A Journey for Life and a Journey for Death: The Meinhardt's Albert Michael Meinhardt and Dr. Yehuda Meinhardt February 2010 This article is dedicated to the memory of our grandparents, Franz Meinhardt and Margarethe Meinhardt (nee Löwenthal), who perished 1942 in the Holocaust, as well to our parents Gerd Meinhardt and Käte Meinhardt (nee Luft), who succeeded to escape Nazi Germany in 1939 and found shelter in Chile, where they could begin a new life. Be their memory blessed (Z.L.). Pay respect to your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, because if one of them would not have existed, you yourself would not exist…. (Simple logistics from Käte Meinhardt) Copyright © 2010 by Albert Michael Meinhardt and Dr. Yehuda Meinhardt, All rights reserved and no part of this article may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever, without written permission by the authors. Enquires should be addressed to one of the authors: [email protected] . Disclaimer: The copyright holders mentioned above are responsible for the content of this article. Yad Vashem’s Online Holocaust Resource Center is merely hosting this item in its database and bares no responsibility for its content. __________________________________________________________________________ מרכז המידע אודות השואה, יד ושם ביה"ס המרכזי להוראת השואה 1 Content 1. Should we leave the country? ……..….5 2. Some anecdotes about life in Schwedt ….……10 3. The “Reichskristallnacht” in Schwedt ….……13 4. On board the “Leipzig” ….…… 22 5. On board the “Peru” ….…….25 6. Arrival in Chile …….….26 7. First steps in the new country …….….29 8. News from Europe …….….32 9. Again in Chile ……….49 10. Life goes on ……….51 11. Schwedt after the war ...…….53 12. Some historical facts about the Holocaust (Shoa) …….….55 13. The Korherr report ……….62 14. The Perpetrators ……….65 15. Acknowledgments ……….67 16. Appendix: Abbreviations used in the text ……….68 __________________________________________________________________________ מרכז המידע אודות השואה, יד ושם ביה"ס המרכזי להוראת השואה 2 1. Should we leave the country? Our mother Käte Luft, the daughter of Elise Laqueur (1873-1939) and Arthur Luft (1861- 1930), was born in Breslau in 1910 and grew up there. In early 1938 she met our father, Gerd Meinhardt (1903-1975) in Berlin. He was introduced to her while visiting a girl friend in Berlin. They soon fell in love with each other and decided to marry quickly. There were bad times for Jews in Germany. In Germany the Nazi government had already been in power for 5 years, and every day brought new restrictions and distresses to their lives. Their wedding took place in Breslau on 7 April 1938. After a civil marriage at the "Standesamt" (the registry office), a short ceremony, officiated by Rabbi Vogelstein was held at the synagogue. Only a few relatives attended, mother’s mother Elise, her two brothers Franz and Herbert Luft, her twin sister Trude, with husband Werner (they were expecting a baby one month later) and a few other relatives. From father’s town of Schwedt nobody could be present. After the wedding our parents moved to Schwedt on the Oder, where our father’s family had been living for generations. Schwedt is located in the northeastern corner of the Brandenburg Province in Prussia. Today the river Oder defines the border to Poland. In Schwedt they resided in the house of our grandparents Franz M. (1877- 1942) and Margarethe Meinhardt (nee Loewenthal) (1880- 1942). They lived on second floor of the house, grandparents lived in the first floor and on the ground floor was the office of Grandfather’s firm. The address was Flinkenberg 6. So our mother lived under the same roof with her mother-in-law, but she was kindly received by her, and by all the Meinhardt Clan, who constituted almost half of the near 100 Jews living in Schwedt. __________________________________________________________________________ מרכז המידע אודות השואה, יד ושם ביה"ס המרכזי להוראת השואה 3 Document 1: Copy of the marriage certificates of the registry office and from the Rabbi Dr.Vogelstein in Breslau. __________________________________________________________________________ מרכז המידע אודות השואה, יד ושם ביה"ס המרכזי להוראת השואה 4 For their honeymoon they made a trip to Palestine. They arrived by train at the port of Trieste in Italy, and embarked on board of the ship "Gerusalemme". Four days later, they arrived in Haifa in British Palestine. On leaving the ship they and their baggage was thoroughly checked for weapons by the British Mandatory Police. Heavy disturbances between Jews and Arabs had broken out since 1936 and the Mandatory Government tried to keep order and security in the country. The British authorities requested a security deposit of 500 PP (Palestine Pounds) to insure that they would leave the country after the visit. The immigration of Jews to Palestine was strictly regulated by the government and only people having the "Certificate" (of immigration) could enter the country to stay. They had a nice time visiting relatives and touring and sightseeing the country. First of all they visited father’s sister Anneliese Meinhardt who had left Germany already in 1935, because she could no longer bear the Nazi discriminations imposed on her life. She was married to Gerd Brueckmann, and they had no children. They lived in a kind of "City Kibbutz", a community of German Jews, which shared all their income and distributed the money according to the needs of each member. They didn’t live in one place, but lived very poorly in different rented flats. Father was shocked at seeing the conditions in which his sister lived. A few months after this visit, Anneliese divorced Gerd and soon married Alfred Neugarten, a soldier of the International Brigades in Spain who brought a small boy with him, Ken, as he was later called. In 1939 the Neugarten’s emigrated to Australia, accepting special visa granted by the Australian Government for Jews in Palestine. In Australia, years later in 1942, they had twins, Frank and Gwendoline (today Anne). Until today all their descendants live in Australia. The "City Kibbutz" didn’t last long and was dissolved after a couple of years. __________________________________________________________________________ מרכז המידע אודות השואה, יד ושם ביה"ס המרכזי להוראת השואה 5 Gerd Brueckmann was killed in action during the 1948 Israeli War of Independence. The other relatives was our mothers favorite Uncle Ludwig Laqueur and his two sons Heinz and Wolfgang, already married but at the time without children, and other cousins who had arrived earlier in Palestine. They all belong to our mother’s side family. The Laqueur family had descended from Reb Dovid Lazarus Laqueur who in about 1800 was the rabbi of the small Jewish community in the village of Staedtel in Upper Silesia. Later generations moved to the cities of Brieg, Oels and Festenberg in Silesia and later to Breslau, the capital of Silesia. All the relatives in Palestine advised our parents not to return to Germany, to renounce the deposit and to stay illegally in Palestine. Father couldn’t imagine that. He thought his place was with his parents in Schwedt, and mother also wanted to return to her family in Germany. So they traveled back to Germany. At the end of May 1938 mother’s twin sister Trude’s baby was born, it was a girl called Marianne. Back in Schwedt our father helped our grandfather to manage his business of growing and processing tobacco. The region of Schwedt, called Uckermark, was the northern most region in the world where tobacco grows. During the 17 and 18 centuries the Prussian Kings settled French Protestant refugees, the Huguenots, who introduced the tobacco industry to the area. Later Protestant refugees expelled by Empress Maria-Theresia from Austria and some Jewish families, such as our ancestors, came to the region. Grandfather was the owner of several fields around Schwedt in which the tobacco plants were grown. After harvesting the leaves they were dried in a big storage shed until they were "ripe" i.e. not too wet and not too dry. Then they were pressed to bales and sent to the customers, the tobacco industries in Bremen and Hamburg. __________________________________________________________________________ מרכז המידע אודות השואה, יד ושם ביה"ס המרכזי להוראת השואה 6 Document 2: The logo of the business letters of grandfather in Schwedt Photo 1: Grandfather Franz Meinhardt in the centre, one of his barn houses. During 1938 grandfather lost all his fields. The Nazi authorities forced him to sell them to Arians (Arianization). The little money he got for the fields was deposited in a frozen account. From this account he was allowed to take out a small amount monthly. He decided to sell the big storage shed, where his firm was located, to a good business and personal Christian friend from Bremen ( the Senator Rasch.). This was done in anticipation of the forced Arianization. Both parties agreed that, if the times should change, grandfather could buy back his firm. The agreement was made orally without any written record. The money paid for the firm was also deposited into the frozen account. __________________________________________________________________________ מרכז המידע אודות השואה, יד ושם ביה"ס המרכזי להוראת השואה 7 2. Some Anecdotes about life in Schwedt and Breslau. - A night in a Hotel - In 1935 the "Nuremberg Laws" (Nürnberger Gesetze) took effect. The laws prohibited any love contact between Jews and Aryans. Offenders found contravening these laws were punished severely. Father had a girl friend in Schwedt, G. D. She was not Jewish. They wanted to have some private time for themselves. In Schwedt this was impossible, everybody knew everyone. They traveled in father’s car to the nearby district center (Kreisstadt) Angermünde. Gisela Meinhardt, a cousin of my father, lent to G.D. her "Ausweis", (identity card).