein Dach – Die Orientierung verloren

Am Freitagnachmittag um 4 Uhr verunglückte bei Iglau auf dem Wege nach Preßburg im Sturm ein Passagierflugzeug der staatlichen Fluggesellschaft. 10 Personen fand den Tod.

Das Flugzeug flog zunächst in großem Sturm und Regen. Bald nach dem Start stieß der Flugzeugführer auch noch auf dichten Nebel, so dass er die Orientierung verlor. Unterdessen wurde der Sturm immer heftiger. Die Maschine wurde hin und her geworfen und schließlich zu Boden geschleudert. Hier verfing sie sich in einem Baum, der umgerissen wurde. Dem Flugzeugführer gelang es noch einmal, die Maschine hochzureißen. Der Versuch einer Notlandung mißglückte jedoch. Das Flugzeug stürzte auf das Dach eines Hauses, fiel um und explodierte. Vier Personen verbrannten, 6 wurden durch den Aufschlag tödlich verletzt. Unter den Opfern der grausigen Katastrophe befindet sich auch der Dresdner Ingenieur Bernhard EIMANN. Der Pilot fand ebenfalls den Tod.

Die Unglücksmaschine wurde vor drei Monaten von Ford aus Amerika bezogen. Sie verfügte über Sitzplätze für 14 Personen und versah den Verkehr zwischen Prag und Preßburg.

TRANSLATION

“10 dead in a plane crash
Airplane crashed onto a roof – Lost orientation

On Friday afternoon at 4 o’clock on the way to Bratislava a passenger plane of the state airline was involved in an accident near Iglau. 10 people were killed.

The plane first flew in a heavy storm and rain. Soon after take-off, the pilot also encountered dense fog so that he lost his orientation. Meanwhile the storm became more and more violent. The plane was tossed back and forth and finally flung to the ground. Here it got caught in a tree that was knocked down. The pilot managed to pull the plane up once more. However, the attempt of an emergency landing failed. The plane crashed onto the roof of a house, fell over and exploded. Four people were burned, six were fatally injured by the impact. Among the victims of the gruesome catastrophe is the Dresden engineer Bernhard EIMANN. The pilot was also killed.

The crashed aircraft was purchased by Ford from America 3 months ago. It had seats for 14 people and provided traffic between Prague and Bratislava.”

 

TRANSCRIPTION

(“Danziger Allgemeine Zeitung (DAZ)” article from Monday the 25th of August 1930) (Figure 9)

Figure 9. “Danziger Allgemeine Zeitung (DAZ)” article from Monday the 25th of August 1930 discussing Rudolf Löwenstein’s death

Die Flugzeugkatastrophe bei Iglau

Zu dem schweren Flugunfall bei Iglau, über den wir Sonnabend berichteten, werden folgende Einzelheiten bekannt: Der auf dem Flug von Preßburg nach Prag verkehrende große, dreimotorige Eindecker geriet kurz vor Iglau in eine schwere Gewitterböe, weshalb sich der Pilot gezwungen sah, eine Notlandung vorzunehmen. Aus bisher noch nicht ganz geklärter Ursache, wahrscheinlich durch ein plötzliches Umspringen des Windes, überschlug sich aber der Apparat, noch ehe er den Boden erreicht hatte. Die schwere Maschine stürzte auf ein von Arbeitern bewohntes Haus, durchschlug das Dach und zerstörte auch einen Teil des Mauerwerks. Der Aufprall war so heftig, dass im Augenblick des Aufschlags eine Explosion des Benzintanks erfolgte.

In wenigen Sekunden war die Maschine in ein Flammenmeer gehüllt. Das Feuer griff auch trotz des starken Regens auf das Hausdach über. Die Feuerwehr löschte den Brand und versuchte die Passagiere aus ihrer furchtbaren Lage zu befreien. Die Hilfe kam jedoch zu spät. Von den 13 Insassen des Flugzeugs konnten vier nur mehr als verkohlte Leichen geborgen werden.Die Identität dieser vier Toten konnte noch nicht festgestellt werden.

Ein Danziger bei der Iglauer Flugzeugkatastrophe tödlich verunglückt

Wie wir erfahren, ist bei dem Flugzeugunglück in Iglau (Tschechoslowakei) auch ein Danziger Kaufmann, der Inhaber einer hiesigen Announcen-Expedition, Rudolf LÖWENSTEIN, ums Leben gekommen.

TRANSLATION

“The air disaster at Iglau

The following details are known about the serious air accident at Iglau, which we reported on Saturday: The large, three-engined monoplane flying from Bratislava to Prague was caught in a heavy gust of thunder shortly before Iglau, forcing the pilot to make an emergency landing. For reasons not yet fully explained, probably due to a sudden change in wind, the plane overturned before it reached the ground. The heavy machine crashed into a house inhabited by workers, punctured the roof and also destroyed part of the masonry. The impact was so violent that at the moment of impact the petrol tank exploded.

In a few seconds the machine was enveloped in a sea of flames. The fire also spread to the roof of the house despite the heavy rain. The fire brigade extinguished the fire and tried to rescue the passengers from their terrible situation. But help came too late. Of the 13 passengers on the plane, four were recovered as charred bodies, but the identity of the four dead could not yet be determined.

A man from Danzig was killed in the Iglau air disaster

As we learn, the plane accident in Iglau (Czechoslovakia) also killed a merchant from Danzig, the owner of a local advertising expedition, Rudolf LÖWENSTEIN.”

 

TRANSCRIPTION

(“Volksstimme” article from Monday the 25th of August 1930) (Figure 10)

Figure 10. “Volksstimme” article from Monday the 25th of August 1930 discussing Rudolf Löwenstein’s death

Danziger Kaufmann tödlich verunglückt

Bei der Flugzeugkatastrophe in Iglau – Tragisches Ende eines Besuchs in der Heimat

Die Flugzeugkatastrophe bei Iglau, über die wir am Sonnabend ausführlich berichtet haben, hat ein elftes Todesopfer gefordert. Der Kaufmann Rudolf LÖWENSTEIN, der Vater des bekannten, augenblicklich in Paris lebenden Danziger Malers Fedja LÖWENSTEIN, ist seinen Verletzungen erlegen.

Rudolf LÖWENSTEIN, der im 59. Lebensjahr stand, war auf dem Heimflug von Prag nach Danzig. Er hatte eine Geschäftstour in die Tschechoslowakei unternommen und damit einen Besuch seines Heimatortes Johannisbad verbunden. Der Rückflug nach Danzig sollte bereits einige Tage früher erfolgen, wegen des ungünstigen Wetters aber wurde der Start auf Freitag verschoben. Am Nachmittag erfolgte dann das furchtbare Unglück, das zu den schwersten Flugzeugkatastrophen überhaupt zu rechnen ist.

Vorläufig ist noch unbekannt, wie das Unglück geschah. Man nimmt an, dass das Flugzeug vom Blitz getroffen wurde. Die Machine stürzte auf das Dach eines Hauses, fiel um und explodierte.

Vier Personen verbrannten und sieben Passagiere, darunter Rudolf LÖWENSTEIN, wurden durch den Aufschlag tödlich verletzt. Die Leiche Löwensteins wird nach Danzig überführt und hier beigesetzt werden.

TRANSLATION

“Danzig merchant killed in accident

At the airplane disaster in Iglau – Tragic end of a visit to the home

The air disaster at Iglau, which we reported on in detail on Saturday, has claimed an eleventh life. The merchant Rudolf LÖWENSTEIN, the father of the well-known Danzig artist Fedja LÖWENSTEIN, who is currently living in Paris, succumbed to his injuries.

Rudolf LÖWENSTEIN, who was nearly 59 years old, was on his flight home from Prague to Danzig. He had gone on a business trip to Czechoslovakia, which included a visit to his hometown of Johannisbad. The return flight to Danzig should have been a few days earlier, but due to the unfavorable weather, the start was postponed to Friday. In the afternoon, the terrible accident occurred, which is one of the most serious aircraft disasters ever.

It is not yet known how the accident happened. It is assumed that the aircraft was struck by lightning. The plane crashed onto the roof of a house, fell over and exploded.

Four people were burnt and seven passengers, including Rudolf LÖWENSTEIN, were fatally injured by the impact. Löwenstein’s body will be transferred to Danzig and buried here.”

Figure 11. Flight path from Preßburg, Czechoslovakia [today: Bratislava, Slovakia] to Prague, showing where the Ford-Tri-Motor plane Rudolf Löwenstein was aboard went down near a town called Iglau, Czechoslovakia

According to the contemporary newspaper accounts, Rudolf Löwenstein, who at the time of his death was almost 59 years old, was on his way home to Danzig. The flight on which he was killed was flying from Preßburg, Czechoslovakia [today: Bratislava, Slovakia] to Prague, when it went down near a town called Iglau. (Figure 11) Rudolf had gone on a business trip to Czechoslovakia, which included a visit to his hometown of Johannisbad [today: Janské Lázně, Czech Republic]. The plane he was on got caught in a heavy rainstorm. Soon after take-off, the pilot became disoriented on account of dense fog, and attempted an emergency landing near Iglau. Possibly due to wind shear, the plane overturned before it could land, crashed into the roof of a house, and exploded; 11 of the 13 passengers aboard were killed. The plane was of a Ford type, possibly a Ford Trimotor 5-AT-B. (Figure 12) Production on this model started in 1925 by the companies of Henry Ford and ended on June 7, 1933. Designed to hold 15 to 17 passengers, it was intended for the civil aviation market, but also saw service with military units.

Figure 12. Picture of a Ford-Tri-Motor plane like the one on which Rudolf Löwenstein was a passenger when he died

 

Let me move on to where my father may have been on the 22nd of August 1930 when his uncle Rudolf was killed. My father 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], the latter of which ended on the 17th of August 1930 (Figure 13); Allenstein is only a little more than 100 miles southeast of Danzig so he likely returned there by train after this apprenticeship.

 

Figure 13. Letter of recommendation given to my father on 17 August 1930 by Dr. Heinrich Krüger from Allenstein, Germany, for whom he briefly apprenticed

 

My father did not establish and open his own dental practice in Tiegenhof [today: Nowy Dwór Gdański, Poland] until the 9th of April 1932. In the interim, he apprenticed with a dentist in Danzig, Dr. Fritz Bertram (Figure 14), and likely stayed with his Aunt Hedwig and Uncle Rudolf in Danzig, and possibly two of their three children living at home.

Figure 14. Dr. Fritz Bertram, the dentist for whom my father apprenticed between 1930 and 1932, sailing with friends in the Bay of Danzig

 

The plane Rudolf Löwenstein was flying was reported to have gone down at around 4pm on the 22nd of August; already by the following day, the two Danzig newspapers had reported on the tragedy. Thus, it’s likely my father’s uncle was expected home the evening of the 22nd of August, and that the family had already been notified or learned of the plane crash that ultimately resulted in Rudolf’s death. Clearly, ninety years after the incident, it’s impossible to know exactly how events played out on that day and when the family eventually learned of Rudolf’s tragic accident but it’s likely my father was present when the family heard about what had happened; it’s not clear from contemporary news accounts whether Rudolf was killed instantly or not. The fact Peter Hanke has not found Rudolf’s death certificate in Danzig may possibly mean it is to be found in the Czech Republic.

As an aside, while I have multiple photos of my great-aunt Hedwig and her three children (Figure 15), and know all their vital statistics, regrettably, I have no known pictures of Rudolf Löwenstein. None of Hedwig and Rudolf’s children bore any offspring, though two were married, so it’s been difficult to track down where their personal papers wound up after their deaths. So, for the moment, Rudolf remains faceless.

Figure 15. My great-aunt Hedwig Löwenstein née Bruck with her three children, Fedor (seated), Jeanne (“Hansi”) & Heinz in Nice, France in March 1946

 

RUDOLF LÖWENSTEIN & HIS IMMEDIATE FAMILY

 

Name (relationship) Vital Event Date Place
       
Rudolf Löwenstein (self) Birth 17 January 1872 Kuttenplan, Czechoslovakia [today: Chodová Planá, Czech Republic]
Marriage 17 September 1899 Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland]
Death 22 August 1930 Iglau, Czechoslovakia [today: Jihlava, Czech Republic]
Hedwig Bruck (wife) Birth 22 March 1870 Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland]
Marriage 17 September 1899 Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland]
Death 15 January 1949 Nice, France
Fedor Löwenstein (son) Birth 13 April 1901 Munich, Germany
Death 4 August 1946 Nice, France
Jeanne “Hansi” Löwenstein (daughter) Birth 9 September 1902 Danzig, Free State [today: Gdansk, Poland]
Marriage    
Death 5 May 1986 Nice, France
Heinz Löwenstein (son) (died as “Hanoch Avneri”) Birth 8 March 1905 Danzig, Free State [today: Gdansk, Poland]
Marriage 22 October 1931 Danzig, Free State [today: Gdansk, Poland]
Death 10 August 1979 Haifa, Israel
       

 

 

POST 68, POSTSCRIPT: DR. JULIUS BRUCK, ENGINEER OF MODERN ENDOSCOPY-TRACKING SOME OF HIS DESCENDANTS

Note: In this postscript, I present additional documentary evidence confirming some of Dr. Julius Bruck’s descendants survived the Holocaust and made their way to England.

Related Post:

Post 68: Dr. Julius Bruck And His Influence on Modern Endoscopy

 

Figure 1. The restored headstone of Dr. Julius Bruck in 2016

 

 

Figure 2. Dr. Julius Bruck’s youngest son, Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck (1872-1937)

 

 

Dr. Julius Bruck (1840-1902) and his wife Bertha Bruck née Vogelsdorf (1843-1917) (Figure 1) had two sons and two daughters born between 1864 and 1872, all of whom were dead by 1937.  The youngest son, Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck (1872-1937) (Figure 2), was the last to die. He and his wife, Johanna Bruck née Graebsch, had two daughters, Hermine and Renate, their fates unknown to me. One of my fourth cousins told me Hermine was born and died in 1924 in Breslau, Germany [today: Wrocław, Poland] and knew only Renate was also born there on the 16th of June 1926; there were unconfirmed rumors Renate had immigrated to England. As discussed in Post 68, independently, I found Johanna and Renate Bruck’s names in the “German Minority Census, 1939,” showing both were still alive in 1939, living in Breslau, and giving their ages. (Figure 3)

 

Figure 3. “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

 

Operating under the assumption the connection to England had some veracity, I searched for a Renate Bruck there. I explained to readers in the original post that on ancestry.com I discovered a Renate Bruck listed in a Willesden, Middlesex, England marriage register, indicating she wed a man there named Harry E. Graham in October 1948. Uncertain this was really Dr. Julius Bruck’s granddaughter, I ordered the marriage certificate from the United Kingdom’s General Register Office (GRO) and confirmed Renate Graham was indeed the surviving daughter of Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck. (Figure 4) The certificate showed that both Renate Bruck and Harry Graham had previously been married.

Figure 4. 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

 

Knowing now that Renate Bruck had survived the Holocaust, and somehow immigrated to England after 1939, I theorized that her mother might also have made it there since I found no indication in Yad Vashem she’d perished in the Holocaust. I searched for Johanna Bruck in MyHeritage hoping I might find new clues there, and indeed found a very promising lead. I discovered a Johanna M.E. Bruck living in Barnet, Hertfordshire, England, born around 1885, who died between January and March 1963, at the age of 78 (Figure 5); I already knew from Johanna Bruck née Graebsch’s first wedding in 1905 to Dr. Renner that she’d been born on the 10th of April 1884, and the difference by one year of her birth seemed insignificant (i.e., 1885 vs. 1884). I checked the distance between Willesden, where Renate Bruck married in 1948 for the second time, and Barnet, where this Johanna Bruck died, and found it was only 44 km apart, or 27 miles, so it was reasonable to assume these people might be related.

 

Figure 5. Page from MyHeritage showing a Johanna M.E. Bruck living in Barnet, Hertfordshire, England, born around 1885, who died between January and March 1963, at the age of 78

 

I’ve previously explained to readers that for a long time I erroneously assumed the information in ancestry.com and MyHeritage replicates itself, but recently discovered this is not the case. By this time, I was virtually positive this Johanna Bruck was Renate’s mother. I returned to the UK’s General Register Office database and searched for a Johanna Bruck who died in the first quarter of 1963. There, I found a listing for a Johanna M.E. Bruck, and ordered this woman’s death certificate. It arrived a few weeks later, and confirmed what I’d already strongly suspected, namely, that Johanna was indeed the widow of Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck (Figure 6); she died of early cardiac failure, a result of ovarian cancer. Thus, I’d finally solved the mystery of where and when Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck’s widow had died.

Figure 6. The death certificate for Johanna Margarete Elizabeth Bruck identifying her as the widow of Dr. Julius Bruck’s youngest son, Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck

 

But I was not yet completely satisfied. I still had not figured out when Renate Bruck might have died, so I returned to ancestry.com. There, I uncovered evidence of yet a third individual Renate Bruck had wed, a man named Gary Newman who she married in 1956. (Figures 7a-b) There was also a fleeting reference on a family tree in ancestry that a Renate Newman had died in England on the 3rd of March 2013. (Figure 8) With an actual year of death, I located a death certificate in the UK’s General Register Office database corresponding to this lady. (Figure 9) Naturally, I ordered a copy of this document, which arrived in just the last few days. Any lingering doubt I might have had that this was Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck’s daughter was dispelled when I saw the maiden name “Bruck” on the certificate with her known date of birth, the 16th of June 1926. (Figure 10) Her cause of death was specified as esophageal cancer. She’d been an interior designer during her working years, while her husband had been a commodity broker.

Figure 7a. Cover page from ancestry.com showing that Renate S.G. Graham, Renate Bruck’s married name by her second husband, wed a man named Gary Newman in October 1956
Figure 7b. Registration page from ancestry.com showing Renate S.G. Newman married “Newman” in the last quarter of 1956

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 8. Page from a family tree on ancestry showing that a Renate Newman, born on the 16th of June 1926, died on the 3rd of March 2013 in England
Figure 9. Page from the UK’s “General Register Office Online Index” with Renate Stefanie Bruck’s name showing she was born in 1926 and died in 2013

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 10. Renate Stefanie Newman’s death certificate identifying her as the widow of Gary Newman, showing her date and place of death, her and her husband’s occupations, and her son’s name, Nicholas Francis David Newman

 

At the time of her death in 2013, her son, Nicholas Francis David Newman, was attendant. Thinking I might finally have found a living descendant of the esteemed Dr. Julius Bruck from Breslau, I first tried looking for him under births in UK’s General Register Office database but discovered this index of historic births goes only until 1916; remember that Renate married her third husband in 1956 so Nicholas’ birth would obviously postdate 1916. The GRO database does, however, include death records until 1957, and, then again between 1984 to the present; oddly, death records between 1957 and 1991 are not available.  Knowing Nicholas Newman was still alive when his mother passed away in 2013, I searched death records for the brief period from then to now. Not expecting to find anything, I was astonished to discover his death was recorded in the first quarter of 2016 when he would have been only 55 or 56 years of age. (Figure 11) I’m awaiting arrival of Nicholas Newman’s death certificate, as I write, hoping I might finally find a living descendant of Dr. Julius Bruck, four generations removed. To date, I’ve been unable to resolve the question of whether Renate Bruck might have had additional children with her third husband, or possibly children by her second husband, Harry Graham. The search continues.

Figure 11. Page from the UK’s “General Register Office Online Index” listing Nicholas Francis David Newman, Renate Newman née Bruck’s son, showing he was born in 1960 and died in 2016

 

 JULIUS BRUCK & HIS IMMEDIATE FAMILY

 

Name (relationship) Vital Event Date Place
       
Dr. Julius Bruck (self) Birth 6 October 1840 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Marriage 1863  
Death 20 April 1902 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Bertha Vogelsdorff (wife) Birth 31 December 1843  
Marriage 1863  
Death 4 February 1917 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Margarethe Bruck (daughter) Birth 19 August 1864  
Death 1923  
Fritz Bruck (son) Birth 31 October 1865  
Death 24 January 1883  
Gertrud Bruck Birth 13 January 1867  
Death 18 June 1869  
Walter Wolfgang Bruck (son) Birth 4 March 1872 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Death 31 March 1937 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Johanna Margarete Elizabeth Graebsch (daughter-in-law) Birth 10 April 1884 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Marriage (to Dr. Alfred Friedrich Karl Kurt Renner) 6 May 1905 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Divorce (from Dr. Renner) 8 March 1917 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Marriage (to Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck)    
Death 5 March 1963 Barnet, Hertford, England
Hermine Johanna Elisabeth Bruck (granddaughter) Birth January 1924 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Death 3 October 1924 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Renate Stephanie Gertrud Bruck (granddaughter) Birth 16 June 1926 Breslau, Germany [Wrocław, Poland]
Marriage (to Eugen Walter Mehne)    
Marriage (to Henry Ernest Graham) 18 October 1948 Willesden, Middlesex, England
Marriage (to Gary Newman) October 1956 Willesden, Middlesex, England
Death 3 March 2013 Woodbridge, Suffolk, England
Nicholas Francis David Newman (great-grandson) Birth 1960 England
Death 2016 England
       

 

 

 

 

POST 15, POSTSCRIPT: BERLIN-FRANZISKA & ELSBETH BRUCK: “ARTIFACTS” FROM FRANZISKA’S BLUMENSCHULE (FLOWER SCHOOL)

Note: I continue with a series of postscripts to earlier Blog posts to catch readers up on findings I’ve made since publishing the original stories. In this brief postscript, I discuss rare “artifacts” from my renowned great-aunt Franziska Bruck’s blumenschule, flower school, in Berlin which readers have generously sent me.

Related Posts:

Post 15: Berlin & My Great-Aunts Franziska & Elsbeth Bruck

Post 21: My Aunt Susanne, Née Bruck, & Her Husband Dr. Franz Müller, The Fiesole Years

Figure 1. My great-aunt Franziska Bruck (1866-1942)

 

My great-aunt Franziska Bruck (Figure 1), the renowned Berlin florist (Figure 2), killed herself on the 2nd of January 1942 in Berlin-Charlottenburg, probably a few days before she was ordered to report for deportation. Likely not having access to Veronal and Scopolamin-Entodal, the most commonly used poisons of the time, she gruesomely ended her life by hanging. By committing suicide, Franziska wanted to avoid the fate of her Jewish neighbors, others of whom were soon deported.

 

Figure 2. Franziska Bruck in her “Schule für Blumenschmuck”

 

 

In April 2019, I was contacted through my Blog by a Ms. Karin Sievert of the “Stolpersteininitiative Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf,” requesting information on my great-aunt Franziska and her siblings (see table at the bottom of this post for vital statistics on my great-aunt and her immediate family). To remind readers, the Stolpersteine project, initiated in 1992 by the German artist Gunter Demnig, commemorates people who were persecuted by the Nazis between 1933 and 1945 (e.g., Jews, Sinti, Roma, political and religious dissidents, victims of “euthanasia,” homosexuals, Jehovah Witnesses, etc.). Stolpersteine, or “stumbling stones,” are concrete blocks measuring 10x10cm (i.e., 3.9 in x 3.9 in) which are laid into the pavement in front of the last voluntarily chosen places of residence of the victims of the Nazis. Their names and fate are engraved into a brass plate on the top of each Stolperstein.

Figure 3. Prinzregentenstraße 75 in Berlin’s Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf borough, Franziska Bruck’s last voluntarily chosen place of residence

 

 

Like many unmarried women of the time, Franziska Bruck sublet an apartment located at Prinzregentenstraße 75 in Wilmersdorf. (Figure 3) By virtue of a Nazi law from 1939 voiding tenant protections for Jews, she’d already been forced to move from there to Waitzstraße 9. (Figure 4–“Arolsen Archives–International Center on Nazi Persercution“) This law stipulated that apartment leases could be terminated without notice and Jews had to find a new place to live within days or were quartered with other similarly displaced Jews. In the case of my great-aunt Franziska, in 2011, the Berlin Stumbling Stone Initiative Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf installed a stone in front of her last home at Prinzregentenstrasse 75. (Figure 5)

 

Figure 4. Page from the “Arolsen Archives-International Center on Nazi Persecution” on my great-aunt Franziska Bruck showing she lived at Waitzstraße 9 and died on the 2nd of January 1942

 

Figure 5. Franziska Bruck’s “stolperstein,” located in front of Prinzregentenstraße 75 in Berlin, recognizing her as a victim of Nazi persecution

 

Ms. Sievert learned of my family history blog from one of her colleagues and requested my assistance in compiling a brief biography of my great-aunt. I was most happy to assist and provide family photographs. Readers can remind themselves by referring to the original post that I included a photo taken in Franziska’s flower shop showing the last Crown Princess of Germany and Prussia, Princess Cecilie, touring her Blumenschule, flower school. (Figure 6) Supplementing information I provided, Karin did her own research and purchased a postcard from a dealer of the same visit taken at a slightly different angle. (Figure 7) In addition, Karin also found an original advertisement for Franziska’s “Schule für Blumenschmuck,” taken from a “Daheim-Kalendar 1915,” home calendar from 1915. (Figures 8-9) As Franziska’s descendant and namesake, Karin graciously and generously gave me both rare family artifacts. I was enormously touched by this kind gesture.

Figure 6. Last Crown Princess of Germany & Prussia, Princess Cecilie, visiting Franziska Bruck’s “Schule für Blumenschmuck”

 

Figure 7. Postcard of the last Crown Princess of Germany & Prussia, Princess Cecilie, visiting my great-aunt’s flower shop

 

Figure 8. An original advertisement for Franziska’s “Schule für Blumenschmuck,” taken from a “Daheim-Kalendar 1915,” home calendar from 1915, given to by Ms. Karin Sievert of the “Stolpersteininitiative Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf”
Figure 9. Cover of the “Daheim-Kalendar 1915” containing the original advertisement for Franziska’s “Schule für Blumenschmuck”

 

Figure 10. My and my wife’s Italian friend, Giuditta Melli, a professional potter, who created a replica of a floral vase like ones used by my great-aunt Franziska for her Ikebana-inspired floral arrangements

 

I would be remiss in not acknowledging another magnanimous deed done by an Italian lady my wife Ann and I befriended at a bus stop in Florence, Italy, in 2014. Like me, our friend, Giuditta Melli (Figure 10), is of Jewish ancestry, and her great-uncle was murdered by the Italian Fascists during WWII in Florence. Giuditta is aware of my great-aunt’s books on flower binding and gardening (Figures 11-12), as well as her floral art featured in important art magazines of the time. (Figure 13) Franziska’s floral work was patterned on Ikebana, the Japanese art of floral arrangement. Giuditta, a potter by profession, created and sent me a replica of a Japanese vase like ones featured in my great-aunt’s floral creations. (Figure 14) This was another enormously kindhearted act that reminds me that while Franziska died under tragic circumstances, her memory and work live on. (Figure 15)

Figure 11. Cover of Franziska Bruck’s 1925 book “Blumen und Ranken,” translated as “flowers and vines”
Figure 12. Cover of Franziska Bruck’s 1926 book “Blumenschmuck,” translated as “flowers”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 13. Cover of February 17, 1915 “Die Bindekunst” periodical with article on Franziska’s floral arrangements

 

Figure 14. The Ikebana-inspired vase created and given to me by Giuditta Melli

 

 

FRANZISKA BRUCK & HER IMMEDIATE FAMILY

 

Name

(relationship)

 Vital Event Date Place
       
Franziska Bruck

(self)

 Birth 29 December 1866 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 2 January 1942 Berlin, Germany
Fedor Bruck

(father)

 Birth 8 October 1834 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Marriage 7 July 1862 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 2 October 1892 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Friederike Mockrauer (mother) Birth 15 June 1836 Leschnitz, Germany (Leśnica, Poland)
Marriage 7 July 1862 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 29 February 1924 Berlin, Germany
Felix Bruck (brother) Birth 28 March 1864 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Marriage 11 February 1894 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 23 June 1927 Berlin, Germany
Charlotte Bruck (sister) Birth 8 December 1865 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Marriage 18 March 1888 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 10 January 1965 Stockholm, Sweden
Elise Bruck (sister) Birth 20 August 1868 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 19 June 1872 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Hedwig Bruck (sister) Birth 22 March 1870 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Marriage 17 September 1899 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 15 January 1949 Nice, France
Robert Bruck (brother) Birth 1 September 1871 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 30 December 1887 Braunschweig, Germany
Wilhelm Bruck (brother) Birth 24 October 1872 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Marriage 2 April 1904 Hamburg, Germany
Death 29 April 1952 Barcelona, Spain
Elisabeth “Elsbeth” Bruck (sister) Birth 17 November 1874 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 20 February 1970 Berlin, Germany

 

Figure 15. My great-aunt Franziska Bruck’s grave in the Weissensee Jewish Cemetery in East Berlin

 

 

POST 40, POSTSCRIPT: ELISABETH “LISA” PAULY NÉE KRÜGER, ONE OF GERMANY’S SILENT HEROES—DISCOVERING HER HUSBAND’S FATE

Note: In this post, I relate the forensic work I undertook to learn the fate of Franz Pincus/Pauly, husband of Lisa Pauly, one of Germany’s “silent heroes” during WWII. Franz Pincus and my uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck were second cousins, and though Franz died in 1941 before my uncle was forced “underground” in 1942 by the Nazis, Franz’s widow sheltered my uncle for periods during his 30 months in hiding.

Related Posts:

Post 40: Elisabeth “Lisa” Pauly née Krüger, One of Germany’s Silent Heroes

Post 44: A Trove of Family History from The “Pinkus Collection” at the Leo Baeck Institute

Post 48: Dr. Ernst Neisser’s Final Days in 1942 in the Words of His Daughter

Post 49: Guide to the Landesarchiv Berlin (Berlin State Archive) Civil Registry Records

Post 57: Disappeared Without A Trace, Maria Pohlmann b. Pauly

 

Figure 1. Translation of affidavit written by Elisabeth “Lisa” Pauly née Krüger on February 3, 1947, on behalf of my Uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck, intended for the American Embassy

 

On February 3, 1947, Elisabeth “Lisa” Pauly née Krüger, one of my uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck’s protectors in the course of his thirty months spent “underground” eluding the Nazis in Berlin during WWII, wrote a letter of reference for him. (Figure 1) In this recommendation, Lisa Pauly mentioned that her husband had died in 1941, without naming him or specifying a cause of death. By referring to the Pauly Stammbaum, family tree (Figure 2), I was able to figure out her husband was Franz Pincus, although for a very long time I was uncertain this was really Lisa Pauly’s spouse. As I explained to readers in the original post, I was only able to confirm “Franz Pincus” and “Franz Pauly” were the same person by systematically going through 1920’s and 1930’s Berlin Address Books checking both names residing at the same address. Employing this approach, as discussed in the original post, I eventually found a “Franz Pincus” living at Deidesheimer Str. 25 in Friedenau in 1928 (Figure 3), and by 1930 discovered a “Franz Pauly” residing at that same address. (Figure 4) For whatever reason Franz changed to using his mother’s maiden name, though both Pincus and Pauly were Jewish.

Figure 2. Pauly Stammbaum section showing “Franz & Lisa.” Franz Pincus was the son of Dr. Oscar Pincus & Paula Pauly, but changed his surname to “Pauly” between 1928 and 1930

 

Figure 3. 1928 Berlin Phone Directory listing “Franz Pincus” living at Deidesheimer Str. 25 in Friedenau
Figure 4. By 1930, “Franz Pauly” was now living at Deidesheimer Str. 25 in Friedenau

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Having uncovered Lisa Pauly’s husband’s name from the Pauly Stammbaum, I next turned to ancestry.com to see what more I might learn. As alluded to in the previous paragraph, I found Franz Pincus/Pauly listed in multiple Berlin Address Books in the 1920’s and 1930’s. I also found a family tree on ancestry.com providing his purported place and date of birth, in Posen, Germany [today: Poznan, Poland] on the 23rd of October 1898 (Figure 5a); this same tree showed that Franz Pincus’s sister, Charlotte Lieselotte “Lilo” Pincus, had been born in Posen on the 30th of December 1895. (Figure 5b)

Figure 5a. Page from “Schlesische Jüdische Familien,” Silesian Jewish Families tree, showing Lisa Krüger was married to Franz Pincus, purportedly born in Posen on the 23rd of October 1898 (Franz and his sister Charlotte’s years of births were transposed on this family tree), with notation that he went by the surname “Pauly”
Figure 5b. Page from “Schlesische Jüdische Familien,” Silesian Jewish Families tree, showing Charlotte Pincus purportedly born on the 30th of December 1895 in Posen (Charlotte and her brother Franz’s years of births were transposed on this family tree)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

When I stumbled upon a picture of Franz and Lilo as children, attending the 1901 wedding of their aunt Maria Pauly to Alexander “Axel” Pohlmann [see Post 57], where Franz looks decidedly older than his sister (Figures 6a-b), I knew Franz and Lilo’s year of births were incorrect. This allows me to reiterate a point I’ve repeatedly made to readers to question vital data found in family trees on ancestry and elsewhere unless you have the original documents to corroborate dates. So, while I was able to conclude Franz and Lilo Pincus were not born, respectively, in 1898 and 1895, I had not yet resolved in what year they’d been born.

Figure 6a. Alexander “Axel” Pohlmann and Maria Pauly on their wedding day, 30th September 1901 in Posen, Germany, with the name of some congregants identified in the margin of the photo
Figure 6b. Closeup of Franz Pincus and his younger sister Charlotte “Lilo” Pincus as children in 1901

 

 

I then remembered the Pinkus Family Collection [See Post 44] archived at the Leo Baeck Institute in New York which is accessible online. Thinking this might include a chart with Franz and Lilo Pincus’s names, along with that of their parents, I scoured the online documents, and eventually stumbled on a page with all their names. (Figure 7) This page confirmed what I had suspected, namely, that their years of birth had been transposed. It turns out, Franz Pincus was born in 1895, and his sister Lilo in 1898; the family tree on ancestry.com, however, correctly noted their respective dates of birth, the 23rd of October for Franz, and the 30th of December for Lilo. This same page also noted Lisa Pauly née Krüger’s place and date of birth, in Berlin on the 20th of December 1890. With the help of Mr. Peter Hanke, affiliated with “forum.danzig.de,” I was able to track down copies of both Franz and Lilo Pincus’s original birth certificates. (Figures 8-9) So far, however, I’ve been unable to pinpoint which borough in Berlin Lisa Pauly was born so have not found her birth certificate.

 

Figure 7. Page from the Pinkus Family Collection archived at the Leo Baeck Institute with Franz Pincus/Pauly and his immediate family’s vital data proving he was born in 1895 and his sister Charlotte Pincus in 1898

 

Figure 8. Franz Pincus’s birth certificate from Posen, Germany showing he was born on the 23rd of October 1895
Figure 9. Charlotte Pincus’s birth certificate from Posen, Germany showing she was born on the 30th of December 1898

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Having located Franz Pincus’s birth certificate, I now set out to try and find his death certificate. From the 1947 letter of recommendation his wife Lisa had written for my Uncle Fedor, I only knew he’d died in 1941, and assumed to begin with that he had died at Maßmannstraße 11, where he and Lisa Pauly resided at the time in the Steglitz Borough of Berlin. I erroneously assumed locating his death register listing in the Landesarchiv Berlin database would be relatively straight-forward; I was sorely disappointed.

 

At the risk of sounding pedantic, let me explain to readers how and where I was eventually able to locate Franz Pincus’s death register listing. This requires reviewing findings I discussed in Post 48, the publication describing Dr. Ernst Neisser’s final days in September-October 1942 in Berlin after he and his cousin Luise Neisser, with whom he lived, were told to report to an old age transport. To remind readers, the elderly Ernst and Luise Neisser opted to commit suicide rather than report for deportation. Because Luise died immediately after taking poison, I easily located her death register listing under the records of Berlin-Charlottenburg, but I was unable to find Ernst’s name listed in the records of this Berlin borough. Ernst, I later learned from a letter his daughter wrote in 1947, lingered for several days before dying, so I reckoned he might have died in another borough. I eventually figured out the only place in Berlin where Jews could still receive medical attention by 1942, or where they were brought to die in case of “failed” suicide attempts, was the Jüdisches Krankenhaus Berlin, the Berlin Jewish Hospital, in the Wedding Borough of Berlin. Having worked this out, I was then able to find Ernst Neisser’s death register listing under records for 1942 in the Wedding Borough and order his death certificate from the Landesarchiv Berlin.

 

In trying to track down Franz Pincus’s death register listing, I decided to apply the same logic and “assume” he might also have died in the Wedding Borough of Berlin for unknown reasons. Obviously, I had no way of knowing then whether Franz Pincus’s death ultimately was from a “failed” suicide attempt, war wounds, fatal disease, or natural causes. Nonetheless, my logic turned out to be sound, and, as in the case of Ernst Neisser, I located Franz Pincus’s death register listing under 1941 in the Wedding Borough. (Figures 10a-b) Naturally, I ordered a copy of Franz’s original death certificate uncertain what new information it might include.

Figure 10a. Cover of the Landesarchiv Berlin register for the Berlin Borough of Wedding (1941) with Franz Israel Pincus’s 1941 death register listing
Figure 10b. Closeup of Franz Israel Pincus’s death register listing showing he died on the 2nd of August 1941

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Franz’s typed death certificate arrived several weeks later. (Figure 11a) My cousin translated the form and it included several new pieces of information. (Figure 11b) Franz had been given the added middle name of “Israel” as was required of all Jewish-born males during the Nazi era. It confirms he died on the 2nd of August 1941 in the Berlin Jewish Hospital of a ruptured appendix. And, at the bottom of the certificate, it shows he’d gotten married on the 12th of May 1928 in Berlin’s Friedenau Borough, or so my cousin and I both read.

Figure 11a. Franz Israel Pincus’s death certificate, Nr. 3681; circled at the bottom is the date he and Elizabeth Krüger married, initially misread as year 1928
Figure 11b. Translation of Franz Israel Pincus’s death certificate

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Armed with a new vital event to check out, I again immediately turned to the Landesarchiv Berlin database trying to locate Franz Pincus and Elisabeth Krüger’s marriage register listing. Surprisingly, I was unable to find it even though the precise date and number of the certificate, Nr. 241, were furnished. I’ve previously encountered this situation, even with exact dates and specific Berlin boroughs in hand, where it is not always possible to track down listings of vital events. The reason for this is not clear to me.

Just in the last few days, collecting and organizing newly acquired information for this post, I reexamined Franz’s typed death certificate hoping something new might reveal itself, and indeed it did. While the marriage year clearly seemed to be 1928, I began to question whether the typed “8” might not be a “3,” so checked the marriage listings under “K” (for Krüger) for 1923 and was rewarded by finding Elisabeth Krüger and Franz Pincus’s names in the Berlin-Friedenau Landesarchiv database. (Figures 12a-b) I’ve now ordered and await the actual marriage certificate but detected a notation in the register that Franz Pincus changed his surname to Pauly, a footnote obviously made some years after Franz got married.

Figure 12a. Cover of the Landesarchiv Berlin register for the Berlin Borough of Friedenau (1916-1924) with Franz Pincus and Elizabeth Krüger’s 1923 marriage register listing
Figure 12b. Closeup of Franz Pincus and Elizabeth Krüger’s 1923 marriage register listing with the certificate number, Nr. 241

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A recent check in MyHeritage for Franz Pincus yielded a “German Minority Census, 1939” form which corroborates some of the aforementioned information, namely, Franz’s dates of birth and death, and he and his wife’s ages and residence in Berlin-Steglitz in 1939. (Figure 13) The information from MyHeritage was late in coming and might have short circuited other searches I did.

Figure 13. “German Minority Census, 1939” page from MyHeritage for Franz Pincus confirming his birth and death dates, he and his wife’s ages, and their residence in Berlin-Steglitz

 

Franz Pincus’s sister, Charlotte “Lilo” Pincus, I discovered from ancestry.com rode out the war in Scotland; as a German foreigner, she was briefly interned before being released and allowed to teach. (Figure 14) She returned to Berlin after the war. A small metal sign bearing her name has been placed at the Christus-Friedhof in Mariendorf, Berlin, showing she died on the 6th of September 1995. (Figure 15)

Figure 14. 1939 “Female Enemy Alien” card for Charlotte Pincus showing she lived in Alva, Clackmannanshire (Scotland), was “Exempted from internment,” and was a teacher during the war
Figure 15. A small metal sign bearing Charlotte Pincus’s name placed at the Christus-Friedhof in Mariendorf, Berlin, showing she died on the 6th of September 1995

 

 

 

 

 

 

From time to time, I stumble across a family letter or diary mentioning the people about whom I write. In writing this post, I recalled a brief mention of Franz and Lilo Pincus in a letter Suse Vogel née Neisser, daughter of the Dr. Ernst Neisser discussed above, wrote in 1972 to her first cousin, Klaus Pauly. (Figure 16) Klaus developed the Pauly Stammbaum, and he asked Suse Vogel’s assistance in identifying some of the people in the picture taken at Maria and Axel Pohlmann’s 1901 wedding. This included Franz and Lilo Pincus (Figure 17), and translated below is what Suse Vogel wrote about them:

Figure 16. Circled section of November 22, 1972 letter written by Suse Vogel née Neisser identifying and briefly discussing Franz and Lilo Pincus
Figure 17. Closeup of Franz (upper) and Lilo Pincus as children in 1901

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

“. . .The remaining little dwarfs bottom left: the upper one is obviously Franz Pincus-Pauly, below probably his sister Liselotte (is she calling herself Charlotte now?) I confess that I disliked her since childhood contrary to the nice ‘Blondel,’ her brother. And I was in agreement about that with bosom friend Aenne. Later, but long before Hitler-times, I declared to myself that Franz and Lilo were raised by their father strictly positivist. To my childish horror they did not ‘believe’ in anything. So, they were a priori ‘without faith, hope and love’ – sounds very presumptuous, but that’s how I felt as a young girl.”

 

While Suse Vogel’s words are not particularly complimentary, the mere fact I could find anything written about Franz and his sister, provides a fleeting glimpse into these long-gone ancestors and brings them to life in a small way.

  

FRANZ PINCUS/PAULY & HIS IMMEDIATE FAMILY

 

Name

(Relationship)

 Vital Event Date Place
       
Franz Pincus/Pauly

(self)

 Birth 23 October 1895 Posen, Germany (Poznan, Poland)
Marriage 12 May 1923 Berlin-Friedenau, Germany
Death 2 August 1941 Berlin-Wedding, Germany
Charlotte “Lilo” Pincus (sister) Birth 30 December 1898 Posen, Germany (Poznan, Poland)
Death 6 September 1995 Tempelhof-Schöneberg, Berlin, Germany
Elisabeth “Lisa” Krüger (wife) Birth 20 December 1890 Berlin, Germany
Marriage 12 May 1923 Berlin-Friedenau, Germany
Death 25 April 1977 Stuttgart, Germany
Oscar Pincus (father) Birth 23 April 1859 Insterburg, East Prussia (Chernyakhovsk, Russia)
Marriage 21 October 1893 Posen, Germany (Poznan, Poland)
Death 18 January 1934 Magdeburg, Germany
Paulina Pauly (mother) Birth 26 April 1872 Posen, Germany (Poznan, Poland)
Marriage 21 October 1893 Posen, Germany (Poznan, Poland)
Death 31 March 1922 Magdeburg, Germany

 

POST 62, POSTSCRIPT: THE FAR-REACHING SEARCH FOR MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN, HEINZ LUDWIG BERLINER—FURTHER PROOF OF HEINZ’S EXISTENCE

Note: In this postscript, I discuss some intriguing new information that has come to light about Heinz Ludwig Berliner since publication of the original post, details of which bring me closer to determining his fate.

Related posts:

Post 18: Remembering My Great-Aunt Charlotte “Lotte” Berliner, née Rothe, Victim of The Holocaust

Post 62: The Far-Flung Search for My Father’s First Cousin, Heinz Ludwig Berliner

I can never predict when or from where further traces of ancestors I’ve written about in earlier posts may materialize. In my original publication, I explained to readers the challenges I encountered trying to uncover concrete evidence of Heinz Ludwig Berliner, one of my father’s first cousins. I first learned about him from a fleeting reference in a document written by my third cousin Larry Leyser’s grandmother detailing the fate of some of our family’s ancestors. His grandmother briefly remarked Heinz Berliner immigrated to some unspecified country in South America after WWII, where he purportedly committed suicide.

 

Figure 1. Cover of March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” showing Heinz Berliner’s stage name, “Enry Berloc,” along with the names of his co-performers, “Witha Herm” and “Maestro Kurt Kohn”

 

As discussed in the original post, I was able to confirm Heinz Ludwig Berliner’s appearance in South America through the cover of a playbill (Figure 1) sent to me by Tema Goetzel née Comac, the wife of Heinz’s nephew; the playbill showed that Heinz, using his stage name “Enry Berloc,” had performed at the “Teatro Municipal,” in an unspecified South American country, on the 19th of March 1948 in the accompaniment of a “Witha Herm” and the “Maestro Kurt Kohn.” More on this later.

For two reasons, I never imagined it would be so difficult to track Heinz’s movements and eventual destination. First, both of Heinz’ s siblings, Ilse (Figure 2) and Peter Berliner (Figure 3), wound up in New York and were known to me since childhood. And, second, as alluded to above, I’m in touch with descendants of Heinz’s siblings, and assumed they would have letters or documents showing where he’d wound up; initially, all they found was the playbill cover to the 1948 recital in which Enry Berloc performed.

Figure 2. Heinz Berliner’s older sister, Pauline Ilse Berliner (1911-1981), standing alongside my father, Dr. Otto Bruck
Figure 3. Heinz Berliner’s older brother, Peter Berliner (1910-1977)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Heinz’s siblings were born in the same town in Upper Silesia where my father had been born, Ratibor [today: Racibórz, Poland], and I was able to locate both of their birth certificates when I visited the “State Archives in Katowice Branch in Raciborz”; vexingly, on two separate visits I could never find Heinz’s birth record, though it was logical to assume he too had been born in Ratibor. I even asked my Polish historian friend in Racibórz, Mr. Paul Newerla, to confirm my negative findings, and his initial efforts were similarly fruitless. As previously discussed, I began to think Heinz may have been born earlier out-of-wedlock and/or born in the town where his parents had married, Meseritz [today: Międzyrzecz, Poland]. I even contacted the archives there but was told the on-line birth records would not be available until this current year; this is on account of Poland’s legal requirement prohibiting the release of birth certificates until 110 years after a person’s birth, so in the case of Heinz possibly soon after his parents married in 1909 in Meseritz.

 

Figure 4. 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 immigrated to Bolivia

 

As readers may recall, this search became moot when I recently discovered a document in MyHeritage entitled “German Minority Census, 1939,” listing a Heinz Ludwig Berliner born on the 24th of September 1916 in Ratibor, showing he lived in the Charlottenburg District of Berlin in 1939, and indicating he had immigrated to Bolivia. (Figure 4) I had some initial doubts this was my father’s first cousin, but after transmitting this new information to Mr. Newerla, Paul was able to finally locate Heinz’s birth certificate in the State Archives in Raciborz, misfiled as it happens, confirming his parents’ names.

Researching the names and information found on the cover of the 1948 playbill, I thought the “Teatro Municipal” was in Buenos Aires, Argentina, as I told readers in my original post. Hoping to locate Berliners who may have wound up there before or after WWII, I turned to family trees on JewishGen, and contacted a lady in Australia who put me in touch with a Ms. Marcia Ras from Buenos Aires with Berliners in her family tree, who turned out to be exceptionally helpful.

 

Figure 5. Cover of March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” with the circled name of the sponsoring organization, “Ministerio de Educacion y Bellas Artes”

 

Following publication of my original post, I sent Marcia a link to it, and she explained that Argentina’s Ministry of Education that had supposedly sponsored the 1948 recital at the Teatro Municipal had never borne the name “Ministerio de Educacion y Bellas Artes.” (Figure 5) Quick online searches showed that in both Venezuela and República Dominicana they were called that way. I sent an email to the Dominican Republic’s Ministry of Education but never received a response. Given Venezuela’s severely dysfunctional state, I never bothered to contact them. I searched for a similarly named entity in other South American countries to no avail.

Marcia could find no evidence Heinz was ever in Buenos Aires. She told me that if he was, he did not enter the country legally. Thousands of Jewish refugees entered Argentina and other South American countries illegally, especially between 1938 and 1949, so he may well have been among them. Marcia was unable to find his name mentioned anywhere. A Ms. Silvia Glocer, an expert in Jewish musicians seeking refuge in Argentina whom Marcia consulted, confirmed she’d also never heard Heinz’s or the maestro Kurt Kohn’s names. They stressed this did not mean they’d never been in Argentina, only that no evidence could be found they’d been there. 

Figure 6a. Picture of the chatelaine with an attached photo locket containing the image of Heinz’s father, Alfred Berliner (1875-1921) (photo courtesy of Tema Goetzel, Heinz Berliner’s niece by marriage)
Figure 6b. Photo locket with the image of Heinz Berliner’s father, Alfred Berliner (1875-1921) (photo courtesy of Tema Goetzel, Heinz Berliner’s niece by marriage)

 

My ongoing search might well have ended here. However, out of the blue, Tema Goetzel sent me a photo from a chatelaine (i.e., a clasp or hook for a watch, purse, or bunch of keys) (Figures 6a-b), asking if I recognized Alfred Berliner, Heinz Berliner’s father. While I know Alfred Berliner was once interred in the Jewish Cemetery in Ratibor and included a photo of his former headstone in the original post, I had no photos of him against which to compare; eventually, Tema sent two more photos, a second of Alfred Berliner (Figure 7), and a third of Alfred Berliner’s wife, Charlotte Berliner née Rothe, with their three children. (Figure 8) At long last, I’d tracked down a photo of the elusive Heinz Berliner, albeit as a young child! (Readers are reminded that in Post 18, I told the story of Heinz Berliner’s mother who perished in Auschwitz in 1943.)

Figure 7. Alfred Berliner, Heinz Berliner’s father (photo courtesy of Tema Goetzel, Heinz Berliner’s niece by marriage)
Figure 8. Heinz Berliner as a child with his two older siblings, Peter and Ilse, and his mother, Charlotte Berliner née Rothe (photo courtesy of Tema Goetzel, Heinz Berliner’s niece by marriage)

 

In the course of our recent conversations, I told Tema the Teatro Municipal I thought was in Buenos Aires was not in fact in Argentina; I related what Marcia Ras had explained to me. Tema, the source of the original playbill, thought it indicated the country. When I told her it didn’t, she again dug out the playbill and found three additional pages (Figures 9a-c) which she hadn’t previously sent, and these sheets specifically mentioned Bolivia, the country the “German Minority Census, 1939” document identified as Heinz’s destination. Armed with a country, I now quickly found a Teatro Municipal in La Paz. (Figure 10) Another puzzle solved.

 

Figure 9a. Second page of the March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” confirming the theater was in La Paz, Bolivia (courtesy of Tema Goetzel)

 

Figure 9b. Third page of the March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” with a summary of the critical reviews from different places where Witha Herm and Enry Berloc performed (courtesy of Tema Goetzel)
Figure 9c. Fourth page of the March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” with the list of musical numbers in each act and the names of the performers (courtesy of Tema Goetzel)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 10. Teatro Municipal de la Paz in Bolivia (Photo Credit: Gatol fotografia)

 

 

Having confirmed from two independent sources Heinz’s connection to Bolivia, I again contacted the Bolivian affiliate of the World Jewish Congress, Circulo Israelita De La Paz, asking if they could check on Jewish musicians who may have sought refuge in Bolivia between roughly 1938 and 1949. This office has been gracious and helpful beyond measure but, to date, they too have been unable to confirm Heinz’s presence there. I think what is true of Jewish refugees entering Argentina illegally is also true of Bolivia. It may well be I’m unable to ever confirm whether or when Heinz died in Bolivia.

 

Figure 11. The popular British-Austrian orchestra leader, Ray Martin, born Kurt Kohn (1918-1988), whose musical score may have been used in the 1948 recital Heinz Berliner performed in

Marcia Ras discovered one other final intriguing thing. In the original post, I told readers that the Witha Herm mentioned in the 1948 playbill was a stage name for a woman known as Herma Wittmann, who died in 1992 in Los Angeles and is interred there. Similarly, the other musician mentioned in the playbill, Kurt Kohn, used an artistic name, Ray Martin (Raymond Stuart Martin). (Figure 11) A quick online search revealed Ray was born Kurt Kohn in Vienna, Austria on the 11th of October 1918, and came to live and work in England in 1937. He was noted for his light music compositions, and created a legacy for himself in British popular music through his work with his orchestra in the 1950’s. I even located a descriptive catalog of his musical recordings, and tried to contact the compiler, Alan Bunting, but learned he’d died in 2016. Fortunately, the discography was created in collaboration with a Nigel Burlinson, whom I was able to reach. Mr. Burlinson sent a very gracious reply telling me he did not think the “Kurt Kohn” who performed at the Teatro Municipal in 1948 was the popular music conductor “Ray Martin” because at the time he was in England conducting orchestras. What to make of this is unclear? Possibly, the musical recital in which Witha Herm and Enry Berloc performed in 1948 in Bolivia merely used one or more of Kurt Kohn’s musical scores as accompaniment?

So, as often happens in my forensic investigations, I take two steps forward, one step back. I now know what Heinz Berliner looked like as a child, and confirmed he indeed immigrated to Bolivia after 1939, but am still left to ponder how and when exactly he died and whether he passed away in Bolivia.

 

HEINZ LUDWIG BERLINER & HIS IMMEDIATE FAMILY

 

Name (relationship) Vital Event Date Place
       
Heinz Ludwig Berliner (self) Birth 24 September 1916 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death after 1948 possibly in Bolivia
Alfred Max Berliner (father) Birth 6 November 1875 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Marriage 17 January 1909 Meseritz, Germany (Międzyrzecz, Poland)
Death 19 February 1921 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Charlotte Henriette Rothe (mother) Birth 2 April 1886 Meseritz, Germany (Międzyrzecz, Poland)
Marriage 17 January 1909 Meseritz, Germany (Międzyrzecz, Poland)
Death January 1943 Auschwitz, Poland
Peter Hermann Berliner (brother) Birth 8 November 1910 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Marriage 24 December 1948 New York, N.Y., U.S.A.
Death 25 July 1977 New York, N.Y., U.S.A.
Pauline Ilse Berliner (sister) Birth 1 October 1911 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Marriage 2 April 1941 New York, N.Y., U.S.A.
Death January 1981 New York, N.Y., U.S.A.

 

 

 

POST 34, POSTSCRIPT 2: MARGARETH BERLINER, WRAITH OR BEING? MORE DISCOVERIES

CORRECTED

Note: In this second postscript to Blog Post 34, I relate to readers additional information that has come to my attention about my great-aunt, Margareth “Grete” Brauer née Berliner, and her family, largely the result of a member of the Brauer family having come across my family history blog and having contacted me.

Related Posts:

Post 34: Margareth Berliner, Wraith or Being?

Post 34, Postscript: Margareth Berliner, Wraith or Being? Murdered in Theresienstadt

One of my expressed desires when I launched my Bruck family history blog in April 2017 is that not only would I relate to readers forensic discoveries I’d made about my father’s family, friends and acquaintances, but perhaps from time to time readers would come across my blog, contact me, and tell me how we are related or share additional information or tales about people that have been the subject of my posts. My expectations have been met, in some cases exceeded, on multiple occasions. This is particularly satisfying when the people or family I’ve written about met a tragic end at the hands of the Nazis and their henchmen. The opportunity to relate even a small part of these people’s lives ensures they will not have passed through this world completely unnoticed.

Figure 1a. My great-aunt Margarethe “Grete” Brauer, her daughter-in-law Herta Brauer, and her grandson Till Brauer, Neubabelsberg, Germany, 1933, a photo found among my Uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck’s surviving papers

 

Figure 1b. Captions on back of photo with Margareth “Grete” Brauer, her daughter-in-law Herta Brauer, and her grandson Till Brauer, Neubabelsberg, Germany, 1933

 

Figure 2. Margareth Auguste Berliner’s birth record (March 19, 1872) (LDS Microfiche Roll 1184449, p. 101)

For readers who’ve not followed the previous posts about my great-aunt Margareth Auguste Brauer née Berliner, let me briefly review. In early 2018, while visiting my German first cousin’s son who is in possession of some of my uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck’s surviving pictures and papers, I asked if I could peruse these documents. Surprisingly, included among the pictures was a single photo captioned partly in my uncle’s handwriting, identifying my grandmother’s sister, Grete Brauer, a great-aunt. (Figures 1a-b) I’d never heard about her growing up, though had discovered a record of her birth on March 19, 1872 (Figure 2), in the Jewish microfilm records available online for Ratibor [today: Racibórz, Poland] from the Church of Latter Day Saints; having previously never found any evidence she survived into adulthood, I’d erroneously assumed she’d died at birth or in childhood. While I knew my grandmother, Else Bruck née Berliner (Figure 3), growing up, I was only six years of age when she passed away in New York City, so it’s not unexpected my grandmother would never have spoken to me about her older sister. Readers may well wonder why my father never told me about her, and I can merely respond by saying that, apart from his beloved sister Susanne, murdered in Auschwitz in September 1942, he had scant interest in family. Regardless, the picture from my uncle’s estate dated 1933 proved that Margareth Brauer née Berliner had indeed lived well into adulthood. What happened to her after 1933 was initially a mystery.

 

Figure 3. My grandmother and Margareth Brauer née Berliner’s younger sister, Else Bruck née Berliner (1873-1957)

 

 

While learning about my great-aunt Margareth Brauer was a new development, I had previously come across the surname “Brauer.” In 2014, when examining the personal papers of two renowned great-aunts, Franziska and Elsbeth Bruck, archived at the Stadtmuseum in Spandau, a suburb of Berlin, I’d come across multiple letters penned to Elsbeth Bruck by Ernst Hanns Brauer and his wife Herta Brauer from Calvia, Mallorca, Spain; just to be clear, Franziska and Elsbeth were sisters of my father’s father, as opposed to Margareth, who was a sister of my father’s mother. At the time, I’d not yet worked out that my Bruck relatives were related to the Brauers through my great-aunt Margareth Berliner’s marriage to a man named Siegfried Brauer, and that Ernst Hanns Brauer (1902-1971) (Figure 4) was their son and my father’s first cousin. (Interested readers will find a table at the end of this post with vital statistics of my great-aunt Margareth Brauer and her immediate family.)

 

Figure 4. Margareth Brauer’s youngest son, Ernst Hanns Brauer (1902-1971), in 1967 in Calvia, Mallorca, Spain

 

 

 

Figure 5a. Photo from left to right: Oliver Brauer, Ernst Brauer, Herta Brauer, Till Brauer, and a family friend “Ricardo,” taken on the day of Till Brauer’s wedding

 

Figure 5b. Captions on the reverse side of Figure 5a

 

Regular readers may recall I was eventually able to track Ernst and Herta Brauer’s descendants to Puerto Rico. (Figure 5a-b) I discussed this in the first postscript to Post 34. In the earlier postscript I also explained to readers that my great-aunt Margareth Brauer had been murdered in Theresienstadt, a fact I uncovered in the Yad Vashem “Shoah Names Database,” a directory I’d neglected to check before publishing my original post.

Figure 6a. Death certificate for Margareth Brauer’s husband, Siegfried Brauer (1859-1926), with the name of their daughter, Hildegard Brauer, circled
Figure 6b. Translation of Siegfried Brauer’s death certificate

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Margareth Brauer’s husband, Siegfried Brauer, died in 1926 in Cosel, Germany [today: Koźle, Poland]. (Figures 6a-b) His death was reported to authorities by a Hildegard Brauer, whom I confused with Herta Brauer, Siegfried’s daughter-in-law, Ernst Brauer’s wife. I hadn’t yet discovered that Margareth and Siegfried Brauer had had a daughter named Hildegard. Once I found Hildegard’s birth certificate (Figures 7a-b) and checked her name in the “Shoah Names Database,” I realized she too had been a Holocaust victim, like her mother. (Figure 8)

 

Figure 7a. Cover page of Hildegard Brauer’s birth certificate from ancestry.com showing she was born on the 8th of August 1892 in Cosel, Germany; her surname, along with those of her parents, is misspelled as “Brawer”
Figure 7b. Hildegard Brauer’s birth certificate

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 8. Page from Yad Vashem’s “Shoah Names Database,” showing Hildegard Brauer was deported to Auschwitz from Berlin on the 3rd of March 1943

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 9. My great-aunt and -uncle Margareth & Siegfried Brauer (photo courtesy of Eri Heller)
Figure 10. The “Justizrat” (Judicial Councilman) Siegfried Brauer (~1859-1926) (photo courtesy of Eri Heller)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 11. Margareth & Siegfried Brauer’s daughter, Hildegard “Hilde” Brauer (1892-1943) (photo courtesy of Eri Heller)

 

 

This current postscript was originally intended to merely update readers on Hildegard Brauer’s fate until I was contacted through my blog’s webmail by a delightful gentleman from Los Angeles named Eri Heller. Like other individuals researching their ancestors, he accidentally discovered my family history blog, specifically the posts about my great-aunt Margareth Brauer. He learned about some of his ancestors and family history he’d previously been unaware of; he also graciously shared with me high-quality pictures of Margareth and Siegfried Brauer (Figures 9-10), as well as their daughter Hildegard (Figure 11), and explained our familial connection. Unbeknownst to me, Siegfried Brauer (~1859-1926) had an older brother, Adolf Brauer (1857-1933) (Figures 12-14), that’s to say Margareth Brauer’s brother-in-law and Eri Heller’s grandfather. So, while Eri and I are not blood relatives, we are second cousins by marriage. Using MyHeritage, I was able to reconstruct much of Eri Heller’s ancestry and find additional photos of his family, although it is not my intention to elaborate on that here.

 

Figure 12. Adolf Brauer (1857-1933), Siegfried Brauer’s older brother and Eri Heller’s grandfather (photo courtesy of Eri Heller)
Figure 13. Adolf Brauer’s wife and Eri Heller’s grandmother, Fanny Brauer née Krebs (1863-1944) (photo courtesy of Eri Heller)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 14. Adolf Brauer and his daughter, Margarete “Grete” Brauer (1892-1982), respectively, Eri Heller’s grandfather and mother (photo courtesy of Eri Heller)

 

 

I’ve previously mentioned to readers I’ve come across a Jewish Silesian family tree on ancestry.com with in excess of 60,000 names; my tree has slightly more than 750 names, and I use it mostly to orient myself when writing about various forebearers and figuring out ancestral connections. One of the greatest pleasures I derive is attaching photos to people in my tree. Without my blog, it’s unlikely I would ever have obtained pictures of my great-aunt and-uncle, Margareth and Siegfried Brauer, and their daughter, Hildegard Brauer, two of whom were victims of the Holocaust. As I implied at the outset, having pictures of individuals and researching and writing their stories makes these otherwise spectral beings in my tree come to life. And, likewise, this is the reason I liberally pepper my blog posts with documents and photos to “prove” these individuals once walked among us.

 

MARGARETH BRAUER NÉE BERLINER & HER IMMEDIATE FAMILY

 

Name

(Relationship)

 Vital Event Date Place
       
Margareth “Grete” Berliner (self) Birth 19 March 1872 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Marriage 14 July 1891 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 24 November 1942 Theresienstadt Ghetto, Czechoslovakia
Siegfried Brauer

(husband)

 Birth 1859 Biskupitz, Germany (Zabrze, Poland)
Marriage 14 July 1891 Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Death 5 February 1926 Cosel, Germany (Koźle, Poland)
Hildegard Brauer (daughter) Birth 8 August 1892 Cosel, Germany (Koźle, Poland)
Death 3 March 1943 Auschwitz, Poland (Oświęcim, Poland)
Kurt Brauer (son) Birth 7 July 1893 Cosel, Germany (Koźle, Poland)
Death 27 August 1920 Cosel, Germany (Koźle, Poland)
Ernst Hanns Brauer

(son)

 Birth 9 August 1902 Cosel, Germany (Koźle, Poland)
Death 19 May 1971 Calvia, Mallorca, Spain
Adolf Brauer (brother-in-law) Birth 10 May 1857 Biskupitz, Germany (Zabrze, Poland)
Death 17 December 1933 Berlin, Germany

 

 

 

POST 70: MY UNCLE DR. FEDOR BRUCK AND HIS GERMAN AND AMERICAN CARS

Note: In this short post, I take a whimsical look at the cars my uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck, Theodore Brook in America, owned in Germany and later in New York. The opportunity for whimsy rarely presents itself when telling stories about my father’s Jewish family, so I’m relieved to take a brief pause from these to relate a lighthearted tale.

Figure 1. Dressed as an English gentleman atop a horse, my uncle Fedor Bruck in 1926 in Liegnitz, Germany before he acquired his first car

 

Figure 2. Dressed as Frederick the Great, my uncle Fedor Bruck in 1926 in Liegnitz, Germany

 

One of my English teachers once cited a writer, whose name is lost to me, talking about coming up with short story ideas who’d quipped these can be found on every street corner. As I near the three-year anniversary of writing stories on my father’s Jewish family, this is a sentiment with which I most heartily concur. The inspiration for this current post came from a gentleman, Raymond “Ray” Fellows, who contacted me through my blog after discovering several posts I’ve written on my uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck (1895-1982), known in America as Theodore “Teddy” Brook. (Figures 1-2)

It turns out Ray’s mother rented a room with kitchen privileges to my uncle in Yonkers, New York before he got married in 1958, a period in my uncle’s life I’m unfamiliar with. Ray, born in 1941, met my uncle when he was a teenager and my uncle was working as a toll collector on the New York State Thruway; at the time, he commuted to work in an AMC Rambler, manufactured by the American Motors Corporation between 1958 and 1969.  Ray clearly remembers this car. He also has fond memories of my charismatic uncle because he treated him as a member of his family, vividly remembers my uncle effusively complimenting him on how nicely he’d decorated his “Charlie Brown” Christmas tree, and even amusingly recalls my uncle making him one of his “delicacies,” cow brains, something Ray has never again eaten! Years later, Ray visited my aunt and uncle in Yonkers, at which time my uncle drove a sporty Plymouth Barracuda, manufactured by Plymouth from 1964 to 1974.

In any case, in my photo archive, I discovered photos of my uncle standing by his AMC Rambler as well as his Barracuda. I also found images of him standing as an obviously much younger man by two cars he owned when he was a dentist in Liegnitz, Germany [today: Legnica, Poland] before the war. One of these cars even has a brief anecdote attached to it from a story my two, now-deceased, German first cousins once shared.

Figure 3a. My uncle Fedor Bruck standing alongside his first motor car, a DKW “Typ P” model, also referred to as a DKW P15; the DKW logo can be seen just below my uncle’s right elbow
Figure 3b. Another image of my uncle standing by his first DKW

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Clearly, having his picture taken alongside his latest set of wheels was a tradition my uncle shared with many other car owners. Following his tour of duty in WWI, my uncle obtained his dental license from the University of Breslau in 1921; then, between November 1924 and April 1936, he had his own practice in Liegnitz until he was forced to shutter it by the Nazis. Likely, my uncle’s first car purchase was a DKW (Dampf-Kraft-Wagen), judging from the picture, the DKW “Typ P” convertible model (Figures 3a-b), also referred to as a “DKW P15” (Figure 4), which rolled off the production lines beginning in May 1928. This was the first motor car made by DKW. It was a light-weight design with a unit body made of wood and imitation leather, that was powered by a two-stroke inline twin engine. DKW was one of the four companies that formed Auto Union in 1932 and is hence an ancestor of the modern-day Audi company. (Figure 5)

Figure 4. Photo of a DKW P15 Roadster

 

Figure 5. Following the amalgamation of four German automobile manufacturers into “Auto Union” in 1932, the DKW logo can be seen above the Auto Union logo enmeshed with the four rings of the modern-day Audi company

 

Figure 6. My uncle Fedor Bruck standing alongside his second DKW motor car, a DKW Cabrio

 

Figure 7. Photo from the “Franschhoek Motor Museum” of a DKW Cabrio, similar to the car once owned by my Uncle Fedor

 

Subsequently, my uncle appears to have owned another DKW, the slightly larger DKW Cabrio. (Figures 6-7) While this is mere conjecture on my part, my uncle’s acquisition of a larger car may have been prompted by his “inadvertent” family. In earlier posts, I told readers my uncle carried on a long-term affair with a married woman, Irmgard Lutze (Figure 8), by whom he had two children, my first cousins Wera Thilo née Lutze (1927-2017) and Wolfgang Lutze (1928-2014) (Figure 9); Irmgard never divorced her husband, with whom she raised the children, which afforded my half-Jewish cousins considerable protection when the Nazis later ascended to power; for this reason, my cousins retained the Lutze surname, though my uncle had ardently hoped they would adopt the Bruck surname.

Figure 8. My uncle in Liegnitz standing alongside Irmgard Lutze, the married woman with whom he had two children, my first cousins Wera and Wolfgang Lutze
Figure 9. In 2001, in Bruhl, Germany, with my two first cousins, Wolfgang and Wera (I’m seated furthest on the right)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

My two first cousins, Wera and Wolfgang, whom I initially met in the mid-1990’s, clearly remember riding in the DKW Cabrio with my uncle and his paramour on Sunday drives through the Silesian countryside, although it would be years later before my uncle announced himself as their “real” father. What made these drives so memorable to my cousins as children was being seated in the rumble seat in the rear of the DKW in the freezing cold. (Figure 10)

Figure 10. Photo from the “Franschhoek Motor Museum” of the rumble seat in a DKW Cabrio, like the one my two cousins vividly remember riding in as children
Figure 11. My Uncle Fedor standing in front of his AMC Rambler
Figure 12. My Uncle Fedor standing alongside his sporty Plymouth Barracuda

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next, one must fast-forward to see my uncle standing by his first American car, the AMC Rambler (Figure 11), which Ray Fellows so clearly remembers. And, judging from my photo archive, my uncle Fedor’s last American car was his Plymouth Barracuda. (Figure 12) However, there is one other car alongside which my uncle can be seen, a Plymouth Savoy, produced between 1951 and 1964. It’s an advertisement for a 1964 Savoy, and, as readers can see for themselves, my uncle is standing in a toll-collection booth, dressed in his work uniform, reaching towards the driver to collect the toll; this photograph was likely staged on the Tappan Zee Bridge where my uncle in fact worked as a toll-collector. (Figure 13) How my uncle came to be featured in a magazine advertisement for Plymouth is unknown, but perhaps when buying his Barracuda, the dealer decided my uncle fit an older demographic towards which the Savoy was targeted, even though he ultimately wound up buying the sportier car?

Figure 13. Dressed in his toll-collector uniform standing at his toll booth on the New York State Thruway, my Uncle Fedor was featured in a 1964 advertisement for a Plymouth Savoy

 

 

POST 69: THE CASE OF DR. ERICH BRUCK, AN UNKNOWN ANCESTOR FROM BRESLAU, GERMANY [TODAY: WROCLAW, POLAND]

Note: In this post I describe the chain of events that led me to learn about a Dr. Erich Bruck, a man with whom I share a surname. His picture was given to me more than five years ago with the question of whether we’re related. I didn’t know then and still don’t, although I know much more about the doctor and his family today as I will relate.

Related Post:

Post 68: Dr Julius Bruck and His Influence on Modern Endoscopy

 

 

Figure 1. Dr. Erich Bruck (1880-1915) in his German military uniform wearing his Iron Cross, an unknown relative interred in the Old Jewish Cemetery in Wrocław

 

In my previous post, I told readers about the very distinctive picture I was handed in 2014 by Ms. Renata Wilkoszewska-Krakowska, Branch Manager, Museum of Cemetery Art (Old Jewish Cemetery, Branch of the City Museum of Wrocław), of a man named Dr. Erich Bruck, telling me he is buried there and asking whether I know anything about him or am related to him. The picture is memorable because, as readers can see for themselves, he is dressed in his German military uniform and is wearing an Iron Cross. (Figure 1) This is not a picture one forgets.

Fast forward. Recently, my 92-year old third cousin, Agnes Stieda née Vogel, mentioned my name and Blog to her 95-year old German friend with whom she communicates by “snail” mail. This friend originally hails from Breslau, Germany [today: Wrocław, Poland] and mentioned in passing to Agnes, that as a child living there, she was friends with the daughter of her dentist, a Dr. Bruck as it happens; the daughter’s name was “Putzi.” This Dr. Bruck taught at the University of Breslau until he was summarily dismissed in 1933 by the Nazi Regime, and eventually committed suicide around 1938. Agnes’s friend wondered whether I might be related to this Dr. Bruck, no forename provided. Knowing that multiple of my Bruck ancestors were doctors or dentists in Breslau or had trained there, including my Uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck, I Googled and checked MyHeritage for any Bruck relatives who might have been in the medical profession there. Imagine my surprise when multiple images of the identical photo I’d been given five years ago of Dr. Erich Bruck popped up on MyHeritage.

Figure 2. Dr. Erich Bruck’s parents, Ludwig Bruck (1842-1906) and Clara Bruck née Berliner (1853-1906)

 

Figure 3. Erich and Ada Bruck with their oldest daughter Erika as an infant
Figure 4. Dr. Erich Bruck and his wife Adelheid “Ada” Bruck née Oppe’s three children, Gertrude, Elisabeth and Erika in 1917

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 5. Erich Bruck’s wife, Adelheid Bruck, who was murdered in the Izbica Ghetto in German-occupied Poland in 1942

From MyHeritage, I was able to determine some vital events in Dr. Erich Bruck’s life, recreate three generations of his family tree, learn the fate of some of Erich’s immediate family, and even uncover photographs of his parents (Figure 2), wife, and three children. (Figures 3-4) (Interested readers will find a table at the end of this post with vital statistics of Dr. Erich Bruck’s immediate family.) As too often happens with Jewish families, I also discovered Erich’s wife, Adelheid Bruck née Oppe (Figure 5), as well as his sister, Liesebeth “Lilly” Bruck née Goldschmidt were both murdered in the Shoah. As for Dr. Erich Bruck, he was born on the 5th of April 1880 in Waldenburg, Germany (Figure 6) [today: Wałbrzych, Poland], and died on the 28th of April 1915 in France during WWI.

Figure 6. 1893 map of German Silesia with the town of Waldenburg, Germany [today: Wałbrzych, Poland], where Dr. Erich Bruck was born, circled

Having found new information and documents I thought Renata Wilkoszewska-Krakowska might be unaware of, I contacted her. We’d lost touch in the intervening years, but Renata remembered me. A few of the documents I uncovered were new but because she regularly conducts walking tours of the Old Jewish Cemetery, Renata naturally has made it her mission to acquaint herself with the Jews interred there and search out historic documents; additionally, much as I’ve done in researching some of my father’s family, friends, and acquaintances, Renata has sought and in some cases met descendants of these people. While much of our recent communications have centered on Dr. Erich Bruck, as I explained to readers in Post 68, I’ve helped track down where Dr. Julius Bruck’s daughter-in-law, Johanna M.S. Bruck née Graebsch, and granddaughter, Renate Bruck, alit in England after WWII; prior to my recent forensic work, neither Renata nor I had known whether either survived the war. Given the murderous rampage of the Nazis, it provides some comfort to know that some family ancestors somehow managed to survive the onslaught.

Figure 7. A German WWI Casualty list showing Dr. Erich Bruck perished on the 28th of April 1915

 

 

 

Figure 8. An announcement from a Breslau newspaper confirming Dr. Erich Bruck’s death on the 28th of April 1915, identifying the infantry regiment of which he was a part, and naming his wife

 

Not only have I been able to provide some new documents to Renata on Dr. Erich Bruck, but she has reciprocated with finds of her own. From MyHeritage, I was able to unearth a German WWI Casualty list showing Dr. Erich Bruck perished on the 28th of April 1915 (Figure 7), as well as a death announcement from a Breslau newspaper confirming this. (Figure 8) Renata explained that Dr. Erich Bruck had been a member of the medical section of the “Schlesische Gesellschaft für Vaterländische Cultur.” In the membership’s journal, “Jahres-Bericht der Schlesischen Gesellschaft für Vaterländische Cultur, Bd. 93-94,” covering years 1915-1916, Renata was able to locate Erich’s obituary explaining the circumstances of the doctor’s death. (Figures 9a-c) Contrary to my assumption that Dr. Bruck had been killed in combat, such was not the case. Instead, while riding a horse, Erich got caught on a telegraph wire resulting in an open wound that became infected and ultimately resulted in his death. Renate tracked down and gave me a copy of Dr. Bruck’s death certificate showing he perished at Château Parcien in France. (Figure 10)

Figure 9a. First page from the “Jahres-Bericht der Schlesischen Gesellschaft für Vaterländische Cultur, Bd. 93-94 (1915-1916),” with Dr. Erich Bruck’s obituary
Figure 9b. Second page from the “Jahres-Bericht der Schlesischen Gesellschaft für Vaterländische Cultur, Bd. 93-94 (1915-1916),” with Dr. Erich Bruck’s obituary

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 9c. Third page from the “Jahres-Bericht der Schlesischen Gesellschaft für Vaterländische Cultur, Bd. 93-94 (1915-1916),” with Dr. Erich Bruck’s obituary
Figure 10. Dr. Erich Bruck’s death certificate indicating he died at Château Parcien in France

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 11. Ms. Renata Wilkoszewska-Krakowska at the tomb of Dr. Erich Bruck on one of her walking tours at the Old Jewish cemetery

 

Figure 12. Lieutenant Georg Sternberg’s obituary with the names of his next-of-kin

 

On her walking tours, Renata almost always stops by the tombstone of Dr. Erich Bruck (Figure 11), using this as an opportunity to talk about the role of Jewish soldiers in WWI. As an interesting aside, Renata mentioned in passing another Jewish WWI victim interred in the Old Jewish Cemetery, a Lieutenant Georg Sternberg (Figure 12), whose tombstone is topped with a helmet (Figures 13a-b); he was killed in the Battle of Lens in 1917. (Figure 14) Renata said she’d been unable to find a photo or learn much about him. Curious whether I might be able to contribute something, I searched in MyHeritage and ancestry.com.

Figure 13a. Lieutenant Georg Sternberg’s restored tombstone, topped by a helmet, at the Old Jewish Cemetery in Wrocław, Poland
Figure 13b. Closeup of Lieutenant Georg Sternberg’s restored tombstone

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 14. Postcard of the Monument at the Soldiers’ Cemetery in Pas-de-Calais for soldiers killed at the Battle of Lens in 1917, the battle where Lieutenant Georg Sternberg perished

 

While I was unable to find a photo of Lt. Sternberg, I was able to find his name on a German WWI Casualty list (Figure 15) as I’d done for Dr. Erich Bruck. He was born on the 26th of March 1889 in Ostrowo, Germany [today: Ostrów Wielkopolski, Poland], and died on the 27th of August 1917 in Nord-Pas-de-Calais, France. Curiously, I discovered two different places where he was supposedly interred, the Langemark German Military Cemetery in West Flanders, Belgium (Figure 16), approximately 68 miles north of where he was killed, and, as expected, in the Old Jewish Cemetery in Wrocław. (Figure 17) Uncertain what to make of this discrepancy, I asked Renata what she thought. She provided a very reasonable and simple explanation. Since Lieutenant Sternberg was only 28 years of age when he was killed and his parents were still living at the time, it’s likely they requested that his remains be returned to Breslau for internment in the Jewish Cemetery.

Figure 15. A German WWI Casualty list with Lieutenant Georg Sternberg’s name and date and place of birth
Figure 16. One document showing Lieutenant Georg Sternberg is buried in the Langemark German Military Cemetery in West Flanders, Belgium
Figure 17. A different document showing Lieutenant Georg Sternberg is interred in the Old Jewish Cemetery in Wrocław

 

As mentioned above, Erich’s wife and sister were both killed in the Holocaust. Renata was able to establish that Erich’s wife, Adelheid “Ada” Bruck, was deported on the 13th of April 1942 to the Izbica Ghetto. In 2018, on the 76th anniversary of Jew deportations from Breslau and Silesia, the City Museum of Wrocław, in collaboration with the “Schlesisches Museum zu Görlitz” and the Jewish community in Wrocław, unveiled a plaque marking the event. In the presence of descendants of the deportees, the ceremony took place at the Odertor Bahnhof, the railway station in Breslau from which transports to the concentration and death camps departed.

Figure 18. Dr. Erika Bruck (1908-2011), Dr. Erich Bruck’s oldest daughter, who died in New Boston, New Hampshire at the age of 103

 

Renate has been able to locate and establish contact with surviving friends of at least one of Dr. Erich Bruck’s daughters, Erika Bruck (Figure 18), who emigrated to America in 1939 and passed away in New Hampshire on October 13, 2011 at 103! Following Erika’s death, her friends and former colleagues wrote a booklet of remembrances; Renata was able to obtain a copy of this document, which she generously shared with me. Erika’s two younger sisters, Elisabeth (Figure 19) and Gertrude (Figure 20) also survived the Holocaust.

Figure 19. Elisabeth Steinitz née Bruck (1909-2011), Dr. Erich Bruck’s middle daughter, who died in Israel
Figure 20. Dr. Erich Bruck’s youngest daughter, Gertrude “Trudi” Maiwald née Bruck (1913-2001)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It is not my intention to discuss the very rich and fulfilling life Erika led, but I want to highlight a little known, often overlooked, chapter in Holocaust history. By 1933, when the Nazis ascended to power, it quickly became apparent to many Jews, including Erika’s parents, it would no longer be safe for Jews in Germany and elsewhere in Europe. Quoting from the booklet about Erika on what was happening then: “At the time, the government of Turkey under the visionary leadership of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk invited many German and Austrian Jews to come to Turkey to help build the scientific, medical, and intellectual infrastructure of the new Turkish Republic. With her family’s urgent encouragement, Erika left Germany and resettled in Turkey in 1933, along with about 1000 other Jews. Before leaving her homeland, she was forced by German authorities to sign a declaration that she would never practice medicine in Germany because her Jewish heritage was unacceptable to the Nazi regime. Erika finally received her medical degree in 1935 in Istanbul. While in Istanbul, she worked at the Haseki Hospital, a government-run hospital which was primitive in most respects when Erika arrived.” Slowly, Erika brought the Haseki Hospital into the modern era.

After immigrating to America, Erika eventually became a pediatrician. She retained a very warm place in her heart for Turkey. Quoting from the booklet about her life: “Erika made regular visits to Turkey to visit old friends. For years after she settled in the U.S., Erika sponsored and trained medical residents from Turkey to repay the good turns done to her by the Turkish government. She retained a love of Turkey and a resolute devotion to the memory of Atatürk throughout her life.”

There is one interesting convergence I want to touch on. As previously mentioned, multiple members of my Bruck family were either doctors or dentists in Breslau or trained there. It just so happens that the subject of Renata Wilkoszewska-Krakowska’s PhD. dissertation, which she is currently writing, will be about Jewish professors from the second half of the 19th Century and early 20th Century who contributed to the development of the renowned medical and dental disciplines in Breslau in those years. Naturally, some of my Bruck relatives will be discussed, notably, Dr. Julius Bruck, Dr. Jonas Bruck, and Dr. Walter Wolfgang Bruck.

Finally, while I’ve not yet been able to determine how or whether Dr. Erich Bruck and I are related, there are two possible lineages to examine, obviously the Bruck patronymic, but also the Berliner matronymic, the maiden name of my grandmother, which is also the maiden name of Dr. Bruck’s mother, Clara Berliner.

REFERENCE

Jablonski, Nina. “Remembering Erika Bruck: April 5, 1908-October 13, 2011.”

 

ERICH BRUCK & HIS IMMEDIATE FAMILY

 

Name (Relationship) Vital Event Date Place
       
Ludwig Bruck (father) Birth 5 January 1848  
Death 23 October 1906 Waldenburg, Germany (Wałbrzych, Poland)
Clara Berliner (mother) Birth 9 February 1853 Gleiwitz, Germany (Gliwice, Poland)
Death 26 March 1906 Waldenburg, Germany (Wałbrzych, Poland)
Erich Bruck (self) Birth 5 April 1880 Waldenburg, Germany (Wałbrzych, Poland)
Death 28 April 1915 Château Parcien, France
Liesebeth “Lilly” Bruck (sister) Birth 5 September 1881 Waldenburg, Germany (Wałbrzych, Poland)
Marriage (to Franz Louis Goldschmidt) 29 July 1913  
Death March 1943 Auschwitz, Poland (Oświęcim, Poland)
Adelheid “Ada” Oppe (wife) Birth 18 March 1883 Mühlhausen, Germany
Deportation 13 April 1942 Izbica Ghetto, Poland
Death 1942 Izbica Ghetto, Poland
Erika Bruck (daughter) Birth 5 April 1908 Breslau, Germany (Wrocław, Poland)
Death 23 October 2011 New Boston, New Hampshire
Elisabeth Bruck (daughter) Birth 28 June 1909 Breslau, Germany (Wrocław, Poland)
Marriage (to Kurt Steinitz) 9 May 1934 Breslau, Germany (Wrocław, Poland)
Death 28 April 2011 Kfar Saba, Israel
Gertrude “Trudi” Bruck (daughter) Birth 22 June 1913 Breslau, Germany (Wrocław, Poland)
Marriage (to Georg Maiwald) 18 July 1938 Bolivia
Death 3 March 2001 Dresden, Germany
       

 

 

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.

Related Posts:
Post 60: 200 Years of The Royal Evangelical High School in Ratibor & A Clue to The Bruck Family

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.

Related Posts:
Post 6: Dr. Otto Bruck & Tiegenhof: 1932 Pocket Calendar
Post 38: The Evidence of My Father’s Conversion To Christianity

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]
Figure 24. Gerhard & Ilse Hoppe