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Fritz Heinsen * 1896

Klaus-Groth-Straße 99 (Hamburg-Mitte, Borgfelde)

FEBRUAR 1943 HAFT
KZ FUHLSBÜTTEL
DEPORTIERT 1943
KZ AUSCHWITZ
ERMORDET
30.10.1943

Fritz Heinsen, born on 1 Nov. 1896 in Berlin, detained on 27 Feb. 1943 in the Fuhlsbüttel concentration camp, on 29 Apr. 1943 in the Auschwitz concentration camp, death there on 30 Oct. 1943

Intersection of Klaus-Groth-Strasse and Elise-Averdieck-Strasse (Klaus-Groth-Strasse 99)

Like Harry Krebs from Klaus-Groth-Strasse 29 (see corresponding entry) and Alfred Berend from Hirtenstrasse 56 in Hamm (see entry there), Fritz Heinsen fell victim to the so-called "Schallert operation” (Schallert-Aktion) in Feb. 1943.

On 1 Nov. 1896, Fritz Heinsen was born as the first child of Martha Olga Heymannsohn, née Herzfeld, and her husband, Siegfried Heymannsohn, in Berlin. He was followed by another son, Hans. Siegfried Heymannsohn died on 11 Nov. 1899. His widow left Berlin with the two sons and moved to Wiesbaden. She converted to Protestantism and had her name simplified. Effective on 30 May 1903, the Chief District Administrator (Regierungspräsident) of Wiesbaden approved her and her children’s name change to "Heinsen.”

Fritz Heinsen completed middle school [Mittelschule – a practice-oriented secondary school up to grade 10] and then a commercial apprenticeship. In the 1920s, he worked as a shipping specialist in Hamburg and Berlin, where he met his future wife, Helene Jacobi, born on 28 July 1908 in Krölpa (District of Ziegenrück). Her parents, Julie Jacobi, née Hauemann, and Wilhelm Jacobi, a master butcher by trade, lived in Saalfeld (Thuringia) and belonged to the Protestant Church. On 14 Apr. 1927, Fritz and Helene Heinsen were married. Their only son, Wolfgang, was born on 24 Mar. 1928 in Hamburg, and he was baptized at the Michaeliskirche, the main St. Michael’s Church, on 17 May 1928.

Fritz Heinsen worked as a shipping agent (Speditionskaufmann) for the Ulrich Rieck Söhne Company. With his wife and son, he lived in a three-bedroom apartment furnished in solid middle-class style at Klaus-Groth-Strasse 99. The family also employed a household help because Helene Heinsen was frequently ill. With the transfer of power to Hitler, initially nothing changed for the family. According to Nazi terminology, the couple lived in a "privileged mixed marriage” ("privilegierte Mischehe”), their son Wolfgang was given the status of a "Jewish half-breed (Mischling) of the first degree.” The first stroke of fate hit the family on 12 Mar. 1937 when Helene Heinsen died giving birth to the daughter. With her death, the protection provided for the family by the non-Jewish mother became obsolete. Fritz Heinsen raised his son by himself with assistance from the grandparents Jacobi, who moved from Thuringia to Hamburg. Wolfgang Heinsen first attended the eight-grade elementary school (Volksschule) and subsequently the Hindenburg-Oberrealschule [a secondary school without Latin] at Brekelbaumspark.

Hans Heinsen had remained unmarried and emigrated to Sweden.

With the "Aryanization” in 1938 of the Ulrich Rieck Söhne Company, whose Orient department he had headed, Fritz Heinsen became unemployed. He gave up his apartment on Klaus-Groth-Strasse in favor of a smaller apartment at Bethesdastrasse 4. Fritz Heinsen was 42 years old when he received an order to report for military duty in early 1939. The authorities implied that his name change had occurred to disguise his Jewish descent, forcing him the resume his birth name as of 6 Apr. 1939. He was unable to prevent his son from being renamed as well. Whereas the son continued to reside or at least to be registered as residing with the Jacobi grandparents on Bethesdastrasse, Fritz Heinsen lived as a subtenant in the neighborhood, in the very end at Malzweg 7 with the Kohrs. Fritz Heinsen did not join the "Jewish Religious Organization” ("Jüdischer Religionsverband”) or the "Reich Association [of Jews in Germany]” ("Reichsvereinigung [der Juden in Deutschland]”), but he did perform forced labor together with other Jews, in 1940 as an excavator for the Frank Company, and in Jan. 1941 for one week in ice and snow removal as a laborer for the civil engineering department, and finally as a laborer at the Rasch und Jung shoe wholesale firm, located at Grosse Bleichen 31.

The person in charge of placing Jews in these forced labor details was Willibald Schallert at the Hamburg Employment Agency, located at Sägerplatz. Completely unexpectedly, Fritz Heinsen was arrested from his workplace together with Harry Krebs on 27 Feb. 1943. Harry Krebs, too, lived in a "privileged mixed marriage.” As it turned out, they belonged to a group of 17 men previously listed as living in "mixed marriages,” who were arrested by Gestapo officers without any grounds provided and committed to the Gestapo’s "Jewish Affairs Department” ("Judenreferat”) at Rothenbaumchaussee 38. When they were transferred to and interrogated at the Stadthaus, the headquarters of the Hamburg Gestapo, 14 days later, some of them read on their routing forms the remark, "has proven by his conduct that he can no longer be tolerated in the Jewish labor detail.” This note suggests Willibald Schallert as the author of the arrest campaign or of the list, respectively. The Hamburg arrests took place in the context of the "factory operation” ("Fabrikaktion”), in the course of which Jewish forced laborers were arrested across the German Reich. Whether the Hamburg Gestapo, its "Jewish Affairs Department,” or the Reich Security Main Office (Reichssicherheitshauptamt) had ordered it remains unclear.

Like most of the others affected by this operation, Fritz Heinsen was taken to the Fuhlsbüttel police prison. Because of his father’s arrest, Wolfgang Heinsen de facto became an orphan and was given an officially appointed guardian. Until 20 Mar. 1943, he continued to attend school, before he was excluded and forced to work as an unskilled laborer. On 21 Mar. 1943, Pastor Junge confirmed him. Prior to Fritz Heinsen being transferred to Auschwitz on 29 Apr. 1943, his son visited him at the Fuhlsbüttel concentration camp. He recalls that there was talk about deportation to Auschwitz and that neither one of them knew what this meant.

In July 1943, Wolfgang Heinsen and his grandparents Jacobi were bombed out in Borgfelde. His grandmother, Martha Olga Heinsen, was deported from Berlin to Theresienstadt. After the deportation of Fritz Heinsen to Auschwitz, his relatives did not receive any more signs of life from him at all.

The "supervisory authority” ("Aufsichtsbehörde”) informed the "Reich Association of Jews in Germany, Hamburg, Bornstrasse 22” ("Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland”), on 3 Dec. 1943 of the following:
"Fritz Israel Heymannsohn, born on 1 Nov. 1896 in Berlin, died of myocardial insufficiency in the Auschwitz concentration camp on 30 Oct. 1943 at 8:50 a.m.
Relative: Son Wolfgang Heynssen, Hamburg, Malzweg.”

Max Plaut from the Reich Association was unable to reach Wolfgang Heinsen at the address indicated, noting the following in a file memorandum on 7 Jan. 1944: "The same showed up at our branch office to inquire about his father, Fritz Israel Heymannsohn. He was informed that his father had died in the Auschwitz concentration camp on 30 Oct. 1943. The address of Wolfgang Heynssen is no longer Malzweg 7 but instead: Alsterdamm 16/18 split-level room 116/washroom. Mail can reach him c/o Autoteile Gesellschaft H. Klessascheck & Co., Hamburg 1, Ferdinandstrasse 38/40. He was told that he may apply for forwarding of the [deceased’s] estate immediately.”

After the war, Wolfgang Heinsen converted to Judaism.

Translator: Erwin Fink

Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: October 2016
© Hildegard Thevs

Quellen: 4; 5; StaH, 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinden, Abl. 1993, 38; Die Wiedergutmachungsakte, 011196, befindet sich noch im Amt für Wiedergutmachung. Mündliche Mitteilungen von Wolfgang Heinsen; Meyer, "Jüdische Mischlinge".
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