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Delfred Jacob * 1883

Pilatuspool 15 (Hamburg-Mitte, Neustadt)

HIER WOHNTE
DELFRED JACOB
JG. 1883
DEPORTIERT 1941
ERMORDET IN
MINSK

further stumbling stones in Pilatuspool 15:
Jenny Jacob

Delfred Jacob, born on 29 Apr. 1883 in Hamburg, deported to Minsk on 8 Nov. 1941
Jenny Jacob, née Hammerschlag, born on 3 Sept. 1886 in Gudensberg, deported to Minsk on 8 Nov. 1941

Pilatuspool 15

The Jewish merchant Aron Jacob (born on 16 Feb. 1857), son of a cap maker from Lissa in Posen (today Leszno in Poland), had left his home country as a young man and settled in Hamburg at Grossneumarkt 32. On 16 Feb. 1883, he had married Hannchen Salomon (born on 26 Dec. 1855). She came from Schleswig, also from a Jewish family, and by then, she lived together with her widowed mother Rosa Salomon, née Abraham, in Hamburg at nearby Peterstrasse 65. Her father, the "tradesman” Jacob Moses Salomon, had already died when his daughter married.

Aron and Hannchen Jacob’s first of eight children was born on 29 Apr. 1883 at 1st Marienstrasse 20 (from 1940, Jan-Valkenburg-Strasse) and was given the first name of Delfred. She was followed by Frieda (born on 4 Aug. 1884), John (born on 4 Sept. 1885), Seraphine (born on 18 Apr. 1887, died on 18 July 1887), Martha (born on 3 May 1888), Zerline (born on 16 Aug. 1889), Anna (born on 10 Feb. 1891), and Leopold Friedrich (born on 17 Dec. 1893).

In 1889, the Jacob family moved to "Bei den Hütten” 97 (today’s Hütten), and in 1898 to Wexstrasse 15. By this time, Aron Jacob worked as editor and publisher, distributing the Norddeutsche Verlobungs-Anzeiger. Like many Jews, Aron Jacob and his family relocated from Hamburg-Neustadt to a more upscale residential area. In Apr. 1910, they moved to Rutschbahn 26 in the Grindel quarter.

Delfred and his brother Leopold Friedrich took part in the First World War. The younger of the two, Leopold, was killed at the age of 22 on 9 Nov. 1916 near Stankewitschi in Russia. Delfred returned from the war in Dec. 1918 and first joined the "Bahrenfeld Freikorps” [a local of the paramilitary formation].

In 1922, he married the widow Jenny Bielefeld, née Hammerschlag. Jenny was born on 3 Sept. 1886 in Gudensberg, a small town in Hessen, as the daughter of Jakob Hammerschlag (born on 13 May 1854) and Mathilde, née Kugelmann (born on 2 Feb. 1863). Her older sister Ida was born on 10 Feb. 1885, and the younger brother Jakob on 8 Oct. 1888 in Hebenshausen. The father, Jakob Hammerschlag, was active as a "tradesman” (merchant) and as a butcher, too. He died shortly before the birth of his son Jakob in Sept. 1888 in Rotterdam, presumably during a business trip. Jacob only reached 10 days of age and his sister Ida must have died early as well because Jenny later stated that she had no brothers or sisters.

In her first union, Jenny had married the assistant Martin Bielefeld (born on 16 Apr. 1881) in Hamburg on 23 Dec. 1913. Serving as a soldier in World War I, Martin Bielefeld was seriously injured by a shot in the pelvis and died of sepsis in the Reserve Hospital V in Altona on 26 July 1918 (for Martin’s brother Leopold Bielefeld there is a Stolperstein at Grindelhof 83; see Stolpersteine in Hamburg Grindel II).

After marrying Jenny, Delfred moved to Marienstrasse 47, where the childless couple lived for the next 13 years. Working as a photographer, Delfred Jacob had started his own business with a "photographic shooting” at the Landungsbrücken in the harbor. After the death of his father on 10 July 1919, he initially provided for his mother’s livelihood. Hannchen Jacob then received a one-time support of 60 RM (reichsmark) from the war victims’ pension office (Versorgungsamt) for the "loss” of her son Leopold and she was supported by the Jewish Community with 5 RM per week.

After the Nazi takeover in 1933, Delfred Jacob’s lease in the harbor was not extended because of his Jewish descent. With an interruption until Sept. 1935, he went to sea as a photographer on the steamer "Jan Molsen,” an excursion ship of the HADAG ferry line, between Hamburg and Cuxhaven. However, this activity was limited to the summer months. The Jacob couple ran into economic distress and had to apply for state support. They could no longer keep their three-bedroom apartment on Marienstrasse, despite taking in a subtenant. They found a smaller one-and-a-half bedroom apartment on the fifth floor at Carolinenstrasse 16, which they shared with a widow, "Frau Engländer.” The welfare office described the apartment as well furnished and orderly.

Being unemployed and a welfare recipient, Delfred Jacob had to do "compulsory work” in the port, first at Hachmannkai, then at Waltershof. In Feb. 1937, Jenny and Delfred Jacob moved to Pilatuspool 15 as the main tenants, where they tried to finance the three-and-a-half bedroom apartment by renting out rooms to subtenants again. In 1937, Delfred Jacob was forced to hand in his trade license, and he had already had to sell his photographic equipment for financial reasons. Jenny Jacob tried to contribute to their livelihood: Since Apr. 1937, she worked as a "glass washer” for the "Arno Honiglager” Company at Meissnerstrasse 15a, where she only earned a small income. In Feb. 1938, Delfred Jacob found a temporary job as a messenger at "Arthur Meyer Herrenmoden,” a men’s fashion company located at Grosse Bleichen 20 for a short time, and in June 1938, he had to do "compulsory work” again, this time in Buxtehude and finally in Moorredder. At the end of 1938, the Jacob couple could no longer afford the apartment on Pilatuspool either; their previous subtenants had emigrated. Delfred and Jenny Jacob then moved to Dillstrasse 16, by then subtenants themselves with Horwitz, and they were able to take only some of their furniture with them.

On 3 Aug. 1940, Delfred’s mother Hannchen Jacob died in the Jewish Hospital at Johnsallee 54. Until her death, she had lived in the household of her widowed daughter Anna Sekkel, née Jacob, and granddaughter Resi at Rappstrasse 2. At the age of 22, on 11 Sept. 1913, Anna Sekkel had married the assistant Alfred John Sekkel (born on 13 Sept. 1886), the son of the tailor Abraham Sekkel (born on 26 July 1852, died on 23 Feb. 1929) and Giedel, née Mormelstein (born on 26 Mar. 1856, died on 17 Apr. 1937). On 9 June 1914, their daughter Resi was born. Alfred Sekkel did not return from the First World War either, he had been killed by a shot in the head at Loos on 13 Oct. 1915 (on the Sekkel family, see also Julius Pilatus).

Anna Sekkel received a "war widow’s pension” of 57.45 RM (reichsmark) and for her daughter Resi a supplementary pension of 44.90 RM per month. She also worked as a clerk by the hour. Four rooms of her six-and-a-half- room apartment on Rappstrasse were rented out, which financed the apartment.

Daughter Resi attended the Israelite girls’ high school (Lyceum) at Bieberstrasse 4 until Easter 1931 and then completed an apprenticeship as a dressmaker at "Mode-Salon Eduard Krämer,” a fashion house in Berlin. Around 1937, she worked for the master dressmaker Sylvia Mitz (born on 22 June 1894, murdered on 10 May 1942 in the Chelmno extermination camp, see Stolpersteine in Hamburg-Eimsbüttel), "Kleiderwerkstätten” ("clothing workshops”), at Schlankreye 43 and finally in the fashion house of Robinsohn Bros. On 2 Sept. 1938, she married Leonhard Podlescher (born on 24 June 1909 in Berlin), who had been living with them as a subtenant since 1936.

Resi and Leonhard Podlescher managed to emigrate via Antwerp to New York in Oct. 1939, where they changed their last name, subsequently going by the name of Palmer.

On 8 Nov. 1941, Jenny and Delfred Jacob, together with Delfred’s sister Zerline and her husband Hermann Peritz (born on 16 Sept. 1882), were deported to Minsk and murdered there.

Stolpersteine at Wandsbeker Chaussee 104 commemorate Zerline and Hermann Peritz (see Stolpersteine in Hamburg-Eilbek).

The Peritz couple, married only in 1940, received their deportation order in the "Jews’ house” ("Judenhaus”) at Heinrich-Barth-Strasse 8. It was the second marriage for both of them. He had been a widower since 1940 and she had been divorced since 1936. Zerline had returned to Hamburg from Essen in Mar. 1933 after separating from her husband, the merchant Jacob Träger (born on 2 Aug. 1886 in Rzeszow/Galicia). First, she was taken in by her brother Delfred and sister-in-law Jenny. Since the end of 1933, she had been residing with her sister Anna Sekkel at Rappstrasse 2 After the attempt to set up a "peddler’s trade” in soaps and aprons had failed, she managed the joint household in return for room and board. As an unemployed person, Hermann Peritz, formerly an independent shoe retailer, had to perform "compulsory work” and lived with them as a subtenant.

Anna Sekkel received her deportation order after moving to Grindelallee 68 together with her older sister Frieda Warneck, née Jacob, from Rutschbahn 15, and her daughter Ruth (born on 5 Oct. 1920). Frieda had married the non-Jewish jeweler Wilhelm Adolf Warneck (born on 14 Apr. 1887 in Huchenfeld, Baden) on 30 May 1919, and the couple had divorced in Feb. 1932. Frieda Warneck was not gainfully employed and she had been receiving welfare assistance since 1936. Daughter Ruth had attended the home economics school at Paulinenstift in the Jewish girls’ orphanage after her schooling, eventually residing as a nurse in the Jewish retirement home at Schäferkampsallee 29, where she received food and 5 RM in allowance. Her hope of being able to leave for Britain or Sweden as a domestic worker was not fulfilled. Anna Sekkel as well as Frieda and Ruth Warneck were deported to the Jungfernhof subcamp of the Riga Ghetto on 6 Dec. 1941. Ruth was one of the few persons capable of working who were sent to the Riga Ghetto after the mass shooting in Mar. 1942. From there, she arrived at the Stutthof concentration camp on 1 Oct. 1944, where all traces of her disappear.

Delfred’s second oldest sister, Martha Cohn, née Jacob, took her own life at Rappstrasse 24 on 15 Dec. 1941 after her siblings had been deported. Her death certificate contains an entry indicating "suicide by poisoning with gas and sleeping-inducing drug.”

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

Stand: July 2020
© Susanne Rosendahl

Quellen: 5; 6; 8; 9; StaH 351-14 Arbeits- und Sozialfürsorge 1321 (Jacob, Delfred); StaH 351-14 Arbeits- und Sozialfürsorge 1321 (Jacob, Hannchen); StaH 351-14 Arbeits- und Sozialfürsorge 1321 (Peritz, Hermann); StaH 351-14 Arbeits- und Sozialfürsorge 18807 (Sekkel, Anna); StaH 351-14 Arbeits- und Sozialfürsorge 1974 (Warneck, Frieda); StaH 351-14 Arbeits- und Sozialfürsorge 1959 (Träger, Zerline); StaH 351-11 AfW 34951 (Palmer, Leonard); StaH 213-11 Staatsanwaltschaft Landgericht-Strafsachen 4068/40; StaH 213-11 Staatsanwaltschaft Landgericht-Strafsachen 5847/40; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2629 u 1012/1881; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2653 u 114/1883; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2054 u 2077/1883; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2081 u 3664/1884; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2106 u 4281/1885; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2152 u 2009/1887; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2176 u 2231/1887; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2201 u 3487/1889; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2253 u 754/1891; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2319 u 4719/1893; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 8689 u 245/1913; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 3218 u 677/1913; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 788 u 759/1918; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 8728 u 240/1919; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 8053 u 475/1919; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 9840 u 576/1929; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 8144 u 213/1937; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 8168 u 406/1940; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 8174 u 445/1941; StaH 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinde Nr. 992 e 2 Band 1; StaH 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinde Nr. 992 e 2 Band 2; StaH 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinde Nr. 992 e 2 Band 3; https://www.ancestry.de. (Geburtsregister Jenny Hammerschlag in Gudensberg (Zugriff 30.3.2017); https://www.ancestry.de. (Geburtsregister Ida Hammerschlag in Gudensberg (Zugriff 30.3.2017); https://www.ancestry.de. (Geburtsregister Jakob Hammerschlag in Hebenshausen (Zugriff 30.3.2017); http://cuxpedia.de/index.php?title=Jan_Molsen (Zugriff 23.4.2017); Yad Vashem, Zentrale Datenbank der Namen der Holocaustopfer Ruth Warneck (Gedenkblatt).
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