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Elise Hirschfeld (née Weil) * 1870

Eppendorfer Landstraße 36 (Hamburg-Nord, Eppendorf)

1941 Minsk
ermordet

further stumbling stones in Eppendorfer Landstraße 36:
Therese Gowa, Hilda Gowa, Reneé Gowa, Wally Hirschfeld

Wally Rosa Hirschfeld, born18 Feb. 1897 in Schwerin, deported 18 Nov. 1941 to Minsk
Elise Hirschfeld, néeWeil, born 3 Aug. 1870 in Baden-Baden, deported 18 Nov. 1941 to Minsk

Eppendorfer Landstraße 36

Wally Rosa Hirschfeld was the daughter of the pharmacist Eduard Hirschfeld and his wife Rosa, née Kantorowicz. Both were Jewish. Eduard was the brother of Magnus Hirschfeld (1868–1935), a pioneer in sex research and of the gay movement in Germany.

He came from Kolberg, the Baltic resort in the then Prussian province Pomerania, then moved to Schwerin where he acquired the Löwen Pharmacy at Wilhelmstraße 2 (today Grunthalplatz 10). Rosa came from Posen (today Poznan, Poland), at that time capital of the West Prussian province Posen. The couple married in 1893.

In addition to Wally, called Röschen in family circles, they also had a son, Hermann Hirschfeld (born 8 May 1894). When the children were still little, their mother died. Hirschfeld sold the pharmacy, moved to Hamburg and opened a pharmacy at Billhorner Röhrendeich 211. He married a second time to Elise Weil from Baden-Baden, daughter of the garment merchant and innkeeper Aron Weil.

We know little about the life of the family in Hamburg into the 1930s. We do know that Eduard Hirschfeld too died young, in 1915. We also know that the Hirschfelds lived for decades, until 1937, at Wandsbeker Chaussee 87 I. The son Hermann managed to leave Germany and reach the safety of the USA. He became an American citizen and changed his name to Harry Field.

Wally continued to live with her stepmother Elise. The two moved to a small apartment at Eppendorfer Landstraße 36, second floor, in Aug. 1937.

It was very tight for them financially. Elise received a modest widow’s pension, but Wally, now roughly forty years old, had no prospect of finding a well-paid job as a Jew. She got by on poorly paid work, for instance as a packer. On various occasions, she was registered with the community as unemployed.

In Oct. 1941 the Gestapo started deporting Jewish citizens from Hamburg, initially with transports to Lodz on 25 Oct. 1941, followed by Minsk and Riga.

Wally and Elise were deported to the Minsk Ghetto on 18 Nov. 1941. Whoever arrived there barely stood any chance of surviving for more than a few weeks. Of the 407 people on their transport, three survived. Wally and Elise were not among them.

Translator: Suzanne von Engelhardt

Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: October 2016
© Johannes Grossmann

Quellen: 1; 4; 5; 8; AfW 080594 Field, Harry; StaH 332-8 Meldewesen A 51 (Hirschfeld, Wally Rosa und Elise); Auskünfte von Jörg Moll, Stadtarchiv Schwerin, E-Mail vom 9.3.10; Adressbuch von Baden für 1870; Auskünfte von Maria Hecht, Stadtarchiv Baden-Baden, E-Mail vom 11.3.10; AB 1900, 1910, 1920; Benz, Lexikon des Holocaust, 2002, S. 152f.; Meyer, (Hrsg.) Verfolgung, 2006, S. 74; Dose, Rolf: Magnus Hirschfeld, 2005, S.14f.
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