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Martha Burchhardt (née Levy) * 1873

Grindelallee 32 / Froebelstraße (Eimsbüttel, Rotherbaum)

HIER WOHNTE
MARTHA BURCHARDT
GEB. LEVY
JG. 1873
DEPORTIERT 1942
THERESIENSTADT
ERMORDET 13.7.1943

Martha Burchhardt, née Levy, born 3 Jan. 1873 in Hamburg, deported 15 July 1942 to Theresienstadt, died there 13 July 1943

Grindelallee 32 (corner of Fröbelstraße)

On 4 June 1894, the 21-year-old Martha Levy married the physician Max Burchhardt in Hamburg, the place of birth of the bride, as was customary at the time. The bridegroom was born on 29 May 1869 in Kroppenstedt in the district of Aschersleben, in the then-Prussian province of Saxony. His parents, the merchant Louis Burchhardt and his wife Jenny, nee Helft, lived in Halberstadt at the time of the wedding. Max and Martha had probably met through her father’s circle of friends and acquaintances, as Baruch Levy was a physician and surgeon. His general practitioner and obstetrical practice was at Welckerstraße 10. Martha's mother’s name was Frommaid Lewisohn. Both Max's and Martha's family were Jewish. Whether because of anti-Semitic discrimination or as a sign of their integration into German society is not known, but Martha's parents changed their first names later to the less Jewish-sounding "Bernhard" and "Franziska."

Max Burchhardt also worked as a general practitioner and initially had his practice on Fuhlentwiete in the Neustadt. In 1898 he relocated it to Grindelallee 32, at the corner of Froebelstrasse. The Germania pharmacy owned by the pharmacist Goldstaub was on the ground floor. The practice was on the third floor, as was the family’s apartment. Max and Martha Burchhardt already had two children: Elsa Helene (*29 Jan. 1896) and Therese (*3 Sep. 1897). On 5 Aug. 1899, their third child, Erwin Felix, was born.

Max and Martha Burchhardt’s daughter Therese also married a doctor: Kurt Neufeld from Tuche. They had two children, Louise (*28 Mar. 1825) and Adolf (*13 July 1926).

Max Burchhardt lived to see the birth of his grandson. He died on 8 May 1927 in Hamburg, just three weeks before his 58th birthday. His widow Martha stayed in the apartment on Grindelallee, where the couple had lived together for almost thirty years. She moved out around 1936, presumably because she could no longer afford the apartment. She lived in a rented room in an apartment at Brahmsallee 15, then one at Brahmsallee 25. She moved in early 1941 to the Jewish retirement home at Sedanstraße 23.

Martha Burchhardt’s mother Franziska died on 13 Feb. 1936, aged 88. She was buried at the Langenfelde Jewish Cemetery. Martha’s parents’ last address was Johnsallee 36.

All three of Martha Burchhardt's children emigrated to Palestine after the Nazis came to power. Therese, Kurt, Louise and Adolf fled on 28 Dec. 1938. Kurt Neufeld had probably been arrested after the November Pogrom in 1938 and sent to the Fuhlsbüttel police prison or the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp - a traumatic experience for most of those arrested. They were humiliated, beaten, and tortured, and were afraid for their lives. Many were only released on the condition that they leave Germany.

Martha Burchhardt remained in Hamburg. On 15 July 1942, many of the residents at the Sedanstraße retirement home were sent to the Theresienstadt Ghetto - the 69-year-old Martha Burchhardt was among them. "From Germany and Austria, the patients and residents of all Jewish hospitals, nursing homes and retirement homes [...] were transferred to Theresienstadt. These incoming transports were heartbreaking [...]. Instead of finding mercy and help, they were now pushed out into bitter poverty to die in the dirt of hunger and cold.” This is how the nurse Alice Randt, who worked in the Theresienstadt infirmary, once described the conditions there.

Martha Burchhardt survived in Theresienstadt for nearly a year. She died on 13 July 1943 of blood poisoning.

On the Stolperstein placed in her memory her name is mistakenly spelled "Burchardt.” The correct spelling is "Burchhardt.”

Translator: Amy Lee
Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

© Frauke Steinhäuser

Quellen: 1; 3; 4; 5; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 205/1927 StaH 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinden 992 e 2 Band 4, Transport nach Theresienstadt am 15. Juli 1942, Liste 1; Hamburger Adressbücher; Lange, Das jüdische Altenhaus, S. 134; Schellenbacher, Gesundheitswesen in Theresienstadt, S. 45 u. S. 97; http://www.ho locaust.cz/de/datenbank-der-digitalisierten-dokumenten/dokument/97334-burchardt-marta-todesfall anzeige-ghetto-theresienstadt/ (letzter Aufruf: 2.7.2016).
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