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Moritz Meyers
© Stadtarchiv Stadtlohn

Moritz Meyers * 1894

Heinrich-Barth-Straße 8 (Eimsbüttel, Rotherbaum)

HIER WOHNTE
MORITZ MEYERS
JG. 1894
"SCHUTZHAFT" 1938
SACHSENHAUSEN
1942 KZ FUHLSBÜTTEL
DEPORTIERT 1942
ERMORDET IN
AUSCHWITZ

further stumbling stones in Heinrich-Barth-Straße 8:
Rolf Arno Baruch, Marion Baruch, Georg Baruch, Bernhard Baruch, Dan Baruch, Gertrud Baruch, Martha Meyers, Berthold Walter, Elinor Wolff, Georg Wolff, Leo Wolff, Lilly Wolff, Toni Wolff, Machla Wolff, Willi Wolff

Martha "Martel" Meyers, née Cohn, born on 1.8.1911 in Krefeld, deported on 11.7.1942 to Auschwitz and murdered
Moritz Meyers, born on 20.1.1894 in Stadtlohn, deported on 11.7.1942 to Auschwitz and murdered

Heinrich-Barth-Straße 8, Eimsbüttel

Martha, called Martel, was the first of two children born to the Jewish couple Adolf Cohn and his wife Henriette Cohn, née Nathan, in Krefeld on Aug. 1, 1911. Her father had been born in Braunschweig on 27.6.1882 (He was deported to Theresienstadt on May 5, 1943 and murdered in Auschwitz in 1944. See www.stolpersteine-hamburg.de. The mother, born 2.3.1884 in Emmerich, died on August 15, 1931 and was buried in the Jewish Cemetery in Solingen).

The family had moved from Krefeld via Frankfurt at river Main to Solingen, where Martel's brother Georg Bernhard was born on 24.4.1919. Adolf Cohn was active in the Jewish community there, and in 1925 he was elected its deputy representative. Adolf Cohn worked in Solingen, where the family lived at Wupperstraße 2, as a representative for school supplies.

On October 26, 1932, as the residents' registration card records, Adolf Cohn went "on a trip." He did not return to Solingen. The family dispersed after Henriette Cohn died: daughter Martel moved to Cologne, son Georg to Leipzig. But by 1934 they were all registered in Hamburg.

In Hamburg, Adolf Cohn and the widow Martha Buchhalter, née Jacob, who was also Jewish, got to know each other. They lived together in their large apartment at Rappstraße 24/ Rotherbaum.

Martel found employment as a clerk at Dr. Robert Wohlers, a chemical factory at Kaiser-Wilhelm-Straße 47 in Neustadt, and then at the Schlesische Furnier Werke at Billstraße 23-25 in Rothenburgsort. Her brother Georg Cohn completed an apprenticeship as a commercial clerk at the theater box office at the Alsterarkaden, which was run by a family named Käse.

Both young-grown children supported their father and his partner both emotionally and financially, as Adolf Cohn was often denied support from the welfare office. On October 27, 1936, Adolf Cohn and Martha Buchhalter were married at Registry Office 1 in Hamburg.

Martha Cohn brought one child into the marriage, her stepdaughter from a first marriage, for whom she had assumed guardianship. This daughter, Frieda Buchhalter, had been born in Beuthen/Kattowitz on 29.9.1922. Her mother had died shortly after her birth, her father Isaak Buchhalter on January 20, 1935. Martha Cohn then moved to Hamburg with the thirteen-year-old.

Sometime during this period, probably in 1938 or shortly before, Martel Cohn then met her future husband Moritz Meyers.

During the November Pogrom in 1938, commandos of the SA moved out to demolish the businesses of Jews. Destruction and looting took place in many parts of Hamburg. Between November 10 and 15, 873 Jews were then verifiably taken to the Hamburg police prison Fuhlsbüttel, most of them were then transferred to the concentration camp Sachsenhausen. This is what happened to Georg Cohn and Moritz Meyers: they were taken into "protective custody" on November 11, 1938, and transferred to Oranienburg/Sachsenhausen concentration camp via the Fuhlsbüttel police prison. While we do not know Georg Cohn's release date, we do know that Moritz Meyers was released on December 15, 1938.

On April 21, 1939, Martel Cohn and Moritz Meyers were married at the registry office in Hamburg and moved in with her parents at Rappstraße 24/ Rotherbaum on the 1st floor. Adolf and Martha Cohn, the stepdaughter Frieda Buchhalter, Georg Cohn and Martel and Moritz Meyers now lived there. Sometimes they also temporarily accommodated nieces and nephews, for the family held together during this difficult time.

Moritz Meyers was the fourth of six children born to the Jewish couple Meijer Meijers and Schenetta Schorfine, née Kleffmann, born on 20.1.1894 in Stadtlohn/ Westphalia. The parents had married in Stadtlohn in 1888. Meijer Meijers came from Holland and traded in manufactured and haberdashery goods.

In his first marriage Moritz, who had changed his original name from Meijers to Meyers, had been married to Hanne Hedwig, née Stein, who had been born on 10.6.1897 in Lügde in the district of Höxter. They had married there on October 14, 1919. Before that, he had been deployed at the front in the First World War. In Lügde, Moritz Meyers took over a manufacturing business for fabrics, dresses and suits from his father-in-law, for which he had to declare bankruptcy in 1926.

He had four children with his first wife: Erwin Meyers (born 2.9.1920), who died after only 10 days; Margot Meyers (born 21.9.1921), Gisela Meyers (born 12.1.1924) and Kurt Karl Meyers (born 10.2.1926), who had all been born in Lügde.

In the early 1930s, Moritz Meyers lived in Heiligenstadt at Bonifatiusstraße 7 in Thuringia. From there he went to Leipzig at the end of 1936. His children later stated that he had worked as a "traveler" (salesman) from 1928 to 1937.

The marriage was divorced on January 17, 1939. Moritz Meyers paid alimony for his divorced wife and children. (His divorced wife Hanne Hedwig Meyers died on February 24, 1942 in the Israelite Hospital in Hanover).

In 1938, Moritz Meyers settled in Hamburg and found a home with the parents of his future wife Martel at Rappstraße 24.

In 1939, tenant protection for Jews was lifted. This allowed landlords to terminate the tenancy of their Jewish tenants. Martel and Moritz Meyers were also affected by this. They had to move out of Rappstraße 24 on June 1, 1939 and share a room with Kendziora in the "Judenhaus" Heinrich-Barth-Straße 8. (This is also where the Stolpersteine were laid).

The children of Moritz Meyers were able to reach England in July 1939 with a Kindertransport and thus survived the National Socialist era.

Until 1940, Martel Meyers' cultural tax card of the Jewish Community still shows income, i.e. she was still gainfully employed, although it is not clear where and in what occupation.

Martel Meyers' father Adolf Cohn was sent to the Fuhlsbüttel police prison in December 1941 for reasons that are not known to us, and this was the reason for his wife to commit suicide. In Martha Cohn's farewell letter to her stepdaughter Martel, she gave as the reason for the suicide that it was unbearable for her not to be able to help her husband. She pinned the letter to the door of her apartment at Rappstraße 24, the couple's last shared apartment. She had addressed the envelope to her daughter Martel in the Heinrich-Barth-Straße 8, cellar. Martha Cohn was found by her son-in-law Moritz Meyers. He testified before the police what he had found: "The kitchen gas stove was open. There was a strong smell of illuminating gas. The main faucet was open."

Although Moritz Meyers immediately arranged for his mother-in-law to be admitted to the Jewish Hospital in Johnsallee, she died shortly thereafter on December 15, 1941 as a result of the suicide.

On June 8, 1942, Moritz Meyers was again imprisoned in the Fuhlsbüttel police prison and was not "released" until his deportation date, July 11, 1942, was approaching.

Martel and Moritz Meyers had to report to the assembly point on July 10, 1942, one evening before the planned deportation, this time the Jewish Community House on Hartungstraße.

The train left Hanover Station on July 11, 1942, and probably reached Auschwitz between July 14 and 16, 1942. There the deportees were murdered immediately after arrival.

Martel Meyers was 31 years old, Moritz Meyers 48 years old.

On the fate of the relatives of Moritz Meyers:
The Meijer Meijers couple fled to the Netherlands in 1939. In March 1943 they were interned in the Vught concentration camp, where Schenetta Schorfine Meijers died on April 23, 1943. Meijer Meijers was murdered in Sobibor on May 14, 1943. (See www.stolpersteine-stadtlohn.jimdofree.com; www.stolpersteine-guide.de.)

Leopold Meyers (b. 3/4/1889) was deported to Riga on December 13, 1941 with his wife Bertha and two children and murdered there (the youngest son survived the deportation). (See: www.stolpersteine-stadtlohn.jimdofree.com.)

Betty Meyers (born 3.4.1891) was deported to Theresienstadt on July 31, 1942 and further deported to Auschwitz on October 9, 1944 and murdered there. (See: www.stolpersteine-stadtlohn.jimdofree.com.)

Siegmund Meyers (born 20.12.1892) died in Stadtlohn on Dec. 24, 1892.

Lina Meyers (born 16.10.1895) married Alex Wolff. Lina Wolff died at Brüggen Hildesheim on April 25, 1922. Her husband Alex Wolff was deported to Riga on December 11, 1941. (See: www.stolpersteine-stadtlohn.jimdofree.com.)

Johanna Meyers, née Marx (born 12.4.1899), was deported from Münster to Riga on 13 December 1941 together with her husband Max Marx and their sons Rudolf Gustav and Werner Marx.

Martel Meyer's brother Georg Cohn was interned in the "Jewish Forestry Camp" in Schönfelde/ Berlin on July 26, 1941. On April 19, 1943, he was deported from there to Auschwitz and then murdered. (See www.stolpersteine-hamburg.de.)

There are Stolpersteine for Adolf and Georg Cohn in Hamburg (as above) and in Solingen Mitte, Breidbacher Tor 2. (See: www.stolpersteine-solingen.de.)

Frieda Buchhalter fled to Sweden on February 22, 1939. She married Kurt Rothschild (born 1.12.1916) there on July 29, 1944, and had two children with him.

Translation Beate Meyer

Stand: February 2023
© Bärbel Klein/Ergänzungen Susanne Rosendahl

Quellen: 1; 2; 4; 5; 8; StaH; 213-13_13965; 213-13_14661; 213-13_25396; 214-1_203; 351-11_14363; 351-11_34951; 351-11_39751; 351-11_44595; 351-11_45670; 351-11_7643; 351-11_47894; 351-14_1041; 351-14_1321; 351-14_1807; 351-14_1959; 351-14_1974; 332-5_1012/1881; 332-5_114/1883; 332-5_2077/1883; 332-5_3664/1884;332-5_4281/1885; 332-5_4438/1886; 332-5_2009/1887; 332-5_2255/1887; 332-5_2231/1888; 332-5_3886/1888; 332-5_754/1891; 332-5_4719/1893; 332-5_3487/1889; 332-5_3296/1890; 332-5_51/1903; 332-5_245/1913; 332-5_677/1913;332-5_255/1916; 332-5_288/1916; 332-5_778/1916; 332-5_2136; 332-5_759/1918; 332-5_240/1919; 332-5_475/1919; 332-5_1029/1921; 332-5_576/1929; 332-5_607/1936; 332-5_213/1937; 332-5_406/1940; 332-5_445/1941; 331-5_3 Akte 1945/1941; 522-1_1066; Stadtarchiv Gudensberg Nr. 52/1886; Stadtarchiv Solingen, Sterbeurkunde Henriette Cohn Nr. 224/1931; Krefeld Geburtsurkunde Martha Cohn 1334/1911;ITS Archives Bad Arolsen Digital Archive Korrespondenzakten 1.2.4.1. [12650952] und [99094924]; Buch und Biografie Stolpersteine Solingen Man soll mich nicht vergessen von Armin Schulte, 16. Januar 2020, Stadtarchiv Solingen; Alfred Gottwaldt und Diana Schulte, Die Judendeportationen aus dem Deutschen Reich 1941-1945, Wiesbaden 2005, S. 395; Karin Guth, Bornstraße 22. Ein Erinnerungsbuch, Hamburg 2001, S. 17; www.ancestry.de;www.geni.com;www.wikipedea.de (Einsicht am 9.3.2017).
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