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Emil Blume * 1871

Bismarckstraße 82 (Eimsbüttel, Hoheluft-West)

HIER WOHNTE
EMIL BLUME
JG. 1871
DEPORTIERT 1942
THERESIENSTADT
ERMORDET 1942 IN
TREBLINKA

further stumbling stones in Bismarckstraße 82:
Rita Blume, Oskar de Vries

Emil Blume, born on 23 May 1871 in Hamburg, deported on 15 July 1942 to Theresienstadt, murdered on 21 Sept. 1942 in the Treblinka extermination camp
Rita (Riekchen) Blume, née Marcus, born on 17 June 1881 in Harburg, deported on 15 July 1942 to Theresienstadt, murdered on 21 Sept. 1942 in the Treblinka extermination camp

Bismarckstraße 82

Emil Blume and his wife Riekchen, née Marcus, were natives of Hamburg and Harburg, respectively. Emil’s parents were the merchant Heimann Joseph und Sara Blume, née Wiener. Riekchen’s parents were Aron and Emilie Marcus, née Koopmann. Emil and Riekchen got married on 18 Sept. 1908. Until then, Emil Blume lived at Eppendorfer Baum 25 and Riekchen in Altona at Sonninstraße 12, both with their parents. Following their marriage, the couple moved to Bismarckstraße. Their only daughter Ursula was born seven years later in 1915. The family moved several times, though remaining in Bismarckstraße, where they lived at no. 112 and later at no. 82.

The family enjoyed a solid middle-class lifestyle until 1933. Since 1908, when his company was entered in the company register, Emil Blume worked as a commercial agent for the Krautheim AG steel corporation in Chemnitz. The most important client in Hamburg was the Menck & Hambrock Company, and the commission yielded a good income. At first, Emil Blume had his business premises at Catharinenstraße 29, then at Eiffestraße 6, and finally at Beim Alten Waisenhause. Political developments after 1933 confronted Emil Blume, too, with considerable problems: Because of his Jewish origins, the Krautheim Company withdrew his long-standing agency status. Although his own company was deleted from the company register only in July 1939, Emil Blume no longer earned any income even before that date. In 1939, the family was forced like all other Jewish men and women to turn in valuables such as silverware and jewelry. Their emigrated daughter Ursula tried to help her parents financially – something her mother kept from her father. In the mid-1930s, the Blume couple had to give up their apartment in Bismarckstraße, moving to Beim Andreasbrunnen 7. From Nov. 1939 onward, they lived in cramped conditions at Haynstraße 5, together with the father’s two sisters. Prior to the deportations, Emil and Riekchen Blume were forced to move to the "Jews’ house” ("Judenhaus”) at Bundesstraße 43. Due to their age, they were spared the large-scale transports in 1941, but they were on the first deportation train leaving Hamburg for Theresienstadt. Only two months later, they were transported to the Treblinka extermination camp and murdered.

The last household effects the Blumes still owned were auctioned off in Hamburg in Oct. and Nov. 1942, yielding nearly 2,000 RM (reichsmark) for the treasurer’s office of the local tax authority.

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

© Jonas Stier

Quellen: 1; 4; 5; 8; StaH 351-11 AfW, 1878; HAB II 1910, 1914, 1925, 1930, 1935, 1938, 1940, Theresienstädter Gedenkbuch, S. 384.