Note: This story is about an accomplished German Post-Impressionist painter, Emmy Gotzmann, whom my great-aunt Elsbeth Bruck in East Berlin was asked to help after WWII.
Forays into my family’s history occasionally reveal encounters relatives had with historic or renowned personages. Following WWII, my Uncle Fedor Bruck took over Hitler’s dentist’s office, recovered valuable historic documents, and was an indirect witness to the Fuhrer’s fate. My great-aunt, Franziska Bruck, the renowned florist, hosted the last Crown Princess of Prussia, Cecelie, in her shop and counted among her clients the last German Kaiser; she corresponded with the renowned German poet Rainer Maria Rilke, another client, letters of which survive. Going back to 1850, the Bruck’s “Prinz von Preußen” Hotel in Ratibor hosted two symphonic performances by the famous Johann Strauss the Younger. This story is about a much lesser-known but enormously talented individual who crossed paths with one of my ancestors, my great-aunt Elsbeth Bruck, “la Communiste,” as she was referred to when I was growing up.
As readers may recall from Post 15, following my great-aunt Elsbeth’s exile in the United Kingdom during WWII, she returned to East Berlin and became a Communist Party apparatchik in the former German Democratic Republic. She was ultimately awarded the “Vaterländischer Verdienstorden in Silber,” the “Patriotic Order of Merit in Silver,” for “special services to the state and to the society.”
This story has to do with my family only insofar as it relates to a letter sent to my great-aunt Elsbeth by the niece of one of my second great-aunts. A little background is helpful. In Post 15, I told readers about the Stadtmuseum, located in Spandau, outside Berlin, where the surviving personal papers of two great-aunts, Elsbeth and Franziska Bruck, are archived. In 2014, my wife and I examined all these papers and took pictures of everything. After returning home, I sorted through what I’d acquired. It included hand-written letters sent between 1947 and 1954 by my grandmother, Else Bruck, née Berliner, to my great-aunt Elsbeth in Berlin from both Fayence, France, later from New York City. Interested in the content of these letters, I asked my distant cousin, Ronny Bruck, if he could translate them; all were written in Sütterlin, which Ronny learned in school. Mistakenly, I included a letter in Sütterlin also sent from New York by a similarly named woman, Else Milch. (Figures 1a & 1b)
Once I received the translation, I realized my mistake. While the letters written by my grandmother were interesting because they mentioned some of my relatives and myself, the letter written by Else Milch on February 26, 1948, was fascinating for altogether different reasons. For one thing, Else remarked on the superficiality of people she’d met in America; for another, Else referred to people I eventually learned were very accomplished in their fields of endeavor. I quote the relevant section of a longer letter:
Letter from Else Milch to Elsbeth Bruck, dated 26th of March 1948:
My Dear Elsbeth,
. . . People can say about the Germans whatever they want, but they loved and esteemed their character and their individuality.
I had an interesting life with a circle of really “living” people.
The “liveliness” of the people living here is only superficial and does not mean anything. But I suppose that if you want to become acquainted with somebody, then you must probably look for the most capable ones.
I think you have to live here a couple of years before you understand all of this. I am here now almost six years and I hope to travel in about four weeks to visit my youngest child in Brazil.
But, now, I come to the reason for this letter.
I don’t know whether you will have the time for this, if the transit system is yet operational, nor whether you’re willing to do this. But, I have the feeling you are the right person to ask.
I have a girlfriend, one of the last ones from my time living in Berlin. . .she is an artist, the former wife of Ludwig Hardt (long-ago divorced). Already, when I left in 1941 she was a renowned artist and formerly the Chairwoman of the “Verein Berliner Künstler” (Berlin Artist Association); politically, she has the same views as you. She could hate (and love), but now she seems to have collapsed. . .at first mentally, but I have heard she now also has heart issues.
I have sent parcels to her but can no longer do so. The last one I sent to her was in mid-December. I also sent a letter, but it has not yet arrived.
I asked friends to look in on her and they did so, but it didn’t work out because those friends were not like-minded. Now, I have the feeling you would be the right person for her.
Of course, she could come visit you if her heart is strong enough. She lives not too far away, in Berlin-Lichterfelde, in the part of the city that is closer to Berlin-Steglitz.
She is a Christian and has family ties to high-ranking officials and accomplished artists; she had mainly Jewish friends, despised the Nazis, and cared for hidden Jews during the war, but now is very lonely.
For a while, she had so-called “Starvation psychosis” [anorexia] meaning she talked about having to starve; I know this because someone told me. Unfortunately, she always needed a lot to eat, much more than me (although she was slim and athletic).
She lives in a dilapidated villa that belonged to her mother. A part of it is rented out. Absolutely lonely!! I wish she could get someone suitable in her house.
Well, if you could write to her asking her to visit, perhaps she would come. I received her last letter at the end of October, and now she doesn’t answer anymore, and that’s why I’m so worried.
Letters such as these are intriguing. Naturally, I researched both Emmy Gotzmann, and her one-time husband, Ludwig Hardt. For Emmy Gotzmann, my Search Engine directed me to a website dubbed “Linosaurus,” which touts itself as “A Blog on the Lesser Gods and Goddesses of linoleum and woodblock printing. And all other things worth sharing.” I contacted the Blog Administrator, explaining I had uncovered an interesting letter mentioning Ms. Gotzmann, including a copy of the original and the translation; I received an enthusiastic reply from Mr. Gerbrand Caspers. He’d forwarded the items I sent to a Mr. Ferdinand Ruigrok van de Werve, who, coincidentally, had just published a biography on Ms. Gotzmann in November 2015. (Figure 2)
Mr. Caspers is a retired dentist and university teacher, who is currently researching and writing a book on German woman artists (painters) born between 1850 and 1900 who were pioneering with color woodblock printmaking from 1905 to 1940. And, Mr. Ruigrok van de Werve is a retired art dealer living in Flensburg, Germany, on the German-Danish border, where Ms. Gotzmann trained from around 1905 to 1909.
Ms. Gotzmann’s full name was “Emmy Auguste Elizabeth Gotzmann,” and she was born in Frankfurt am Main on March 19, 1881. (Figure 3) Emmy may have received her formal art training at the “Verein der Künstlerinnen und Kunstfreundinnen zu Berlin” between 1901 and 1904, although most of her training appears to have come at private schools and artist colonies. (Figure 4) German art historian Ulrich Schulte-Wülwer writes about this: “The triumph of open-air painting at the end of the 19th century was the birth of artists’ colonies. For painters who were denied access to the art academy, artist colonies offered a welcome opportunity to compete with their male counterparts. In Ekensund. . .Emmy Gotzmann-Conrad outclassed her contemporaries, painting in the style of van Gogh and French Pointillists.”
Gotzmann’s first marriage in 1905 to the lawyer Walter Conrad (Figure 5) lasted until 1913, but it is her second marriage (Figure 6) to the Jewish actor and “declamator” (i.e., one who declaims or speaks in a rhetorical manner), Ludwig Hardt (Figure 7), that is briefly mentioned in Else Milch’s letter. This marriage lasted until about 1928 and brought Emmy into contact with “literary expressionism” and its actors and moved her increasingly into Jewish circles. As Else Milch noted, Ms. Gotzmann was the Chairwoman of “Verein Berliner Künstler,” from 1928 to 1930. During the time of National Socialism, because her Post-Impressionist paintings were deemed “degenerate art,” she was cut off from the art business and became increasingly impoverished. Most of Emmy’s paintings were destroyed during WWII, and only those in her parents’ home and stored with relatives survived. The few paintings that survive speak to Ms. Gotzmann’s tremendous talent. (Figure 8)
Emmy passed away in Berlin on September 27, 1950, so almost 2 ½ years to the day after Else Milch wrote to my great-aunt. It is unclear whether Elsbeth Bruck and Emmy Gotzmann ever actually met, though I like to believe so.
Emmy Gotzmann’s second husband, the actor Ludwig “Leo” Hardt was born on January 16, 1886 in Neustadt, Upper Silesia, Germany (today: Prudnik, Opolskie, Poland); he immigrated to America, and passed away in New York City in 1947. Interestingly, he is interred in Mount Hebron Cemetery in Flushing, Queens, only a short distance from where I grew up.
The author of the letter to my great-aunt, Else Milch, née Kantorowicz, was born in Posen, Prussia (today: Poznan, Poland) on May 2, 1875, and died in Queens, New York on February 16, 1963. In February 1948, earlier the same year that Else Milch wrote to my great-aunt in East Berlin, she traveled to Brazil to visit her children. Attached to her Immigration Card from this visit to Brazil is her photograph. (Figure 9) In a story that will be related to readers in a future post, one of my German third cousins gave me a copy of a letter written to his father by one of Else Milch’s daughters from Porto Allegre, Brazil in 1989. Included in this letter were a few poor-quality images of a much older Else Milch. (Figure 10)
Note: This story consists of extracts from a first-hand account describing deportation of Jews from the notorious WWII French detention center of Gurs beginning in August 1942. It was written in French by one of my father’s first cousins, Eva Zernik, née Goldenring, sister of Fritz Goldenring, who perished in the Shanghai Ghetto in 1943, as detailed in Post 25.
When we last encountered Eva Goldenring, she was a guest at the “Villa Primavera,” in Fiesole, Italy, outside Firenze (Florence), between May and June of 1938, overlapping my father’s stay there. (Figure 1) After leaving the Villa Primavera, Eva may have joined her mother in Rome, where Helene Goldenring was known to have gone after leaving the Villa Primavera in 1937 (Figure 2), or she may have quit Italy. As readers will recall from Post 21, between September 2, 1938 and November 17, 1938, Italy enacted a series of racial laws, including one forbidding foreign Jews from settling in Italy. It seems certain that by September 1938, Eva Goldenring had left for France, and her brother, Fritz Goldenring, for Shanghai. Their mother, Helene Goldenring, may have returned to Berlin for a while because, surprisingly, her name continues to appear in Berlin Address Books in both 1939 and 1940. (Figure 3) Regardless, the path and timing of Helene’s escape from Europe is unknown.
The reason we know Eva Goldenring went to France is that she wrote a lengthy account of the deportation of Jews beginning in August 1942 from the French detention center of Gurs, where she was interned. Eighteen pages of a much longer chronicle, written in French, along with a series of anti-Nazi poems, written in German from Madrid following Eva’s release from Gurs, survive. They were donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum by Eva’s stepson, Alfred Zernik, following Eva’s death.
The circumstances and details of Eva’s immigration to France are lost to us, but, like my Aunt Susanne and Uncle Franz Müller, she may have been able to live there openly as a Jewish refugee for several years. What is known is that Eva spoke and wrote impeccable French, judging from her account of Gurs, and this no doubt was helpful.
The Gurs camp was located at the base of the Pyrenees in southwestern France and was originally established by the French government in April 1939 to intern political refugees and members of the International Brigade fleeing Spain after the Spanish Civil War. It was one of the first and largest detention camps before WWII in France. Early in 1940, the French government interned about 4,000 German Jewish refugees in Gurs as “enemy aliens,” along with French leftist leaders who opposed the war with Germany. There seems little doubt this mass arrest of Jews swept up Eva Goldenring, wherever she was holed up.
The French armistice with Germany, which was signed in June 1940, placed Gurs under the administrative authority of the treasonous French government, the Vichy regime, the supposed “free zone.” Conditions at the camp were appalling, overcrowded with a perpetual shortage of water, food, and clothing. Internees were crammed into dark filthy barracks with sealed windows, rats, lice, and fleas. During rainstorms, the roofs leaked, and the swampy land turned to mud so thick that, incredibly, prisoners couldn’t walk to the latrines for fear they might drown. Eight-hundred internees are known to have perished in Gurs between 1940-41 from contagious diseases, including typhoid fever and dysentery, although more than 1,100 prisoners in all are known to have died in the camp.
Compounding the crowded conditions, in October 1940, Germans deported roughly 6,500 Jews from southwestern Germany (Baden-Pfalz-Saar) into the unoccupied part of France, most of whom wound up in Gurs. This deportation, named for the two Nazi administrators who engineered it, was referred to as the “Wagner-Bürckel-Aktion.” The day after the deportations, Wagner proudly proclaimed his area of Germany to be the first to be “Judenrein,” free of Jews, in accordance with Hitler’s desire.
Between August 6, 1942 and March 3, 1943, Vichy officials handed over 3,907 Jewish prisoners from Gurs to the Germans, the majority of whom were sent to the Drancy transit camp outside Paris. From Drancy, they were deported in six convoys to concentration camps in German-occupied Poland, primarily Auschwitz. Drancy is the same assembly point my Aunt Susanne was deported from on September 7, 1942, also destined for Auschwitz, although she had transited through Camp des Milles.
Much of Eva Goldenring’s account of Gurs details events surrounding the selection process related to three convoys that departed Gurs after August 1942. Because of her language skills, this may have provided Eva a measure of personal protection. Werner L. Frank, author of a book entitled “The Curse of Gurs: Way Station to Auschwitz,” touches on the benefit of speaking French: “Barrack and îlot chiefs were appointed to represent the interests of their constituency to the camp’s management as well as to maintain order with their jurisdictions. Individuals having French language facility were especially valuable in assuming leadership roles.” (p. 246)
Select passages of Eva’s account of the Jewish deportations from Gurs are presented below under general categories; the complete translation of Eva’s 18-page account is attached for interested readers.
Roundups
At the beginning of the summer of 1942, the camp saw an influx of foreign Jews—mostly Polish and Czech—coming from the occupied zone, especially Paris. The newcomers told us in detail about the hunts for Jews, people being arrested in the streets, arrested while they slept in their beds at night.
This time, they [German authorities] helped themselves to men, women, youths, and even children. Families were separated. . .People told stories of a train waiting in a station outside Paris, full of little children crying, calling their mothers who were gone. A line of guards surrounded them, prohibiting anyone from approaching them or bringing them something to eat or drink.
Destroying Children’s Cultural Identity
Traces that would have allowed the children to one day be identified—even reunited with their parents, if their parents were still alive—had been destroyed. The system had been applied even to babies in the cradle.
“Illusions”
Among ourselves, we were still clinging to the illusion of the “border” that was the demarcation line [between the occupied part of France and the free zone]. The noontime new reports were always optimistic. The war could not last much longer now—we would spend the last winter at Gurs—afterwards would come the end, liberation, peace.
French Collaboration
At the end of June 1942, the camp received an almost unnoticed visit from a small commission of three or four tall, blond young men. They glanced inside a block, inspected the infirmary, the central hospital, the C.C.A.’s [Comité Central d’Assistance] office. They asked this or that prisoner their place of birth. If the response was “Germany”—they simply said “Ah—hm.” Later we learned that it was a commission of the Gestapo.
Establishing Deportation Lists
One fine evening, one of the first days of July one of the block leaders informed his colleagues on behalf of the Director that the next day the blocks would be “consigned”, which meant total prohibition from entering or leaving. This would be in order to establish lists.
Unfortunately, there was not a single directive—neither for the inmates nor for those who were making the list. No one realized how mortally important it was.
But as it was, little by little the ones making the list got tired, and we had to finish the whole thing that afternoon—it was a hot sunny day—so decisions about the lives and welfare of thousands and thousands were made without knowing why, with a levity free of qualms.
“Quotas”
From that day on, a certain jitteriness developed in the camp. . . But, … the night of July 30-31, the English radio reported that Hitler had asked Mr. Laval to hand over to him the foreign Jews in the free zone. This piece of news was naturally not divulged in the noontime news report.
On July 31, the Camp received a visit from Mr. Lowry, President of the Nimes Coordination Committee which brought together the Red Cross, the Quakers, the YMCA, the American Joint [Distribution Committee], the Children’s Aid Society (the OSE, “Oeuvre de Secours aux Enfants”) and others. As usual, the representatives of social institutions in the Camp had a meeting, at the end of which the author [I] asked Mr. Lowry if the bit of news from the English radio was in line with the truth. “Since you already know it,” he replied, “I must tell you that it is true—unfortunately.”
In exchange for the release of the French prisoners, Mr. Laval had offered Mr. Hitler the foreign Jews in the free zone. The figure was fixed at 10,000 individuals. Later, under the pretext that the 10,000 had not been delivered by the agreed-upon deadline, the Germans demanded 15,000, then 20,000; finally, it became a general measure. The Quakers offered to take the 10,000 into their care—Mr. Laval refused.
Faustian Bargain
In the camp, fears took shape more and more. . .
. . .rumors and news continued to circulate. People talked about a long train of livestock cars at the station in Oloron, about the arrival of a whole posse of trucks and buses; people reported that at Gurs a hundred or more of the new State Police had arrived.
That afternoon, sure enough, two young officers in black uniforms —modeled after the German S.S. uniforms—walked in. At the same time, the Director went from block to block, calling many people over to ask them whether they would want to stay if their parents, children, spouses left the camp or whether they would rather go with them. They were given one minute to make their decision and sign the paper saying that they would be leaving of their own will.
Kafkaesque Nightmare
The Director worked all night. . .making the lists.
The next morning, the blocks were consigned. The camp was surrounded by rows of “black-coats.” Even the block leaders were not allowed to go out. Through an almost unbearable silence, we heard the lists from the Directory come in. They came in around 9:30am. The barrack leaders were assembled in the block secretary’s office—the crowds waited outside. The block leader read off the names. They fell from his mouth one by one, like death sentences.
The first thing we noticed was that the list contained, in alphabetical order, almost all the people of German or Austrian nationality.
. . .Since the whole thing had been a complete secret up to the very last minute, we were so distraught, so in the dark as to the criteria for the deportation, that when this first convoy was taken away, there were practically no attempts to intervene to help this or that person affected; no one tried to hide or risk trying to escape.
We had one last meal, then the call to go to the blocks, luggage in hand—in the men’s blocks almost everyone was ready—the names were called one after another—people said goodbye to each other—the person who was called went out into the road—little by little the groups assembled. As the last one was put in order, the caravan slowly started out towards the entrance of the Camp, towards the two large train sheds—those who were left stood along the wire fences waving goodbye with their hands or handkerchiefs—many of the ones leaving tried to keep a good face on—even to smile.
It could be said that the police presence was unnecessary. Sometimes it even seemed that they disappeared, in the face of the peaceful and disciplined attitude of the prisoners. Especially during the night hours when the departures happened, when they put their helmets on, rifles in hand—really, we were surprised if we paid any attention to it at all. It was as if people’s glances landed beside them, or over their heads.
This air of silent dignity was, it is true, partly a result of the fact that some of these poor people were too weary to really realize what was happening. They had seen their fate approaching, they had trembled, fought against it—now it was decided—there was nothing more to do.
“God Did Not Hear Them”
The next day rumors circulated that the train had not left; then, that it was traveling with the doors open at a very reduced speed. Later, that the Germans had not accepted them, that they had been expecting laborers, and would send them back. In those days, such floods of prayers went up to heaven, prayers from the heart, —but God did not want to hear them.
Deportation Criteria
We knew that a second convoy was supposed to follow it two days behind. On Thursday, the block leaders and the charities’ efforts to learn the criteria governing the deportation measures were met with success. We learned that, essentially, the measures concerned all Jews of German, Austrian, Polish, and Czech origin who had entered France after 1936. It was expected that there would be exceptions for: persons over 60 years of age (later 65); members of the clergy; children under 16 without family; husbands of pregnant women; parents of French children; those who were “Aryan” (in the camp this was interpreted to mean individuals who had a non-Jewish parent or spouse); parents of children less than two years old; and individuals who had rendered some kind of service to the France nation: those who had belonged to a combat unit for at least three months, or were particularly valuable to the French government or economy.
“Matter of the Interventions”
For those who were conscientious of what was going on realized the real issue in the matter of the interventions [relative to names on the official list of deportees]: They had to hand over a fixed number. To save one meant condemning someone else in their place—and did they have that right?
The outcome of all the brouhaha with the lists was that in the end, there were so many exceptions that it was necessary to find “new material.” The wretches in the blocks kept waking up to the sound of cars flying down the road. How many of those poor souls who thought that they had been forgotten, exempt, rescued, suddenly saw a guard next their bed: “Quick, quick, get up, get your luggage”—hearing those heavy footsteps approach already made everyone in the barracks tremble—is he going to pass by—is he going to come in here? Many stopped sleeping in their barracks.
“Errors”
In the first convoy, there being no directives—at least not that the charities or internees were aware of—a great number of people were deported who should not have been. This time the interventions tried to fix some of the errors. Not all.
A man named Max Sternmeiler left despite his Romanian papers which he had in his possession and had shown to the Director. Later, when his wife, who had been brought to the Rivesaltes camp, telegrammed to ask for a paper from the Gurs camp confirming her husband’s Romanian nationality, and thus hers as well, the husband had already left with his papers in his pocket. The woman was condemned, too.
“The best ones”
In general, we noticed that it was the best ones who had left. Among those from the old crowd who had stayed, besides the true exceptions, there were many clever types, with a lot of information and sometimes a lot of money, in a word people with connections and street girls.
“Nothing was sacred”
Nor could anyone forget the case of the Gutmann children, not that it was an isolated case. The father, being “untransportable”, had stayed in the village. The poor mother had come with her three children between 3 and 6 years old. These people could not have been rich—their clothes made that plain enough. But each one of the children was properly dressed, clean, hair neatly brushed; each one wore their little piece of ribbon in their hair. They slept all three together on a cushion on the ground, with their arms around each other’s necks—that night the mother did not leave them out of her sight for one second. What was going through her mind? Later, we saw the children again—without their mother. Nothing was sacred for them anymore, not even a mother. —-
Eva was eventually released or escaped from Gurs. Quoting again from Werner L. Frank on the issue of camp security: “Gurs security was somewhat loose, allowing for visits by the prisoners to nearby areas in order to conduct trade and even for off-site work. Outsiders were permitted access to the campgrounds, including children who had been separated from their interned parents and were now living at remote safe houses. Such laxity would suggest that an escape could be managed quite easily. However, there were deterrents to unauthorized departures including lack of official identity documents, apprehension about leaving loved ones behind, lack of French language skills and general fear of the unknown. Nevertheless, there were escapes. . .” (p. 276)
Certainly, Eva’s language skills would have allowed her to blend in with the local populace had she escaped. However, it is more likely her fluency in French made her useful to one of the aid groups operating in the internment camp, and they may have helped her procure safe conduct documents or false papers. In any case, Eva eventually made her way to way to Madrid, Spain, where she lived until 1947 when she immigrated to America (Figure 4) and rejoined her mother, who’d emigrated from Valparaiso, Chile that same year. (Figures 5 & 6) Eva got married in 1952 to Curt Zernik. (Figure 7). She passed away in 1969 (Figure 8), a year after her mother. (Figure 9)
Note: Since publication of Post 14 in October 2017, three different readers sent me information related to the M. Braun Brauerei. All three have graciously allowed me to update the original post using visuals they provided.
In the original Blog post, I included a postcard showing the M. Braun Brauerei in the early 20th Century. (Figure 1) The postcard was written on July 28, 1912 from Ratibor, by my great-grandmother Olga Berliner, née Braun, and addressed to my great-aunt Franziska Bruck in Berlin. Within the past week, my third cousin, once-removed, Larry Leyser, sent me a different postcard of the front of the same brewery. (Figure 2) While this image is rather less clear, what makes it so informative is that it names the square on which the M. Braun Brauerei was located, namely, “Neu Markt.”
Combined with an 1891 map of Ratibor (today: Racibórz, Poland) that a different reader, Mr. Paul Newerla, sent me, showing Neu Markt, I now know precisely where the M. Braun Brauerei was situated. This 1891 map even pinpoints the location of the brewery on the square, while a 1927-28 plan map of Ratibor shows the square. (Figures 3 & 4) Mr. Newerla, has written a book on Raciborz, entitled “Ratibor einst und jetzt,” translated roughly as “Ratibor, then and now.” (Figure 5). In addition to the map from 1891, Paul also sent me a treasure trove of information on the Bruck family hotel in Ratibor, the Bruck’s “Prinz von Preußen” Hotel, which will be the subject of an upcoming postscript.
A different Polish gentleman, Mr. Grzegorz Miczek, contacted me after seeing my original post. He asked whether I had any additional documents related to the brewery as reference for a book he’s writing on the “Raciborskie Brewery.” He mentioned he possesses a few bottles from the brewery, and graciously sent me images of them that he’s allowing me to share with readers. These elegant old beer bottles speak for themselves. (Figures 6-9)
My cousin Larry Leyser made another interesting discovery. The brewer Markus Braun, after having a dozen children by his first wife, Caroline Spiegel, remarried a Johanna Goldstein and had two additional children, a daughter Wanda Eugenia Braun (Figure 10; Translation) born in 1869, followed a year later by a son Markus Braun. (Figure 11; Translation) It appears the elder Markus passed away in 1870 at the age of 53 before his youngest son was born some months later.
Note: This postscript discusses additional information obtained about the Bruck’s “Prinz Von Preußen” Hotel from a Polish gentleman who has written a book on the history of Ratibor.
Following publication of Post 11, Mr. Paul Newerla from Raciborz, Poland, author of a book on Ratibor, entitled “Ratibor einst und jetzt” (“Ratibor, then and now”) (Figure 1), contacted me. He shared a lot of information and visuals from his book and other sources, including historic maps, to round out my understanding of the Bruck’s “Prinz von Preußen” Hotel, the inn owned by my family for three generations. Mr. Newerla also made me aware that my family’s connection to Ratibor extends a generation earlier. According to land registers from the city of Ratibor, Jacob Bruck (1770-1832), father of the original owner of the Prinz von Preußen, Samuel Bruck, was an arrendator, a lease-holder, on two properties within Ratibor. Jacob owned properties on Jungfernstrasse and Stockhaus-Gasse prior to construction of the family hotel; interestingly, an 1812 city map sent to me by Mr. Newerla shows the exact parcels owned by Jacob. (Figure 2)
Ratibor’s city walls, towers (Figure 3) and gates, surrounding the town, were only demolished in 1828, after which the Prinz von Preußen was constructed at the corner of Oderstraße and Bollwerkstraße. (Figures 4, 5, & 6) The same 1812 map just alluded to shows the city walls and gates. Approximating the position of the family hotel, it appears it was built almost atop where one Odertor, city gate, once stood.
A historian, Ms. Katrin Griebel from Zittau, Saxony, who has studied the surviving personal papers of two of my great-aunts, Franziska Bruck and Elsbeth Bruck, archived at the Stadtmuseum in Berlin, has gleaned some anecdotes about the family hotel. According to Ms. Griebel, the building occupied by the Bruck’s Hotel was the former palace of a marquis. Upon the nobleman’s death, the palace became known as the “Prinz von Preußen.”
By 1850, the marquis’s palace was assuredly a hotel. Mr. Newerla sent me notices related to two orchestral performances given by Johann Strauss the Younger at the “Prinz von Preußen.” In October 1850, Johann Strauss had plans to perform in front of the Russian Czar, and on his way to Russia he performed at the hotel the evening of October 17, 1850, spending the night. (Figure 7) On his return from Warsaw, he again stopped in Ratibor, giving an orchestral performance “im Saale des Prinzen von Preußen,” the “Hall of the Prince of Prussia,” on the afternoon of November 17, 1850 (Figure 8), leaving that same evening for Vienna.
The Bruck’s Hotel’s “Saale des Prinzen von Preußen” (Figure 9) served other community functions. Mr. Newerla has found records indicating that on October 31, 1859, Ratibor’s fire department held a large carnival ball there; the fire department also organized a theatrical performance, the proceeds of which were earmarked for the assistance of an injured fire brigade colleague.
Several pages from Mr. Newerla’s book discuss the founding in Ratibor of the “Peace Lodge XVII No. 361”of the “Independent Order B’nai B’rith” on May 9, 1886, which met at the “Prinz von Preußen.” B’nai B’rith was originally founded in 1843 in New York, and became established in Berlin, Germany in 1882. My great-grandfather, Fedor Bruck, was a member of Ratibor’s Lodge. Even though the statute of the Lodge specifically excluded politics from its field of activities, they were under police surveillance. While the Lodge continued to meet at the Bruck’s Hotel until at least April 1934 and steered clear of political matters, they appear to have been under pressure to disband.
Page 39 from Ratibor’s 1889 Address & Business Book (Figure 10), sent to me by Mr. Newerla, lists residents along Oderstraße, including number 16. Both my great-grandfather, Fedor Bruck, and grandfather, Felix Bruck, are listed at this address. Fedor is the “Besitzer,” or owner, and Felix Bruck the “Geschäftsführer,” the Managing Director (Figure 11); by 1892 Fedor Bruck was deceased. Under business listings, there are none for hotels, but Fedor Bruck is listed under “Gasthöfe 1 Classe,” first-class inns, and, oddly, under “Bade-Anstalten,” or bathing establishments. (Figure 12)
Mr. Newerla sent me a series of advertisements for the Bruck’s Hotel. (Figures 13-19) They appear to extend from the time the hotel was owned by my great-grandfather, Fedor Bruck, possibly through the 1930’s and later. Throughout its existence, it was known as the “Bruck’s ‘Prinz von Preußen’ Hotel,” even though it was no longer owned by my family.
Note: This story relates to the brief time between 1946 and 1948 when my father, Dr. Otto Bruck, worked illegally as a dentist in Nice, France.
The Nazi’s “Reich Citizen Law,” one of two Nuremberg Laws passed by the Reichstag on September 15, 1935, declared that only those of German or related blood were eligible to be Reich citizens; the remainder were classed as state subjects, without citizenship rights. From this point forward, my father was “stateless.”
For me, this story begins more than 60 years ago in Nice, France, along la Côte d’Azur, when as a young boy I was in the company of my maternal grandmother and we were walking through Vieux Nice. (Figure 1) I’m unsure what tricks time plays with memories, but I clearly remember my grandmother stopping along a street I would recognize many years later as Boulevard Jean Jaurès (Figure 2), pointing to a building on the windward side, and telling me my father had had his dental office there. My grandmother knew this because my father had done extensive work on her teeth. This may also have been when I first learned my father was Jewish. It would be many years, in all honesty, before I would absorb the full significance of these facts.
In previous posts, I’ve mentioned having visited on multiple occasions Ratibor (today: Racibórz, Poland), where my father was born in 1907. On my second visit there, in 2012, I met a gentleman at the Tourist Bureau, who, like myself, is a retired archaeologist. He currently edits a journal, entitled the Almanach Prowincjonalny, and upon learning of my family’s connection to Ratibor, wondered whether I’d be interested in writing an article for this periodical. I eagerly agreed, and in April 2013, my article was published.
In writing this essay, I’d learned from my mother that my father had worked for a woman dentist by the name of Mme. Lotter between 1946 and 1948 in Nice. Recall, this is the city where my parents first met, and where my dad settled after his release from the English Army in June 1946 because he had an aunt and cousins living there. (Figure 3) Because Mme. Lotter was entirely disinterested in dentistry, my father essentially managed her dental practice. This was an illegal arrangement because he was stateless, in French, “apatride,” and therefore not authorized to work in France. (Figures 4a & 4b) The authorities eventually caught him in flagrante in 1948 and charged him with practicing dentistry illegally. By this time, my father had obtained a visa for the United States which was predicated on not having a criminal record. Rather than risk being denied entry into the States, my father absconded before his trial.
Fast forward now to 2014 when my wife and I visited l’Hôtel de Ville in Nice in search of information on my father’s aunt and cousins. This was discussed in Post 16. While waiting for assistance, I was left alone for some moments and encouraged to peruse the books containing les certificats de décès, the death certificates, so took the opportunity to check for deceased Lotters. Having only this surname to work with, I systematically set myself to looking through the death certificates for the years starting with 1948, the year my father left France and Mme. Lotter was assuredly still alive.
In the spirit of Branch Rickey’s mantra that “luck is the residue of design,” I quickly discovered a gentleman by the name of HENRI LOTTER who died on May 28, 1970. Fortunately, there were only a handful of deceased Lotters, all men, but this individual caught my attention because it gave his divorced wife’s name, SIMONE JAUBERT. (Figures 5a & 5b) I discovered she died on November 1, 1964. (Figure 6) I requested copies of both of their death certificates, uncertain whether this Mme. Lotter-Jaubert was even a dentist.
Armed with these death certificates, I asked where the various people were buried. I was directed to a different nearby office of l’Hôtel de Ville in Nice, Service De L’administration Funéraire, essentially the “Bureau of Cemeteries.” Here we would make the acquaintance of Mme. Joelle Saramito, who, like other French bureaucrats I’ve met, was intrigued by an American who speaks fluent French; Mme. Saramito has helped me multiple times over the years including on one of my most spectacular discoveries, which will be the subject of a future post. As fortune would have it, Mme. Lotter-Jaubert is buried alongside her husband in Cimitiere De Caucade (Figure 7), the same cemetery where my Aunt Hedwig Loewenstein, née Bruck, and her son, Fedor Löwenstein’s headstones are located. While our visit to Cimitiere De Caucade allowed us to view all the tombstones simultaneously, it did not conclusively answer the question of whether this was the correct Mme. Lotter.
To answer this question, I revisited Mme. Saramito, and asked her where I might find Yellow Pages for Nice for the late 1940’s. She directed us to the “Archives municipales de Nice” (Figure 8), on the western outskirts of Nice. So, on July 4, 2014, we presented ourselves there to the “Président de salle” (Figure 9), literally, “President of the Hall.” Unquestionably, this must be one of the most highfalutin titles I’ve ever come across. Regardless, upon our arrival, I explained what I was looking for, and “Le Président” brought out several annuaires téléphoniques, telephone directories, for the period in question. Much to my delight, in the 1947-48 annuaire, under the listing for “Dentistes,” I found “Lotter-Jaubert, Simone, place Saint-Francois 2” (Figures 10a & 10b), confirming that Mme. Simone Lotter had indeed been a dentist. Simone’s ex-husband, Henry Lotter, I discovered had been unpharmacien, a pharmacist.
There remained but one final thing for me to confirm, whether in fact a distant memory that the office building my grandmother had pointed to was indeed located in Vieux Nice. (Figure 11) And, in fact, I was able to locate the still standing building at Place Saint-Francois 2, in the old section of Nice (Figures 12, 13 & 14). This story proves that occasionally with only scant information to begin with, in my case just a surname and a 60-year old childhood memory, one can sometimes make extraordinary discoveries about one’s family.
Note: This tale is about another of my father’s first cousins, Mr. Fritz Goldenring. This post provides an opportunity to explore the fate of a Jewish émigré, who, while he did not perish in a concentration camp or ghetto in Europe, is every bit as much a victim of Nazi persecution as those individuals who were murdered in these places. How I learned about Fritz does not follow a linear path, although I’ll strive to relate my discoveries in a somewhat chronological fashion. Like the stories of many of my relatives, there are glaring gaps in what I’ve pieced together.
Two of my father’s photos taken in May 1938 in Fiesole, Italy, following his arrival there after fleeing Germany, show a woman identified as Eva Goldenring. (Figures 1 & 2) I later learned she was another of my father’s first cousins. Like most of his relatives, Eva and her mother Helene Goldenring, née Hirsch, were rarely mentioned when I was growing up, although I knew they’d survived the war and eventually immigrated to America. Both daughter and mother stayed at the Pension “Villa Primavera” in Fiesole, Italy, co-managed by my Aunt Susanne Müller, Helene twice in 1937-38 (Figures 3 & 4) and Eva in 1938.
In Post 14, I discussed the Tenant Brewer, Markus Braun, from Ratibor, the town where my father was born. Markus had a dozen children by his first wife, Caroline Spiegel, then two more by his second wife, Johanna Goldstein. I’m distantly related to most of my American cousins through Markus Braun. My third cousin, once-removed, Larry Leyser (Figure 5), is one such relative, and, like myself, an active genealogist. Several years ago, Larry shared a two-page summary written by his grandmother, Katerina Leyser, née Rosenthal (Figure 6), detailing some of Larry’s ancestors. This document provided the first mention of Fritz Goldenring and identified him as the brother of Eva Goldenring and son of Helene Goldenring; no other information was given.
To try and learn more, I turned to ancestry.com, and happened on a tantalizing mention of Fritz Goldenring originating from Aufbau Newspaper, saying he had died in Shanghai; Fritz’s name was listed in the April 19, 1946 edition of Aufbau. (Figure 7) Aufbau (German for “building up, construction”), I discovered, is a journal targeted at German-speaking Jews around the globe founded in 1934. From September 1, 1944 through September 27, 1946, Aufbau printed numerous lists of Jewish Holocaust survivors located in Europe, as well as a few lists of victims. These lists, which have been digitized, contain 33,557 names that are searchable via “JewishGen’s Holocaust Database,” “JewishGen Germany Database,” and the U. S. Holocaust Memorial Museum’s “Holocaust Survivors and Victims Database.” According to JewishGen, the extent of the information available on any individual varies widely.
For Fritz Goldenring, I learned he was born on September 11, 1902 and died on December 15, 1943; intriguingly, it gave his last residence simply as “Nizza.” Coincidentally, Nizza is the Italian name for Nice, France, a place with which my family has connections, as readers may recall. Mistakenly believing that Fritz may last have resided here before immigrating to Shanghai, I asked an acquaintance at Nice’s l’Hôtel de Ville whether she could find any trace of Fritz Goldenring there, to no avail. Knowing of the Goldenring family’s travels to Genoa, Italy in July 1926, I looked for a “Nizza” nearby, and discovered a place named “Nizza Monferrato” only 65 miles away; I sent the Comune there an email, received a very gracious reply saying Fritz Goldenring similarly had no connection to this place.
Realizing I was grasping at straws, I resolved to renew my search for Fritz Goldenring from the place he’d assuredly lived, namely, Shanghai. I turned to my friend, Ms. Madeleine Isenberg, from the Los Angeles Jewish Genealogical Society, who assists fellow “travelers.” I asked whether she could refer me to someone in the Jewish community in Shanghai, and she suggested I contact “Chabad” centers in Shanghai; Chabad is one of the largest Hasidic groups and Jewish religious organizations in the world. I emailed three such centers in Shanghai, asking who I should contact about obtaining a copy of Mr. Goldenring’s death certificate, and almost immediately received an email from Rabbi Shalom Greenberg. He’d forwarded my request to Mr. Dvir Bar-Gal, who leads “Tours of Jewish Shanghai.”
Mr. Bar-Gal, it turns out, is an Israeli photojournalist whose mission of tracking down traces of Shanghai’s Jewish past began by accident, when he discovered a Hebrew tombstone in a Shanghai antique shop in 2001. He’s become known as Shanghai’s “gravestone sleuth,” tracking down Jewish tombstones scattered around the city’s outlying villages, tombstones used for everything from building beams to washboards. Between the mid-19th and mid-20th centuries, Shanghai transformed from a small fishing village to China’s largest city and become known as the “Pearl of the East.”
The Jewish tombstones that Mr. Bar-Gal is racing the clock to save are remnants of Shanghai’s Jewish community that once numbered no fewer than 30,000 Jews. Jews first arrived in Shanghai in 1845, built their fortunes, and quickly occupied key positions in the city, making significant social and economic contributions. Russian Jews escaping the pogroms of the early 1900’s represented the next wave of immigrants. They were followed by the last major group of Jewish immigrants, the most well-known of three waves, European refugees escaping Nazi terror. At the time, China was the only country in the world where Jews did not require an entry visa, and this is certainly the reason my father’s cousin, Fritz Goldenring, sought refuge here.
Many of the Jewish refugees who arrived in Shanghai were penniless but were assisted by the wealthier and established Sephardic Jews. After the Japanese occupied Shanghai in 1937, the Nazis applied pressure on them to deport or murder the city’s Jews, an order they refused. Instead, they confined the roughly 20,000 stateless Jewish refugees to the Shanghai Ghetto, formally known as the “Restricted Sector for Stateless Refugees,” an area roughly one square mile in the Hongkou district. About 23,000 of the city’s Jewish refugees were restricted or relocated to the area between 1941 and 1945 by the “Proclamation Concerning Restriction of Residence and Business of Stateless Refugees.” The Shanghai Ghetto was never walled, and Jews were housed alongside local Chinese, who lived in equally deplorable conditions.
The first Jewish cemetery was established in 1862, and by the 1950’s four Jewish cemeteries existed in Shanghai containing 3,700 graves. As the city expanded, in 1958, it was decided to systematically transfer the graves to a newly constructed international cemetery to the west of the city. The few Jews who remained after the Communists came to power were supposed to assist in these transfers, but during Mao Zedong’s “Cultural Revolution,” the international cemetery was instead destroyed, and the gravestones scattered. These uprooted tombstones are the traces of Shanghai’s Jewish past that Mr. Bar-Gal is striving to relocate and preserve.
So, as readers can clearly conclude, referral to Mr. Bar-Gal was fortuitous. While unable to provide a death certificate for Mr. Goldenring, Mr. Bar-Gal provided two valuable clues. He told me that before being expelled from Germany, Fritz had last worked in Darmstadt, Germany as a journalist. He recommended I contact Darmstadt to obtain his death certificate, so I sent the Rathaus (City Hall) there an email. My request was eventually forwarded to the Stadtarchiv, or City Archive, in Darmstadt, and finally, in October 2017, they responded. They could find no evidence that Fritz Goldenring had lived in Darmstadt, but they did find a reference to him in on-line directory at the Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv, the Hesse Central State Archive, in Wiesbaden. They added one additional clue, namely, that Fritz was born in Berlin.
With this new information, I next contacted the Hessisches Hauptstaatsarchiv. They eventually responded telling me there exists an Entschädigungsakte, a claim for compensation file, submitted by Helene Goldenring, née Hirsch, as the heir of her son Fritz Goldenring. (Figure 8) After paying a fee, I was able to obtain a copy of this 160-page file, a document that ultimately filled in some holes.
This file includes typed and handwritten pages, all in German, so I convinced one of my cousins to review and summarize the highlights. The compensation file, while leaving many facets of Fritz’s life in doubt, did answer some questions. It confirmed Fritz had been born in Berlin; attended grammar and high school there; apprenticed as an office worker in Nordhausen; and worked in Hamburg for Schenker & Co., a transport and logistics company dealing with planes, ships and trucks. He eventually became a journalist, as I’d learned from Shanghai. As his situation in Germany became increasingly tenuous, he hoped to parlay his possession of perfect pitch and musical talents into a ticket elsewhere, so in 1938 he went to Berlin. While there, he was apparently arrested for jay-walking and jailed for three days. In a classic example of a “Catch-22,” upon his release, he was deemed to have been “previously convicted” and forced to leave Germany.
Knowing Fritz’s sister and mother had both stayed at the “Villa Primavera” in Fiesole, I re-examined the Pension’s guest logs, and discovered Fritz had also stayed there, registering for a month-long visit on May 16, 1938. (Figure 9) I surmise after he was deported from Germany, Fritz first went to Fiesole before eventually making his way to Shanghai. While in Fiesole, he even played in a men’s tennis tournament because, among my father’s personal papers, I discovered a newspaper clipping showing my father and Fritz’s results. (Figure 10)
It’s not clear how long Fritz Goldenring stayed in Italy, but like my aunt and uncle, he likely left no later than September of 1938, probably from Genoa aboard a luxurious Italian or Japanese cruise ship headed to Shanghai. I became curious whether Mr. Bar-Gal could tell me when Fritz arrived there, so I again contacted him. There exists an Emigranten Adressbuch for Shanghai, dated November 1939, listing Fritz Goldenring, which Mr. Bar-Gal sent me a scan of, proving Fritz was there no later than late 1939. (Figures 11a & 11b)
The Japanese designated the Shanghai Ghetto on February 18, 1943 and compelled those who’d arrived after 1937 to move there by May 18, 1943; many relocated Jews lived in group homes called “Heime,” including Fritz, who lived at “Alcockheim 66,” along with 60 other men. Helene Goldenring’s compensation file explained Fritz’s cause of death, namely, Sprue and Avitaminose. Avitaminosis is a disease cause by a deficiency of vitamins, and is closely associated with sprue, a chiefly tropical disease characterized by diarrhea, emaciation, and anemia. Fritz is recorded as having died on December 15, 1943 at the Ward Road Hospital in Shanghai; apparently, the winter of 1943 in Shanghai was severe, and hunger was widespread.
Fritz’s mother’s compensation file, together with immigration records available from ancestry.com for his family, illustrate how widely the Goldenring family was dispersed during WWII. Fritz’s sister, Eva Goldenring, for reasons I’m striving to understand, survived incarceration in the notorious French detention center of Gurs at the base of the Pyrenees in southwestern France; Eva would eventually live in Madrid before immigrating to America in 1947. Fritz’s mother, Helene, made her way to Valparaiso, Chile, where her brother, Robert Hirsch, an engineer, had immigrated in 1939 from Bilbao, Spain. Robert died in 1943 in Chile, and on July 3, 1947, Helene immigrated to New York (Figure 12), where she was reunited with her daughter. (Figure 13)
Note: Occasionally, I will take a brief pause in my story-telling to engage with readers. These conversations may relate to the approach I take in writing my Blog; entail new discoveries that readers have brought to my attention; offer promising avenues for doing “forensic genealogy”; or discuss new features or elements I’ve added to my Blog. Feedback is welcome.
I feel compelled to take hold of the narrative as it relates to the telling of my family’s stories. Were better writers than me inclined to tell this tale, they could likely do it with greater pathos and originality but perhaps it would lack some of the authenticity I’m striving for. Beyond this, I concede family histories are mostly of interest to blood relatives familiar with the individuals discussed, either personally known to them or to whom they can link to on a family tree. For this reason, I consider it vitally important to couch as many of my family stories in a broader historic context that a larger audience can relate to and find interesting. And, personally, researching the history in which some of the events played out has been endlessly fascinating.
Other than my family Blog, I have no direct footprint in social media, and this is a conscious decision. During my second visit to Tiegenhof, the town in the Free State of Danzig where my father was once a dentist, I was interviewed by a reporter from a Pomeranian newspaper after my translated talk. Some days later, I Googled the event. The reporter had accurately portrayed the interview. However, I was stunned by the vile and odious nature of some reader comments believing I’d only come to Poland for financial gain or to reclaim confiscated property. Loathe as I am to say this, I attribute some of these attitudes to anti-Semitism. For this reason, I intentionally opt to keep a low profile on the Internet even if it means that people who might be interested in my Blog only discover it by accident or never find it.
One of my stated goals when I launched my Blog was the hope some readers would provide additional information related to my posts, and in two instances I’m delighted to say this has happened. Post 14 deals with the Braun & Berliner Brewery in Ratibor. A Polish gentleman, Mr. Grzegorz Miczek, shared with me pictures of two historic bottles from this brewery which he graciously has allowed me to upload as a “Postscript” to this post. Similarly, another Polish gentleman, Mr. Paul Newerla, shared with me some photos and advertisements of the hotel owned by my family in Ratibor through three generations, the Bruck’s “Prinz von Preußen” Hotel; these too will soon be added as a Postscript to Post 11. In the case of these gentlemen and a few other individuals who’ve contacted me through my Blog, I’ve turned them on to resources they were previously unaware of, so the exchange has hopefully been mutually beneficial.
Figure 1-With Ms. Madeleine Isenberg, my friend at the Los Angeles Jewish Genealogical Society who assists members in their genealogical research
I’ve mentioned the Jewish diaspora in several Blog posts. In working on my family history, I occasionally discover fleeting references to a few of my father’s cousins or relatives that dispersed to places in South America or even China in the era of the National Socialists. Thereupon, I usually call upon a friend and long-standing affiliate of the Los Angeles Jewish Genealogical Society, of which I’m a member, to ask if she has any contacts in the Jewish community in those countries. This friend has been beyond gracious and of enormous help. (Figure 1) In an upcoming post, I will share the results of one such investigation instigated by information obtained from a man organizing tours of Jewish Shanghai.
Finally, I want to alert readers to two new pages I’ve added to my Blog in a section retitled “Resources.” Readers will now find a “Glossary” of foreign words I’ve used in my posts, as well as a list of the “Archives and Databases” I’ve accessed and made use of in uncovering historic documents related to my posts. For genealogists researching in some of the countries listed, I hope they may find these resources useful.
Note: This is the last in the series of articles discussing my Aunt Susanne Müller, née Bruck, spanning from 1936, when she left Berlin with her husband Dr. Franz Müller, to the moment she was arrested in Fayence by the Vichy French in August 1942. It describes the final two-and-a-half to three weeks of her life and that of Ernst Mombert, her step-daughter’s brother-in-law. Surviving documents in my father’s personal papers, along with records publicly available, allow me to track the precise route my Aunt Susanne and Ernst took to their deaths in Auschwitz.
My Aunt Susanne and her step-daughter’s brother-in-law, Ernst Mombert, were arrested by the Vichy French in Fayence, France, probably around the third week of August 1942. Their arrests were the result of the implementation of the so-called “Final Solution to the Jewish Question.” On January 20, 1942, Nazi officials had convened in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee to discuss the implementation of the Final Solution, whereby most of the Jews of German-occupied Europe would be deported to Poland and murdered. Following the Wannsee Conference, the deportation of Jews throughout Nazi-occupied areas to extermination camps increased in momentum. In France, the deportations, which had begun in March 1942, reached their peak in the summer of 1942, overlapping with the arrest of my relatives. Involvement of French authorities intensified during this period.
Arrests of individual Jews in the occupied zone of France had begun around 1940, and general round up in 1941. By March 1941, the Vichy State created the Commissariat General aux Questions juives (“Commissariat-General for Jewish Affairs”), which managed the seizure of Jewish assets and organized anti-Jewish propaganda. Around this same time, the German began compiling registers of Jews living in the occupied zone. The Second Statut des Juifs of June 2, 1941 systematized registrations across all of France, including the unoccupied parts of France controlled by the Vichy government where Fayence was located. Because Jews in the unoccupied zone were not required to wear the yellow star-of-David badge, these records would provide the basis for future rounds-ups and deportations. No doubt, my relatives’ names were on these registers.
In Post 22, I told readers seven members of my family once lived at the fruit farm in Fayence, although only two were ever arrested by the French collaborators. It remains unclear why the other five were never seized. While I’m disinclined for various reasons to credit local French authorities for having played a role in protecting my family during WWII, supposedly 75% of the roughly 330,000 Jews in metropolitan France in 1939 survived the Holocaust, which is one of the highest survival rates in Europe. This story, however, is about Aunt Susanne and Ernst Mombert, my relatives who did not survive.
Soon after my Aunt Susanne was arrested, she and Ernst Mombert were transported approximately 20 miles to the nearby town of Draguignan. (Figures 1 & 2) Whether they were taken there by train or other conveyance is unknown. The priority that the Nazis and their henchmen placed on the extermination of Jews following the Wannsee Conference suggests arrested Jews were brought to major transit centers in a matter of weeks for deportation to concentration camps. Susanne and Ernst wrote an undated postal card to the Mombert family in Fayence from Draguignan, postmarked August 26, 1942, that survives in my father’s personal papers; their stay in Draguignan was brief, only half-an-hour. (Figure 3) An acquaintance from the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles tells me Jewish detainees were encouraged to write postal cards so Nazis could identify and root out surviving family members.
My dear ones, We have just arrived in Draguignan and will leave in half-an-hour for aux Milles. Once again, I remind you to ask David to come for the pump, at any price, even if you must pick him up by car. Vegetables, be careful with the string-beans, water every other day—cabbage twice weekly. Cucumbers every other day—pick the corn—chase the birds, as directed by Marius. Tomatoes water once a week. Special attention: Carrots! bugs on cabbage. Take care of the old and the young. Don’t worry. Before sending the certificates, wait until our address has arrived. Love to all, Susanne, Ernst
From Draguignan, Susanne and Ernst were then transported approximately 76 miles to the notorious French detention center at Camp des Milles in Aix-en-Provence, a place that is today a museum. (Figure 4) While it was never an extermination camp, unlike Auschwitz where Susanne and Ernst were murdered, it is extremely foreboding because it survives virtually intact and gives one a real sense of what awaited the Jewish internees. (Figure 5) Susanne and Ernst wrote a second postal card from here, dated August 24, 1942, postmarked five days later. (Figure 6)
August 24, 1942 Dearest Peterle, How are you? Did the doctor come? Take care of yourself and don’t lose courage—me, I am well—I have met some acquaintances fromHyères, a woman doctor from Berlin who knows you—well, we will see what happens to us. Ernst has also met some people he knows—we talk quite often. Mummi, how are you? And Margit and the rest of the family? Don’t work too hard—for the five of you there will be enough from the property. Go to Sénégnier and explain our situation to him. My thanks to all of you as well as to our friends for their kindness. My love to all of you. Thousand kisses, Papstein! Susanne
Next, Susanne and Ernst were taken 56 miles to Avignon, whose bridge is the subject of a children’s well-known French nursery rhyme, Sur le pont d’Avignon, although most certainly this was not on their minds. The last words my Uncle Franz and the Mombert family heard from Susanne and Ernst came from the third and final postal card mailed from there. The card is dated September 2, 1942 and postmarked the same day. (Figures 7 & 8)
Dearest Franzl, Up to now, the trip has not been too bad. I stayed together with some very nice ladies. We are well fed, too well for my taste. I am so sad that I cannot send you anything (chocolates, sardines, cookies). All these things come from the Quakers and from the Union of the Israelites of France. . . but what does it mean to us? In any case, I have decided to hold on to be reunited with all of you. Do not lose your patience and courage. They have loaded all and everyone in wagon trains—old people, children, the sick, etc. Kisses, embraces for all of you and good wishes. Susanne
P.S. Maybe I will be able to send you something else.
In this last postal card, my Aunt Susanne mentions the Union Générale des Israélites de France (UGIF), along with the Quakers, as the providers of charitable donations. The Germans created the UGIF on November 29, 1941 to more closely control the Jewish community. Through this organization, the Germans were thus able to learn where local Jews lived. Many of the leaders of the UGIF were themselves ultimately deported to concentration camps.
In this final postal card, my Aunt Susanne also mentions that by the time Jewish detainees had arrived in Avignon, they had been loaded into cattle cars, likely in Camp des Milles. The Société Nationale des Chemins de Fer Français (SNCF), the state-owned railroad system of France, was an active participant in the transport of Jewish detainees to the extermination camps, and evidence of their complicity can be seen even today in railroad sidings at Camp des Milles. (Figure 9)
My relatives never again wrote words that have been handed down to the present. The three postal cards, all written in French, selflessly remind the surviving family to carefully water and tend to the fruits and vegetables on the farm on which their survival clearly depended. The mundane nature of Susanne and Ernst’s final words is a poignant reminder of how ordinary Jews were trying to lead normal lives when their everyday existence was so tragically interrupted by the Nazis.
From Avignon, my relatives were taken more than 430 miles to Drancy, a suburb outside Paris, which was an assembly point for Jews being deported to concentration camps. My Aunt Susanne and Ernst Mombert are known to have survived until at least September 7, 1942. Both of their names appear, coincidentally on the same page (Figures 10a & 10b), on a list of 1000 Jewish prisoner deported from Drancy, a suburb of Paris, destined for Auschwitz, aboard Convoy 29, which departed Drancy at 8:55am and arrived in Auschwitz two days later. (Figures 11a & 11b) My aunt, correctly identified as a German national, is incorrectly shown having been born in “Ratisbonne” rather than Ratibor, Germany.
Serge Klarsfeld, a Romanian-born French activist and Nazi hunter known for documenting the Holocaust to enable the prosecution of war criminals, compiled the lists using surviving German documents. The nationality of only 893 deportees was recorded from Convoy 29, possibly because some arrived from the unoccupied zone only a few hours before the convoy was slated to leave for Auschwitz. The German record of deportees was divided into seven sub-lists, and while both Susanne and Ernst originated from the unoccupied zone, they were likely identified as coming from Camp des Milles. The convoy contained 435 women and 565 men. Upon arrival in Auschwitz (Figure 12), except for 59 men and 52 women, the remaining deportees were immediately gassed to death. (Figures 13 & 14) According to my father, his sister always carried a poison pill in a locket, and I choose to believe she took her own life before the convoy arrived in Auschwitz.
It is impossible to pinpoint the actual date my relatives were arrested in Fayence. Cancellation dates on the postal cards and Susanne and Ernst’s arrival in Drancy no later than September 7th suggest it cannot have taken more than three weeks before they were murdered, no later than September 9th. The ultimate irony is that my aunt moved to Fayence, almost 1000 miles away from where she was born in Ratibor, Germany, only to be hauled back and murdered less than 70 miles from her hometown. Stolpersteins, the small, brass memorials commemorating individual victims of Nazism, have been placed, respectively, at the last residences in Berlin and Giessen, Germany where my Aunt Susanne and Ernst Mombert and his family lived. (Figures 15 & 16)
Note: This post is the next chapter in my Aunt Susanne and Uncle Franz’s story, following their departure from Fiesole, Italy around September 16, 1938. Their exodus came on the heels of enactment of racial laws by Fascist Italy beginning in 1938 enforcing discrimination mainly against Italian and foreign Jews. The final destination, at least in the case of my Uncle Franz, was Fayence, France, 230 miles almost due west as the crow flies across the Ligurian Sea. Why my aunt and uncle fled here was a decision shrouded in mystery, but one I eventually worked out with the assistance of an American researcher studying Dr. Franz Müller’s renowned son, Peter Müller-Munk.
Fayence is located in France’s Var region. (Figure 1) It’s a charming small town of medieval origin that was once fortified and is considered one of a series of “perched villages” that overlooks the plain between the southern Alps and what’s called the Esterel massif, which borders the Mediterranean Sea between Cannes and Saint-Raphaël. Fayence is slightly more than 40 miles west-southwest of the beautiful seaside town of Nice, along France’s Côte d’Azur. Nice is where my parents met in 1946, and a place I spent some enjoyable summers with my maternal grandmother. I’ve been told my grandmother even took me on an outing to Fayence as a child, though I have no recollection of this. But, like Fiesole, Italy, Fayence is a place I associate with my aunt and uncle.
Following my aunt and uncle’s departure from Fiesole, likely in the company of my grandmother and my father, I presume they traveled by train through Nice on their way to Fayence. Since my father had an aunt and cousins who lived in Nice, they may even have spent a few days there along the way. Unlike Fiesole, La Mairie or L’Hôtel de Ville (City Hall) in Fayence does not appear to have maintained immigration or emigration logs during this period, so it’s impossible to pinpoint my relatives’ arrival there. Suffice it to say, by early October 1938, they were likely in place.
I learned why my aunt, uncle, and grandmother settled in Fayence because of my family tree on ancestry.com. One day, I was contacted via my tree by a woman from Coral Gables, Florida, Ms. Jewel Stern (Figure 2), wanting to speak with me about my uncle. Ms. Stern was trying to learn all she could about Dr. Franz Müller’s renowned son, Peter Müller-Munk. She explained that not only did my uncle have a son by his first marriage, but he also had a daughter, Karin Margit Müller-Munk, a fact I was unaware of. She was married to a man named Franz (“Francois” in France) Hermann Mombert, who with his brother Ernst owned the fruit farm in Fayence where my family sought refuge in 1938. Margit’s brother came to America in 1926 and went on to become a world-renowned silversmith and industrial designer in Pittsburgh, thus, he was known to me unlike his sister, who died relatively young and anonymously in Fayence. Ironically, through Ms. Stern I learned a lot about my own extended family.
Among my father’s pictures are two sets of photographs from Fayence, the first taken between September and November of 1941, the second precisely on March 2, 1947. Some context is necessary. With few other options available to my father after leaving Fiesole, Italy, barely a month later, on October 21, 1938, he enlisted in the French Foreign Legion in Paris. He was stationed in Saïda and Ouargla, Algeria (Figure 3), as a member of the “1ère Batterie Saharienne Porteé de Légion.” Because of his Jewish origins, my father, like all other Jewish enlistees at the time, was given an alias; during his time as a legionnaire, he was known as “Marcel Berger.” (Figures 4a & 4b) Because my father spoke fluent French he easily passed as a Frenchman.
Between September and November of 1941, my father visited the south of France while on leave from the French Foreign Legion (FFL). It was during this time that he last saw his sister Susanne (Figure 5) and took photos in Fayence. (Figures 6 & 7) What imbues this visit with historic interest is the fact that as a soldier in the FFL, he was able to travel, likely under his pseudonym, across “enemy” lines from Algeria to France. One must assume such travel was possible only because the FFL was ostensibly allied with Vichy France—a regime that, until November 1942, was most powerful in the unoccupied, southern “free zone” centered on the commune of Vichy. In theory, Vichy France also represented the French Colonial Empire, of which Algeria was a part, so this may explain how my father was able to travel between Africa and France in the middle of WWII.
As an aside, the Vichy Government, which had enacted anti-Semitic laws in the 1930’s and 1940’s, would occasionally send one of their envoys to liaise with FFL military units based in North Africa, ostensibly to root out Jews; during these visits some commanders, perhaps because of their antipathy and disdain for the Vichy Government, sent their foreign regiments on random deployments deep into the Sahara. (Figure 8) Regardless of the reason, this likely saved Jewish lives, including my father’s life.
The second set of pictures from Fayence was taken on March 2, 1947. (Figures 9 & 10) My father and one of his first cousins visited the Mombert family with whom my grandmother was still living to celebrate her 74th birthday the next day. At the time, my father worked as a dentist in Nice, an intriguing story that will be the subject of a future Blog post. The two sets of pictures from Fayence, along with letters and documents I’ve located, indicate seven members of my family once lived there. These included my Aunt Susanne, my Uncle Franz, my grandmother “Mummi,” as she was known, Francois and Margit Mombert, along with Francois’s brother Ernst and their mother, Nellie Mombert. Their vital data is summarized in the table at the end of this post.
Ms. Stern spent over 20 years studying and collecting the works of Peter Müller-Munk and learning about him and his family; her goal, which came to fruition in 2015, was to develop a special exhibit at the Carnegie Museum of Art in Pittsburgh on Peter’s amazing works. (Figure 11) To learn about Peter’s father, Ms. Stern enlisted one of her Parisian friends to travel to Fayence, visit L’Hôtel de Ville, find Dr. Franz Müller’s final resting place and that of his daughter (Figures 12, 13 & 14), obtain copies of their death certificates, take pictures of the fruit farm where my aunt and uncle had lived, and more. Ms. Stern graciously shared all this information with me, and, in turn, I rounded out my uncle and aunt’s story by providing pictures, documents, and history about their lives in Berlin and Fiesole. It was mutually beneficial.
In 2014, my wife and I retraced the steps taken by Ms. Stern’s friend and visited Fayence. Additionally, Ms. Stern told us of an elderly local woman who had once worked for Francois Mombert beginning in 1941 when she was 15, so we planned through our contact at L’Hôtel de Ville (Figure 15), Mme. Claudine Clary (Figure 16), to interview this Mme. Marie-Rose Siri. Immediately upon our arrival in Fayence, we spoke with Mme. Clary, who, among other things, explained where my uncle and his daughter are buried and told us their graves will soon be evacuated if their tombs are not restored and maintenance fees paid. (Figure 17)
Our visit with Mme. Siri and her daughter, Martine Siri (Figure 18), had been pre-arranged. My fluency in French meant I could converse directly with Mme. Siri. I was particularly curious about one picture taken in Fayence (Figure 19), showing my aunt and uncle eating lunch with his daughter and son-in-law, Margit and Francois Mombert. A young lady is serving them, and I was curious whether Mme. Siri recognized herself, but unfortunately not. As a young girl, Mme. Siri did household chores and helped harvest and package fruit for eventual sale in Cannes; the farm produced apricots, peaches, apples, and later artichokes and strawberries. Mme. Siri recalled that Ernst Mombert, who had severe “strabisme,” or crossed eyes, was nonetheless able to work in the orchards.
Mme. Siri fondly recalled Francois. She remembered collecting mushrooms with my Aunt Susanne, and my aunt’s ability to discern edible fungi. Poignantly, Mme. Siri told the story of when my Aunt Susanne was arrested by the Vichy in late August 1942; she was in hiding at the time, and the officials left word that if she did not present herself to the authorities, they would instead arrest one of the elderly members of the family. This is not something my aunt would ever have countenanced so she turned herself in.
Mme. Siri mentioned something intriguing, specifically, that Francois Mombert and possibly also his wife were part of the French Resistance. When the French collaborators came to the fruit farm along Chemin Banegon in late August 1942, they only arrested my Aunt Susanne and Ernst Mombert even though the three elderly members of the family were certainly present. Why all the Jews at the farm were not seized then is unclear.
While Mme. Siri’s memories of my family’s years in Fayence are few, what she was able to recall brought them to life, if only dimly.
Before leaving Mme. Siri, she and her daughter explained how to get to the nearby house once located along Chemin Banegon (Figure 20) where the former Mombert homestead is located. I was very interested in seeing the place. In doing family history, chutzpah is sometimes required. Showing up unannounced on the doorsteps of a stranger’s house situated in a rural setting in a foreign country is an example. To say we startled the current owner, Mme. Monique Graux, would be a mild understatement. Fortunately, Mme. Graux was intrigued by the nature of our unplanned visit, and, entirely because of my wife’s warm and sympathetic countenance, invited us in and showed us around her home, inside and out. (Figures 21 & 22)
Mme. Graux claimed she and her husband purchased the house along Chemin Banegon around 1960 from a gentleman named M. Lebreton, who’d owned it for only two-and-a-half years and bought it from Francois Mombert. Mme. Graux never met Francois Mombert nor his wife, so could tell us nothing about them. She explained the house dates from 1740 and was historically used to tan animal hides. Given that Margit Mombert died in Fayence on March 22, 1959, sale of the house before her death strikes me as a bit improbable. Curious as to when Mme. Graux and her husband purchased the farmhouse, I asked Mme. Clary about obtaining a copy of l’acte de propriété, the deed of ownership; the notary company informed her I could not get it because I am not related to the current owner.
Near our hotel was a winery where we wanted to do a tasting. As Americans traveling abroad, we typically stand out, so it intrigues the French when they hear someone obviously American speak their language with only a hint of an accent. Such was the case when we visited this winery, and the owner engaged me in conversation. The reason for our visit to Fayence came out, and the owner, M. Alain Rebuffel (Figure 23), remembered his grandfather talking about knowing my family; he recalled his grandfather was more kindly disposed towards Jews than his grandmother, who wanted nothing to do with them. Interestingly, Mme. Clary told us her father similarly remembered my family.
M. Rebuffel suggested we speak with his uncle, M. Roger Faye (Figure 24), who is the custodian at the cemetery where Dr. Franz Müller and his daughter are interred and lives in the adjacent house. Upon our visit to the cemetery, we examined and photographed the now crumbling tomb of my uncle and his daughter. Then, we called on M. Faye, who mentioned that several years earlier he had evacuated a tomb belonging to a member of the Mombert family, whose name he could not remember. I ultimately worked this out when I discovered an on-line biography about Francois and Ernst’s father, Paul Karl Mombert. He was a professor at the University of Giessen in Germany, who like my Uncle Franz, was fired in 1933. He was imprisoned by the Nazis, but eventually released; he died from cancer shortly thereafter, on December 1, 1938, in Stuttgart, Germany, and his ashes were sent to Fayence. There is no doubt that the Mombert tomb evacuated in Fayence was that of Paul Mombert.
Following my return to the States in 2014, I contacted the Archives Départementales du Var in Draguignan, France to inquire about Fayence real estate records and determine precisely when Ernst and Francois Mombert purchased the property along Chemin Banegon. Fortunately, the historic records have survived and place acquisition of the farm in December 1933. (Figure 25)
As mentioned above, Ernst Mombert was arrested along with my Aunt Susanne by the Vichy collaborators in August 1942, and neither survived. The real estate records reveal a minor, but interesting historical fact. They indicate that on September 6, 1947, exclusive ownership of the farm was transferred to Francois Mombert (compare Figure 26 to Figure 25), that’s to say, almost five years to the day after Ernst Mombert was deported to Auschwitz. In the case of my Aunt Susanne, deported to Auschwitz the same day as Ernst, it took the Comune de Fayence seven years, until 1949, to officially declare her dead. (Figure 27) The wheels of bureaucracy grind slow.
Ms. Stern learned much about Peter Müller-Munk from the personal papers of his aunt, Marie Munk, one of the first female lawyers in Germany. Marie became a judge in 1930, but, like many Jews, was dismissed from her judicial position in 1933. She eventually came to the United States, obtained her law degree here, and had a notable career as a women’s rights activist. Marie Munk’s papers are archived at Smith College, and in one letter, the date of her niece’s marriage to Francois Mombert on December 4, 1934 is mentioned. Unknown initially when and where they’d been married, it took Ms. Stern and me a long time to track this down. On a second visit to Fayence in 2015, in passing, I mentioned this date to Mme. Clary who immediately checked her office records and located Francois and Margit’s marriage certificate. (Figure 28) Interestingly, after Margit’s death in 1959, Francois Mombert continued to correspond with Marie.
The next Blog post will be the final chapter about my Aunt Susanne’s abbreviated life.
Below readers will find the vital events of the seven family members I’ve determined lived in Fayence.
Note: This post is the next chapter in my Aunt Susanne and Uncle Franz’s story, following their departure in late 1935 or early 1936 from Berlin to escape the increasingly repressive National Socialist regime, when they sought refuge in Fiesole, Italy. There are certain family history stories I look forward to writing and sharing with readers, and this is one such tale, when, albeit briefly, my relatives held out hope they might survive the homicidal madmen threatening Europe in the lead-up to WWII and lead normal lives. Much about the roughly two-and-a-half years my aunt and uncle spent in Fiesole remains unknown, including why they decided to immigrate here. Still, some of what I’ve learned as recently as 2016 provides a sound basis to speculate why they may have moved here.
In Post 1, I introduced readers to a quote by the brainy, former executive of the Los Angeles Dodgers, Branch Rickey, who once said that “Luck is the residue of design.” The story I’m about to relate about my Aunt Susanne and her esteemed husband, Dr. Franz Müller, and the discoveries I made about their years in Fiesole, Italy, speaks volumes to this truth.
Figure 1-Roman amphitheater in Fiesole
I can’t remember exactly when I first learned that my aunt and uncle had lived in Fiesole, a gorgeous Tuscan town, founded by the Etruscans in the 9th-8th centuries B.C., located on the scenic heights to the northeast of Firenze (Florence). However, I recall when I first visited Fiesole. It was in the 1990’s, long before I became interested in family history, when I was a mere archaeologist and my aim was simply to visit the Roman ruins that are the town’s main tourist attraction. (Figure 1) I’ve always imagined the tawny landscape and gently rolling hills of Tuscany as an inviting billowy pillow in which to do a face-plant. So, it’s easy to comprehend the attraction Tuscany might have held for Jewishimmigrants in the face of the malign forces that surrounded them.
The current post organizes chronologically all the information I’ve collected about my aunt and uncle during three visits to Fiesole, in 2014, 2015, and again in 2016. Before starting my family investigations, I had no idea, for example, when my aunt and uncle departed Berlin, nor when they arrived in Fiesole. But, as I explained in the previous post, I learned from the Grundbuch, or “real estate register” for the property my uncle owned in Berlin-Charlottenburg, that he sold his house there in November or December 1935, and likely departed with my aunt soon afterwards. Similarly, in conjunction with what I eventually discovered in Fiesole, I place their arrival there in the first quarter of 1936.
Judging from the dated pictures in my father’s photo albums, he too departed Germany, likely from Berlin, two years later, in early March 1938. Between March 5th and March 9th, my father spent several days visiting the tourist attractions in Vienna, Austria, seemingly in the company of other Jewish émigrés. Having lost his profession, and bewildered as to what the future held, he headed for Fiesole. Along the way, my father stopped to do some skiing and hiking in the Dolomite Mountains and passed through a town in Alto Adige, Italy, named Bolzano or Bozen; this is a place my wife and I have visited on several occasions for reasons having nothing to do with family history, and everything to do with the famed 5,000-year old “Ötzi the Iceman,” discovered in the Tyrolean Alps, who is displayed at the Museum of Archaeology in Bolzano. Eventually, my father arrived in Fiesole, his pictures never specifying exactly when though I ultimately worked this out. (Figure 2)
Knowing of my family’s association with Fiesole, I decided to contact the “Municipio,” or City Hall there, and inquire about any documentary evidence they might possess on my aunt and uncle. When I accessed their website, I was pleasantly surprised to discover a branch of the Municipio called “Archivio Storico Comunale,” the “Municipal Historic Archive.” I immediately contacted them on March 27, 2014, explained my family’s connection to Fiesole, provided my aunt and uncle’s names, and the street name where they’d lived, Via del Salviatino, and asked for any relevant information. Amazingly, the very next day the town’s archivist, Ms. Lucia Nadetti, responded by sending me a page from Fiesole’s emigration register from 1938 with my aunt and uncle’s names listed. (Figure 3) The speed with which I was able to find evidence of my aunt and uncle’s presence in Fiesole left me breathless.
Fiesole’s emigration register placed my aunt and uncle’s arrival in Fiesole as April 30, 1936, and their departure to France as September 16, 1938; the register, among other things, showed they lived at Via del Salviatino 14, a place I only later learned was named the “Villa Primavera” (Figures 4a & 4b), and shared living accommodations with an Austrian woman named Lucia von Jacobi. For reasons I will get into below, I actually place my aunt and uncle’s arrival in Fiesole a month earlier, on March 31, 1936. Lucia Nadetti further explained there was no evidence my aunt and uncle paid taxes on their residence, and concluded they were probably renting the house, a question I resolved to answer when I visited Fiesole in 2014.
After studying the 1938 emigration register (see Figure 3), I followed up with a few questions related to abbreviations and Italian words I could not make out. Ms. Nadetti explained my aunt was shown as “coniugi,” married to Franz, and identified as “a.c.,” or “Atta a casa,” namely, a housewife. By contrast, Ms. Jacobi was described as “benestante,” or well-to-do, and registered as a “vedova,” or widow.
Figure 5-Ms. Lucia Nadetti, our friend and archivist at the “Archivio Storico Comunale”
I told Ms. Nadetti of our plans to vacation in Fiesole later in 2104, and she promised to show me everything she’d found when we came. My wife and I eventually turned up at the “Archivio Storico Comunale” in Fiesole in June 2014, the year we spent 13 weeks visiting places associated with my family’s diaspora, traveling from Gdansk, Poland to Valencia, Spain. By the time we showed up, Ms. Nadetti (Figure 5) had collected the registration logs listing all my aunt and uncle’s guests. During Italy’s Fascist era, all out-of-town visitors were required to appear with their hosts at the Municipio, provide their names, show their identity papers, indicate their anticipated length of stay, and complete what was called a “Soggiorno degli Stranieri in Italia,” or “Stay of Foreigners in Italy.” I was a bit surprised at the rather large number of guests my aunt and uncle had hosted, but simply attributed this to my relatives offering accommodations to Jews fleeing Germany.
These registration forms, while highly intrusive, are enormously informative for doing genealogical research, uncovering names of visitors, and establishing timelines for these guests. When completing the “Soggiorno” forms (Figure 6), guests were required to provide the names of both their parents, including the mother’s maiden name, plus their own date and place of birth. While these forms have not survived for all the guests who stayed with my aunt and uncle, those that remain are particularly useful. In a future Blog post, I will relate the stories of some guests whose fate I’ve been able to determine.
The immigration log recorded my father’s arrival in Italy, following his departure from Vienna, as May 10, 1938 (Figure 7), and his registration at the Comunale in Fiesole as May 26th. Given that my father had been in Vienna as late as May 9th, I surmise he arrived in Italy by an overnight train. The immigration register records a second visit by my father in September 1938, which I’ll discuss below.
Initially, I didn’t know whether my uncle ever owned Via del Salviatino 14, so upon our arrival in Fiesole, Ms. Nadetti directed me to the “Conservatorio Dei Registri Immobiliari” in nearby Firenze to check ownership records. Here, we learned the descendants of a former obstetrician/gynecologist, named Dr. Gino Frascani, own two houses along Via Del Salviatino, numbered 12 and 14; my uncle, it turns out, never owned the Villa Primavera. Naturally, I assumed Via del Salviatino 14 was the house where my aunt and uncle had once lived, an erroneous supposition as it turned out.
Figure 8-Our Italian friend Ms. Giuditta Melli
The visit to the Conservatorio turned out to be fortuitous, but not simply for what we learned there. In 2014, my wife and I were staying at a bed-and-breakfast on the outskirts of Fiesole, and rather than deal with the city traffic to get to the Conservatorio, we took the bus there. By happenstance, while trying to ascertain where to catch the return bus at the end of the day, a delightful English-speaking Italian woman, Ms. Giuditta Melli (Figure 8), noticed our confusion and confirmed we were in the right place. She was headed on the same bus, so we exchanged pleasantries on the ride, and she invited us to visit the ceramic shop near the Conservatorio where she teaches. Two days later we dropped by and mentioned in passing the reason for our visit to Fiesole. Giuditta was moved to tears because she’d recently learned that her great-uncle was Jewish and had been deported to Buchenwald from Firenze by the Fascists and murdered there. As we prepared to leave, we exchanged emails and promised to stay in touch. This turned into an exceptionally productive friendship.
After our visit to the Conservatorio, my wife and I paid a return visit to Ms. Nadetti at the Archivio Storico Comunale to update her on our findings. Reminded of Dr. Frascani’s connection to properties along Via del Salviatino, Ms. Nadetti consulted an immigration register from 1936, similar to ones she’d shown us from 1937 and 1938. In it, she discovered my aunt and uncle initially were guests of Dr. Frascani at Via del Salviatino 14, the house they ultimately leased from him; this document shows my aunt and uncle arrived in Fiesole on March 31, 1936, and registered at the Municipio on April 7th, in other words, a month earlier than the emigration register that placed their arrival there on April 30, 1936. (Figure 9)
Having definitively linked my Uncle Franz to Dr. Gino Frascani, Ms. Nadetti found and shared a few documents about the doctor, and, eventually even compiled a summary of Dr. Frascani’s activities as a City Councilman for Fiesole through four legislative terms, 1905, 1910, 1914 and 1920. We also learned Dr. Frascani had been Mayor of Fiesole (Figure 10) for a time but forced to quit after being threatened by the Fascists on account of his socialist leanings. Interestingly, the roster of mayors listed on a placard in the Municipio does not even include Dr. Frascani.
One document given to us by Ms. Nadetti showed Dr. Frascani (Figure 11) paid for construction of an “Istituto di Cura Chirurgica del Salviatino,” dedicated to his mother, Ersilia Frascani, built in 1908-09 along Via del Salviatino in Firenze. (Figure 12) The sanatorium was divided into sections for: general and special surgery; gynecology; obstetrics; and medical services. Dr. Frascani, a truly remarkable man whose life story begs to be told, even maintained free beds in the institute’s common infirmary for “charity.” The Istituto still stands today, regrettably no longer as a hospital, but rather as exclusive condominiums.
Having for the moment learned as much as we could from the various archives and city offices, my wife and I set out to locate Via del Salviatino 14. One could almost characterize this search as a comedy of errors. Prior to visiting Fiesole, I had located the house on Google Earth, so assumed I knew what I was looking for.
Via del Salviatino 14 is situated in an exclusive section of town, and when we finally located the address, the street-facing side of the apartment building did not appear as it had in my father’s pictures. (Figure 13) Coincidentally, the day we first visited, two black SUVs with tinted windows and burly guards, obviously protecting a high-ranking government official, refused to let us access the rear of the building to check. Confronted with this obstacle, we were forced to strategically retreat. When we returned the next day, the portly guards were gone, and we were able to access the building’s backside. Clearly, this was not the house my aunt and uncle had lived in.
Figure 14-Street sign along Via del Salviatino indicating boundary between Fiesole & Firenze
Puzzled, I returned to the street, and discovered my mistake. Via del Salviatino begins in Firenze (Florence), almost at the point where the “Sanatorio Frascani” is located, BUT, continues into Fiesole; in other words, Via del Salviatino transects both towns, and as fate would have it, the divide between Fiesole and Firenze is directly in front of the Via del Salviatino 14 we were standing at in Firenze. (Figure 14)
Having resolved this issue, we quickly found the Via del Salviatino 14, in Fiesole, a short distance up the street. On one of three mailboxes at this location with house numbers 12, 14 and 14a (Figure 15), is the name “R. FRASCANI.” Naturally, we concluded this was a descendant of Dr. Frascani, and that he resides in the house where my aunt and uncle had once lived. We drove up the dirt road, rang the bell at the gated entrance to his bed-and-breakfast, but no one answered. However, we ran into a young man riding a Moped, a childhood friend of Mr. Frascani, as it happens; he called Ranieri on his cellphone and we spoke briefly. However, since neither of us spoke the other’s language well, we agreed I would send him an email with my questions upon my return to the states, which is in fact what I did. Regardless, it would be another year before we met in person and I got answers to some of my queries.
In the interim, I maintained contact with Giuditta Melli. One day, she discovered a fleeting reference in a German article saying my Aunt Susanne Müller-Bruck and her housemate, Lucia von Jacobi, had co-managed a pension. Given the large number of guests that had stayed at the Villa Primavera, this should have been obvious from the start.
In anticipation of our 2015 visit to Fiesole, Giuditta invited my wife and I to stay with her and her family at their large villa in Firenze, only a short distance from Via del Salviatino. Giuditta also arranged and served as translator for our meeting with Ranieri, the grandson of Dr. Gino Frascani, and his mother, Ms. Maria Agata Frascani, née Mannelli, the daughter-in-law of Dr. Frascani. (Figure 16) It was
during this get-together that we finally learned the house where Ranieri lives and has his B&B is not the Villa Primavera. In fact, as we found out at the Conservatorio the year before, his family owns both Via del Salviatino 12 and 14. However, sometime after 1940, houses along Via del Salviatino were renumbered, and the Villa Primavera (Figure 17) reassigned the number “16.” Ranieri showed us the adjacent Villa Primavera from his property and told us the house no longer belongs to his family.
After our get-together with Ranieri Frascani, his mother invited us to her home (Figure 18) and showed us the thick album with photos and articles related to the construction and opening of the Istituto di Cura Chirurgica del Salviatino in 1908-09. (Figure 19)
Having finally resolved that the Villa Primavera where my aunt and uncle had once resided was now numbered Via del Salviatino 16, I’ve tried on several occasions to contact the current owners, to no avail.
Figure 20-Dr. Irene Below, author of a book on Ms. Lucia von Jacobi, at Parco di Monte Ceceri, Firenze, October 2016
Following our visit to Fiesole in 2015, my wife and I had not anticipated returning in 2016. However, Giuditta made a surprising discovery while researching Lucia von Jacobi, the Austrian lady with whom my aunt ran the Pension Villa Primavera, and our plans changed. She learned of a professor, Dr. Irene Below (Figure 20), from Werther, Germany, who’d written a full-length book about Ms. Jacobi. Giuditta immediately contacted Dr. Below, explained her interest in Lucia, told her of my aunt and uncle, and mentioned she was in touch and assisting Dr. Franz Müller’s nephew.
Dr. Below was surprised to hear from Giuditta and learn of her interest in people Irene had studied and knew about. Dr. Below related a fascinating tale. She came to Firenze in 1964 as a student intending to write about the history of art. While researching this topic, however, she came across magazines and diaries of an unknown person who turned out to be Lucia von Jacobi, a woman with very famous friends (e.g., Heinrich and Thomas Mann, Gustaf Gründgens, etc.), and decided instead to write about her. Then, amazingly, in 1966, Dr. Below walked into an antiquarian shop in Firenze and discovered the bulk of Ms. Jacobi’s personal papers, which she soon purchased with her parents’ financial assistance. For those aware of events in Firenze in 1966, great floods along the Arno in November resulted in countless treasures being swept away and destroyed; if not for Dr. Below’s fortuitous discovery, the same would likely have happened to Ms. Jacobi’s papers.
Dr. Below explained that beginning in 1936, Lucia von Jacobi (Figure 21), together with my aunt and uncle rented the Villa Primavera, and soon after began to take in guests. Ms. Jacobi arrived in Firenze in December 1934, via Vienna, Prague, Meran, and Ascona. However, according to Dr. Below, Lucy traveled from Berlin, so my aunt and uncle may already have known Lucy in Berlin or had friends in common.
As to the relationship of my uncle to Dr. Frascani, I’ve been unable to discover how they met. However, since both were doctors, I assume they worked together professionally before my aunt and uncle moved to Fiesole. While it’s likely Dr. Müller worked in Dr. Frascani’s sanatorium, there’s some uncertainty about this as I discuss below.
Dr. Below sent Giuditta a PowerPoint presentation and scientific paper she delivered in 2009 at the “Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz,” entitled “Florenz 1935-1938: Zuflucht – Treffpunkt – Sehnsuchtsort. Lucy von Jacobi (1887-1956) und ihre Pension Villa Primavera,” translated roughly as “Florence 1935-1938: Refuge – Meeting – Longing. Lucy von Jacobi (1887-1956) and Her Pension Villa Primavera.” Seemingly, for a brief period between 1935 and 1938, German refugees, especially those interested in arts and culture, found refuge in Firenze, and gathered with friends and like-minded people at the Villa Primavera for recreation and conversation, brought together by Ms. Jacobi. Immigrants and guests mingled with locals to discuss Florentine art, Tuscan cuisine, the landscape, architecture from near and far, and more. I imagine my aunt and uncle may have been attracted to Fiesole for the same reasons other Jewish émigrés were, the intellectual milieu and attractive setting; in the case of my uncle, the ability to continue working as a doctor may also have been a factor.
Figure 22-Ms. Lucia Nadetti & Dr. Irene Below at the at the “Archivio Storico Comunale”
At Giuditta’s invitation, Dr. Below, as well as my wife and me, all gathered in Firenze in October 2016. (Figure 22) This gave us an opportunity to discuss other things Dr. Below had learned from Lucia’s papers. Regarding my aunt and uncle, there were several remarkable items found in Lucia’s belongings. Dr. Below discovered a photograph of Ms. Jacobi with my Uncle Franz seated on the same chairs as a photo I possess showing my aunt and uncle. (Figures 23 & 24) She also found a card written by my Aunt Susanne to Lucia on July 31, 1938, from Champoluc in the Aosta Valley, Italy, where my aunt and uncle had gone to rest.
Perhaps, most interesting is the second page of a letter my Aunt Susanne wrote when Lucia traveled to Palestine for three months in the latter half of 1938. This trip may have been prompted by Hitler and Mussolini’s visit to Firenze on May 9, 1938, soon after resulting in Mussolini’s embrace of the “Manifesto of the Racial Scientists” on July 14, 1938. Basically, this Manifesto declared the Italian civilization to be of Aryan origin and claimed the existence of a “pure” Italian race to which Jews did not belong. Between September 2, 1938 and November 17, 1938, Italy enacted a series of racial laws, including one forbidding foreign Jews from settling in Italy. Ms. Jacobi had just returned to Firenze, but after passage of the racial laws, she escaped in October 1938 to Switzerland, forced to leave all her possessions behind. Dr. Below surmises that Lucia’s personal papers remained in the Villa Primavera until Dr. Frascani’s descendants sold the house, likely shortly before they wound up in the antiquarian shop.
Dr. Below explained that following Ms. Jacobi’s return from Palestine, she was constantly being watched and her mail monitored. Curious as to whether the same might have applied to my uncle, I asked Dr. Below about this and she gave me the name of a German researcher, Mr. Klaus Voigt, who has examined the files at the “Archivio centrale dello Stato” (“Central Archives of the State”) in Rome on people who were monitored during Italy’s Fascist era.
Mr. Voigt explained that monitoring of people like my uncle would have been done by the local Questura, that’s to say, the police in the province of Firenze, and that he never found a file on my uncle in the archives in Rome. He further revealed all these local files, stored in the basement of the Uffizi, were destroyed in the 1966 inundations in Firenze, previously mentioned. Seemingly, the only files that survive at the Archivio centrale dello Stato in Rome were for important opponents of Fascism.
Mr. Voigt shared another interesting fact about my uncle. Dr. Franz Müller’s name was familiar to Mr. Voigt as a teacher at the Landschulheim Florenz, which was directed by two German-Jewish émigrés. During his stay in Firenze, my Uncle Franz taught a special course there for medical-technical assistants. For this reason, I’m uncertain whether he also worked in the “Sanatorio Frascani” during his years in Firenze.
I began this post with mention of the 1938 emigration log sent to me by Ms. Nadetti, indicating my aunt and uncle departed Firenze on September 16, 1938. Previously, I also mentioned that my father’s name, Otto Bruck, was recorded in the immigration log a second time. He registered on September 15, 1938 (Figure 25), for a stay of two weeks, but I surmise he left with my aunt and uncle, and, as it happens, my grandmother the next day.
Within two weeks of Hitler and Mussolini’s visit to Firenze on May 9, 1938, Jewish immigrants who’d not previously registered with the Municipio were required to do so. This included my Uncle Franz, my grandmother Else Bruck, née Berliner, and Lucia von Jacobi, but, oddly, not my Aunt Susanne. (Figure 26) Their names all appear in the registration logs in May 1938, their length of stays shown as “per sempre,” that’s to say, forever. Clearly, forever lasted only a few more months.
REFERENCE
Below, Irene and Ruth Oelze
2009 “Lucy von Jacobi: Journalistin” Mit Aufsätzen und Kritaken. Deutsche Kinemathek (Berlin). München Ed. Text + Kritik. Film & Schrift, Band 9.
