POST 122: HERTA BRAUER, THE FAMILY CONNECTION TO THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC’S NOTORIOUS DICTATOR, RAFAEL TRUJILLO

 

Note: In this lengthy post, I discuss one of my Jewish relatives by marriage who along with her family wound up in the Dominican Republic during WWII. I explore the cultural and political context in which Herta Brauer worked and her role in introducing ballet to the country under the sponsorship of Flor de Oro Trujillo, the daughter of the country’s longtime dictator Rafael Trujillo.

 

Related Posts:

POST 34: MARGARETH BERLINER, WRAITH OR BEING

POST 34, POSTSCRIPT: MARGARETH BERLINER, WRAITH OR BEING? DEATH IN THERESIENSTADT

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

It is generally accepted there are seven continents in the world, from largest to smallest, Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, Europe, and Australia. Probably not unlike many readers, I can trace ancestors or relatives connected to all these continents apart from Antarctica. Within North America, I occasionally learn about family that passed through one of the Caribbean islands, usually Cuba.  This post dwells on one Jewish family member, Herta Brauer, who lived with her family in the Dominican Republic for several years. As a result of a relationship she mysteriously established with Flor de Oro Trujillo (Figure 1), one of the daughters of the Dominican Republic’s longtime notorious and brutal dictator, Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina, Herta was instrumental in the introduction of ballet into the country. In this post I discuss Herta Brauer’s time in the Dominican Republic and the significance of her contribution to Dominican culture.

 

Figure 1. Flor de Oro Trujillo (1915-1978), first-born daughter of the Dominican Republic’s longtime dictator Rafael Trujillo (1891-1961)

 

For the benefit of new subscribers as well as longtime followers, let me briefly review how I learned about Herta Brauer, a relative by marriage whom I introduced to readers in Post 34. Several years ago while in Germany visiting the son of my deceased first cousin, I was perusing my uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck’s photographs that had been inherited by this cousin. One picture immediately caught my attention. On the reverse was written in German what translates as, “Three generations: Grete-Herta-Till & Neubabelsberg 1933”; Neubabelsberg is located near Spandau, on the western outskirts of Berlin. Then, in what was unmistakably my uncle’s shaky handwriting he had added: “Aunt Grete Brauer (mother’s sister with her daughter-in-law and grandson).” (Figures 2a-b) I had an epiphany at this moment when I realized that my grandmother’s sister, Margareth Auguste Berliner, whose birth record I had previously discovered on LDS Microfilm Number 1184449 (Figure 3), had survived to adulthood; this was an “aha” moment because my father had never mentioned the existence of his maternal aunt, so I assumed after first learning about her that she had died at birth or in infancy. As I explained in Post 34, I would eventually learn that my great-aunt Margareth, Grete for short, had been murdered in Theresienstadt in 1942.

 

Figure 2a. Greta Brauer, her daughter-in-law Herta Brauer, and her grandson Till Brauer, Neubabelsberg, Germany, 1933

 

Figure 2b. Captions on the back of photo with Grete Brauer, Herta Brauer, and Till Brauer, Neubabelsberg, Germany, 1933

 

Figure 3. Margareth Auguste Berliner’s birth record (March 19, 1872) (LDS Microfiche 1184449, p. 101)

I first came across the surname “Brauer” when examining the personal papers of my paternal great-aunts Franziska Bruck and Elsbeth Bruck that are archived at Berlin’s Stadtmuseum, coincidentally also in Spandau. Here, I discovered multiple letters written to my great-aunt Elsbeth in East Berlin from Calvia, Mallorca by Hanns & Herta Brauer between 1965 and 1967. (Figure 4) The letterhead on some letters read “Dr. E. H. Brauer,” and they were variously signed “Ernst,” “Hanns,” and “Ernst & Herta.”  Elsbeth’s archived materials also include photos the Brauer family sent her, though none of Grete Brauer. (Figures 5-6) Until I found the previously mentioned photo of Grete, I had assumed the Brauers were friends of my great-aunt, not closely related family.

 

Figure 4. Letter from Herta & Ernst Brauer dated the 9th of November 1967 sent from Calvia, Mallorca to my great-aunt Elsbeth Bruck in East Berlin

 

Figure 5. Photo of Ernst Hanns Brauer in Calvia, Mallorca dated September 1967

 

Figure 6. Photo of Ernst Hanns Brauer standing next to the noted author Robert Graves (1895-1985) in Deià, Mallorca in April 1967

                                 

Margarethe Berliner (1872-1942) married a man named Siegfried Brauer (1859-1926) in August 1891. (Figure 7) They had two sons, Kurt Brauer (born on July 7, 1893) and Ernst Han(n)s Brauer (born August 9, 1902) (Figure 8) and at least one daughter, Hildegard Brauer (born April 8, 1892), who was also murdered in the Holocaust; possibly, a Thea Brauer born in 1911 who perished in 1919 and who was buried in the Jewish Cemetery in Ratibor [today: Racibórz, Poland] may have been another of their daughters. Kurt Brauer died in 1920 and was also interred in the Jewish Cemetery in Ratibor, but Ernst Hanns Brauer (1902-1971) married Herta Brauer née Stadach (1904-1983) in 1932. (Figures 9a-c) Herta had a daughter by a previous marriage while Ernst and Herta had two sons. The vital statistics for Margarethe and Siegfried Brauer and select descendants and close family are included in a table at the end of this post.

 

Figure 7. Marriage announcement for Siegfried Brauer and my maternal great-aunt Margarethe Brauer née Berliner showing they married in Cosel O.S. (Oberschlesien) in August 1891

 

Figure 8. Birth certificate for Siegfried & Grete Brauer’s son, Ernst Han(n)s Brauer, showing he was born in Cosel, Germany [today: Koźle, Poland] on August 9, 1902
Figure 9a. Cover page for Ernst Hanns Brauer and Margareth Muenchow née Stadach (aka Herta Brauer) 1932 marriage certificate

 

Figure 9b. Page 1 of Ernst Hanns Brauer and Margareth Muenchow née Stadach (aka Herta Brauer) 1932 marriage certificate
Figure 9c. Page 2 of Ernst Hanns Brauer and Margareth Muenchow née Stadach (aka Herta Brauer) 1932 marriage certificate

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As I explained to readers in Post 34, after learning of my maternal great-aunt’s existence, I quickly turned to ancestry.com. There, I found a surprising number of documents and information on the Brauer family which began to fill in some temporal gaps. With information recently acquired, I am better able to partially understand the Brauer family’s movements from 1941 onwards although their length of residence during some periods is still unclear. 

One document I found for Herta Brauer was her Social Security Death Index which indicated that she died in August 1983 (Figure 10), and that her last supposed place of residence was in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Aware of a Puerto Rico connection, I Googled the Brauer surname and Puerto Rico, and found a promising lead in the form of a “Till Carl Brauer Mongil”; as an aside in most Spanish-speaking countries offspring carry two surnames, that of their father and mother, thus “Brauer” and “Mongil.” Since Till Brauer once ran a fishing business in Puerto Rico (Figure 11), I was easily able to contact him via email and confirm that he was indeed related to Ernst and Herta Brauer; he was their grandson. We exchanged information and photos and have continued to stay in contact.

 

Figure 10. Herta Brauer’s Social Security Death Index indicating she died in San Juan, Puerto Rico in August 1983

 

Figure 11. Till Carl Brauer Mongil, my third cousin once removed

 

Fast forward. The source for an increasing number of my Blog stories is inspired by readers who contact me through Webmail. Typically, I’m asked for or offered information about the people whom I write about, or people ask whether we are related; often readers are curious as to the source of my information.

I was recently contacted by a Mr. Francisco Pou (Figure 12) from the Dominican Republic who is working on a documentary about the history of classical ballet in his country. It turns out that Herta Brauer is the person who introduced ballet into the Dominican Republic. Since Francis stumbled upon mention of her in my Blog, he was curious whether I could provide additional background information about Herta since she disappeared from the country’s records “almost mysteriously,” according to Francis. I sent him some ancestry.com documents, as well as copies of the letters written by Ernst and Herta Brauer from Calvia, Mallorca to my great-aunt Elsbeth Bruck in East Berlin in the mid-1960’s; I also sent Francis a few family photos obtained either from Till Brauer or found among my great-aunt Elsbeth’s personal papers archived at the Stadtmuseum in Spandau. However, the tale that Francis related is much more compelling, the telling of which will allow me to share lesser-known history about the Dominican Republic’s role during WWII offering to save Jewish refugees.

 

Figure 12. Francisco Pou, documentarian from the Dominican Republic, chronicling the history of classical ballet in his country, including the role that Herta Brauer played

 

Let me provide some context for the Dominican Republic’s role in offering Jews safe haven during WWII and the direct impact this had on Herta Brauer and her family.

In July 1938, delegates from 32 countries met in Evian, France to try and address the issue of German-Jewish refugees caused by the Nazis’ aim to make Germany judenrein (cleansed of Jews). This international conference was in response to the mounting political pressure on the United States and other nations. Most Jews from Germany and elsewhere wanted to go to the United States but were unable to obtain visas needed to enter. Even though the violent pogroms in Germany of November 1938 were widely reported on in the news, Americans were unwilling to welcome Jewish refugees; amid the Great Depression, Americans feared these displaced persons would compete with them for jobs and social programs set up to help them.

Rather than sending our Secretary of State to the Evian Conference, President Roosevelt instead selected a businessman and close friend of his to attend, Myron C. Taylor. During the nine-day meeting, while nation after nation expressed sympathy for the plight of the Jews, most nations including the United States refused to accept any refugees. One notable exception to this position of refusing to allow more Jewish refugees was the tiny nation of the Dominican Republic. Astonishingly, they offered to accept up to 100,000 refugees.

The Dominican Republic Settlement Association Inc. (DORSA) acquired 22,230 acres on the north coast of the country in a place called Sosúa from the Dominican President Rafael Trujillo; the American Jewish Joint Agricultural Corp. (Agro-Joint) heavily subsidized the project. The agreement ultimately negotiated and signed by DORSA and the Dominican Republic assured the immigrants freedom of religion and eased immigration by offering tax and customs exemptions.

While the Dominican Republic had agreed to accept up to 100,000 Jewish refugees, it is estimated that only about 5,000 visas were issued and that barely 700 Jews made it there. The reality is that while the visas would have allowed the recipients to escape the Holocaust, most of the refugees receiving them never reached the Dominican Republic since transatlantic travel proved to be extremely difficult, especially for Jews from occupied countries.

When WWII started, there were only about 40 Jews in the Dominican Republic. The first immigrants arrived in the middle of 1940, and it is estimated that by 1942 the Jewish population was 472. Jews continued to arrive in the Dominican Republic after WWII ended so that by 1947, they numbered 705. The project to bring Jews to Sosúa was intended to promote agricultural development along the Dominican Republic’s northern coast though most refugees were not inclined towards agriculture and preferred to work as businessmen and artisans. Each refugee family was given 82 acres of land, 10 cows plus one additional cow per child, and a $10,000 loan at one percent interest. The number of Jews in the Dominican Republic gradually continued to decline in the decades after WWII. By the 1980’s, most of the Jewish refugees in Sosúa had sold their land to tourist developers and left the country to pursue economic opportunities elsewhere. According to the estimates of Hebrew University demographer Sergio Della Pergola’s “World Jewish Population, 2016,” the Dominican Republic is home to between 100 and 300 Jews. 

The motivation for Jews to escape to the Dominican Republic during WWII is obvious but readers may wonder what motivated President Trujillo to offer to accept up to 100,000 Jewish refugees. As previously stated, Trujillo hoped that these refugees could contribute to the country’s agriculture and consequently donated land in Sosúa in anticipation of a Jewish agricultural settlement. It is also believed that he supported letting Jewish refugees into the country as part of his strategy to encourage European rather than Haitian immigration. Trujillo was reputedly extremely racist and wanted Jewish immigrants as a way of “whitening” the Dominican Republic. Additionally, Trujillo personally profited by pocketing the “processing fees” that immigrants (or their sponsors) had to pay to be allowed in.

Trujillo used this same approach with refugees from the Spanish Civil War and Japanese migrants. In the case of the latter, the Dominican Republic signed a treaty with Japan in 1956. The Japanese motivation was to use emigration policy to improve the country’s international image following WWII by having the Japanese contribute to the development of foreign countries. Trujillo, dictator of the Dominican Republic from 1930 until his assassination in 1961, by contrast sought to use Japanese migrants as a buffer against black Haitian squatters by settling them along the country’s western border with Haiti.

There is a tragic side note to Trujillo’s decision to accept Jewish refugees during WWII. In 1937, the border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic, who share the island of Hispaniola, was the scene of a mass slaughter in which historians estimate between 9,000 and 20,000 Haitians were killed in the Dominican Republic. It earned the name the “Parsley Massacre” because Dominican soldiers carried a sprig of parsley. When the soldiers encountered people suspected of being Haitian, they would ask them to pronounce the Spanish word for it, “perejil.” Haitians whose first language was Haitian Creole found it difficult to say it correctly, which cost many of them their lives.

In any case, the U.S. administration regarded Trujillo as a staunch ally but after the scale of the massacre emerged, President Roosevelt’s administration made the Dominican Republic pay reparations to the victims’ families, money which ultimately never reached them. Regardless, it is believed that by agreeing to take in Jewish refugees Trujillo was trying to get back into the good graces of the United States.

Let me turn now to discussing Herta Brauer and her family’s arrival in the Dominican Republic, and the specific role she played there insofar as it is known. Shortly after Francis Pou contacted me, he sent me copies of the Dominican Republic Immigration Bureau’s “Application for residence permit in accordance with law no. 95” for Herta and her family. (Figures 13-16) It shows they arrived at Ciudad Trujillo (https://www.encyclopedia.com/…/ciudad-trujillo), as Santo Domingo was known from January 1936 until November 1961, on the 25th of March 1941. Herta was accompanied by her husband Ernst, their son Till Brauer, and Herta’s daughter by her first marriage, Yutta Maria Muenchow.

 

Figure 13. The Dominican Republic Immigration Bureau’s “Application for residence permit” for Herta Brauer showing she arrived there on the 25th of April 1941

 

122-Figure 14. The Dominican Republic Immigration Bureau’s “Application for residence permit” for Ernst Hanns Brauer showing he arrived there on the 25th of April 1941

 

Figure 15. The Dominican Republic Immigration Bureau’s “Application for residence permit” for Yutta Maria Muenchow, Herta’s daughter by her first marriage, showing she arrived there on the 25th of April 1941

 

Figure 16. The Dominican Republic Immigration Bureau’s “Application for residence permit” for Till Brauer showing he arrived there on the 25th of April 1941

A ”List or Manifest of Alien Passengers for the United States” shows the family left Lisbon, Portugal on the 22nd of February 1941 aboard the ship the “S.S. Marques de Comillas” (Figure 17); this same form shows their last previous address was in Rome, Italy. The “Record of Aliens Held for Special Inquiry” form shows the family arrived in New York City on the 12th of March 1941 (Figure 18), so a little less than three weeks later. A handwritten note on this form indicates they “Transshipped to Santo Domingo” on the 20th of March 1941 aboard the “S.S. Cosmo.” Another “List or Manifest of Alien Passengers for the United States” confirms the family sailed from New York City on the 20th of March 1941. (Figure 19) The family appears to have briefly made landfall in San Juan, Puerto Rico on the 25th of March before sailing onto Santo Domingo the same day; the nautical distance between these two spots is 252 miles. Prior to receiving the Brauer’s Dominican immigration forms from Francis, I had mistakenly assumed the family had ridden out the war in Puerto Rico. It’s now clear to me that by the 25th of March 1941, Herta and her family were in fact in the Dominican Republic.

 

Figure 17. ”List or Manifest of Alien Passengers for the United States” showing the Brauers left Lisbon, Portugal on the 22nd of February 1941; form shows they previously lived in Rome

 

Figure 18. “Record of Aliens Held for Special Inquiry” form showing the Brauers arrived in New York City on the 12th of March 1941; notation shows they “Transshipped to Santo Domingo” on the 20th of March 1941 aboard the “S.S. Cosmo”

 

Figure 19. “List or Manifest of Alien Passengers for the United States” confirming the Brauers sailed from New York City on the 20th of March 1941

 

The Dominican immigration forms sent to me by Francis Pou show the family resided at “Calle Socorro Sanchez #9” in Ciudad Trujillo upon their arrival. However, according to Francis, the family did not stay in Ciudad Trujillo, nor did they relocate to the Jewish community of Sosúa. Instead, they moved to the town of Jarabacoa, located in the Central Mountain Range of the Dominican Republic at an elevation of more than 1700 feet; Francis characterizes this as the “Switzerland of the Caribbean.” (Figures 20-21) Francis believes that Herta and her family moved to this mountain town because it was in a safe and remote place, and only later relocated to Ciudad Trujillo when they realized the Dominicans were no threat to them as Jews and because her work required her to be in a larger city.

 

Figure 20. The picturesque setting of Jarabacoa in the Dominican Republic’s Central Range

 

Figure 21. The town of Jarabacoa in the Dominican Republic’s Central Range where the Brauers lived for a year after arriving

 

The name Jarabacoa comes from Taino indigenous people who spoke a dialect of the Arawakan language group. Notably, the Lucayan branch of the Taíno were the first New World peoples encountered by Christopher Columbus, in the Bahama Archipelago on October 12, 1492.

I recently stumbled on a 2015 paper by Jorge Mendoza entitled “Danza en República Dominicana: raíces, tradición y vanguardia,” translated as “Dance in the Dominican Republic: roots, tradition and avant-garde.” This paper includes numerous references to Herta Brauer and explains the political and cultural context in which she worked; it rounds out my understanding of Herta’s involvement in the Dominican Republic. I will highlight some of the author’s findings.

The dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina was sworn in as head of the Dominican Republic on the 16th of August 1930. A devastating cyclone hit the island 18 days later that is estimated to have killed between 2,000 and 8,000 people, a significant percentage of the capital’s 50,000 inhabitants. Trujillo’s emergence and the rapid reconstruction he instigated in the wake of the devastating cyclone resulted in the emergence of lower-class workers and peasants and middle- and upper-class civil servants, intellectuals, and businessmen who supported the dictatorship. Herta Brauer arrived in the country amid Trujillo’s 31 years in office when the life of Dominicans revolved around his image and that of his family.

Jorge Mendoza uncovered information on Herta in an article published on the 9th of October 1944 in the defunct Dominican newspaper “La Nación” entitled “Nace el ballet en República Dominicana,” “Ballet is born in the Dominican Republic.”; the article was based on an interview conducted with her by a journalist identified only by the initials “R.M.A.” Curiously, the news story noted that Herta and Dr. Ernst Hanns Brauer apparently received a special dispensation from Pope Pius XI himself to marry while they were living in Rome. This notation is a bit puzzling since Herta and Ernst are known to have gotten married in Berlin on the 12th of March 1932 and self-identified as Jewish. Could this marriage exemption mean they had converted to Catholicism after they arrived in Italy whenever that was? If I’m interpreting things correctly, it was around the same time Pope Pius XI granted the Brauers a special marriage release that they decided to emigrate to the Dominican Republic. Whether the Pope interceded on their behalf to facilitate this or whether they obtained visas under the terms negotiated at the Evian Conference is unknown.

The idea of creating a dance school came to the Brauers while they were living in Jarabacoa. According to the journalist R.M.A., the Brauers “. . .became intoxicated with the light and color of the tropics,” and listening to the typical merengue imbued them with the rhythmic sense of “the simple people of the mountain.” The Brauers lived for a year in Jarabacoa before relocating to a house in Ciudad Trujillo located a block away from the ocean that still stands today.

While Herta Brauer was not alone in teaching ballet in Ciudad Trujillo, through circumstances that are unknown, she was fortunate to meet and obtain the financial support of Flor de Oro Trujillo, Rafael Trujillo’s first-born daughter. According to Francis Pou, Flor de Oro Trujillo was very different than the dictator’s other children. She was not a criminal like her siblings and had a very troubled relationship with her father. She was very liberal, well-educated, and a socialite in Europe. She was married an astonishing nine times and spent the last twelve years of her life in New York, dying there in 1978 reliant on friends for financial support; she’d clearly been disinherited by her family.

Soon after Herta relocated to Ciudad Trujillo she started offering ballet classes in the living room of her house probably beginning in early 1943. (Figure 22) Flor de Oro covered the scholarship expenses for Herta’s pupils, while other donors apparently covered the cost for ballet slippers, costumes, and tights for regular practices. As in other countries, ballet in the Dominican Republic was born as a pastime of the middle and upper classes. Training sessions are known to have lasted between six and seven hours a day.

Figure 22. A photo sent to me by Francis Pou believed to be Herta Brauer surrounded by her ballet students

 

It’s hard to imagine that Herta was unaware that she had escaped one totalitarian regime only to be taken in by another. Perhaps her ambition forced her to overlook this uncomfortable truth because, clearly, she could not have opened her academy without the help of Flor de Oro Trujillo. When it did eventually open it was named after her benefactor. This could have been out of gratitude or because she was compelled to identify herself with and contribute to the general atmosphere which paid constant homage to Generalissimo Trujillo.

During Trujillo’s rule, art and culture became a means of propaganda and a distraction from the regime’s brutal excesses. Trujillo imposed merengue as the national dance in Dominican society, and in his honor, merengues were written extolling his virtues. Herta Brauer was the first dance teacher to bring merengue to ballet. Taking the basic steps of this popular dance, she combined them with the techniques of ballet to favorable review. In the first merengue ballet she choreographed, Herta named the musical piece “El general llegó,” “The General Arrived,” a clear reference to Trujillo. There can be little doubt that Herta had taken note of the price she had to pay for the privileges she was granted by the Trujillo regime, which included being “untouchable” by any competitors wishing to diminish her cultural influence.

Francis believes that Flor de Oro’s cultured lifestyle may have drawn her to Herta and that introducing her father to ballet may have given Flor an entrée into his government.

Herta Brauer will be prominently featured in the documentary Francis is currently developing. She is important because she introduced ballet into the Dominican Republic, because she was the first person to blend Dominican folk music with ballet, and because she created choreographies for public events where Trujillo was in attendance. Significantly, coming from a country of a little more than ten million people, Herta trained a generation of accomplished ballet dancers that continue to be over-represented in some of the world’s major ballet companies, such as Martha Graham, the Washington Ballet, etc.

Regardless, in around 1947 Herta decided to take leave of the Dominican Republic leaving everything in the hands of a Hungarian dance teacher, a Magda Corbett, another Jew. (Figure 23) The reasons for Herta’s departure are not entirely clear, although a negative review may have angered her, or she may simply have accepted a better offer from the University of Puerto Rico.

Figure 23. The Dominican Republic Immigration Bureau’s “Application for residence permit” for Magdalene E. Starr de Corbett, the Hungarian Jewish teacher who replaced Herta Brauer after she left for Puerto Rico in around 1947; the form shows that Magda Corbett arrived in the Dominican Republic on the 16th of December 1947

 

A “Passenger Manifest” for Pan American Airways shows that Ernst Brauer arrived in San Juan, Puerto Rico alone from the Dominican Republic on the 7th of October 1947 (Figure 24), roughly coinciding with the time the Brauers are believed to have left the country. As with historic documents that provide temporal information, the passenger manifest includes another interesting fact. It shows that at the time that Ernst Brauer departed the Dominican Republic he was still deemed to be “Stateless” and had only ever been issued a Dominican residence permit; he never received Dominican citizenship even though he had lived there for almost seven years. It may be that only Ernst and Herta’s youngest son, Oliver Brauer (Figure 25), born in the Dominican Republic on the 24th of January 1942 ever obtained Dominican citizenship. (Figure 26) What is known about Oliver is that he along with the rest of the Brauers became American citizens, likely in Puerto Rico. To avoid the draft during the Vietnam War Oliver left for Germany, where he is believed to have died.

 

Figure 24. A Passenger Manifest for Pan American Airways showing that Ernst H. Brauer arrived in San Juan, Puerto Rico from the Dominican Republic on the 7th of October 1947

 

Figure 25. Undated photo of Till Brauer (right) with his younger brother Oliver Brauer, born in the Dominican Republic in 1942

 

Figure 26. Herta Brauer’s 1949 USA “Petition for Naturalization” showing that Oliver Brauer, her youngest son with Ernst Brauer, was born in the Dominican Republic on the 24th of January 1942

 

It’s unclear how long Herta and Ernst Brauer resided in Puerto Rico. However, an undated newspaper article about Ernst and Herta Brauer’s continued balletic work in Mallorca, Spain after their arrival there unequivocally states they remained in Puerto Rico for eight years. (Figure 27) Assuming they arrived there from the Dominican Republic in 1947, that would mean they stayed until around 1955; this would also coincide with their arrival in Mallorca, Spain. The “Report of the Death of an American Citizen” was completed for Ernst showing he died on the 19th of May 1971 in Calvia, Mallorca, where he is interred. (Figure 28) As previously mentioned, Herta’s Social Security Death Index indicates she died in August 1983 and claims her address at the time was in San Juan, Puerto Rico. (see Figure 10) For this reason, I erroneously assumed she had left Mallorca and rejoined her children in Puerto Rico following her husband’s death. Till Brauer, however, confirms that Herta Brauer died in Mallorca and is buried in the same cemetery alongside Ernst Brauer.

 

Figure 27. Undated newspaper article discussing Herta & Ernst Brauer’s work with the Palma de Mallorca’s ballet company

 

Figure 28. U.S. State Department Form for “Report of Death of An American Citizen,” showing Ernst Hanns Brauer died on May 19, 1971, in Mallorca

 

In reading the undated news article discussing Herta and Ernst’s continuing work in Mallorca, it’s clear that Herta taught dance while her husband oversaw the business aspects of running the dance studio. Why Ernst and Herta came to Mallorca is another unanswered question, but Francis directed me to a 1954 video on YouTube showing the close relationship that Trujillo had with Generalissimo Francisco Franco of Spain. Is it possible that Flor de Oro Trujillo recommended Ernst and Herta to Franco? Like in the Dominican Republic, according to Francis, it appears that their school in Mallorca was also subsidized and that free ballet lessons were offered. Regardless, it seems that Ernst and Herta could not avoid living in yet a third totalitarian country.

 

 

REFERENCES

ANU Museum of the Jewish People. “The Jewish Community of the Dominican Republic.” https://dbs.anumuseum.org.il/skn/en/c6/e250705/Place/Dominican_Republic

Davis, Nick (2012, October 13). The massacre that marked Haiti-Dominican Republic ties. BBC.

“History of the Jews in the Dominican Republic.” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Jews_in_the_Dominican_Republic

“Japanese Settlement in the Dominican Republic.” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_settlement_in_the_Dominican_Republic

Johnson, Rudy (1978, February 17). Flor de Oro Trujillo, Whose Father Led Dominican Republic. New York Times, Section D, Page 12.

Mendoza, Jorge (2015, January-December). Danza en República Dominicana: raíces, tradición y vanguardia (Dance in the Dominican Republic: roots, tradition and avant-garde). Istimica, pp. 99-130. 

Museum of Jewish Heritage A Living Memorial to the Holocaust. “Sosúa: A Refuge for Jews in the Dominican Republic (Sosúa: Un Refugio de Judíos en la República Dominicana),” https://mjhnyc.org/exhibitions/sosua-refuge-jews-dominican-republic-sosua-un-refugio-de-judios-en-la-republica-dominicana/

R.M.A. (1944, October 9). Nace el ballet en República Dominicana (Ballet is born in the Dominican Republic). La Nación. 

“The Jews of the Dominican Republic.” YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=ysm2cqydwwE

“Trujillo Y Franco 1954.” YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5JO_f-OZsg

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. “The Evian Conference,” https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/the-evian-conference

World Jewish Congress. “Dominican Republic.” https://www.worldjewishcongress.org/en/about/communities/DO

 

 

 

VITAL STATISTICS OF MARGARETH BRAUER NÉE BERLINER & SELECT FAMILY & DESCENDANTS

 

NAME EVENT DATE PLACE SOURCE
         
Auguste Margareth Berliner (self) Birth 19 March 1872 Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland] Margareth Auguste Berliner’s birth record (LDS Microfiche 1184449, p. 101); 1891 marriage certificate
Marriage 14 July 1891 Cosel, Germany [today: Koźle, Poland] 1891 marriage certificate
Death 25 November 1942 Theresienstadt Ghetto [today: Terezín, Czech Republic] Memorial Book (Victims of the Persecution of Jews under National Socialist Tyranny in Germany, 1933-1945)
Siegfried Brauer (husband) Birth 29 November 1858 Biskupitz/Hindenburg Oberschlesien (Upper Silesia), Germany [today: Biskupice (Zabrze), Poland] 1891 marriage certificate
Marriage 14 July 1891 Cosel, Germany [today: Koźle, Poland] 1891 marriage certificate
Death 5 February 1926 Cosel, Germany [today: Koźle, Poland] 1926 death certificate
Ernst Hanns Brauer (son) Birth 9 August 1902 Cosel, Germany [today: Koźle, Poland] 1902 birth certificate
Marriage (to Herta Münchow née Stadach) 12 March 1932 Wilmersdorf, Berlin, Germany 1932 marriage certificate
Death 19 May 1971 Calviá, Mallorca, Spain Department of State form “Report of the Death of an American Citizen”
Herta Margarete Leonore Stadach (Herta Brauer) (daughter-in-law) Birth 4 February 1904 Neumünster, Germany 1925 marriage certificate; 1950 “Declaration of Intention” form to become a U.S. citizen
Marriage (to Karl Ferdinand Hermann Münchow) 3 October 1925 Kolberg, Germany [Kołobrzeg, Poland] 1925 marriage certificate
Marriage (to Ernst Hanns Brauer) 12 March 1932 Wilmersdorf, Berlin, Germany 1932 marriage certificate
Naturalization 16 May 1955 San Juan, Puerto Rico U.S.A. “Petition for Naturalization”
Death March 1983 Mallorca, Spain Till Brauer (oral communication)
Yutta Maria Münchow (daughter of Herta Brauer by her first husband) Birth 30 August 1926 Koslin, Germany [today: Koszalin, Poland] Herta Brauer’s U.S.A. “Petition for Naturalization”
Death 26 October 1986 San Juan, Puerto Rico Puerto Rico Death Certificate
Till Brauer (grandson) Birth 7 November 1932 Berlin, Germany Herta Brauer’s U.S.A. “Petition for Naturalization”
Death 11 December 2001   Till Brauer (oral communication): Information attached to photo with his brother Oliver found on ancestry.com
Oliver Domingo Frederic Brauer (grandson) Birth 24 January 1942 Ciudad Trujillo, Dominican Republic [today: Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic U.S.A. “Petition for Naturalization”
Death   Germany Till Carl Brauer Mongil (oral communication)

 

POST 112: WOLFRAM E. VON PANNWITZ’S BEQUEST TO THE HEBREW IMMIGRANT AID SOCIETY

 

Note: Inspired by a reader of my Blog, this post builds on a previous one about my uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck’s friend, German baron Wolfram von Pannwitz, who upon his death, bequeathed his $500,000 fortune in equal parts to the Catholic Church and the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS). In this post, I explore some additional questions surrounding Wolfram.

Related Post:

POST 84: MY UNCLE DR. FEDOR BRUCK’S FRIEND, WOLFRAM E. VON PANNWITZ, GERMAN BARON

Paraphrasing one of my English teachers, quoting a long-forgotten to me author, “the basis for a short story can be found on any street corner in the world.” This Blog post, short story if you will, is an example. The inspiration for this tale is a reader of my Blog, John Thiesen from Newton, Kansas, who stumbled on Post 84 where I discussed my uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck’s (Theodore Brook in America (Figure 1)) friend, Wolfram E. von Pannwitz, a German Baron.

 

Figure 1. My uncle Dr. Fedor Bruck (1895-1982), Theodore Brook in America, in September 1981

 

 

While Mr. Thiesen and I are unrelated, and I would have had no reason to know of his family, John contacted me because his grandfather John Kroeker and Wolfram E. von Pannwitz came to America at the same time aboard a ship named the “Marine Marlin” departing from Bremen, Germany on the 8th of July 1947, making landfall in New York City on the 17th of July; my uncle Fedor also travelled on this ship at the same time, so would likely have met John Kroeker. Naturally, I already knew my uncle had met Wolfram in a Displaced Persons Camp in Germany, that they had traveled together to America, and had remained friends throughout the remainder of their lives. (Figure 2) I was completely unaware that Wolfram, and possibly my uncle, had befriended John Kroeker on their voyage to America.

 

Figure 2. Wolfram E. von Pannwitz, far right, at my aunt and uncle’s wedding on March 4, 1958, in New York City

 

Upon contacting me, John Thiesen told me a little about his grandfather as the basis for trying to understand why he had suddenly moved to Providence, Rhode Island from Kansas in about 1953. He thought that perhaps his grandfather’s acquaintance with Wolfram von Pannwitz might have had something to do with this and hoped I might know. John explained that upon his arrival in America his grandfather moved to Kansas; he apparently suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, and for whatever reason seemed unable to fit in there. So, he eventually relocated to Rhode Island though he had no friends or family there that Mr. Thiesen is aware of. His grandfather’s address book is in John’s possession, and amazingly includes Wolfram von Pannwitz’s name and Providence address, seemingly written in Wolfram’s own hand (Figure 3); more on this below. The question John asked me is whether von Pannwitz was still in Providence in 1953? As a related aside, given the likelihood that my uncle Fedor met John Kroeker aboard the Marlin Marlin on his trip across the Atlantic, I wondered whether my uncle’s name appears in his address book? It does not, according to John Thiesen.

 

Figure 3. Page from John Kroeker’s address book with Wolfram E. von Pannwitz’s Providence, Rhode Island address, seemingly written in his own hand. The address is care of (c/o) of Dr. Alexander Dorner, from whom Wolfram likely rented a room (Photo courtesy of John Thiesen)

 

A brief digression. In the 1947 Marine Marlin passenger manifest, John Kroeker’s nationality is given as “Stateless,” unlike Wolfram and my Uncle Fedor who are identified as German. (Figures 4-6) John Kröker, as his name is spelled on his 1894 Hamburg, Germany birth certificate (Figures 7a-b), is shown on this document to have been “evangelisch,” Protestant, though his grandson tells me he was a Mennonite. This is logical as the Mennonite church is a branch of the Protestant church having emerged from the Anabaptist movement of the 16th century. What is puzzling to me is why John Kroeker was Stateless. In the case of my own father who as a Jew was Stateless upon his arrival in America because the Nazis revoked the German nationality of all Jews, John Thiesen says that his grandfather was Stateless because he was a citizen/subject of the Russian Empire. Why or how he wound up in Russia remains unexplained.

 

Figure 4. Listing for John Kroeker in the “Alien Passenger Manifest” for the “Marine Marlin” showing he departed Bremen, Germany on July 8, 1947, and arrived in New York City on July 17, 1947, and indicating that he was “Stateless”

 

Figure 5. “Alien Passenger Manifest” for Wolfram E. von Pannwitz showing he traveled aboard the “Marine Marlin” at the same time as John Kroeker and that he was a German national

 

Figure 6. “Alien Passenger Manifest” for my uncle Fedor Bruck showing he too traveled aboard the “Marine Marlin” at the same time as John Kroeker and his friend Wolfram E. von Pannwitz and that he was also a German national

 

Figure 7a. Cover page for John Kröker’s birth certificate indicating he was born on the 3rd of May 1894 in Hamburg, Germany

 

Figure 7b. John Kröker’s birth certificate indicating he was born on the 3rd of May 1894 in Hamburg, Germany and that he was born a Protestant (“evangelisch”)

 

Anyway, faced with John’s question as to where Wolfram lived in 1953, I started investigating this.

From almost immediately upon his arrival in America, available documents in ancestry.com find Wolfram associated with Providence, Rhode Island. Beyond the fact that his residence in John Kroeker’s undated address book places him on 10 Cooke Street in Providence, apparently boarding in the home of a Dr. Alexander Dorner, the “Rhode Island, U.S., Indexes to Naturalization Records, 1890-1992” for “Wolfram Von Pannwitz” shows this same address for him on the 15th of October 1947. (Figures 8a-b) Incidentally, this record is more aptly referred to as a “Declaration of Intention” to become an American citizen once the five-year waiting period was over. Presumably, Wolfram lived in Providence, R.I. after his arrival in New York on the 17th of July 1947.

 

Figure 8a. Cover page for the “Rhode Island, U.S., Indexes to Naturalization Records, 1890-1992” for “Wolfram Von Pannwitz”

 

Figure 8b. The “Rhode Island, U.S., Indexes to Naturalization Records, 1890-1992” for Wolfram giving his full name as “Wolfram Ernst Hans Wilhelm Eberhard von Pannwitz,” and his date and place of residence (i.e., 10 Cooke Street, Providence, R.I.) on the 15th of October 1947

 

As an aside, Wolfram’s October 1947 “Rhode Island Index to Naturalization,” as well as his 1889 birth certificate, gives his full name; like that of many aristocrats it was very lengthy, “Wolfram Ernst Hans Wilhelm Eberhard von Pannwitz.”

Absent any contemporary phone directories and address book listings for Wolfram von Pannwitz following his arrival in America, either for Providence or New York City, and the yet unavailable 1950 census, there is no clear evidence for how long Wolfram resided in Providence. However, when Wolfram departed New York City for Germany via Southampton, England on the 19th of February 1953 aboard the “Queen Elizabeth” his address was given as the Hotel Seville on East 29th Street (Figures 9a-b), his permanent residence throughout his life in New York City. (Figure 10)

 

Figure 9a. Cover page for list of passengers departing New York City aboard the Queen Elizabeth on the 19th of February 1953

 

Figure 9b. Wolfram von Pannwitz’s name on the passenger manifest showing him departing New York City on the 19th of February 1953, providing the date and place he became a naturalized U.S. citizen, the 8th of December 1952 in New York City, and his place of residence, the Hotel Seville

 

Figure 10. The Hotel Seville where Wolfram E. von Pannwitz rented modest accommodations for $23 a week

 

This same February 1953 passenger manifest shows Wolfram was naturalized in New York City on the 8th of December 1952, logically, slightly more than five years after his arrival in America. The distance between Providence and New York City is only about 180 miles, so it is possible Wolfram was naturalized in New York City while still residing in Providence. Still, it is safe to conclude that by early 1953 Wolfram was permanently living in Manhattan at the Hotel Seville. The question of how long or whether his residency in Providence may have overlapped with John Kroeker’s is another unknown.

Let me move now to the question of why Wolfram may have taken up residency in Providence. Aware of Wolfram’s more permanent inhabitance there, I did a Google search of “Mr. von Pannwitz + Providence, Rhode Island.” Completely unexpectedly, I stumbled upon an article I’d previously overlooked when researching Wolfram written by Ms. Geraldine S. Foster, a past president of the Rhode Island Jewish Historical Association (RIJHA), entitled “Strands of history: HIAS and Rhode Island.” Embedded in this article is the explanation of why Wolfram von Pannwitz, upon his death, bequeathed half of his sizeable estate to the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS). (Figure 11)

 

Figure 11. Contemporary newspaper account from a 1966 New York daily discussing Wolfram E. von Pannwitz’s $500,000 bequest, split equally between Cardinal Spellman and the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society

Quoting from Ms. Foster’s article: 

Almost since its founding, HIAS has not turned away non-Jews who needed its help. An undated new article in RIJHA archives tells us that in 1946, a Providence couple approached a Jewish organization, Rhode Island Refugee Service (later part of Jewish Family and Children’s Service), to ask for help in processing immigration papers for Wolfram von Pannewitz [sic], described as an anti-Nazi German Protestant and an aristocrat.

The couple had signed the proper forms, but then found they urgently needed a second affidavit. They also needed a conduit for the money to pay for von Pannewitz’ [sic] passage.

The R.I. agency, an affiliate of HIAS, helped them find someone to provide the affidavit and fulfill their other needs. We do not know how large a role HIAS played in von Pannewitz’ [sic] rescue. What we do know is that in 1966, he left his entire fortune of $500,000, in equal parts, to Cardinal Francis Joseph Spellman and HIAS.

According to the Museum of Family History, HIAS is described as follows: “HIAS, the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society, is America’s oldest international migration and refugee resettlement agency. Dedicated to assisting persecuted and oppressed people worldwide and delivering them to countries of safe haven. HIAS has rescued more than 4.5 million people since 1881. Growing from organizations founded in the 1870s and 1880s to assist Jewish migrants arriving in America, HIAS is responsible for the rescue and resettlement into the United States of noted academics, artists, athletes, entertainers, scientists, mayors, governors, and members of the United States Congress, as well as everyday people. Its operational goals are based on Jewish religious teachings.”

As the above article states, it’s unclear how large a role HIAS played in bringing Wolfram to America, but we do know from a contemporary document that the cost of his passage aboard the Marine Marlin was $134 plus $8 fee. (Figures 12a-b) Possibly, obtaining a second affidavit may have been as important as paying for the trip?

 

Figure 12a. Cover page of “Passenger List of Displaced Persons” showing Wolfram von Pannwitz departed Bremen, Germany aboard the Marine Marlin on the 8th of July 1947

 

Figure 12b. “Passenger List of Displaced Persons” showing the cost of Wolfram von Pannwitz’ passage to the United States was $134 plus an $8 fee, costs presumably paid for by HIAS

 

Which brings us to the final question of why, upon landing in America, did Wolfram decide to settle in Providence, Rhode Island? From the above article, we know a Providence couple approached the Rhode Island Refugee Service asking for their help in processing Wolfram’s immigration papers. Was this the Dr. Alexander Dorner and his wife with whom Wolfram boarded when he lived in Providence? This seems likely. As I discussed in Post 84, Wolfram’s wife died young in Germany, and he was estranged from his German family because they had cheated him out of his inheritance. It appears Wolfram had no family in America and lived a rather reclusive and modest lifestyle, accruing a large fortune through stock investments. Possibly, moving to Providence upon his arrival here may initially have been his best option until he settled in, which he did most admirably.

 

 

REFERENCE

 

Foster, Geraldine S. “Strands of history: HIAS and Rhode Island. Jewish Rhode Island, November 8, 2018,

https://www.jewishrhody.com/stories/strands-of-history-hias-and-rhode-island,9401

 

 

POST 105: FEDOR LÖWENSTEIN’S NAZI-CONFISCATED ART: RESTITUTION DENIED

Note: In this post, I discuss my own attempt to obtain compensation and damages from the French government on behalf of my family for works of art seized by the Nazis in December 1940 from my father’s first cousin, Fedor Löwenstein, a noted painter. I also touch on the multiple occasions France has wronged my family during WWII, following WWII, and continuing to the present.

Related Posts:

POST 15: BERLIN & MY GREAT-AUNTS FRANZISKA & ELSBETH BRUCK

POST 16: TRACKING MY GREAT-AUNT HEDWIG LÖWENSTEIN, NÉE BRUCK, & HER FAMILY THROUGH FIVE COUNTRIES

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

 

Figure 1. My great-aunt Franziska Bruck (1866-1942)
Figure 2. My great-aunt Elsbeth Bruck (1874-1970)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This story begins in 2014. This is the year my wife and I took a 13-week trip to Europe traveling from northeastern Poland to southeastern Spain following the path of my Jewish family’s diaspora. It included a stop at the Stadtmuseum in Spandau, on the outskirts of Berlin, where the personal papers of two of my accomplished and unmarried great-aunts, Franziska Bruck (Figure 1) and Elsbeth Bruck (Figure 2), are archived. The family items at the Statdtmuseum include academic papers, diaries, numerous professional and personal letters, family photographs, awards, and miscellaneous belongings. (Figures 3a-b) During my visit, I photographed all the articles and artifacts for later study.

 

Figure 3a. Entrance to the Stadtmuseum in Spandau, Berlin, Germany where my great-aunts’ personal papers are archived
Figure 3b. Archival boxes at the Stadtmuseum containing my great-aunts’ personal papers

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The letters and photographs turned out to be most informative. The letters were written in four forms, Old German Script (known as die Kurrentschrift or Kurrent for short in German); an updated version of Kurrent called Sütterlin developed in the early 20th Century; normal German script (deutsche Normalschrift); and typed normal German. Suffice it to say, that the three forms of German script are completely indecipherable to me, so I depended on German-speaking friends and relatives to translate these letters. However, in the case of letters typed in German, using a good on-line translator, called DeepL, I was able to make sense of the content of some of these missives.

One letter I translated provides the basis of much of this Blog post. (Figures 4a-c) It contains astonishing information that led to the seven-year odyssey I embarked upon to obtain redress from the French government for an injustice perpetrated upon my father’s first cousin, Fedor Löwenstein, by the Nazis. The letter was written by Fedor’s younger sister, Jeanne “Hansi” Goff née Löwenstein, to her aunt, my great-aunt, Elsbeth Bruck. It is dated the 30th of October 1946, and was sent from Nice, France to Berlin, Germany. What makes the letter so astounding is not that it mentions both my paternal grandmother ELSE Bruck and my father OTTO Bruck, since both had connections to Nice and France in 1946, but rather to Hansi’s declaration that one of her brother Fedya’s (named Fedor but also called “Fidel”) paintings had sold posthumously in 1946 for 90,000 French Francs. Using a Historic Currency Converter, I determined this would be worth more than $16,000 as of 2015, obviously even more today. Given the enormous amount that one of Fedor Lowenstein’s paintings had fetched in 1946 convinced me that he was no run-of-the-mill painter and that I needed to learn more about him.

 

Figure 4a. First page of typed letter dated the 30th of October 1946 sent by my father’s first cousin, Jeanne “Hansi” Goff née Löwenstein, to her aunt, my great-aunt, Elsbeth Bruck
Figure 4b. Second page of typed letter dated the 30th of October 1946 sent by my father’s first cousin, Jeanne “Hansi” Goff née Löwenstein, to her aunt, my great-aunt, Elsbeth Bruck

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 4c. Translation of letter

 

One place my wife and I visited in 2014 attempting to obtain copies of original death certificates for ancestors who had died in Nice was la Mairie de Nice, City Hall. There, I was able to obtain death certificates not only for Fedor Lowenstein (Figure 5) and his mother, Hedwig Löwenstein née Bruck (Figure 6), but also for his sister, Jeanne Goff née Löwenstein. (Figure 7) I was fortunate to even find Fedor Lowenstein’s name in the death register. In German, his surname was spelled “Löwenstein,” with the “ö,” that’s to say with an umlaugh over the “o,” transcribed in English as “oe”; in the French death register, Fedor’s surname was spelled simply as “Lowenstein” (Figure 8), so I nearly missed finding his name among the 1946 deaths. I would later discover that Fedor’s surname was variously spelled “Lowenstein,” “Löwenstein,” and even “Loevenstein.”

 

Figure 5. Fedor Lowenstein’s death certificate from Nice, France indicating he died there on the 4th of August 1946
Figure 6. Fedor Löwenstein’s mother’s death certificate from Nice, France showing Hedwig Löwenstein née Bruck died there on the 15th of January 1949; the name on her death certificate is “Edwige Bruck”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 7. Fedor Löwenstein’s sister’s death certificate from Nice, France showing Jeanne “Hansi” Goff née Löwenstein died there on the 5th of May 1986; the name on her death certificate is “Jeanne Loewenstein”
Figure 8. Death register listing dated the 5th of August 1946 for Fedor Löwenstein listing his name as “Fedor Lowenstein”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Having obtained the death certificates, I was dispatched to a different administrative office in Nice, le Service Administration Funéraire, the Funeral Administration Office, to locate their tombs. While Fedor’s sister I learned had been cremated, the Funeral Administration Office directed me to the Cimetière Caucade, the Caucade Communal Cemetery (Figure 9), on the outskirts of Nice to find Fedor and Hedwig’s tombstones. (Figures 10-11) It was providential that I was assisted at the Funeral Administration Office by a Mme. Jöelle Saramito (Figure 12), who would later render me a great service.

 

Figure 9. Reception Bureau at Cimitiere Caucade where Fedor Löwenstein and his mother were once interred

 

Figure 10. Hedwig Löwenstein née Bruck’s surviving headstone though her bones were removed to a charnel house
Figure 11. Fedor Loewenstein’s headstone correctly transcribing the “ö” as “oe”; the headstone survives though his bones were also removed to a charnel house

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Figure 12. In 2015, me standing alongside Mme. Jöelle Saramito from Nice’s Funeral Administration Office, who helped track down valuable information about Fedor Löwenstein

 

 

Jeanne Goff née Löwenstein’s translated 1946 letter convinced me her brother was no ordinary painter. Knowing this, I became curious whether I could obtain an obituary from a contemporary newspaper that might lead me to living descendants. Hoping Mme. Saramito might be able to track it down for me, or at least point me in the right direction, I contacted her. What she provided surpassed my expectations.

In what can only be characterized as a fortunate occurrence of serendipity, Mme. Saramito sent me links to several articles about an exposition featuring three of Fedor Löwenstein’s paintings seized by the Nazis that had been displayed at the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux. Unbeknownst to my wife and me, this exhibit had taken place there between the 16th of May and the 24th of August 2014, overlapping our extended stay in Europe that year; needless to say, had we known about this exposition, we would have detoured there.

Among the links Mme. Saramito sent me was an article naming the art curator for the exhibition held at the Musée des Beaux-Arts, a lady named Florence Saragoza; the article also mentioned the French government was looking for legitimate family members to whom Fedor Loewenstein’s artworks could be returned.

 

Figure 13. March 1946 photo of Fedor Loewenstein (seated) with his sister Hansi, his brother Heinz, and his mother Hedwig in Nice, France, taken several months before his death in August 1946
Figure 14. Photo of Fedor Loewenstein with his brother Heinz in military uniform taken in Nice, France on the 24th of October 1945

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

While I had several photographs of Fedor Löwenstein with his family in Nice (Figurse 13-14) found at the Stadtmuseum in Spandau, and a copy of his acte de décès, death certificate, obtained from la Mairie de Nice, there was much I did not know about my father’s first cousin. Hoping to learn more, I tried to contact Mme. Saragoza, and quickly discovered she was affiliated with the Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication as a conservatrice du patrimoine, curator of heritage. My initial email to her at the Ministère de la Culture “bounced.” I eventually learned that she was also the then-Director of the Musée Crozatier in le Puy-en-Velay, France (Figure 15), where my subsequent email reached her. I will always remember her response dated the 16th of September 2014, “What a surprise to read your e-mail! (To be honest I cried) . . .I’m so glad to read about someone from Lowenstein’s family!” Logically, Mme. Saragoza had assumed that Fedor’s family had been murdered in the Holocaust, emigrated, or would be unlikely to learn about the exhibition in Bordeaux and the resurfaced paintings. More on this later.

 

Figure 15. Mme. Florence Saragoza, former Director of Musée Crozatier in le Puy-en-Velay, France

 

 

Almost immediately after connecting with Mme. Saragoza, she sent me the Journal d’exposition, the exhibition catalog, for the Fédor Löwenstein (1901-1946) trois œuvres martyres exposition. (Figure 16) Most of Fedor Löwenstein’s biography and the history behind the works of art confiscated by the Nazis is drawn from this reference.

 

Figure 16. Cover page of the 2014 exhibition catalog from the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux that featured Fedor Löwenstein’s three orphaned paintings

 

 

Wilhelm Fédor Löwenstein was born in Munich, Germany on the 13th of April 1901, and is often characterized as a Czech painter because this was his family’s country of origin. He first studied at the School of Decorative Arts in Berlin and then at the Academy of Fine Arts in Dresden. In 1923, Fédor Löwenstein settled in Paris (Figures 17a-b), attracted by the artistic influence of the capital. An artistic movement dominated there, designated in 1925 as the École de Paris, the School of Paris; in reality, this name does not refer to any school that really existed, but rather to the École de Paris, which brought together artists who contributed to making Paris the focus of artistic creation between the two world wars. It was in this rich artistic context that Löwenstein painted and drew.

 

Figure 17a. Undated photo of Fedor Löwenstein as a young man
Figure 17b. Back of undated photo of Fedor Löwenstein indicating he was the first cousin of my aunt Susanne Müller-Bruck, my uncle Fedor Bruck, and my father Otto Bruck

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Paris he mixed with and became a student of the painter André Lhote from Bordeaux and joined the “Groupe des Surindépendants” in 1936. Löwenstein’s early works were marked by the influence of cubism, whose main representatives worked in Paris, although his subsequent productions evolved towards abstraction, probably under the influence of André Lhote. In 1938, he painted “La Chute” (The Fall), inspired by the signing of the Munich Agreement that dismantled the Czechoslovakia that had been created in 1918. As is noted in the 2014 Bordeaux retrospective exhibition catalog, “The composition and iconographic vocabulary of the work are reminiscent of the convulsed and screaming silhouettes of Picasso’s Guernica, exhibited a year earlier in the Spanish Pavilion at the Paris World’s Fair.” The comparison to Picasso’s famed work speaks volumes about Löwenstein’s remarkable talent. 

When France entered the war in September 1939, Löwenstein, like many artists, had to leave the capital. As a foreigner, he had to hide to escape France’s exclusion laws. He went to Mirmande (Drôme) on the advice of Marcelle Rivier, a friend and another of André Lhote’s students. The two artists probably met in Paris shortly before France entered the war. At that time, Mirmande, a village in ruins, welcomed a few painters who lived there. But most of them came there to work alongside André Lhote during his summer academy. The village became a place of refuge for many Parisian artists of foreign origin, all of whom led a relatively peaceful life, free from military operations and repression, contending mostly with the difficulty of obtaining art supplies.

This ended abruptly when the Germans occupied the whole of Metropolitan France in November 1942. Until then, the French Demarcation line marked the boundary between the occupied part of France administered by the German Army in the northern and western part of France and the Zone libre in the south. The suppression of the Demarcation line marked by the invasion of the southern zone by the Germans put an end to the peaceful life the artists in Miramande had enjoyed.  This caused the group gathered there to break up.

From then on, it was the French Resistance network that worked to protect the refugees of Mirmande, thus allowing many Jewish painters to flee. Marcelle Rivier, Fedor Löwenstein’s friend who had enticed him to move there, somewhat amusingly described her involvement in his evacuation in 1943 from Miramande: “That night I put on Lowenstein one of these vast peasant skirts that we wore then and by a night of full moon in this month of February 1943, we left for Cliousclat. . .With his skirt, Lowenstein had the air of a horse disguised and the ground left no other means than to take the traced road. There I entrusted him to Ména Loopuyt, a Dutch painter living in Cliousclat. Charles Caillet had gone by bicycle to the abbey of Aiguebelle to get along with the abbot and gave us an appointment at his house. The next day at midnight, Doctor Debanne disguised the Jews as wounded, and they were taken to Aiguebelle.”

As the exposition catalog goes on to describe, “They [the Jews] were in possession of false identity cards made by Maurice Caillet, the curator of the Valence Museum. In agreement with the bishopric and the superior of the community, the monks of the abbey of Aiguebelle in the Drôme welcomed refugees at the end of 1942 and sheltered Jews whom they employed in the various works of the abbey. Löwenstein decorated tiles without enthusiasm.”

In the fall of 1943, ill, Fedor went to Paris, under the pseudonym of Lauriston, to consult at the Curie Institute and at the Broussais Hospital in the south of Paris, where Dr. Paul Chevallier, a French pioneer in hematology, was practicing. However, his disease was not diagnosed, and he continued to deteriorate. Löwenstein would eventually return to his family in Nice, where he was hospitalized and would die on the 4th of August 1946. It was determined he died of Hodgkins Lymphoma.

Fedor’s association with the “Groupe des Surindépendants” from 1936 onward resulted in him exhibiting regularly with them until the outbreak of WWII. The group even organized a personal exhibition for him in 1939. At some point in 1940 during his stay in Miramande, Fedor returned to Paris where he selected small format works as well as six watercolors that he brought to be shipped to New York City. There is little information about the circumstances surrounding this project, but the paintings were sent to a harbor warehouse in Bordeaux for shipment to an American gallery. Unfortunately, the crates never left Bordeaux but were instead “requisitioned” by German military authorities on the 5th of December 1940, the date of a major seizure operation.

A special commando unit affiliated with the “Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg (ERR)” (Reichsleiter Rosenberg Taskforce) raided the warehouse where Fedor’s crates were stored, seized them, and had them shipped to Paris where they were stored at the “Jeu de Paume.” The ERR was a Nazi Party organization dedicated to appropriating cultural property during WWII and was led by the chief ideologue of the Nazi Party, Alfred Rosenberg, ergo its name. The Jeu de Paume was the seat of ERR’s processing of looted art objects confiscated from Jewish-owned collections.

Owing to the abstract cubist nature of Löwenstein’s works, the ERR staff at the Jeu de Paume deemed them as “degenerate” and consigned them to the store room for condemned art, the “Salles des Martyrs,” Martyrs’ Hall. They were marked for destruction, in German “vernichet.” In total, 25 paintings by Fedor were seized and brought to the Jeu de Paume to be disposed of for ideological reasons.

Almost seventy years after the Liberation of Paris in August 1944 three of the purportedly destroyed Löwenstein paintings resurfaced in French museum collections. French Ministry of Culture officials were able to match the resurrected paintings with information contained in the ERR database for three works labeled by the Germans as Löwenstein 4 (“Paysage” or Landscape), Löwenstein 15 (“Peupliers” or Poplars), and Löwenstein 19 (“Les Arbes” or The Trees). In the official catalogue of unclaimed works and objects of art known as “Musée Nationaux Récupération (MNR),” the works are assigned MNR numbers R26, R27, and R28. These three paintings correspond to Löwenstein’s works of art that were displayed at the Musée des Beaux-Arts in Bordeaux in 2014 for which I would later file a claim for restitution. As an aside, all three paintings were signed “Fedor Loevenstein.” I would later learn from a French reader of my Blog, who purchased several of his works at auction, that Löwenstein also signed some with his initials in reverse, “LF.”

In connection with researching and writing the catalog for the 2014 exhibit of Fedor Löwenstein’s three resurrected paintings, Florence Saragoza and her colleagues uncovered the notes of the curator at the Jeu de Paume, Rose Valland. Her notes from July 20, 1943, confirm the fate of artworks destined for destruction: “Scholz and his team continue to choose from among the paintings in the Louvre’s escrow and stab the paintings they do not want to keep. This is how they destroyed almost all of Masson’s works, all of Dalí’s. The paintings in the Loewenstein, Esmont (sic), M[ichel]-G[eorges] Michel collections are almost all shredded. . .” On July 23rd, she added “The paintings massacred in the Louvre’s sequestration were brought back to the Jeu de Paume. Five or six hundred were burned under German surveillance in the museum garden from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. . . . The paintings that remained in the Louvre were classified by category. . .”. It appears that Löwenstein’s three works that escaped destruction had been classified by the Louvre as “paintings of lesser importance,” while the remaining works were likely stabbed, shredded and/or incinerated.

As a side note, since virtually all the images of Fedor Löwenstein’s paintings as well as the historic images of the Martyrs’ Hall at the Jeu de Paume are copyrighted, I refer readers to the hyperlinks to view photos.

As a mildly interesting aside, Florence Saragoza and her colleagues, using the notes left behind by Rose Valland, then curatorial attaché at the Jeu de Paume, were able to attribute most of the paintings exhibited there. They did this using a detailed digitization of the negatives, work by work, accompanied by anamorphosis. This was a new term to me and is defined as: “. . .a distorted projection requiring the viewer to occupy a specific vantage point, use special devices, or both to view a recognizable image. It is used in painting, photography, sculpture and installation, toys, and film special effects. The word is derived from the Greek prefix ana-, meaning ‘back’ or ‘again’, and the word morphe, meaning ‘shape’ or ‘form.’ Extreme anamorphosis has been used by artists to disguise caricatures, erotic and scatological scenes, and other furtive images from a casual spectator, while revealing an undistorted image to the knowledgeable viewer.” In the case of the historic photos on display in the Martyrs’ Hall, I take this to mean that since the paintings in the photos look somewhat distorted, some digital manipulation was required to identify and attribute the works of art.

As previously mentioned, Fedor Löwenstein’s 25 paintings were seized from État-major administratif du port, hangar H, Bordeaux, the “Port Administration Headquarters, Hanger H, Bordeaux.” They were seized at the same time as a set of Dali’s works were taken from another collector, which were described under the acronym “unbekannt,” “unknown.” This was intended to indicate that the history of the works had been lost during the various transfers from their seizure in Bordeaux to their shipment to Paris, the inventories being drawn up only belatedly by the historians of the ERR. Again quoting from the exhibition catalog, “But the fact that these collections were made anonymous was also part of the ideological policy of the Third Reich, which aimed at cultural appropriation, an affirmation of superiority inscribed in a historical connection and a rewriting of art history.” As in the case of Dali’s works, the provenance of the three orphan paintings by Löwenstein was lost and they were described as having been donated anonymously in 1973. Only in 2011 were they were reclassified as stolen works. This brings me to where things stood when I learned all the above.

Soon after connecting with Florence Saragoza, she asked me whether I wanted to file a claim with the Commission pour l’indemnisation des victimes de spoliations (CIVS) for the return of Fedor Löwenstein’s three orphan paintings, as well as payment of damages. CIVS is the commission established in 1999 under the French Prime Minister to implement the policy of the State regarding the reparation of the damages suffered by the Jews of France whose property was looted during the Occupation, because of the anti-Semitic measures taken by the German occupier or by the Vichy regime. This seemed like a logical next step. Given my intimate familiarity with my father and his first cousins’ family tree, I immediately realized that I am Fedor’s closest living relative. (Figure 18) That’s to say, because neither Fedor nor either of his two siblings had any children or surviving spouses, as a first cousin once removed, I am their closest surviving blood relative.

 

Figure 18. My father Dr. Otto Bruck (1907-1994) standing alongside his first cousin and the sister of Fedor Löwenstein, Jeanne “Hansi” Goff née Löwenstein, on the 2nd of March 1947 in Fayence, France, the town from where my aunt Susanne Müller-Bruck was deported to Auschwitz

 

 

With Mme. Saragoza’s gracious assistance, I filed a claim with CIVS in October 2014. CIVS acknowledged receipt of my claim in November 2014, assigning it a case number, “Requête 24005 BROOK,” noting that considering the numerous claims pending before their office and the multiple archives and offices that would need to be consulted, it could take some time to render a decision. In fact, it took more than 6 ½ years.

In June 2015, my wife and I met with the staff at the CIVS in Paris (Figure 19) to discuss my claim, whereupon I provided them with a written account of the chronology detailed above and my ancestral connection to Fedor Löwenstein. In February 2017, I was eventually contacted by a genealogist contracted by CIVS to investigate my claim. I shared an updated written account of what I had sent to CIVS in 2015, and included an extensive array of historic documents, photos, and exhibits, along with a detailed family tree. In essence, I did the genealogist’s work for him.

 

Figure 19. In June 2015, meeting in Paris with Mme. Muriel De Bastier and Mlle. Eleonore Claret from CIVS, the Premier Ministre’s office handling my restitution claim

 

Between February 2017 and June 2021, when CIVS rendered their written decision, I was never contacted by the Premier Ministre’s office. The decision letter from the Premier Ministre along with the attached report by Le Rapporteur Generale arrived on the 17th of June 2021. It included much of the same information discussed above. The final decision is that my claim was rejected.

Beyond the disappointment and anger I feel about this determination, I was curious about the merits and legal basis of this ruling. Inasmuch as I can ascertain, it appears that because France is governed by principles of civil law rather than common law, my rights have been supplanted. Civil law has its features compiled and codified into a collection for ready reference. It is inspired by the Roman law. Common law, on the other hand, has its rules and regulations administered by judges and vary on a case-to-case basis. Civil law was framed in France. Common law was started in England. Common law varies from case to case depending upon the customs of the society whereas civil law has a predefined written set of statutes and codes for reference. Judgment in common law varies whereas in civil law, the judges must strictly follow the codification written in the book.

In the case of my claim for restitution, CIVS concluded there are what are called “universal legatees,” an element of civil law, whose claim to Löwenstein’s property and damages supersede my own. France considers property left in a will a “universal legacy,” so the person who inherits the rights, obligations, possession, and debts of an ancestor’s title in property through a testamentary disposition is called a “universal legatee.”

These universal legatees in the case of Fedor Löwenstein’s estate are descendants of individuals, merely friends, who inherited from his brother and sister. They and their descendants were not and are not related by blood to Fedor Löwenstein, as I am. Were it not for my efforts to uncover information about Fedor’s orphaned works and file a claim for repatriation and damages, these individuals would have no knowledge of their existence. Furthermore, had it not been for my own extensive genealogical research into Fedor Löwenstein’s spoliated works and ancestry, the CIVS genealogist contracted to undertake the forensic investigation into my claim likely would not have uncovered all the information I provided in 2017. Notwithstanding the stated wishes of CIVS and the Musée National d’Art Moderne housed in the Centre Pompidou in Paris to restore Fedor Löwenstein’s to his family, this is emphatically not happening.

Figure 20. My father Dr. Otto Bruck standing on la Promenade des Anglais in Nice, France in 1946

In retrospect, I would say I should not be surprised by this outcome. France has a long-standing tradition of having wronged my family going back to when the French were complicit in helping the Germans deport my aunt Susanne Müller née Bruck in August 1942, from Fayence, France to Auschwitz, where she was ultimately murdered. Then, following the war, in 1948, they arrested my father, Dr. Otto Bruck (Figure 20), in Nice, France for allegedly practicing dentistry illegally, simply for managing the practice of a dentist who had no interest in her business. My father was arrested only because he was “apatride,” stateless. Rather than offer French citizenry to a man who spoke fluent French and who offered a service much-in-need following WWII, they detained and intended to prosecute him had he not decamped for America. And this although my father served France nobly and honorably for five years during the war as a soldier in the French Foreign Legion. Arguably, France may have met its legal obligation with its decision regarding my claim, but they most assuredly have not fulfilled their moral obligation by handing over my ancestor’s paintings and awarding damages to so-called “universal legatees.” Family of Fedor Löwenstein they are decidedly NOT!!

 

 

REFERENCE

 

Fédor Löwenstein (1901-1946) trois œuvres martyres. 16 May-24 Aug. 2014. Musée des Beaux-Arts de Bordeaux, Bordeaux.

 

 

VITAL STATISTICS OF WILHELM FÉDOR LÖWENSTEIN & HIS IMMEDIATE FAMILY

 

NAME EVENT DATE PLACE SOURCE
         
Wilhelm Fédor Löwenstein (self) Birth 13 April 1901 Munich, Germany Munich Birth Certificate
  Death 4 August 1946 Nice, France Nice Death Certificate
Rudolf Löwenstein (father) Birth 17 January 1872 Kuttenplan, Czechoslovakia [today: Chodová Planá, Czech Republic] Kuttenplan, Czechoslovakia Birth Register Listing
  Marriage (to Hedwig Bruck) 17 September 1899 Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland] LDS Family History Center Microfilm Roll 1184449 (Ratibor)
  Death 22 August 1930 Iglau, Czechoslovakia [today: Jihlava, Czech Republic] LDS Family History Center Microfilm Roll 1184408 (Danzig)
Hedwig Löwenstein Bruck (mother) Birth 22 March 1870 Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland] LDS Family History Center Microfilm Roll 1184449 (Ratibor)
  Marriage (to Rudolf Löwenstein) 17 September 1899 Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland] Ratibor Marriage Certificate
  Death 15 January 1949 Nice, France Nice Death Certificate
Elsbeth Bruck (aunt) Birth 17 November 1874 Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland German Democratic Republic Passport
  Death 20 February 1970 East Berlin, German Democratic Republic  
Jeanne “Hansi” Goff née Löwenstein (sister) Birth 9 September 1902 Danzig, Free State [today: Gdansk, Poland] Danzig Birth Certificate
  Marriage (to Georges Goff) UNKNOWN    
  Death 5 May 1986 Nice, France Nice Death Certificate
Heinz Löwenstein (brother) (died as “Hanoch Avneri”) Birth 8 March 1905 Danzig, Free State [today: Gdansk, Poland] LDS Family History Center Microfilm Roll 1184407 (Danzig)
  Marriage (to Rose Bloch) 22 October 1931 Danzig, Free State [today: Gdansk, Poland] Danzig Marriage Certificate
  Death 10 August 1979 Haifa, Israel Haifa Burial Certificate
Otto Bruck (first cousin) (died as Gary Otto Brook) Birth 16 April 1907 Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland] Ratibor Birth Certificate
  Marriage 22 October 1949 Manhattan, New York  
  Death 14 September 1994 Queens, New York New York City Death Certificate
Richard Alan Brook (first cousin once removed) Birth 27 December 1950 Manhattan, New York  

 

 

 

POST 26: “APATRIDE” (STATELESS)

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.”

Figure 1-Vieux Nice is the city’s old town, characterized by narrow cobblestone streets and pastel-hued buildings

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.

Figure 2-Light rail running along Boulevard Jean Jaurès, much changed from when I was a young boy

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. 

Figure 3-My father, Dr. Otto Bruck, in 1946 along Nice’s Promenade des Anglais

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.

Figure 4a-My father’s French “Titre D’identité et De Voyage”

 

Figure 4b-My father’s French “Titre D’identité et De Voyage,” identifying him as “apatride,” or stateless

 

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. 

Figure 5a-Henri Lotter’s name listed in the Nice death register, alongside that of his wife, Simone Lotter-Jaubert (registration date does not correspond with the death date)

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. 

Figure 5b-Simone Lotter, née Jaubert, death register listing

 

Figure 6-Simone Lotter, née Jaubert, death certificate

 

 

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.

Figure 7-The graves of Simone Lotter, née Jaubert, buried alongside her divorced husband, Henri Lotter in Cimetière De Caucade

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 un pharmacien, a pharmacist.

Figure 8-Entrance to “Ville De Nice Archives Communales”

 

Figure 9-The highfalutin title of “Président de salle”

 

Figure 10a-Listing in 1947-48 Nice telephone directory for “Dentistes”

 

 

Figure 10b-Listing in 1947-48 Nice telephone directory for “Lotter-Jaubert, Simone, place Saint-Francois 2” under the category of “Dentistes”

 

Figure 11-Entrance sign to “Vieux Nice”

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.

Figure 12-The office building at “Place Saint-Francois 2” where my father worked for Mme. Simone Lotter
Figure 13-Street sign for “Place Saint Francois”

 

 

Figure 14-Entrance to “Place Saint-Francois 2”