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Mendel Reiss * 1876

Hammer Landstraße 12 (Hamburg-Mitte, Hamm)

HIER WOHNTE
MENDEL REISS
JG. 1876
FLUCHT 1938 HOLLAND
INTERNIERT WESTERBORK
DEPORTIERT 1944
BERGEN-BELSEN
ERMORDET 28.10.1944

further stumbling stones in Hammer Landstraße 12:
Stefanie Reiss

Menachem Mendel Reiss, born on 29 July 1876 in Lemberg (today Lviv in Ukraine), in 1938, flight to the Netherlands, on 20 June 1943 detained in the Westerbork camp, on 15 Feb. 1944 in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, died there on 28 Oct. 1944

Stefanie Reiss, née Czaczkes, born on 5 May 1887 in Lemberg, in 1938, flight to the Netherlands, on 20 June 1943 detained in the Westerbork camp, on 15 Feb. 1944 in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, on 10 Apr. 1945, transport to Theresienstadt, died on 23 Apr. 1945 in Tröbitz

Hammer Landstrasse 12

When exactly the Reiss and Czaczkes families from the royal and imperial (Habsburg) city of Lemberg and settled in Altona and Hamburg, respectively, is not known. From Lemberg, a multicultural city in Galicia with a large population of educated assimilated Jews, they brought with them not only Austro-Hungarian citizenship, but also knowledge of several languages, literary and musical traditions, and commercial skills.

The Czaczkes family included the parents Jakob and Rose, née Kalt, widowed name Halpern, daughter Stefanie, born on 5 May 1887 in Lemberg, her older brother Nathan, born on 28 Dec. 1885 in Stanislaus (Ivano-Franskivsk)/Galicia, and the younger brother Zygmund/Siegmund, born on 24 May 1894, also in Lemberg. Nathan Czaczkes became a general practitioner and lived with his wife Ruth, née Peine, at Susannenstrasse 43 in Eimsbüttel. Due to a senate decision of 24 June 1921, he assumed from then on the family name of Costa. His brother Siegmund Czaczkes traded in men’s wear and lived with his wife Leonie, née Stern, and son Gregor, born on 9 Feb. 1923, first at Ulmenau 3 in Hamburg-Eilbek, then at Andreasstrasse 35 in Hamburg-Winterhude.

On 14 June 1908, Stefanie Czaszkes married Menachem Mendel Reiss, also from Lemberg and eleven years her senior. His father was Joseph Ber/Beer Reiss/Reis, whose various spellings of his name reflect his origins. On 27 June 1882, he received a Hamburg residents’ registration form with the address indicated as 2nd Elbstrasse 14 (today: Neanderstrasse) in Hamburg-Neustadt. It also showed his job designation of "tradesman” ("Handelsmann”) and the names of the relatives: Wife Rachel, née Neuer, born in 1848, named Rosa; Menachem Mendel, born on 29 July 1876; Isaak, born on 3 May 1880; and Eleonore, born on 23 Feb. 1882. Soon afterward, the Reiss family moved to Altona, where their daughter Polina/Paula was born on 28 Oct. 1884. The names of other siblings are not known to us.

Josef Ber Reiss and his wife Rachel joined the Altona Hochdeutsche Israelitische Gemeinde ("High German Israelite Community”). In 1889, they established the "Kaufhaus Reiss,” a yard goods and linens store at Kirchenstrasse 36, next to which they also lived. Josef Ber Reiss died at the age of 51 on 20 May 1898 and he was buried in the Community cemetery on Bornkampsweg. His widow continued the business and moved it to Altonaer Fischmarkt 39-41, again with an attached apartment.

Son Mendel attended the Israelite Community School in Altona starting on 6 Aug. 1886 and graduated on 1 Apr. 1891. He aspired to a career as an opera tenor. After his singing training, he performed in various small opera houses such as the one in Bremen, but then ended his career because as the oldest child, he had to support his mother. However, toward this end, he first had to complete an apprenticeship as a merchant. Following his training, he became a partner in the "Kaufhaus Reiss” in 1906 and four years later, a personally liable partner. When his mother retired from the business on 31 Dec. 1913, he took it over completely. Rachel Reiss outlived her husband by almost 20 years. Passing away on 17 Apr. 1917, she was also buried in the Bornkampsweg cemetery.

In the meantime, Stefanie Reiss had given birth to her first child, daughter Verona, called Vera, born on 20 June 1909. One year later, on 20 July 1910, son Joseph Bernhard was born. Kurt Egon was born as a late arrival on 28 Nov. 1916.

Even during the First World War, Mendel and Stefanie Reiss improved their situation: Together with a partner, Mendel Reiss founded the Guttmann & Co. men’s wear store at Mönckebergstrasse 12, intersection to Barkhof, and the family moved from Hafenstrasse 3 to a larger and more expensive apartment at Grosse Bergstrasse 271. Stefanie Reiss took over the responsibility for sales and personnel in her husband’s store and represented her husband when he went on business trips. Thanks to her knowledge of English, French, Polish, Italian, and Russian, she achieved an influx of foreign customers. Although these activities went beyond the assistance by wives, as required by the German Civil Code, and she fully filled the position of an employee, she was not mentioned in the preserved business documents. The household was managed by a non-Jewish housekeeper, Henny Plate, who was assisted by a maid and a nanny.

The children attended secondary schools, Vera the Lyceum – the girls’ high school – on Allee, the two sons the high school on Königstrasse. All three received piano lessons; Vera also had her own grand piano on which she practiced for hours. In the summer, Stefanie Reiss spent four weeks of vacation with the children in Timmendorf on the Baltic Sea.

In 1928, Mendel Reiss, his wife and the children acquired German citizenship. For this purpose, it was necessary to establish proof of his military service. Mendel Reiss had served as a sergeant in Albania during World War I. (Only ten years later, they became stateless, as they were automatically expatriated parallel to their emigration).

After the business had been expanded to include a cigar shop on the corner of Spitalerstrasse, the Reiss couple employed 25 people at times, including a decorator and a poster painter. The enterprise flourished, and Mendel and Stefanie Reiss were able to afford an even larger apartment and an even more comfortable life. They moved into a nine-room apartment at Museumstrasse 25 in Altona, purchased an Austro-Daimler and hired a driver. In the winter, they went on vacation together.

None of the children wanted to take over their parents’ business, but each followed their own musical inclinations. Vera and Egon Reiss studied music; Josef also switched to music after an initial commercial apprenticeship. Egon prepared himself for a career as a concert pianist and conductor for many years and he also studied poster painting and interior decoration at the School of Arts and Crafts.

When Vera Reiss married in 1930, she quit her studies. Her husband, Kurt Philip, was co-owner of pawnshops. Her parents provided her with a generous trousseau and dowry and gave her the furnishings for a four-room apartment.

However, the world economic crisis did not leave Guttmann & Co. unscathed. In Dec. 1931, Mendel Reiss concluded a court settlement with his creditors, which deeply shook his self-image. He was not able to keep the business. Through the mediation of his brother-in-law Siegmund Czaczkes, the business passed to an acquaintance, who was ultimately unable to prevent bankruptcy.

After a period of rest, Mendel Reiss became active again. The changes in his life were not initially due to the transfer of power to Hitler, but rather to the life of his oldest son. Joseph Reiss had completed his apprenticeship as a textile merchant at Gebr. Robinson (Robinson Bros.), the prominent clothing store on Neuer Wall, and then worked in his father’s company. He had never given up his artistic interests, but he saw no future in Germany. He emigrated to Belgium in 1933, where he took the artist’s name of Varisory, and became active in radio.

The next member of the family to emigrate was Stefanie Reiss’ brother Nathan Costa in 1935 to Palestine, after his divorced wife and children had already emigrated there in 1933.

In Mar. 1933, Mendel and Stefanie Reiss moved with their youngest son Egon and the housekeeper from Altona to Hamburg, where they initially lived at Mühlendamm 44 in Hohenfelde. At the same time, after many years of membership in the High German Israelite Community in Altona, they moved to the Hamburg German-Israelitic Community.

Instead of dealing in men’s shirts, Mendel Reiss then learned to produce and repair them from Carl Feder and became co-owner of the Wegner & Co. shirt factory in Spaldingstrasse in Hammerbrook. Since he was not entered in the register of qualified craftsmen, he was unable to open his own business, but in 1935, he succeeded in opening at Graskeller 18/20 a small shop for men’s fashion articles. At the same time, he moved into an apartment at Hammer Landstrasse 12 in Hamm. The owners were the heirs of Baron von Ohlendorff, whose magnificent villa was located opposite on the Geest slope. On the ground floor of the apartment building was the Schauburg movie theater, above it were medical specialists and a dentist. Egon lived there with his parents until his emigration to Luxembourg on 12 May 1936.

Verona and Kurt Philip apparently emigrated in 1937, and not much later, Verona’s parents followed them with housekeeper Henny Plate. They initially lived in The Hague, where Mendel and Stefanie Reiss managed to support themselves by selling their jewelry, two fur coats, and the stamp collection. In 1938, they received the last visit from their son Joseph. In Jan. 1939, Siegmund Czaczkes also moved to the Netherlands with his family, his wife Leonie and son Gregor, born on 9 Feb. 1923.

When the German Wehrmacht occupied the Netherlands on 10 May 1940, the coastal area had to be cleared. Mendel and Stefanie Reiss moved to Gouda and sought a livelihood there. They started their own business with a stocking repair shop. Henny Plate returned to Hamburg. Verona and Kurt Philip went into hiding until the end of the German occupation of the Netherlands and remained there after the liberation.

After the Jews had been concentrated in Amsterdam starting at the end of 1942, Mendel and Stefanie Reiss eventually lived at Albrecht-Dürerstraat 1. In Oct. 1942, Mendel Reiss took over a position in the "general service for social concerns of the Employment Agency Germany” at the "Jews’ Council” in Amsterdam. This entailed both of their "Sperre,” the protection from deportation. Nevertheless, they were arrested during the major raid among the remaining Jews on 20 June 1943 and interned in the Westerbork transit camp.

They were among the permanent prisoners who were employed there as "exchange Jews.” Himmler used them in order to exchange them, if necessary, for Reich Germans or for goods in short supply. On 15 Feb. 1944, they were transferred to the "star camp” ("Sternlager”) in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, the "residential” camp for exchange Jews there. Mendel Reiss died there on 28 Oct. 1944 at the age of 68.

Stefanie Reiss remained in the camp for the winter and she was sent to Theresienstadt on 10 Apr. 1945 on a transport. She died on the way there in Tröbitz on 23 Apr. 1945. Later named the "Lost Train,” this was the last of three trains used to evacuate about 2,000 prisoners from Bergen-Belsen to Theresienstadt when the British Army approached.

After a ten-day odyssey through Germany on the way to Falkenberg/Elster in southern Brandenburg, the train came to a stop in front of the blown-up Elster Bridge. Typhus had broken out among the passengers. The Red Army made sure that the train arrived in Tröbitz and that the 700 inhabitants of the village took care of the passengers of the train. Many of them became infected. Altogether, the typhoid epidemic claimed more than 320 lives. Among them was Stefanie Reiss. She reached the age of 57. She is commemorated at the memorial site there.

The relatives of Mendel Reiss who remained in Hamburg had already been deported: sister-in-law Käthe Minna Reiss, née Lievendag, on 28 Oct. 1938 to Bentschen/Zbaszyn/Poland; Eleonore, married name Holz, with her husband Jacob, on 6 Dec. 1941 to Riga (see corresponding entries); Polina, married name Holz, with her husband Abraham Adolf Wolf on 19 July 1942 to Theresienstadt. No one returned.

Zygmund/Siegmund, Leonie and Gregor Czaczkes were interned in Westerbork for only a few days before being deported to the Sobibor death camp on 2 July 1943.

After four years of internment in various concentration camps in Belgium and France, Joseph Reiss-Varisory escaped from the transport during his transfer to the Dachau concentration camp. He experienced the end of the war with forged papers as an interpreter in the transit camp for foreign workers in Dachau and remained in Germany.

Egon Reiss emigrated to Cuba.

Translator: Erwin Fink
Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: September 2020
© Hildegard Thevs

Quellen: 1, 2 F 321, 4, 5, 8; Hamburger Adressbücher; StaH 351-11 Wiedergutmachung 3089, 9333, 18382, 29608, 35977, 41283; 332-5 Geburts-, Heirats-, Sterberegister; 522-1, Jüdische Gemeinden 390, 391; www.jüdischer-friedhof-altona.de/datenbank.html, Bornkampsweg; Joodsmonument; Hans-Dieter Arntz: Tröbitz 1945 und der Verlorene Zug, in: Der letzte Judenälteste von Bergen-Belsen, S. 449–530, Aachen 2012; Anna von Villiez, Mit aller Kraft verdrängt, München, Hamburg, S. 248; https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vorzugsjude, Abruf 9.11.2019; Arolsen, Kartothek des Judenrats Amsterdam, Abruf 9.1.2020.
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