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Familie Marcus: Erwachsene v.l.n.r: Martha, Gustav, Hella, Fritz, Siegmund; Kinder: Felix (Yizhak) und Therese (Rachel). Aufgenommen von Rosa Marcus, Fritz‘ Marcus Ehefrau, in Berlin bei der Auswanderung der Familie Fritz und Rosa Marcus nach Palästina, A
© Privatbesitz

Siegmund Marcus * 1876

Ritterstraße 63 (Wandsbek, Eilbek)

HIER WOHNTE
SIEGMUND MARCUS
JG. 1876
DEPORTIERT 1941
MINSK
ERMORDET

further stumbling stones in Ritterstraße 63:
Henriette Hella (irrt. Ella) Marcus

Henriette Hella Marcus, née Ascher, born on 2 Feb. 1887 in Doberan/Mecklenburg, deported on 8 Nov. 1941 to Minsk
Siegmund Marcus, born on 12 Mar. 1876 in Schwerin/Mecklenburg, deported on 8 Nov. 1941 to Minsk

Ritterstrasse 63

Siegmund Marcus was born on 12 Mar. 1876 in Schwerin/Mecklenburg. He was the oldest child of the merchant Eduard Marcus, born in Schwerin on 4 Dec. 1835, and his wife Helene, née Burchard, born on 21 May 1850 in Neubukow. Siegmund had five younger siblings: Antonia (called Toni), born on 17 Jan. 1878; Gustav, born on 19 June 1879; Otto, born on 11 Dec. 1880; Maria (called Riekchen), born on 7 Feb. 1882; as well as Fritz, born on 16 June 1894. The siblings, too, were born in Schwerin.

At the time Siegmund Marcus was born, his parents lived in their house at Schmiedestrasse 17b, still a busy shopping street in Schwerin even today. His father operated a store for men’s fashions there, later the "representation of a lottery collection” was added.

Siegmund Marcus’ future wife, Hella Ascher, was born on 2 Feb. 1887 in the house of her parents, the merchant Theodor Ascher and the housewife Dora, née Jacobson, at what was then Poststrasse 16 (today: Severinstrasse 13) in Doberan/Mecklenburg. Hella’s family was of the Jewish faith, as was the family of Siegmund Marcus. In Doberan, Theodor Ascher managed an agency of the Mecklenburgische Hypotheken- und Wechselbank Schwerin, a mortgage and exchange bank. The residential and business building of the Ascher family at the time reveals even to this day that they were well off.

Corresponding to the economic situation of her parents, Hella Ascher attended the girls’ secondary school on Marienstrasse in Doberan together with girls from the surrounding villages and landed estates until she was 17 years old.

Hella had one sister, Martha, born on 26 Mar. 1881, and half-sister Ina, born on 8 July 1873. Even today, one can tell from looking at her later domicile at Poststrasse 17 (today: Severinstrasse 13), located opposite the parents’ home, that she [Martha] lived in prosperous circumstances. Martha Ascher died on 1 Dec. 1912, at the age of only 31.

Before 1900, Siegmund Marcus apparently worked as a commercial clerk for his father in Schwerin. The census of the Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin carried out in 1900 indicates Siegmund Marcus as a one-year volunteer in the 89th Grenadier Regiment in Schwerin. By this time, he no longer lived with his parents but as a subtenant with the Röper family at Werderstrasse 9.

Hella Ascher and Siegmund Marcus were married on 26 Apr. 1908 in Doberan. The young Marcus couple settled in Parchim, Siegmund’s place of residence. Parchim is located about 40 kilometers (approx. 25 mi) southeast of Schwerin. In 1910, the city had almost 10,000 inhabitants. Daughter Käthe was born there on 23 Jan. 1909.

Like many Mecklenburg residents at this time, Siegmund Marcus and his family were also drawn to Hamburg. In the big city, promising job prospects were beckoning. The Marcus family arrived in Hamburg probably in 1912. The Hamburg directory contains the name of "S. Marcus” for the first time in 1913, in combination with the occupational designation of agent and an address located in Hamburg-Altstadt at Graskeller 21. As early as one year later, the family changed addresses to Mattentwiete 2, a little later to Mattentwiete 3 (rear building), also in Hamburg-Altstadt. The job title in the Hamburg directory switched from "agent” to "agencies,” and all the way to "silk ribbon representation.” In 1919, the family moved to Ritterstrasse 63 in Hamburg-Eilbek, staying there for 12 years.

During the Eilbek years of the Marcus family, Siegmund Marcus did business as a "merchant.” Since the beginning of 1929, he worked as an independent representative for photographic film in Northern Germany, also administrating a large building on the Alster River. For the time before 1933, relatives estimated Siegmund Marcus’ assets to amount to 20,000 to 30,000 RM (reichsmark).

In 1931/1932, a move to Kippingstrasse 6 in Hamburg-Eimsbüttel was on the agenda. Siegmund Marcus now described himself as a "commercial agent.” Siegmund’s brother, Otto Marcus, remembered differently in the subsequent restitution proceedings. According to him, even before 1933, the Marcus family owned a four-and-a-half- to five-bedroom apartment at Haynstrasse 13 in Hamburg-Eppendorf, listed in the Hamburg directory from 1936 onward. Hella Marcus’ mother lived there as well, while her father had passed away as early as 1920. Until getting married to Leonhard Friedberg, probably in Mar. 1937, daughter Käthe lived on Haynstrasse, according to Otto Marcus’ report.

The circumstances of life of the Marcus family in the years after the handing-over of power to the Nazis are in the dark. The documentation concerning restitution proceedings after 1945 does not provide any information about the humiliations and the consequences of the discriminations that doubtlessly affected the Marcus family as well. One can safely assume that Siegmund Marcus was gradually deprived of the means to earn an income, thus rendering the economic circumstances of the family increasingly more precarious. In 1939, the assets had nearly halved due to the economic restrictions imposed on Jews. All the same, the "levy on Jewish assets” ("Judenvermögensabgabe”) demanded from Siegmund Marcus in 1939 still amounted to 4,200 RM.

At the end of 1940, the Marcus couple was deprived of their own apartment. They were sent to become subtenants with the relatives Louis Loewenthal and his wife Ina, née Ascher (Hella Marcus’ half-sister), at Haynstrasse 10 in Eppendorf. Together with Pauline Wolff, already 70 years old, whom Louis Loewenthal had been compelled to take in even before the Marcus relatives, three tenant groups with five persons lived in the apartment at Haynstrasse 10 by then. Siegmund and Hella Marcus were compelled to sell large parts of their extensive household effects far below value. They were allowed to keep only the most valuable items, including a substantial stamp collection.

At Haynstrasse 10, the Marcus couple received the deportation order. Siegmund and Hella Marcus were deported to Minsk on 8 Nov. 1941.

The remaining belongings were confiscated and auctioned off immediately after the deportation. In early Jan. 1942, the auctioneer paid about 1,500 RM to the treasurer’s office with the Chief Finance Administrator (Oberfinanzkasse).

Siegmund Marcus’ brother Otto later reported about a message from Riga in 1942. After that, there were no more signs of life at all from Siegmund and Hella Marcus. Both were declared dead as of 9 May 1945 in the course of subsequent inheritance proceedings.

Siegmund and Hella’s daughter Käthe got married a second time on 30 Oct. 1941, after her first husband, Leonhard Friedberg, had already passed away on 30 Dec. 1937. Her name was now de Haas. Nine days later, on 8 Nov. 1941, she and her new husband, Edgar, born on 26 Sept. 1910 in Wandsbek, were also deported to Minsk.

Siegmund Marcus’ sister Antonia died in her native city of Schwerin in 1924, at the age of 56.

The brother Gustav and his wife Martha lived in Berlin. Both were deported from Berlin to Auschwitz on 19 Feb. 1943 and murdered there.

Otto Marcus, also a brother, lived with his wife Hannah in Breslau (today Wroclaw in Poland). This couple had two children, Ernst (Schlomoh), born in 1920, and Lena, born in 1923. Both children emigrated to Palestine in 1938. The parents emigrated to Shanghai, in 1939, after Otto Marcus had been detained in the Buchenwald concentration camp for some time.

Sister Maria (Riekchen) Marcus married the non-Jewish Freiherr (Baron) von Fichtl, moved to Berlin and had three children. The von Fichtl family survived the period of National Socialism.

In 1923, the youngest brother, Fritz, married Rosa, née Nelken. Together with their two children, Therese (Rachel), born in 1923, and Felix (Yizhak), born in 1931, they left Germany from the town of Kolberg in 1936, taking up residence in Palestine. Thanks are due to Yizhak Marcus for the information about the fates of Siegmund Marcus’ siblings and their families.

The married couples Siegmund and Hella Marcus as well as Louis and Ina Loewenthal had both lived at Haynstrasse 13 from 1936 until 1939 already, before being forced to change, probably in quick succession, to move into the shared apartment at Haynstrasse 10 in 1940. The drugs agent Louis Loewenthal, born on 23 Nov. 1860 in Hamburg, was married to Hella Marcus’ older half-sister, Ina. The Loewenthal couple had two children, Martin, killed in the First World War in 1917, and daughter Hedwig, who was born in 1894 and emigrated to the Swiss city of Basel in 1935. Louis Loewenthal passed away on 16 June 1942, shortly before his wife Ina was deported to Theresienstadt on 19 July 1942. Before that, she had to pay 2,529.01 RM for a "home purchase contract” ("Heimeinkaufsvertrag”). As early as 6 Sept. 1942, she was deported further to Treblinka and murdered there. For Ina Loewenthal, a Stolperstein is located at Ifflandstrasse 8 in Hamburg-Hohenfelde.

The fellow occupant of the Marcus family at Haynstrasse 10, Pauline Wolff, née Koppel, born on 30 Jan. 1870 in Leer/East Friesland, took her own life on 14 July 1942 in face of imminent deportation to Theresienstadt on 15 July 1942. In the very end, she lived at Bogenstrasse 27.


Translator: Erwin Fink

Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: October 2017
© Ingo Wille

Quellen: 1; 4; 5; 7; 9; AB; StaH 314-15 OFP Oberfinanzpräsident R 1938/3451; 331-5 Polizeibehörde – Unnatürliche Sterbefälle 3 Akte 1942/1157; 332-5 Standesämter 1072-16/1937, 8180-345/1942; 351-11 Amt für Wiedergutmachung 3128; 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinden 992 e 2 Band 2, Band 5 Deportationslisten; Standesamt Parchim, Geburtsurkunde Käthe Marcus; Auskunft des Stadtarchivs Schwerin, Jörg Moll vom 29. November 2011 zu Siegmund Marcus’ Geschwistern; Heiratsurkunde Siegmund und Hella Ascher, Stadtarchiv Bad Doberan; Dank an Petra Klawitter, Gelben Sande, Yizhak Marcus, Israel, und Jürgen Seemann, Schwerin, für ergänzende Informationen, Hinweise, Recherchen und ein Foto; Dank an Frau Gläwe, Stadtarchiv Bad Doberan für intensive Recherche und einige sehr hilfreiche Hinweise, sowie an Frau Steinbruch, Landeshauptarchiv MV, Schwerin, für freundliche Unterstützung.
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