Search for Names, Places and Biographies

Helena Saldorf * 1858

Deichstraße 29 (Hamburg-Mitte, Hamburg-Altstadt)

HIER WOHNTE
HELENA SALDORF
JG. 1858
EINGEWIESEN 1939
HEIANSTALT LANGENHORN
"VERLEGT" 23.9.1940
BRANDENBURG
ERMORDET 23.9.1940
"AKTION T4"

Helena Saldorf, born on 30 Aug. 1858 in Hamburg, murdered on 23 Sept. 1940 in the Brandenburg/Havel euthanasia killing center

Stolperstein in Hamburg-Altstadt, at Deichstrasse 29 (formerly Deichstrasse 30)

Helena Saldorf was born on 30 Aug. 1858 in Hamburg as the oldest of three children of the Jewish married couple Salomon Michel and Miehne Saldorf. After her, Mathilde was born on 4 Sept. 1861 and Miguel on 3 June 1865, also in Hamburg. The family was of the Jewish religion. The parents, Salomon Michel Saldorf, born on 25 Aug. 1820 in Bremen, and Miehne, née Collin, born in Apr. 1824 in Plön, had married on 21 Feb. 1858 in Hamburg.

At the time of Helena’s birth, the Saldorf family lived at Hütten 61 in Hamburg-Neustadt, at time the other two children were born, on Görttwiete between Hopfenmarkt and Rödingsmarkt in Hamburg’s historic downtown.

Salomon Michel Saldorf initially worked as a lithographer (Lithograph). His task was to transfer the artwork to the lithographic stone reversed left to right as exactly as possible. Already by the time of Helena’s birth, he had expanded his field of activity by stone printing (Steindruck). The stone printer’s workshop and the family apartment were located at the same address, Hütten 61. From 1867 onward, the Hamburg directory identifies the lithographer "M. Saldorf” as being based at Deichstrasse 31 (today Deichstrasse 29) in Hamburg’s historic downtown. The family lived and worked there for more than 20 years. In addition to the lithography and stone printing shop at Deichstrasse 31, Fischmarkt 2, and Schopenstehl 15/16, Michel Saldorf had a share in a company under the name of Saldorf & Heinike, "lithography, book and stone printing” with the almost identical company specialization. When Salomon Michel died in 1874, his widow Miehne took over the business and continued to run it until 1891. Helena Saldorf’s brother Miguel had joined the printing company. In 1892, he married Emily Lazarus, a tailor’s daughter who was also Jewish, born on 22 June 1874 in Manchester. Miehne Saldorf gave up operations on Deichstrasse, so that Miguel Saldorf concentrated on the new company.

By this time, Miehne Saldorf lived together with her son and probably also with Helena at Grosse Reichenstrasse 49/51, located in Hamburg’s historic downtown as well. Whether the second daughter Mathilde still lived in her mother’s household is not known.

No information is available about Helena Saldorf’s childhood, youth, school attendance, or vocational training. Her patient file card shows that she had health problems and was treated as an inpatient at the "Friedrichsberg lunatic asylum” ("Irrenanstalt Friedrichsberg”) at the end of the nineteenth century.

In Nov. 1904, she was admitted to the "Langenhorn lunatic asylum.” Her mother Miehne did not live to see this anymore. She had died on 8 Feb. 1903. In 1935, Helena Saldorf was admitted to the Carl-Ninck-Haus of the diaconal Anscharhöhe Asylum (Anstalten Anscharhöhe) in Lokstedt (today Hamburg-Eppendorf). In July 1939, she again became a patient of the institution in Langenhorn, which by then was called "sanatorium and nursing home” (Heil- und Pflegeanstalt).

In the spring/summer of 1940, the "euthanasia” headquarters in Berlin, located at Tiergartenstrasse 4, planned a special operation aimed against Jews in public and private sanatoriums and nursing homes. It had the Jewish persons living in the institutions registered and moved together in what were officially so-called collection institutions. The Hamburg-Langenhorn "sanatorium and nursing home” ("Heil- und Pflegeanstalt” Hamburg-Langenhorn) was designated the North German collection institution. All institutions in Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein, and Mecklenburg were ordered to move the Jews living in their facilities there by 18 Sept. 1940. After all Jewish patients from the North German institutions had arrived in Langenhorn, they were taken to Brandenburg/Havel on 23 Sept. 1940, together with the Jewish patients who had lived there for some time. At age 82, Helena Saldorf was the second oldest in the group. On the same day, they were killed with carbon monoxide in the part of the former penitentiary converted into a gas-killing facility. Only one patient, Ilse Herta Zachmann, escaped this fate at first (see corresponding entry).

It is not known whether, and if so, when relatives became aware of Helena Saldorf's death. In all documented reports it was claimed that the person concerned had died in Chelm (Polish) or Cholm (German). It was noted on the birth register entry of Helena Saldorf that she had died in Chelm on 7 Dec. 1940 and that the records office of Chelm II had registered her death under number 569/1940. However, those murdered in Brandenburg were never in Chelm or Cholm, a town east of Lublin. The former Polish sanatorium there no longer existed after SS units had murdered almost all patients on 12 Jan. 1940. Also, there was no German records office in Chelm. Its fabrication and the use of postdated dates of death served to disguise the killing operation and at the same time enabled the authorities to claim higher care expenses for periods extended accordingly.

The fates of Helena Saldorf’s siblings Mathilde and Miguel as well as his wife are not known. Their names do not appear in the Memorial Books and victim lists.
Helena Saldorf is commemorated by a Stolperstein in Hamburg-Altstadt at Deichstrasse 29 (formerly Deichstrasse 31).

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

Stand: March 2020
© Ingo Wille

Quellen: 1; 4; 5; 9; StaH 133-1 III Staatsarchiv III, 3171-2/4 U.A. 4, Liste psychisch kranker jüdischer Patientinnen und Patienten der psychiatrischen Anstalt Langenhorn, die aufgrund nationalsozialistischer "Euthanasie"-Maßnahmen ermordet wurden, zusammengestellt von Peter von Rönn, Hamburg (Projektgruppe zur Erforschung des Schicksals psychisch Kranker in Langenhorn); 332-3 Zivilstandsaufsicht C 149 Sterberegister Nr. 444/1874 Salomon Michael Saldorf; 332-5 Standesämter 518 Sterberegister Nr. 255/1903 Miehne Saldorf, 2792 Heiratsregister Nr. 802/1892 Miguel Saldorf/Emily Lazarus; 352-8/7 Staatskrankenanstalt Langenhorn Abl. 1/1995 Aufnahme-/Abgangsbuch Langenhorn 26.8.1939 bis 27.1.1941; 522-1 Jüdischen Gemeinden 696e Geburtsregister Nr. 215/1858 Helena Saldorf, 696f Geburtsregister Nr. 221/1861 Mathilde Saldorf, 696f Geburtsregister Nr. 309/1865 Miguel Saldorf; UKE/IGEM, Archiv, Patienten-Karteikarte Helena Saldorf der Staatskrankenanstalt Friedrichsberg.
Zur Nummerierung häufig genutzter Quellen siehe Link "Recherche und Quellen".