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Siegfried Salomon * 1909

ABC-Straße 19 (Hamburg-Mitte, Neustadt)

HIER WOHNTE
SIEGFRIED SALOMON
JG. 1909
DEPORTIERT 1941
RIGA
ERMORDET

further stumbling stones in ABC-Straße 19:
Lena Salomon

Siegfried Salomon, born 17 July 1909 in Kiel, deported 8 Nov. 1941 to Minsk
Lena Salomon, née Hoffmann, born 5 Apr. 1914 in Altona, deported 8 Nov. 1941 to Minsk

ABC-Straße 19 (ABC-Straße 24)

The parents of Siegfried Salomon were both natives of Kiel. His father Daniel Salomon was born on 4 May 1874, his mother Fanny, née Jonas, on 3 May 1881. Daniel Salomon worked as a messenger and was registered along with his family in Lübeck at Wahmstraße 42 as of 1929. Kiel was also where his older sister Elsa was born on 28 May 1901. Elsa Gross, née Salomon, later immigrated to Uruguay. Siegfried’s younger brother Israel Salomon was born on 8 Feb. 1913 in Bad Mergentheim in Baden-Württemberg. He managed to flee to England in the summer of 1939.

When he was done with his formal education, Siegfried Salomon completed a three-year apprenticeship as a druggist. Siegfried Salomon wanted to take part in a so-called Hachschara to prepare professionally for a life in Palestine, so he registered with Fränkel in Blankenese at Rissener Landstraße 127 on 16 June 1933. Anton Fränkel (born 29 Apr. 1896 in Vienna) was the custodian of the Wilhelminenhöhe children’s recovery home of the Israelite Community located at that address.

Wilhelminenhöhe was also a settlers’ school where the Zionist youth organization Hechaluz (Hebrew: the pioneer) ran an agricultural re-training facility.

In the summer of 1934, Siegfried Salomon underwent training to become a gardener in Harksheide at the manor Gut Brüderhof. It was there that the youth organization ran an additional training facility under the direction of the non-Jewish tenant Ernst Wilhelm Leuschner (Gut Brüderhof belonged to the Evangelical foundation Das Rauhe Haus (The Rough House), founded by Johann Hinrich Wichern in Hamburg in 1833).

Afterwards, Siegfried Salomon spent time in Schnakenberg. The circumstances that led him there are not known. In the beginning of Nov. 1935, he was once again living in Lübeck, on 8 Jan. 1936 he returned to Hamburg. He was never able to fulfill his desire to immigrate to Palestine, possibly because he was not able to obtain a visa for the territory under British mandate. Siegfried Salomon registered as a commercial assistant in Altona at General-Litzmann-Straße 19 (today Stresemannstraße). At the start of Sept. he lived at Hansastraße 57 as a lodger of the couple Bertha and Adolf Levin (deported from Berlin to Theresienstadt and killed in Chelmno (Kulmhof) in May 1942), then at Neuen Steinweg 27/28 with Rebekka and James Rosenstein (Stumbling Stones have been laid for the Rosensteins at Rutschbahn 25). Siegfried Salomon was now working as a servant and apparently lived with his employers.

We do not know when he met Lena Hoffmann. The couple wed sometime between 1936 and 1938. Lena Hoffmann, called Leni, was born in Altona on 5 Apr. 1914. She had worked for various families as a "household apprentice”. The last place, according to her religion tax card, was at Leopold Katz’s matzo factory at Neumann-Reichardt Straße 29-33 in Hamburg-Wandsbek, where unleavened bread was manufactured for Passover (until 1934 the factory was located at Kohlhöfen 19/20).

Her family had lived on General-Litzmann-Straße since 1918, when it was still called Kleine Gärtnerstraße (today Stresemannstraße). Her father Munisch Hoffmann (born 3 June 1881) came from Eastern Europe and was born in Stanisławów (Stanislau) in Galicia (today Iwano-Frankiwsk, Ukraine). Her mother Marie Cilly, née Zuer (born 5 Apr. 1882), was a native of Leipzig where their eldest children were born: Erna on 18 Feb. 1908) and Henry Heinz (born 3 Sept.1909). The couple had wed in Meuselwitz on 15 Mar. 1907. Her younger siblings were all born in Altona: Bertha on 11 Feb. 1916, Nitta (Meta) on 19 Nov. 1920, Hella on 10 Feb. 1923 and Manfred on 20 Oct. 1927. Marie and Munisch Hoffmann worked in shoe repair and the sale of leather goods along with their eldest children. They ran several shops in Hamburg and Harburg.

Lena’s parents had Polish citizenship – her mother had received it through her marriage. The Hoffmann Family had moved to Bundesstraße 31 by the time they were deported to the Polish border on 28 Oct. 1938, along with their four under-aged children, the families of their eldest son Henry Hoffmann (see his entry) and their eldest daughter Erna who was married to the shoemaker Alfred Tugendhaft (born on 19 May 1904, killed on 6 Mar. 1943 in Majdanek), within the framework of the so-called Operation Poland. All trace of them was lost during the summer of 1939 after the provisional camp in the empty barracks at the Polish border town Zbaszyn (Bentschen) was disbanded.

Lena escaped expulsion because she had taken on German citizenship through her marriage. The Salomons lived as lodgers of the businessman Jakob Mendel (born 12 Feb. 1875 in Essen) and his non-Jewish wife Maria, née Klein (born 10 Feb. 1901 in Essen Katerberg), in a three-and-a-half-room apartment at ABC-Straße 24. Jakob Mendel contracted a severe illness in 1935 and was released from Esterwege concentration camp unable to work. His wife was released that same year after several months in Moringen concentration camp. The Mendels were penniless and desperately needed lodgers. Jakob Mendel died on 28 Oct. 1941 at the Jewish Hospital at Johnsallee 68 (a Stumbling Stone has been laid for his sister Jenny Moses at Hoheluftchaussee 19, see Stolpersteine in Hamburg-Eimsbüttel and Hamburg-Hoheluft-West). A mere 14 days after the death of his landlord, Siegfried Salomon received his deportation orders for 8 Nov. 1941 to Minsk Ghetto. Lena then signed up "voluntarily for evacuation” so she would not be separated from him.

Siegfried’s parents Fanny and Daniel Salomon had tried to emigrate, but their attempts failed. On the morning of 6 Dec. 1941, they were taken from Lübeck to Oldesloe where they were added to the Hamburg transport of Jews to Riga.

As of Apr. 2008, Stumbling Stones honor Mr. and Mrs. Salomon in Lübeck at Wahmstraße 42. A Stumbling Stone has been laid for Lena’s sister Bertha Hoffmann at Husumer Straße 16 in Hamburg (see Stolpersteine in Hamburg-Eppendorf).

Translator: Suzanne von Engelhardt
Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: May 2020
© Susanne Rosendahl

Quellen: 1; StaH 213-13 Z 22579; StaH 351-11 AfW 25229 (Salomon, Siegfried); StaH 351-11 AfW 5232 (Hoffmann, Munisch); StaH 351-11 AfW 34363 (Hoffmann, Henry); StaH 351-11 AfW 24520 (Mendel, Maria); StaH 351-11 AfW 29589 (Tugendhaft, Alfred); StaH 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinde Nr. 992 e 2 Band 2; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 8174 u 349; Heidemarie Kugler-Weiemann über Fanny und Daniel Salomon, http://www.stolpersteine-luebeck.de/n/de/main/adressen/wahmstrasse-42.html, (Zugriff 8.5.2014); Bußenius: Zionistische Erziehung, in: Menora und Hakenkreuz, S. 425–435; http://www.statistik-des-holocaust.de/list_ger_nwd_411206.html, (Zugriff 14.2.2015); www.ancestry.de (Heiratsregister Munisch Hoffman und Marie Zilie Zuer am 15. März 1907, Zugriff 3.8.2017).
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