Josef Mockrauer Archives - bruckfamilyblog.com

POST 45: HOLOCAUST REMEMBRANCE: RECALLING MY PAULY ANCESTORS

REMARK: What started out as an attempt to remember relatives and friends of Dr. Josef Pauly’s branch of my family who perished in the Holocaust became more involved the deeper I got into writing. I uncovered two new third cousins, including an elderly relative who personally knew some of the victims; I discovered a diary written by one of the Holocaust victims, translated into English, describing the final wrenching months of he and his wife’s lives before they killed themselves; I found a second, lengthier account, in German, written by the daughter of another victim, describing her father’s final two years before he too committed suicide; I learned about a Polish on-line database with inhabitant information from Posen, Germany [today: Poznań, Poland] (Figure 1), the community where Dr. Pauly lived and where all nine of his children were born. And, to top it all off, I just uncovered another collection at the Leo Baeck Institute in New York/Berlin, the John H. Richter Collection, an enormous cache of materials referencing, among other ancestors, the family of one of Josef’s son-in-laws, the Neissers. None of these discoveries alone have changed the trajectory of this post, but together they were cause for distraction. That said, these recent finds allow me to tell a more complete story.

Note: In this post, I remember members of my Pauly family and their close friends who perished in the Holocaust.

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

Figure 1. 1917 map of Posen, Germany with Wilhelmstraße highlighted, street along which Dr. Josef Pauly and his family lived

Holocaust Memorial Day takes place annually on different days across the globe and marks the date on which remaining prisoners at Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi concentration camp, were liberated in 1945. This is a day for everyone to remember the millions of people murdered in the Holocaust, under Nazi Persecution, and in subsequent genocides which followed in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur. With each passing month, unhappily, I learn about more members of my extended family and their friends who perished at the hands of the National Socialists. To coincide with this day of remembrance, I want to recall and memorialize the multiple victims among the Pauly branch of my family along with a few of their close friends.

Regular readers may recollect that Post 40 post was about Elisabeth “Lisa” Pauly née Krüger, one of my Uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck’s “silent heroes,” who hid him in Berlin during WWII for periods of his 30-month survival “underground.” Most of the Pauly family members mentioned in this post were aunts, uncles, and cousins of Lisa Pauly. Briefly, let me provide more context on how this family is related to me.

Figure 2. My great-grandmother Friederike Bruck née Mockrauer (1836-1924)

Figure 3. My great-great-uncle Josef Mockrauer (1845-95), Friederike’s younger brother

In Post 44, I mentioned two siblings, my great-grandmother, Friederike Mockrauer (Figure 2), and her brother, my great-great-uncle, Josef Mockrauer (Figure 3); I was already aware of their existence but found more information on their children in the “Pinkus Family Collection” archived at the Leo Baeck Institute in New York/Berlin. Friederike and Josef had other siblings, including a sister Rosalie Mockrauer (1844-1927) (Figure 4) who married Dr. Josef Pauly (1843-1916) (Figure 5) from Posen, Germany [today: Poznań, Poland]; together they had eight daughters and one son, all of whom survived to adulthood. Ancestrally-speaking, these nine children would be my first cousins twice-removed.

Figure 4. My great-great-aunt Rosalie Pauly née Mockrauer (1844-1927), married to Dr. Josef Pauly

Figure 5. My great-great-uncle Dr. Josef Pauly (1843-1916)

Figure 6. Wilhelm Pauly (1883-1961), Josef and Rosalie Pauly’s only son

The only son from Josef and Rosalie Pauly’s union was named Wilhelm Pauly (Figure 6), and through steps I detailed in earlier posts, I was able to track down two of Wilhelm’s grandsons, Peter Pauly and Andreas “Andi” Pauly, living in Germany; Peter and Andi are my third cousins. Both have been enormously helpful in the course of my ancestral research. Not only have they provided a detailed, hand-drawn Stammbaum (family tree), developed by their father, Klaus Pauly, but they’ve scanned and made available copies of many family photographs.

Figure 7. Large Pauly family get-together, probably in the mid-1890’s, with heads of the 31 attendees circled and numbered (numbers correlate to table below)

Figure 8. My third cousin Agnes Stieda née Vogel, Ernst & Margarethe Neisser née Pauly’s granddaughter, whom I only just learned about

This included a photo of a large Pauly family get-together that likely took place in Posen, Germany, probably in the mid-1890’s, judging from the estimated age of some of the individuals pictured whose dates of birth are known to me. The partial caption that accompanied this and other photos has allowed me to put names to some of the people shown, including all nine of Josef and Rosalie Mockrauer’s children. Through a laborious process of cross-comparison with other photos, including another large Pauly family get-together for the 1901 marriage of one of Josef and Rosalie’s daughters, I’ve now been able to identify 22 of the 31 individuals captured on film in this snapshot (Figure 7); as I was writing this post, an elderly third cousin from Canada who I only just learned about, Ms. Agnes Stieda née Vogel (Figure 8), helped identify two more people. Considering the age of the image and the incomplete captioning, it’s astonishing that after almost 125 years it’s still possible to put names to faces of people who lived largely “anonymous” lives. I attach the table below with names and vital data of the people (i.e., casual readers need not concern themselves with this):

NO.	NAME	EVENT	DATE	PLACE

1	Anna Rothholz née Pauly	Birth	14 March 1871	Posen, Germany
		Death	21 June 1925	Stettin, Germany
		Marriage	20 May 1892	Berlin, Germany
2	Josef Pauly	Birth	10 August 1843	Tost, Germany
		Death	7 November 1916	Posen, Germany
		Marriage	1869
3	Paula Pincus née Pauly	Birth	26 April 1872	Posen, Germany
		Death	31 March 1922	Magdeburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany
		Marriage	16 November 1891	Berlin, Germany
4	UNKNOWN WOMAN
5	Julie Neisser née Sabersky	Birth	26 February 1841	Wöllstein, Germany
5	Julie Neisser née Sabersky	Death	11 April 1927	Berlin, Germany
6	*ERNST NEISSER*	Birth	16 May 1863	Liegnitz, Germany
		*DEATH* *(SUICIDE)*	*4 OCTOBER 1942*	*BERLIN, GERMANY*
		Marriage	5 September 1898	Stettin, Germany
7	Margarethe Neisser née Pauly	Birth	16 January 1876	Posen, Germany
		Death	10 December 1941	Berlin, Germany
		Marriage	5 September 1898	Stettin, Germany
8	Rosalie Pauly née Mockrauer	Birth	3 January 1844	Leschnitz, Germany
		Death	28 November 1927	Berlin, Germany
		Marriage	1869	Unknown
9	Rosalinde Kantorowicz née Pauly	Birth	22 January 1854	Tost, Germany
9	Rosalinde Kantorowicz née Pauly	Death	3 November 1916	Frankfurt am Main, Hessen, Germany
10	UNKNOWN MAN
11	Charlotte Mockrauer née Bruck	Birth	8 December 1865	Ratibor, Germany
		Death	10 January 1965	Stockholm, Sweden
		Marriage	18 March 1888	Ratibor, Germany
12	UNKNOWN WOMAN
13	UNKNOWN BOY
14	Therese Sandler née Pauly	Birth	21 August 1885	Posen, Germany
14	Therese Sandler née Pauly	Death	1969
15	*GERTRUD KANTOROWICZ* *“GERTRUDE PAULY (PSEUDONYM)”*	Birth	9 October 1876	Posen, Germany
15		*DEATH* *(MURDERED)*	*20 APRIL 1945*	*THERESIENSTADT, CZECHOSLOVAKIA*
16	Maria Pohlmann née Pauly	Birth	21 July 1877	Posen, Germany
		Death	Unknown
		Marriage	30 September 1901	Posen, Germany
17	*GERTRUD WACHSMANN* *NEE POLLACK*	Birth	10 July 1867	Görlitz, Saxony, Germany
		*DEATH* *(MURDERED)*	*22 OCTOBER 1942*	*THERESIENSTADT, CZECHOSLOVAKIA*
		Married	17 October 1893	Görlitz, Saxony, Germany
18	Heinrich Sabersky	Birth	July 1845	Grünberg, Germany
18	Heinrich Sabersky	Death	January 1929	Berlin, Germany
19	*HELENE GUTTENTAG* *NEE PAULY*	Birth	12 April 1873	Posen, Germany
		*DEATH* *(SUICIDE)*	*23 OCTOBER 1942*	*BERLIN, GERMANY*
		Marriage	5 February 1898	Berlin, Germany
20	*ADOLF GUTTENTAG*	Birth	4 December 1868	Breslau, Germany
		*DEATH* *(SUICIDE)*	*23 OCTOBER 1942*	*BERLIN, GERMANY*
		Marriage	5 February 1898	Berlin, Germany
21	Wilhelm Pauly	Birth	24 September 1883	Posen, Germany
21	Wilhelm Pauly	Death	1961	Unknown
22	UNKNOWN MAN
23	*ELLY LANDSBERG* *NEE MOCKRAUER*	Birth	14 August 1873	Berlin, Germany
		*DEATH* *(MURDERED)*	*15 MAY 1944*	*AUSCHWITZ, POLAND*
		Marriage	1892	Posen, Germany
24	Edith Riezler née Pauly	Birth	4 January 1880	Posen, Germany
24	Edith Riezler née Pauly	Death	1963	Unknown
25	UNKNOWN MAN
26	UNKNOWN WOMAN
27	*ELISABETH HERRNSTADT* *NEE PAULY*	Birth	2 July 1874	Posen, Germany
		*DEATH* *(MURDERED)*	*27 MAY 1943*	*THERESIENSTADT, CZECHOSLOVAKIA*
		Marriage	11 May 1895	Cunnersdorf, Germany
28	Arthur Herrnstadt	Birth	15 March 1865	Hirschberg, Germany
		Death	21 October 1912	Stettin, Germany
		Marriage	11 May 1895	Cunnersdorf, Germany
29	Adolf Wachsmann	Birth	3 January 1859	Ratibor, Germany
		Death	Unknown	Unknown
		Married	17 October 1893	Görlitz, Saxony, Germany
30	UNKNOWN MAN
31	UNKNOWN MAN

*Names italicized and in CAPS are family and friends who perished in the Holocaust. Numbers in the left-hand column correspond with the numbered, circled heads in Figure 7.

Figure 9. Mid-1890’s Pauly family get-together with Holocaust victims’ faces circled

Having identified more than half the people in the Pauly family photo, I researched their fate using family queries, ancestry.com, and Yad Vashem; I’ve learned through experience that if I can find no other information on the fate of family, I’m compelled to check the Holocaust database. While multiple of the individuals in the photo had the relative “good fortune” to have died before the Nazis came to power, I was surprised at the number of people in the photo killed by the Nazis or who took their own lives after they were told to report for deportation. (Figure 9) What was even more sobering was discovering that children or husbands of some of the people photographed similarly perished during the Holocaust. While I’m unable to show images of all the victims, it’s important to acknowledge they once existed.

Adolf and Helene Guttentag

Figure 10. Helene Guttentag née Pauly (1873-1942)

Figure 11. Dr. Adolf Guttentag (1868-1942)

Figure 12. Christoph Guttentag, Adolf and Helene Guttentag’s grandson, the second third cousin I learned about while writing this Blog post

Helene Guttentag née Pauly (1873-1942) (Figure 10) was the third oldest of Josef and Rosalie Pauly’s daughters, and married Dr. Adolf Guttentag (1868-1942) (Figure 11); they had one son, Otto Guttentag (1900-1992), who immigrated to America. In the course of writing this Blog post, I found his obituary and established contact with one of Adolf and Helene Guttentag’s grandchildren, my third cousin Christoph Guttentag (Figure 12), living in North Carolina; I learned from him about the existence of a diary that Adolf Guttentag wrote for his son in the final weeks of his life before he and Helene committed suicide on October 23, 1942 in Berlin. The diary eventually made its way to their son, who donated it to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. It is available in English on their website (i.e., Christoph’s mother did the translation). My next Blog post will be about this diary, which is unquestionably one of the saddest accounts I’ve read about Jews entrapped in Germany during WWII with no means of escaping other than to kill themselves.

Hermann Rothholz

Dr. Hermann Rothholz (1857-1940) was married to the oldest of Josef and Rosalie’s nine children, Anna (1870-1925) (Figure 13); she died in 1925, and thereby escaped the horrors of the Holocaust. Dr. Rothholz was not so fortunate, and was transported from Stettin, Germany [today: Szczecin, Poland] to the Lublin District of Poland, and died there on October 19, 1940.

Ernst Neisser

Figure 15. Margarethe Neisser née Pauly (1876-1941), who predeceased her husband, possibly of natural causes

Ernst Neisser (1863-1942) (Figures 14a-b) was born in Liegnitz, Germany [today: Legnica, Poland] in 1863 to a Protestant family of Jewish descent. He was a bacteriologist, and the nephew of Alfred Neisser who in 1879 isolated the Neisseria gonorrhoeae bacteria that causes gonorrhea. Ernst Neisser became the director of the municipal hospital in Stettin, Germany in 1895, and married Margarethe Pauly (1876-1941) (Figure 15) in Stettin on September 5, 1898. After his retirement around 1931 they moved to Berlin. He and his cousin, who was named Luise Neisser (1861-1942), committed suicide together. In Adolf Guttentag’s diary, Ernst’s cousin is referred to only as “L. Neisser”; only one Neisser with the initial “L” is listed in the Shoah database who died in Berlin, “Luise,” so I reasoned this was the cousin with whom Ernst committed suicide. And, Ms. Stieda confirmed her name.

Figure 16. A “Page of Testimony” from Yad Vashem for Ernst Neisser uncertainly identified as a widower

Margarethe Neisser’s name does not appear in Yad Vashem as a Holocaust victim, suggesting she died before Ernst killed himself. According to the large family tree I’ve referred to in previous posts, the “Schlesische Jüdische Familien” (Silesian Jewish Families), she died on December 10, 1942, two months after her husband. This death date made no sense to me. First, Yad Vashem suggests Ernst Neisser was a widower (Figure 16), and second, why would Margarethe wait two months to kill herself after her husband, unless they were divorced or separated and living apart, no evidence of which exists. I’ve explained to readers in the past that I rarely accept prima facie ancestral data from other trees unless I can track down the origin, even if the information is from a usually reliable source. I again contacted Ms. Elke Kehrmann, the tree manager, and asked where dates for Margarethe’s death come from; she explained she’d found them in two other trees, but upon re-examining those trees, Elke realized she’d accidentally recorded the death year as 1942 when it was really 1941! Once I learned this, the timing of Ernst Neisser’s death vis a vis his wife’s death made more sense. The cause of her death is unknown, but the fact remains she is not listed as a Shoah victim.

In the course of researching Ernst Neisser, I found a 34-page typed letter written by his daughter, Susan Vogel née Neisser, in 1947 to an American relative. It is entitled “Die letzten ebensjahre Vaters Prof. Ernst Neisser,” “The Last Two Years, Professor Ernst Neisser,” and describes the last years of her father’s life from 1939-1942. The letter concentrates on the suicide of Ernst and his cousin to escape deportation in 1942. Unfortunately, the document is written in German, so presently I can offer no insights on Dr. Neisser’s final years.

And, lastly, as mentioned at the outset under “Remarks,” I learned about the huge “John H. Richter Collection, 1904-1994” archived at the Leo Baeck Institute in New York/Berlin; suffice it to say, this collection includes an enormous amount of ancestral information, not only about the Neisser family, but even about my own Bruck ancestors.

Elizabeth Herrnstadt, Anna Herrnstadt, & Ilse Herrnstadt

Figure 17. Elizabeth Herrnstadt née Pauly (1874-1943)

Figure 18. Elizabeth’s husband, Arthur Herrnstadt (1865-1912), who predeceased her and avoided the horrors of the Holocaust

Elizabeth Herrnstadt née Pauly (1874-1943) (Figure 17) was the fourth of Josef and Rosalie Pauly’s daughters. She was married to Arthur Herrnstadt (1865-1912) (Figure 18), with whom she had two daughters, Anna (“Aenne”) in 1896 (Figure 19) and Ilse in 1897. (Figure 20) Arthur died in 1912, but Elizabeth, Aenne and Ilse were all murdered in 1943 in the Theresienstadt Ghetto in Czechoslovakia. Astonishingly, Aenne Herrnstadt was the godmother of Agnes Stieda, the third cousin I mentioned above.

Figure 19. Birth certificate for Anna “Aenne” Herrnstadt, the older of Arthur and Elisabeth’s two daughters, born in Cunnersdorf, Germany on the 1st March 1896

Figure 20. Birth certificate for Ilsa Herrnstadt, the younger of Arthur and Elisabeth’s two daughters, born in Cunnersdorf, Germany on the 20th of February 1897

Gertrud Kantorowicz (pseudonym “Gertrud Pauly”)

Figure 21. Gertrud Kantorowicz (1876-1945), whose pseudonym was “Gertrud Pauly,” suggesting a close affiliation with the Pauly clan

Gertrud Kantorowicz (1876-1945) (Figure 21), like all nine of Josef and Rosalie’s children, was born in Posen, Germany; her pseudonym was apparently “Gertrud Pauly,” suggesting a close relationship with the Pauly clan. Gertrud was one of the first women in Germany to obtain a PhD. in Humanities. She was in England in 1938 but inexplicably returned to Germany later that year. After the outbreak of war, she arranged a post at Skidmore College in the United States, but by then was unable to leave Germany legally; she was arrested trying to illegally cross into Switzerland, and sent to the Theresienstadt Ghetto in Czechoslovakia, where she died in April 1945, shortly before the end of WWII.

Gertrud Wachsmann

Figure 24. A death certificate for Gertrud Wachsmann (misspelt “Wachsbaum”), curiously completed on the 5th September 1955, 13 years after she was murdered in the Holocaust

Gertrud Wachsmann née Pollack (1867-1942) (Figure 22) was married to Adolf Wachsmann (Figure 23), an Apotheker (pharmacist) in Posen. The detailed Pauly Stammbaum (family tree) I’ve alluded to in multiple posts, includes some Pollacks, suggesting Gertrud was a distant cousin of the Paulys. She appears to have been deported from Breslau, Germany, first to a detention camp at Grüssau in Lower Silesia, then to the Theresienstadt Ghetto in Czechoslovakia where she perished in October 1942. (Figure 24)

Elly Landsberg

Figure 26. Charlotte Mockrauer née Bruck (1865-1965), second wife of Josef Mockrauer, whose niece she was

Elly Landsberg née Mockrauer (1873-1944) (Figure 25), was the daughter of Josef Mockrauer by his first marriage to Esther Ernestine Mockrauer née Lißner; to remind readers, Josef Mockrauer was the sister of Rosalie Pauly née Mockrauer. Josef Mockrauer’s second wife was Charlotte Mockrauer née Bruck (1865-1965) (Figure 26), my great-aunt, who was born in 1865. In a book by Elly Landsberg’s grandson, W. Dieter Bergman, entitled, “Between Two Benches,” he mentions his grandmother: “In 1891 Elly came from Berlin to the town of Posen to stay with her aunt Rosalie and with the well-known family of Dr. J. Pauly. Her widowed father had remarried a young cousin and Elly was not happy in Berlin. In Posen, however, she fitted right into the family of eight girls.” (p.11) A point of clarification. Josef Mockrauer was not in fact a widower, and his first wife Ernestine Mockrauer lived until 1934; after separating from her husband, she had an out-of-wedlock son in 1884, Georg Mockrauer, oddly given the surname of his mother’s former husband.

In 1892 in Posen, Elly married a lawyer, Adolf Landsberg (1861-1940), who came from a family of distinguished scholars and rabbis. Elly went on to become a lawyer. She lived in Naumburg Saale, Germany during the war, and was deported first to the Theresienstadt Ghetto in Czechoslovakia, then moved to Auschwitz, where she was murdered on May 15, 1944.

Figure 27. Maria Pohlmann née Pauly, born 1877, who survived WWII thanks to her “connected” husband

Figure 28. Alexander “Axel” Pohlmann (1865-1952), Maria’s husband

In response to why Maria might have survived the Holocaust when multiple members of her family did not, my cousin sent, among other things, what turned out to be an “Einwohnermeldekarte” (resident registration card) or “Einwohner-meldezettel” (resident registration form) for Maria and her husband. Having never seen one of these cards, I asked about its origin, and my cousin explained that each city historically kept these records for their residents. With recent changes in European laws, these police records must be digitized for individuals born at least 120 years ago and made available at no cost to the public. Poznan, Poland happens to be one of those jurisdictions which has automated these resident registration cards, but each city and country is moving at its own pace.

Polish databases, for me, are notoriously difficult to navigate. I had the incredibly good fortune to find detailed English instructions on how to use these digitized population records for the city of Poznań (Posen), so for any readers with ancestors born there at least 120 years ago, here is the link.

Readers may rightly wonder where some of the specific vital data included in the table above comes from, so using the digitized Posen population records, I’ll give three examples.

Figure 29. “Einwohnermeldekarte” (resident registration card) or “Einwohner-meldezettel” (resident registration form) for Maria and Alexander Pohlmann showing they got married on 30th September 1901

The resident registration card for Alexander “Axel” Pohlmann and Maria Pauly, mentioned above, records their marriage as 30^th September 1901. (Figure 29) A photo given to me by Andi Pauly of Axel and Maria’s wedding is captioned with the date 1902 (Figure 30), so the resident registration card provides an opportunity to precisely date the event.

Figure 30. Alexander “Axel” Pohlmann and Maria Pauly’s 1901 wedding including names of some guests

Three resident registration cards can be found among the Posen population records for Josef and Rosalie Pauly and their nine children; as readers may be able to discern, for at least some of the children, their date of birth and place and date of marriage are shown. (Figures 31a-c)

Figure 31a. Resident registration card 1 for Josef & Rosalie Pauly and their children providing dates of birth and place and date of marriage (only Josef and Rosalie Pauly’s names and vitals are circled)

Figure 31b. Resident registration card 2 for Josef & Rosalie Pauly children providing dates of birth and places and dates of marriage

Figure 31c. Resident registration card 3 for Josef & Rosalie Pauly children providing dates of birth and places and dates of marriage

And, finally, the resident registration form for Adolf and Gertrud Wachsmann, friends of the Pauly’s, provides Adolf’s date and place of birth and their date and place of marriage, all previously unknown facts now firmly “anchored” with reference to a historic document. (Figure 32)

Figure 32. Resident registration card for Adolf and Gertrud Wachsmann providing previously unknown vital data

In conclusion, in the absence of surviving personal papers, it is very difficult to properly commemorate victims of the Holocaust who led fulfilled lives which were abruptly terminated by the Nazis. Still, I feel a need to at least speak their names, show their faces, where possible, and acknowledge their existence using what scant evidence can be found to show they were once living beings.

REFERENCE

Bergman, W. Dieter

1995 Between Two Benches. California Publishing Co. San Francisco, CA

POST 30: FAMILY ”PILGRIMAGE” 2018

I typically interject myself into Blog posts only to relate forensic discoveries related to my family research. This post is an exception. Below readers can see images from my wife’s and my recently completed European vacation to Spain, Germany, Poland, Czech Republic and Austria. We were gone 44 days, stayed in 22 different places, flew more than 14,000 miles, drove 4,000 miles, and walked over 250 miles. The number that stands out though are the roughly 35 family, friends, and acquaintances we met or revisited along the way, a family history “pilgrimage” of sorts. These people greatly enhanced our journey, inspired us, educated us, furthered my family research, and expanded our horizons. To these fellow travelers we dedicate this Blog post.

The tone for our family history tour was set by the actual pilgrimage my wife Ann and I made along a portion of the historic route to Santiago de Compostela in Spain that earned us our “Compostela.” (Figure 1) The Compostela is the accreditation one receives by completing the pilgrimage to the Tomb of St. James in Santiago de Compostela, Spain. In our case, we obtained our accreditation by walking the last 118km, or 73 miles, of the pilgrimage route from Sarria to Santiago over five days between May 16^th and May 20^th, 2018.

Below, readers will find a gallery of portraits of family, friends and colleagues we met on our journey.

Figure 1. Ann & me celebrating our Compostela in Santiago, Spain, May 2018

Figure 2. With my distant cousin Ronny Bruck & his wife Erika. Guardamar del Segura, Spain, May 2018

Figure 3. With my cousin Ronny Bruck who is sporting a broken right shoulder. Ronny has translated many historic German documents for me. Guardamar del Segura, Spain, May 2018

Figure 4. My second cousin Margarita Vilgertshofer née Bruck with her son-in-law Daniel, daughter Susanne, and husband Erich. Daniel & Susanne dressed in typical Bavarian garb on the occasion of our visit. Fürstenfeldbruck, Germany, May 2018

Figure 5. Margarita’s brother, Antonio Bruck, another second cousin, with his wife Inge. Munich, Germany, May 2018

Figure 6. With my third cousin, Anna Rothholz. Munich, Germany, May 2018

Figure 7. With another third cousin, Andi Pauly, whose father developed a detailed family tree showing connections between our families & who collected many family photos that Andi has shared. Munich, Germany, May 2018

Figure 8. Ashok Sridharan, Indian-origin Mayor of Bonn, participating in the Feast of Corpus Christi holiday parade. Sigi Meiborg, who is writing her PhD. dissertation on Franz Mockrauer, one of my father’s first cousins, lives in Bonn. May 2018

Figure 9. Entrance to the house where Ludwig van Beethoven was born in Bonn, Germany, May 2018

Figure 10. Ann with my deceased first cousin Wolfgang Lutze’s family. His widow Gisela is seated, and her two children, Kay & Katya, are behind her. Hilden, Germany, June, 2018

Figure 11. My father’s dear friends from his days in the Free State of Danzig, Peter & Lolo Lau, with their granddaughter Sandra, her husband Kalojan, and their twin boys, Paul & Jan. Peter identified many people in my father’s pictures from his days in Tiegenhof as a dentist. Oberhausen, Germany, June 2018

Figure 12. With Dr. Irene Below, author of a book on Lucia von Jacobi, the Austrian lady with whom my dear Aunt Susanne co-managed the Villa Primavera Pension in Fiesole, Italy. Werther, Germany, June 2018

Figure 13. Standing by the grave of Josef Mockrauer, buried in the Jüdischer Friedhof in Weissensee. Josef was one of my father’s uncles, and father of Franz Mockrauer, subject of Sigi Meiborg’s PhD. Berlin, Germany, June 2018

Figure 14. Ann and me with Mr. Paul Newerla, retired lawyer & scholar on the history of Ratibor, where my father was born. Paul has taught me a lot about the history of Ratibor and been very generous with his time. Raciborz, Poland, June 2018

Figure 15. Standing with Paul Newerla by the historic statue of John of Nepomuk, once located on Neumarkt near where the Berliner Brauerei once stood, now situated in the middle of a parking lot. Raciborz, Poland, June 2018

Figure 16. Our English-speaking Polish friend, Malgosia Ploszaj, from Rybnik, Poland, near Raciborz. Malgosia is very active studying the former Jews of Rybnik, and has helped me enormously reviewing historic records at the Polish State Archives in Raciborz. Raciborz, Poland, June 2018

Figure 17. Ann with yet another of my third cousins, Kurt Polborn & his wife Irmgard. Kurt has also translated historic German documents for me & taught me a lot about German history. Landsberg am Lech, Germany, June 2018

Figure 18. Anna Rothholz’s younger brother, Walter, yet another third cousin. Schliersee, Germany, June 2018

Figure 19. Ann with my third cousin Anna Rothholz’s husband, Gunter Geiss. Schliersee, Germany, June 2018

Figure 20. Ann with my sibling second cousins, Antonio & Margarita. Schliersee, Germany, June 2018

Figure 21. With my second cousin Margarita & her husband Erich at a Rathskeller. Munich, Germany, June 2018

POST 12: “STATE ARCHIVES IN KATOWICE BRANCH IN RACIBÓRZ (RATIBOR)”

Figure 1-Entrance to the “Archiwum Państwowe w Katowicach Oddział w Raciborzu“

In the previous Blog post dealing with the Bruck’s Hotel “Prinz von Preußen,” the hotel in Ratibor owned by the Bruck family for three generations, the reader learned about the “Archiwum Państwowe w Katowicach Oddział w Raciborzu” (“State Archives in Katowice Branch in Raciborz”) where civil records of births, marriages, and deaths from the 1870’s onward are to be found. (Figure 1) I explained to the reader the genesis of this situation, namely, that the Imperial Chancellor Otto von Bismarck and the liberal nationalists in Germany saw the existence of a Church loyal to the Pope as a threat to national unity, and, for this reason, sought to bring the Church under the control of the Prussian state. This conflict with the Church was known as the Kulturkampf (“Cultural Struggle“). Among other things, this resulted in mandating that births, marriages, and deaths be recorded as civil events. Consequently, today, a researcher is compelled to show up in person to access these records at the State Archives.

Figure 2-Ms. Malgosia Ploszaj from Rybnik, Poland examining the civil records at the State Archives in Raciborz

In the previous Blog post, I explained I’d been referred to an English-speaking Polish lady, Ms. Malgosia Ploszaj, who is studying the former Jews of her hometown of Rybnik, about a half-hour from Raciborz. Prior to our visit to Raciborz in May 2014, Malgosia had already visited the State Archives there and discovered the existence of an inch-thick portfolio of administrative documents related to management of the Bruck’s Hotel from about 1912 to 1928.; these have been discussed in the previous Blog post. When my wife and I visited Raciborz in May 2014, Malgosia accompanied us to the State Archives and helped us efficiently navigate the plethora of civil documents. (Figure 2)

My father’s older sister, Susanne, was born in Ratibor in 1904, and my father, Otto, three years later in 1907. (Figure 3) Once I understood their birth documents would not be among the Jewish religious records found on Mormon Church microfilms, it became a priority to find them with the civil records at the State Archives. I knew my father’s older brother Fedor had been born in 1895 in the nearby town of Leobschütz [today: Głubczyce, Opole Voivodeship, Poland], so had no expectation of uncovering his birth certificate. With Malgosia’s assistance, we were very quickly able to locate the birth records of both my father and my aunt. (Figure 4)

Figure 3-My Aunt Susanne, my father Otto and my Uncle Fedor as children in Ratibor

Figure 4-Birth Register (“Urodzenia”) for the period 1874-1902 found at the State Archives in Raciborz

In former times, it was quite common for parents to have many children, so I often wondered why nine years (1895 to 1904) had transpired before my grandparents had a second child. This question was promptly answered by a careful examination of the birth certificates for these years; it turns out my grandparents indeed had a second child in this intervening period, a son by the name of Walter Bruck, who was born in August 1900 but died shortly thereafter in April 1901. The existence of another older brother was never mentioned by my father when I was growing up. As to the Birth Certificate for my Uncle Fedor born in 1895, I did eventually locate it in the Eastern Prussian Provinces database: Östliche preußische Provinzen, Polen, Personenstandsregister 1874-1945 (Eastern Prussian Provinces, Germany [Poland], Selected Civil Vitals, 1874-1945).

Figure 5-My great-aunt Elsbeth Bruck, right, with her older brother Wilhelm “Willy” Bruck as children in Ratibor

I found several other original family documents at the Polish State Archives in Raciborz that ultimately provided context for artifacts in my possession, and also pointed me to other towns and countries to find additional historic family records. At the State Archives in Raciborz, I also found the Birth Certificate for my great-aunt, Elsbeth Bruck. (Figure 5) Previously, I’d located the birth record for Elsbeth’s seven older siblings, born to my great-grandparents Fedor Bruck and Friederike Bruck, nee Mockrauer, on the Jewish microfilm records from Ratibor, but was puzzled as to why I’d never found hers. When I eventually learned that Elsbeth was born in the midst of the Kulturkampf, it became obvious her record would be with the civil documents, which is where I ultimately found it and where I also discovered her given name was not Elsbeth but “Elisabeth.”

Figure 6-My grandparents, Felix “Lixel” Bruck and Else Bruck, nee Berliner, on their wedding day, February 11, 1894

A particularly interesting document I found was the marriage certificate for my grandparents (Page 1 & Page 2), Felix Bruck and Else Bruck, nee Berliner, dated February 11, 1894; prior to the discovery of this certificate, I didn’t know when my grandparents got married although I have photos of them on their wedding day. (Figure 6) This document was interesting principally because it provided context for an “erinnerung,” or remembrance, I’d found among my father’s papers. The name on the cover page of this remembrance, written in difficult-to-decipher Gothic font, said “Willy Bruck,” and was dated “February 11, 1894.” I incorrectly assumed it related to a ceremony or rite in honor of a relative who’d died on this date; unfortunately, I could think of no relative by this name who’d died on this day. After a German cousin recently examined this remembrance, all became clear. Felix’s younger brother was Wilhelm or “Willy” Bruck, and the remembrance I thought was a death announcement was actually an ode or poem Willy had written on the occasion of his brother’s marriage, “in brotherly love.” (Figure 7) While I never knew my grandfather, and my father only spoke sparingly of him when I was growing up, from this remembrance I also learned Felix’s nickname was “Lixel.”

Figure 7-Cover of remembrance poem written by Wilhelm “Willy” Bruck for his brother Felix’s wedding “in brotherly love”

Figure 8-Wilhelm “Willy” Bruck standing next to his velocipede in 1889 in Ratibor, possibly the same bike his brother once fell off of

In the poem Willy Bruck wrote in honor of his brother Felix’s marriage, he teased his brother about a few incidents that occurred to him as a young lad, such as the time he threw a stone through an expensive window and when he fell off his velocipede. Coincidentally, among the family pictures is one of Willy Bruck himself standing next to his own velocipede, perhaps a hand-me-down from his older brother! (Figure 8)

In addition to the marriage certificate I found for Felix Bruck, I also located the marriage certificates for two of his younger sisters, Charlotte Mockrauer, nee Bruck (1865-1965) (Page 1 & Page 2), and Hedwig Loewenstein, nee Bruck (1870-1949) (Page 1 & Page 2). These historic documents are of interest primarily because they eventually helped me unravel the complete family tree for these branches of my family, and, in turn, lead to some compelling discoveries. In time, I will relate to the reader these tales which are rather involved and span multiple countries.