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Henny Hansen (née Daltrop) * 1889

Lüneburger Straße 35 (Harburg, Harburg)

HIER WOHNTE
HENNY HANSEN
GEB. DALTROP
JG. 1889
DEPORTIERT 1941
ERMORDET IN
MINSK

Henny Hansen, née Daltrop, born 3 Jan. 1889 in Harburg, deported 18 Nov. 1941 to Minsk, date of death unknown

Harburg-Altstadt, Lüneburger Straße 35

By the time Henny Daltrop was born, her parents Josef (17 Mar. 1847 – 4 Sep. 1943) and Rosa (Rosalie), née Galitzien (15 Nov. 1850 – 15 Mar. 1931) had moved from Gütersloh, where her brother Theodor (see Theodor Daltrop) was born, to Harburg. Her father ran a flourishing printing shop at Große Schippsee 34 in Harburg. He also sold stationery and typewriters.

Her father was also very active in the Harburg synagogue. He was a member of the college of representatives for 50 years, the president of the hebra kaddisha (burial society) for 30 years, and held the office of president of the congregation for nearly two decades. During his many years of service he was unequaled in his efforts to retain a high degree of continuity within the congregation and to integrate the religious and cultural minority into its non-Jewish surroundings.

Despite much progress toward his goal, he must have felt an immense sense of frustration when, on 19 September 1919, his daughter became engaged to the non-Jewish doctor Adolf Hansen, and her future mother-in-law was "less than thrilled to welcome a Jew into the family.”

Nevertheless, the wedding took place. The short duration of the marriage had other reasons. Even before the couple married, Adolf Hansen had a reputation for "all kinds of extravagances.” It was rumored that "as a Communist,” he was "a proponent of free love,” and the rumors proved to be true. The relationship suffered under his escapades, and the couple divorced after a few years.

In 1929 Henny Hansen became a member of the Hamburg Jewish Community. Her records show that she changed addresses often in the following years – in all likelihood not always of her own free will. In 1929 she lived at Farmsener Straße 4, then at Leinpfad 25 and Hochallee 76. In 1935 her address was Görnestraße 45, in 1936 Isestraße 141, in 1937 Eckernförder Straße 5 and finally Johnsallee 68. This was also the address of the Israelite Hospital, where she was working as a nurse. The building where the Israelite Hospital had originally been located, on Eckernförder Straße in St. Pauli, had been commandeered for use as a military hospital. The Israelite Hospital moved to the premises of the former Calmann Private Clinic, and continued to operate under severely limited conditions.

Henny Hansen was one of the 407 Hamburg Jews who boarded the train for Minsk at the Hanover Station on Lohseplatz in the fall of 1941. When she received her deportation orders, her fears were likely more palpable than those of many others who were on the transport. In 1940, her nephew Fritz Daltrop had been transferred from the psychiatric hospital in Langenhorn to an institution in Brandenburg, where he suddenly died a short time later. Her sister-in-law Thekla Daltrop, her brother Hermann’s widow, had committed suicide shortly before – on the evening before she was to be deported to Lodz. And, since her brother Theodor and his wife Else had been deported eastwards four weeks earlier, nothing had been heard from them.

The journey to Minsk lasted five days. The capitol of Belarus had been taken shortly after the German invasion of the Soviet Union. At that point nearly 90,000 Jews lived in the city. They were herded into a ghetto, in which a special area was designated for Jews from the German Reich. Before the second transport from Hamburg arrived, the SS executed 19,000 Russian Jews to "make room” for the new arrivals. The lives of thousands of ghetto residents would end in the nearby extermination camp, Maly Trostenets.

Upon arrival, the men, women, and children from Hamburg were housed in the newly "cleared” quarters. In the following weeks and months they worked as forced labor for the Wehrmacht, the SS, or the Todt Organization on war-related engineering projects. Many of those deported to the ghetto died in the first 18 months of hunger, cold, and infectious diseases. The rest were shot or gassed in an "operation” on 8 May 1943. Only very few of those who were deported from Hamburg to Minsk in November 1941 survived this hell. Henny Hansen was not among them.

Translator: Amy Lee

Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: October 2016
© Klaus Möller

Quellen: 1; 4; 5; 8; Heyl (Hrsg.), Harburger Opfer; Heyl, Synagoge; Gottwaldt/Schulle, "Judendeportationen", S. 90; Schriftliche Mitteilung Johanna Buchholz vom 10.4.2006; http://www1.uni-ham­burg.de /rz3a035//johnsallee3.html (eingesehen am 6.11.2009).
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