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Auguste Friedburg als Rote-Kreuz-Schwester 1915 in Belgien
© Privatbesitz

Auguste Friedburg * 1879

Kurzer Kamp 6 Altenheim (Hamburg-Nord, Fuhlsbüttel)

1942 Theresienstadt
tot 20.3.1943

further stumbling stones in Kurzer Kamp 6 Altenheim:
Dr. Julius Adam, Johanna Hinda Appel, Sara Bromberger, Therese Bromberger, Friederike Davidsohn, Margarethe Davidsohn, Gertrud Embden, Katharina Embden, Katharina Falk, Jenny Friedemann, Mary Halberstadt, Käthe Heckscher, Emily Heckscher, Betty Hirsch, Hanna Hirsch, Regina Hirschfeld, Clara Horneburg, Anita Horneburg, Emma Israel, Jenny Koopmann, Franziska Koopmann, Martha Kurzynski, Laura Levy, Chaile Charlotte Lippstadt, Isidor Mendelsohn, Balbine Meyer, Helene Adele Meyer, Ida Meyer, Ella Rosa Nauen, Celine Reincke, Friederike Rothenburg, Benny Salomon, Elsa Salomon, Martha Rosa Schlesinger, Louis Stiefel, Sophie Stiefel, Louise Strelitz, Eugenie Hanna Zimmermann

Auguste Friedburg, born on 8.7.1879 in Hamburg, deported on 19.7.1942 to Theresienstadt, perished there on 20.3.1943

Kurzer Kamp 6, Old People's Home (Hamburg-North, Fuhlsbüttel), designated 1939 "Judenstift" and Rothenbaumchaussee 26, Rotherbaum

Auguste Friedburg was born on July 8, 1879 in Hamburg into a Jewish family that had established itself in the Hanseatic city with a banking business. In order to gain an insight into the family background that shaped her, the history of the family up to her birth will first be presented.

Her great-grandfather Salomon Meyer Friedburg from Celle, son of Moses Friedburg and Sara, née Isaac Salomon, from Copenhagen, had come to Hamburg and married Friederike, née Eschwege, from Hamburg in 1800.

Their son Moritz Friedburg had been born in Hamburg in 1805, the year in which the private bank "Salomon Meyer Friedburg & Co" was founded. He was married on May 27, 1828 to Emily Samuelson, born in Jamaica, by Isaak Bernays, the rabbi of the Askenazi community in Hamburg. Emily's parents, Hyman Samuelson, a goldsmith from London, and Rebecca Alexander from Hamburg, had married there in 1786, later emigrating to the United States. Emily's brother Samuel Henry Samuelson played an important role in the English iron industry and had good business connections.

Moritz Friedburg worked at his father's bank as a "bill agent" (i.e., a bank clerk responsible for accepting and honoring bills of exchange). To hold a bank account at the Hamburg bank and thus to be able to participate in banking transactions, Auguste's great-grandfather Salomon Meyer, as a member of the German-Israelite community of Hamburg, was only permitted by the treasury after a payment of 750,- Mark Banco according to the banking law of 1840. For obtaining a Banco foil in 1843 he had to pay the "löbliche Kämmerei" 25,- Mark Courant (currency, silver money). When on May 25, 1849 he was one of the first Jews to receive the Hamburg Bürgerbrief (citizenship certificate) after their equalization in Hamburg, this made his business dealings much easier. In addition to trading in securities, one of the main focuses of his banking business was brokering loans for trade and industry. Together, Emily and Moritz Friedburg had six children in Hamburg, one of whom was Martin, the father of Auguste Friedburg.

Martin Eduard Friedburg (born March 7, 1843) belonged to the German-Israelite community, as did his parents. He grew up in the Grindelviertel and attended the Höhere Privat-Knabenschule of E. H. Wichmann. In addition to science subjects and commercial accounting, he was taught English, French, Spanish and Danish in their languages, thus preparing him in the best possible way for a career as a merchant. After a banking apprenticeship at Bankhaus Behrens & Söhne, the subsequent further training abroad was also part of the program. Afterwards, as was expected of the eldest son at the time, he returned to his father's banking business. When Martin Friedburg was admitted to the Hamburg State Association on November 27, 1868, he was baptized Lutheran and lived at Ferdinandstraße 45. A short time later, in September 1869, he married Auguste, née Lasart (b. Oct. 15, 1847), in her birthplace of Heidelberg. She, too, came from a Jewish family and had converted to the Christian faith. Her parents, Isabella, née Meyer, and the merchant Leopold Lasart, lived in Heidelberg. On September 22, 1870, Martin Friedburg gave his notice of resignation to the German-Israelite congregation.

Three years after the wedding, a double kinship connection was established between the two families Friedburg and Lasart: the younger sister of Auguste Friedburg's mother, Lina Lasart, married Adolph Friedburg, the younger brother of Auguste's father, in Hamburg.

Together with his brother Adolph, Martin Friedburg became a partner in his father's banking firm, the limited partnership "Salomon Meyer." On the last day of 1872, Moritz Salomon Friedburg died at the age of 67 in his apartment at Magdalenenstraße 27. He was laid to rest in the Grindel Jewish Cemetery.

Martin Friedburg bought the prestigious villa at Sophienterrasse 7 on the Außenalster. Auguste, named after her mother, was born there on July 8, 1879, as was her older sister Emily Susanna Elisabeth (born March 1, 1875). Auguste Friedburg grew up near the Außenalster with her parents and with her four older sisters Fanny, Elisabeth, Helene, Lina and two brothers Victor and Theodor; two other brothers had died as infants. Auguste's mother came from a Jewish Orthodox home, but had been influenced in Heidelberg by life in the home of Professor Gervinus and his musical wife. These had lived in a new world where Germanness, Christianity and music were seen as important values in life. This had been the deciding factor in Auguste and her siblings growing up in the Evangelical Lutheran faith, as granddaughter Emilie Melchior later reflected in her memoirs.

When Auguste was four years old, her grandfather Leopold Lasart died on February 18, 1884, in his apartment at Eppendorfer Weg 36. He was buried in the Ilandkoppel Jewish Cemetery, grave site A 12, No. 14; in the meantime, her maternal grandparents had moved from Heidelberg to Hamburg to be near their daughters. The maternal great-grandparents, Salomon Lazarus and Babette, née Abenheimer, had died in Heidelberg. One year later, on November 7, 1885, the grandmother Emily Friedburg, née Samuelson, also died. She found her final resting place next to her husband in the Grindelfriedhof.

Auguste's eldest brother Victor Leopold (born 20.8.1870 at Wexstraße 2) initially attended a private school and, as befitted the eldest son at the time, grew into the banking business. The bank had a good reputation and survived economically difficult times, such as those during the cholera epidemic in Hamburg in August 1892.

Martin E. Friedburg, like his brother John Friedburg a year earlier, belonged to the Kunstverein in Hamburg as a "full member" and his wife Auguste as an "associate member" in 1887. The family card, used since 1892, certainly expanded the cultural education of Auguste, then twelve years old, and her older siblings.

Auguste's maternal grandmother, Isabella Lasart, lived for nine years after her husband's death. In March 1893 at the age of 77, she passed away at Auguste's parents' home on Sophienterrasse. Auguste was 14 years old at the time. Isabella Lasart was buried next to her husband in the Jewish Cemetery Ilandkoppel in Ohlsdorf, grave location A 12, No. 13. A year later, Auguste's father gave up the spacious villa in which the family had lived for 22 years and together they moved into the house at Harvestehuder Weg 63b, which was built according to his plans. It can be assumed that Auguste and her sisters received private lessons and attended a private secondary school. So far, this could only be proven by the entry in the access book of the prestigious private school of Antonie Milberg, where it says that a "Frl." Friedburg from Harvestehuderweg 63a, among others, together with a "Frl. Heinichen from Gr. Fontenay 12 and with the siblings "Frl." Beschütz from Oberstraße 83 attended the Selekta (a class with selected particularly good female students) in April 1896. It can be assumed that "Frl. Friedburg" means Auguste; she was 16 years old at that time, Lina already 18 and Helene 19. Her sisters Elisabeth and Fanny were already married.

Music played a big role at home. Auguste's father had learned to play the violin and had received piano lessons. At the age of ten, he had experienced his first piano concerto by Bach with Carl von Holten, the young Johannes Brahms and Carl Bargheer. Auguste's brother Theodor was also a gifted violin player and their mother an enthusiastic Bach interpreter at the piano. Monthly soirees were given at the family home and a music-loving society gathered around Johannes Brahms, a friend of his father's, violinist Carl Bargheer, concertmaster of the Philharmonic Society and teacher at the Hamburg Conservatory, and cellist Albert Gowa.

Auguste's eldest brother Victor Friedburg, who had taken the oath of citizenship in Hamburg in November 1895, was given procuration by his father in 1898 in the banking firm that had since been called "Martin Friedburg & Co". Victor Friedburg had married Elisabeth Mylius from Hamburg in his first marriage in 1896; she too was of Lutheran denomination. In addition to his musical inclinations, Victor Friedburg was fond of literature; as a member of the "Gesellschaft der Bücherfreunde zu Hamburg e. V.," he became its chairman from 1929 to 1933.

Auguste's eldest sister Fanny Semon, née Friedburg (born 17.8.1872), had married the gynecologist Dr. med. Max Julius Semon (born 1865), in November 1894. Her husband came from a Jewish family in Danzig. There their three children were born: Elisabeth (born 27.8.1898), Hans Martin (born 22.7.1900) and Olga (born 22.3.1902). In July 1919 this marriage was divorced.

Auguste's second oldest sister Emily Susanna Elisabeth (b. 8.3.1875), called Elsie, was in love with a prospective theologian at the age of 17. Her father was opposed to this union and the engagement did not take place. At the age of 22 she was married to the lawyer Dr. jur. Sally George Melchior; he was a member of the German-Israelite community and had his office at Michaelisbrücke 3. Elisabeth Friedburg thus married into a respected Hamburg Jewish family on January 23, 1897. An ancestor of her husband, Marcus Melchior, had been buried in the Wandsbek cemetery in 1732. His son Moses had gone to Copenhagen in 1760 and founded the family firm "Moses & Son G. Melchior". Their marriage to the scholar's daughter Brigitte Israel produced their son Sally Melchior (1814-1865). At the age of 18, he had come to Hamburg, married Emilie Ester Levinsohn (1817-1877) and founded the company "Dehn und Melchior" with Bernhard Dehn. Later, his business partner Bernhard Dehn became his brother-in-law when his sister Hanna Melchior married.

Sally Melchior had laid the economic and financial foundation of the family in Hamburg as a successful merchant by importing cotton goods from Manchester. His son Moritz Melchior (1839-1905) had married Emilie Reé (1847-1873) and continued the company. His sons Carl and George were able to pursue academic careers as lawyers. Carl Melchior, later a partner in the Warburg Bank, participated in the Versailles peace negotiations after World War I as a respected lawyer and representative of Germany.

Elisabeth and George Melchior's common daughter Emilie Elisabeth, Auguste's niece, was born on December 3, 1897 in Hamburg-Harvestehude at Werderstraße 86. The question of the daughter's religious upbringing was decided after months of discussion in such a way that the father allowed baptism and Christian influence to apply in school and church, but not at home. The daughter recalls in her memoirs that every year for his birthday her father received a "bolesanche" delivered by a Portuguese-Jewish bakery. The "holy ball" was loaded with succade and raisins - they doused it with rose water. The marriage was divorced in 1906, a year after the death of Elisabeth's father-in-law Moritz Melchior.

Auguste's third sister Isabella Helene Heinichen, née Friedburg (b. 22.6. 1876), had married the lawyer Dr. jur. Johann Christian Eduard Heinichen (b. 14.10.1870) in November 1898, and lived at Magdalenenstraße 32, near her parents' house. Her husband was baptized Lutheran and was the son of Dr. jur. Adolph Heinichen, a district court director, and Louise Nathalie Caroline, née Söhle. The marriage, which produced son Adolph (b. 24 Apr. 1901) and daughter Agathe (b. 15 Aug. 1904), was divorced in March 1915.

Auguste's fourth sister, Lina Friedburg, called Linchen (b. 7/26/1877) remained unmarried, as did Auguste.

Auguste's eight years younger brother Martin Theodor Friedburg (b. 12.2.1887), married Anna Luise Feddersen (b. 5.7.1891) from Halendorf near Eutin on December 12, 1912, when he was 25 years old.

Auguste's brother Victor Friedburg became a partner in the family firm, which had been renamed from "Salomon Meyer" to "Martin Friedburg & Co" at the beginning of 1898.

After a successful land speculation, Auguste Friedburg's father sold the house in Harvestehuder Weg and acquired a stately villa with a respectable property of three quarters of an acre in Blankenese on Falkenstein 4, near the Warburg estate on Kösterberg. Auguste's mother especially loved the forest and nature there; it reminded her of her home around Heidelberg. Her father was also able to enjoy a bit more of it after he had transferred the company to his son Victor at the beginning of 1907. After a reconstruction of the villa, a number of guest rooms and a large music room with two grand pianos were created. This meant that family gatherings and soirées could continue to be held.

A huge children's playground, vegetable gardens, the forest that stretched down to the Elbe River and a greenhouse with the famous, sulfur-yellow, fragrant tea rose Maréchal Neil completed the "paradise", where the grandchildren also grew up and played Indians. Auguste's mother knew how to teach the children about nature and tell them vivid fairy tales. This love of nature was also passed on to them by Auguste Friedburg, called Gusti, and her sister Lina, called Linchen, as unmarried aunts.

For Auguste Friedburg, the Jewish Community's cultural tax file lists "technical assistant" as her occupation. From the unpublished "memoirs" of her niece Emilie Braun-Melchior it can be learned that she was a "photographer" and had worked for some years during the First World War as an X-ray assistant in a military hospital in Antwerp. She learned and trained this profession in at the Lette-Schule Berlin (a foundation that cared for the professional training of girls and women of the bourgeoisie).

In a photograph from the time of the First World War, Auguste Friedburg can be seen as a Red Cross nurse in her nurses' station. Next to her bed is a picture of her mother, who had died shortly before, and a poem by Tagore Rabindranath, Nobel Prize winner for literature in 1913: "I slept and dreamed that life was joy. I awoke and saw, life is duty. I did my duty, and lo, life was joy."

Auguste's brothers Victor and Theodor both participated in World War I as soldiers.

Their mother Auguste Friedburg, née Lasart, died at home on Falkenstein on the morning of June 24, 1915, at the age of 67, after suffering from a stomach ailment; she was holding a volume of Goethe letters in her hands. All her life she had suffered from the fact that her only brother had been killed in the Prussian-French War of 1860. Her sister Lina Friedburg, née Lasart, followed her three months later. Both were buried in the Ohlsdorf cemetery. Auguste Friedburg in the family burial plot with 16 graves. Her husband had a monument made of sandstone erected there, grave site R 6 II, No. 8. Lina Friedburg, née Lassart, found her final resting place not far away, grave site U 7 I, No. 221.

During this time, the family also met outside in the countryside just outside Hamburg at the Melusinenthal estate near Schwarzenbeck. Auguste's brother Theodor Friedburg and his wife Anna Luise managed the estate there. Auguste's sister Elisabeth lived with them for some time to support her sister-in-law during the birth of her second child. Klaus was born on February 16, 1917, two and a half years after his sister Anna Liese (born July 6, 1914). A family photo exists from this time, taken by Auguste on May 19, 1917, with handwritten names of those present on the back. It is probably the last photo taken together with Theodor. Her brother Victor returned home at the end of the war in 1918 as a lieutenant, decorated with the Iron Cross I, but not her brother Theodor Friedburg. He had been killed in France toward the end of World War I, on September 22, 1918, leaving behind his wife Anna Luise with their four-year-old daughter Anna Liese and one-year-old son Klaus Martin Berend.

Auguste's father was still active in his banking business. He sold his property on Falkenstein in the economically difficult time after the First World War. The small Friedburg family with Auguste, her sister Lina and their father moved into a condominium, into the house Rothenbaumchaussee 26, first floor, built in 1922 according to the plans of the architect brothers Hans, Oskar and Ernst Gerson. Presumably, the Friedburg Bank was one of the foreign exchange lenders with whose help the Gerson brothers financed the coals and the entire annual production of bricks in the Oldenburg region for Hamburg buildings. In 1925, the painter Willy Davidson, a member of the Hamburg Secession, also moved into his studio apartment on the 6th floor in Rothenbaumchaussee together with his friend, the interior designer Curt Ahleff.

Auguste visited the passport office on September 13, 1923, she had lost her identity card. Medium height, brown eyes and dark brown hair with an oval face and no special distinguishing marks - that's how 24-year-old Auguste is described in the passport record.

It was the year of the Great Depression, after the collapse of the New York Stock Exchange in October 1929, when Auguste's father, Martin Friedburg, died in his home on December 10, 1929, at the age of 68. The next day, an announcement by his son Victor appeared in the "Hamburger Nachrichten" in the name of the family as well as his company: "Until the last day of his life, he served the company with his rich experience and in untiring fulfillment of his duties. We will hold his memory in high esteem for all time. Martin Friedburg & Co, Mönkedamm". The funeral service took place three days later on a Saturday in the crematorium of the Ohlsdorf cemetery.

One year later, Auguste's next oldest sister Lina also died at the age of 53, on May 8, 1930, in the Jerusalem Hospital, Moorkamp 2. She had suffered from anemia. Like her father, she too found her final resting place in the family grave in Ohlsdorf Cemetery. Formerly a place for the whole family with 16 graves, grave location R 6, No. 1-16, it is no longer preserved today.

After these strokes of fate, Auguste Friedburg sought a safe home for her old age. In 1931, she moved near her sister Elisabeth Melchior in Winterhude to Braamkamp 36, first floor. For Elisabeth Melchior it is documented that in 1930 she had acquired a lifelong right of residence in the "Senator Erich Soltow Foundation" by paying 1,200 RM.

After her divorce in 1906, Elisabeth Melchior had initially lived with her daughter Emilie, also called Emmy, at Eppendorferbaum 9. Later, in 1912, she had moved near her parents to a first floor apartment in Blankenese, Bahnhofsstraße 42. There, for the first time, had been electric light instead of kerosene lamps and candles. For her own safety, Elisabeth Melchior had acquired a dog, a gray-coated schnauzer named Peter, and taught him to bring her daughter Emmy's schoolbag when she came home from school. During a walk in late August 1915, he had eaten poison and died from it.

Her daughter Emilie remembers in her memoirs that she received round pieces with butter and a slice of brown bread as her school breakfast. At home they never had sausage and cheese, in the morning they had round pieces and egg, at noon buckwheat groats, and in the evening, after English dinner time at 6 p.m., a hot meal prepared by the cook. Usually there would have been two courses, which were served after Elisabeth's bell signal. Times at the end of the First World War in Blankenese at Wittsallee 7 were marked by hunger and cold. Emilie also remembers her mother's insistence that she did not want to buy anything on the black market.

Elisabeth Melchior had wanted her daughter Emilie, Auguste's niece, to learn home economics at the convent school after passing her Abitur on February 12, 1917, as was customary for senior daughters at the time, in order to prepare for marriage. Although she would have preferred to study right away, she had agreed to work for six months on an estate in Ostholstein. With her father's consent, she had then begun her law studies in Heidelberg, meeting her future husband in 1919. She moved to Hamburg and enrolled at the newly founded university there for the winter semesters of 1920/21 and 1922/23 in the Faculty of Law and Political Science, lastly also together with Lilly Melchior, who became her sister by marriage through her father's second marriage. Her father's precondition for consenting to her marriage was her passing the second state law examination; in May 1926 she successfully passed this in Hamburg. The Hamburg judicial administration wanted her to be the first female judge to serve as an associate judge in a civil chamber. Due to her impending marriage, she asked for a postponement and was then listed in the civil service list as an "assessor on leave" until further notice.

Emilie had been baptized and confirmed at the age of 16 in the Eppendorf church by Pastor Heitmann. In 1926 she had returned to her Jewish roots and was married to Paul Ernst Braun in a small liberal synagogue in Bonn. Her husband came from a Berlin Orthodox Jewish family. Elisabeth Melchior had a good relationship with her son-in-law. Her grandson Peter was born in Berlin on June 27, 1927. As late as October 1932, her daughter Emilie Braun was able to exchange her rights as a lawyer in Hamburg for a license to practice law in Berlin. One year later, right at the beginning of the National Socialist rule, she was struck off the list of admitted lawyers under the anti-Jewish Law for the "Restoration of the Professional Civil Service". She emigrated to Paris in March 1933 with her husband Paul and their five-year-old son Peter. There they tried to establish a livelihood in Neuilly sur Seine with a small clothing store. Elisabeth Friedburg also came to France to visit. She picked up her grandson from hospital and children's home stays in Switzerland and entertained thoughts of emigrating. She spoke fluent French and Portuguese and could have emigrated to Rio through connections. Elisabeth Melchior, however, had been well received by the French and felt comfortable in France. Her application to the Paris Prefecture for permission to immigrate was initially approved; however, the file then went to the Ministry of the Interior, was not processed further, and was still there at the beginning of the war in 1939. Elisabeth Melchior was therefore unable to emigrate to France.

Auguste's brother Victor Friedburg had resigned from the family business in 1935, after he, as a Jewish owner, was at the mercy of the decrees and laws of the National Socialist rulers. He had handed over the sole management of "Martin Friedburg & Co" to his son Rudolf in May 1936. The personally liable partners were the three sons from Victor Friedburg's second marriage - Rudolf and Helmuth in Hamburg and Günther Friedburg, who had emigrated to Buenos Aires in February 1936. On October 19, 1938, a foreign exchange audit was carried out on the basis of the Foreign Exchange Law § 34. The company owner Rudolf Friedburg declared that the company "Martin Friedburg & Co" was not to be considered a Jewish company. The three brothers Rudolf, Helmuth and Günther were "half-breeds" who had been raised Christian and were citizens of the Reich. The father was Jewish, the mother of "Aryan" descent. Thus, the company was spared from the "Aryanization".

In August 1938, Auguste Friedburg moved from her apartment at Braamkamp 36 to Braamkamp 42, 2nd floor. Her sister Elisabeth lived in the house next door, No. 40. According to the statutes of the "Senator Erich Soltow Foundation" of 1929, the housing complex at Braamkamp 34-44 had been built as housing for mainly older, female persons. In addition to the two unmarried sisters Elisabeth and Katharina Embden, who lived above Auguste's apartment, the widows Emilie Ascher and her daughter Alice had also moved into house No. 36, Ella Nauen into No. 38, and Hanna Hirsch into the retirement home No. 64.

Auguste's sister Helene Heinichen had lived with her daughter Agathe (b. 1904) in a three-room apartment at Dorotheenstraße 45 since their divorce in 1915, and her son Adolph (b. 1901), a young lawyer and "Bahrenfelder Kämpfer" (member of the Freikorps Bahrenfelder Zeitfreiwilliger 1919/1920), had died on August 21, 1934. Helene Heinichen had transferred her entire estate to her daughter Agathe, as she was considered a "Mischling of the first degree".

Auguste's eldest sister Fanny Semon had also stayed with her daughter Olga after the divorce, initially in Jena, where in 1923 her daughter had trained as a nurse for infants and children, since she had been unable to study medicine during the difficult economic times of inflation. Fanny Semon had been offered a job as a business manager in a private eye clinic. After successfully completing her medical studies in Munich, Olga Semon worked in Karlsruhe as an assistant physician in the children's hospital until she was dismissed in 1933. For a short time she was then able to find work as a senior physician in a sanatorium in Berlin-Grunewald. In 1934, Fanny Semon moved back to her hometown with Olga. In 1935 Olga passed an examination as a masseuse in Berlin and was thus able to work in Hamburg. They lived together at Alsterkamp 10 - until their emigration in September 1938 to Auckland in New Zealand. There Fanny Semon's second daughter Elisabeth also followed, after she had been denied the opportunity to practice her learned profession as a dietary laboratory assistant in Karlsbad. In Auckland, Olga Semon earned a living as a masseuse, studied medicine on the side and passed her exams three years later in Wellington. Fanny Semon's son Dr. Juan Hans Martin Semon escaped to Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Auguste Friedburg's assets were subject to a "security order" in March 1940, as she had an equal one-sixth share with her siblings in the community of heirs of Martin E. Friedburg's community of heirs. Her assets were confiscated and the National Socialist rulers demanded that she pay the so-called Reich Flight Tax. For her living expenses she was only allowed to dispose freely of an amount of 175,- RM per month. Every additional expense had to be applied for, documented and approved.

On September 5, 1940, Auguste Friedburg applied to the foreign exchange office of the Chief Finance President for the release of 200 RM: "They have been made available to me by the Budge Foundation for the purpose of a medically ordered convalescent trip and transferred to my security account." Whether the recuperation trip was granted to her is not known.

On December 6, 1941, Auguste's sister Elisabeth Melchior, who was four years older, was deported to Riga-Jungfernhof and murdered. She was 66 years old. Elisabeth's daughter Emilie received a letter after the war from her cousin Dr. Erika Wille-Friedburg, in which she reports on the last days before Elisabeth Friedburg's deportation: Dr. Walther Quiring, senior surgical physician at the General Hospital (presumably St. Georg) and longtime friend of Elisabeth Melchior, had kept Emilie's mother as a patient, although for him as an "Aryan" doctor the treatment of Jews had been forbidden. During his farewell visit, he handed Elisabeth Melchior sleeping pills, so many that Erika Wille-Friedburg, who had been very concerned about Elisabeth Friedburg at the time, suspected that the doctor had wanted to give his patient the option of choosing suicide. Erika Wille-Friedburg, however, had the impression that Elisabeth Melchior was completely unaware of this and therefore did not want to inform her about it.
Her daughter Emilie remembered statements made by her mother and reports in her memoirs: "Romantically inclined as she was, my mother had occasionally expressed to me that she hoped to die consciously - a wish that had better not have come true in such a way." A last sign of life from Elisabeth Melchior was received by a non-Jewish relative by marriage in Lübeck, a postcard written by Elisabeth Melchior and postmarked there.

After her sister Elisabeth had been deported, Auguste Friedburg continued to receive a monthly allowance of RM 75 from her as a donor through the Jewish Community for another year. On May 30, 1942, she had to move into the "Judenhaus", the Mendelson-Israel-Stift, together with the sisters Gertrud and Katharina Embden. Emily Ascher, Marie Fraenkel, Hanna Hirsch and Ella Nauen had already been admitted there a month earlier. Auguste Friedburg had just been hospitalized for several weeks and was unable to make the move herself, so Fritz Rosenberg and Cläre Schneider assisted her. The move was carried out by the Krumpf transport company. She had to apply again for reimbursement of moving expenses.

Although Auguste, like her siblings, had belonged to the Evangelical Lutheran Church all her life, she was deported to Theresienstadt six months after her sister Elisabeth, on July 19, 1942, in accordance with the National Socialist race laws. Before that, she had been forced to sign a "home purchase contract" and had to pay 7,449.32 RM, supposedly for housing and supplies.

According to the statements of her niece Emilie, she is said to have suffered a severe stroke shortly before the deportation. Auguste Friedburg died in Theresienstadt on March 20, 1943, at the age of 63.

The further fate of the family members
In the meantime, the family of Auguste Friedberg's niece, Emilie Braun, née Melchior, was subjected to life-threatening persecution after the German occupation of France. After a period of internment, they had been released and had joined the resistance movement. Their lives were dominated by the fear of being arrested, they lived underground with false papers, constantly changing their addresses. At times they were imprisoned in Gurs. The separation from their young son Peter, now called Pierre, was particularly difficult for Emilie and Paul Braun.

On August 17, 1942, Paul Braun was arrested and interned in the Vénissieux camp near Lyon. From Lyon, Paul Braun was deported to Drancy, and on September 2, 1942, he was deported with Convoy No. 27 to Auschwitz and murdered. Two days earlier, his mother Alice Braun had been deported from Berlin to Riga and murdered there on August 18, 1942, one month before her 69th birthday. Stolpersteine for Alice and Paul Braun were inaugurated in summer 2013 in Berlin, Else-Lasker-Schüler-Straße 11, together with their descendants.

Paul Braun's sister Henriette Kühne had been partially protected by her marriage to her non-Jewish husband and survived.

Pierre Braun was a member of a partisan group of the Resistance, and Emilie Braun also helped with the resistance and was supported by the Resistance. Both were able to survive in France. After the war, they initially went to the United States. Later Emilie lived in Israel and died there in 1991 in Binyamina. Pierre Braun returned to France, studied law and married Madette. He passed away in Limoges in 1996. Madette Braun preserved Emilie Braun's memoirs; they were published by the University of Limoges in 2011.

By order of the Gestapo, Helene Heinichen was forced to vacate the Dorotheenstraße apartment on October 15, 1943, despite protests from her daughter Agathe, who, because she had a non-Jewish father, invoked her position as head of the household. They then moved into an apartment in Cranachstraße, Groß Flottbek. Helene Heinichen's divorced husband, who provided for her upkeep, was married and living in Leipzig in his second marriage. At the beginning of the next year, Helene Heinichen received the deportation order for January 19, 1944 to Theresienstadt and had to report to the collection point at the Talmud Tora School.

Helene Heinichen survived the time of suffering in the Theresienstadt ghetto. For a while she had been able to work there as a kitchen help, then came the liberation at the end of the war. She returned to Hamburg and lived there with her daughter Agathe at Braamkamp 38, 2nd floor. Isabella Helene Heinichen, née Friedburg, died on October 9, 1965, at the age of 89, in the place where her sisters had also wanted to spend their retirement. The funeral service took place six days later at Ohlsdorf Crematorium. Her urn was buried in the Heinichen family grave, grave location AF 31, No. 361 III. Her daughter-in-law Rose Marie, née von Brocken, had chosen it for Helene's son. The ashes of her grandson Johann Christian Adolph Heinichen, who was killed at the age of 20 in February 1945 in Carlsfeld near Halle, also found a place in it. Helene's daughter Agathe Heinichen died on November 6, 1997 in Hamburg-Altona; she too found her final resting place in the family grave. A large gravestone with her names and dates of life immortalized on it still commemorates her there today.

Auguste's sister Fanny Semon and her daughter Olga returned to Germany from their country of exile, Australia, after the war in 1954. Fanny's daughter Elisabeth Semon, married Neumann, had died of a brain tumor in Switzerland in May 1953 at the age of 54. Fanny and Olga Semon settled in Bremen. Olga Semon opened a medical practice, but did not regain inner peace. She could no longer practice her profession and moved to England with her 86-year-old mother in 1958. In Canterbury, Kent, another attempt to establish herself as a doctor failed. In 1963 Olga Semon suffered from severe depressive moods. Auguste's sister Fanny Semon died in Canterbury in March 1965 at the age of 92. After her mother's death, Olga Semon's psychological problems intensified. She returned to Hamburg and was brought to the Eppendorf Psychiatric University Hospital for treatment by her brother Juan Hans, who had himself returned from Buenos Aires and in the meantime had settled in Berlin as a lawyer. Olga Semon stayed at the university clinic for a month and then went to the anthroposophically oriented Friedrich Husemann Clinic. There she was diagnosed with "uprooting depression of regression age." Her brother Juan Hans Semon later returned to Buenos Aires. Olga Semon moved back to England. On December 20, 1993, she died at St. Martin's Hospital in Canterbury at the age of 90.

Auguste's brother Victor Friedburg was able to survive in Hamburg in a "privileged mixed marriage" and continued the family's banking business at Alsterdamm 16 with his son Rudolf after the war. Victor Friedburg died at the beginning of 1951 at the age of 80 in his apartment at Alster 71. The private bank "Martin Friedburg & Co" with the owner Rudolf Friedburg existed until 1984. Today's company "Friedburg Grundstücksverwaltungen" with descendants grew out of this Friedburg family.

Auguste's sister-in-law, the wife of her brother Theodor, who was killed in World War I, Anna Luise Friedburg, and their children Klaus and Anne Liese had escaped to Ohio to the USA in 1937. Klaus became a well-known animal surgeon and specialist in difficult operations on small birds.

Auguste Friedburg's nephews and nieces survived in Brazil and England, France, the USA and Israel.

It is thanks to Klaus Friedburg, his son Martin L. Friedburg, Emilie Braun-Melchior and her daughter-in-law Madette Braun that many family photos, documents and the memory of Auguste Friedburg and her long-established Hamburg family have been preserved. For the stumbling stone dedication for Auguste's sister Elisabeth Melchior, on September 16, 2015 at Braamkamp 40, the great-nephew Martin Friedburg and his wife Beth came from the USA. Students* of the 10th grade French class Klosterschule contributed to the dignified memory of the mother of a former Klosterschule student with the musical contribution "Comme toi".

Translation: Margot Löhr

Stand: April 2023
© Margot Löhr

Quellen: 1; 2; 4; 5; 7; 8; StaH, 314-15 Oberfinanzpräsident, R 1938-3040 Friedburg Martin, R 1940-231 Friedburg Auguste; StaH, 332-3 Zivilstandsaufsicht, Geburtsregister, A 94 Nr. 5087/1870 Victor Friedburg, A 289 Nr. 74/1875 Elisabeth Friedburg; StaH, 332-3 Zivilstandsaufsicht, Heiratsregister, B 101 Nr. 383/1869 Martin Friedburg u. Auguste Lassart; StaH, 332-3 Zivilstandsaufsicht, Sterberegister, C 230 Nr. E 199/1872 Moritz Friedburg; StaH, 332-5 Standesämter, Geburtsregister, 8912 u. 499/1876 Helene Friedburg, 8923 u. 2077/1877 Lina Friedburg, 8939 u. 2202/1879 Auguste Friedburg, 13615 u. 1029/1901 Adolph Heinichen, 14187 u. 2138 /1904 Agathe Heinichen; 9134 u. 2383/1897 Emilie Melchior; StaH, 332-5 Standesämter, Heiratsregister, 8566 u. 481/1894 Julius Semon u. Fanny Friedburg, 2873 u. 308/1896 Victor Friedburg u. Elisabeth Mylius, 8583 u. 31/1897 George Melchior u. Elisabeth Friedburg, 8590 u. 477/1898 Eduard Heinichen u. Helene Friedburg; StaH, 332-5 Standesämter, Sterberegister, 7793 u. 451/1884 Leopold Lassart, 7806 u. 3114/1885 Emily Friedburg, 7876 u. 487/1893 Isabella Lassart, 4892 u. 127/1915 Auguste Friedburg, 6932 u. 1395/1915 Lina Friedburg, 8097 u. 438/1929 John Friedburg, 8098 u. 679/1929 Martin Friedburg, 8104 u. 199/1930 Lina Friedburg, 1307 u. 34/1951 Victor Friedburg; StaH, 332-7 Staatsangehörigkeitsaufsicht, AIf Bd. 146 Nr. 2097, AIf Bd. 174 Nr. 22625, AIf Bd. 89 Nr. 658, B I a 1849, Nr. 658; StaH, 332-8 Meldewesen, A 24 Bd. 298; StaH, 351-11 Amt für Wiedergutmachung, 1927 Fanny Semon, 19268 Emilie Braun, 2980 Agathe Heinichen, 23650 Juan Semon, 26254, 26344 Olga Semon, 28800 Agathe Heinichen; StaH, 352-5 Gesundheitsbehörde, Todesbescheinigungen, 1884 Sta 3 Nr. 451 Leopold Lassart, 1929 Sta 3 Nr. 679 Martin Friedburg, 1930 Sta 20 Nr. 199 Lina Friedburg; StaH, 362-6/16 Antonie Milberg, 1 Bd. 1; StaH, 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinden, Geburtsregister, 696 d Nr. 45/1841 Fanny Friedburg, 696 d Nr. 43/1843 Martin Friedburg, 696 d Nr. 169/1846 Louis Friedburg, 696 d Nr. 249/1848 Adolph Friedburg, 696 d Nr. 26/1850 John Friedburg; StaH, 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinden, Heiratsregister, 702 b Nr. 23/1838 Moritz Friedburg u. Emily Samuelson; StaH, 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinden, Sterberegister, 725 l Nr. 221/1868 Rebecca Moses; StaH, 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinden, Abl. 1993/1 A 10, 382 Austrittserklärungen, Abl. 1993/1, B 36, Abl. 1993/1, A 42; StaH, 741-4 Fotoarchiv, K 2350, S 4540; Archiv Friedhof Ohlsdorf, Beerdigungsregister, 1915/Nr. 7511, 1915/Nr. 11877, 1933/Nr. 1614, Feuerbestattungen, 1929/Nr. 3646, 1930/Nr. 1566, 1934/Nr. 3274 B, 1965/Nr. 8620, Grabbriefe, Nr. 608/1915, Nr. 26088 U/1915, Nr. 140632/1935; Adressbücher Hamburg 1800–1943; Hamburger Börsen Adressbuch, A 909/0022 Nr.11, 1912/13, A 902/0017, 1926, 1928, 1929; Datenbankprojekt des Eduard-Duckesz-Fellow und der Hamburger Gesellschaft für jüdische Genealogie, Grindelfriedhof, Ohlsdorf 1883–1889, Ohlsdorf 1890–1895, A 12-13/14, http://jüdischer-friedhof-altona.de/datenbank.html, eingesehen am: 22.2.2022; Emilie Braun-Melchior: Memoiren, Aufzeichnungen, begonnen 1949 in Israel, unveröffentlicht; Emilie Braun-Melchior: Blätter im Wind, Jugend-Erinnerungen, zum 24. Juli 1978 für Ruth Fleck, unveröffentlicht; The Memoirs of Emilie Braun-Melchior, translated by AMG Blake, March 1993; Fotos Privatarchiv Madette Braun und Martin Friedburg; Auskünfte Jochen Klinge, Kirchenarchiv St. Johannis Eppendorf; Auskünfte Monika Marschalck, Staatsarchiv Freie Hansestadt Bremen; Auskünfte Barbara Schulze, Förderkreis Ohlsdorfer Friedhof e. V., Familiengrabstätte Friedburg, Martin = R 6, 1-16; Emilie Braun-Melchior: Trois pays, deux guerres. En femme dans la tourmente, Limoge 2011, freundlicherweise zur Verfügung gestellt von Madette Braun und Martin Friedburg; Frank Freytag von Loringhoven/Carl Schmidt-Reitz: Martin Friedburg & Co. (Veröffentlichungen der Wirtschaftlichen Forschungsstelle e. V., Bd. 17), Hamburg 1957; Fritz Homeyer: Deutsche Juden als Bibliophilen und Antiquare (Schriftenreihe Wissenschaftlicher Abhandlungen des Leo Baeck Institutes, Bd. 10), Tübingen 1963; Ingo Köhler: Die "Arisierung" der Privatbanken im Dritten Reich (Schriftenreihe zur Zeitschrift für Unternehmensgeschichte, Bd. 4), München 2005; Anna von Villiez: Mit aller Kraft verdrängt, Entrechtung und Verfolgung "nicht arischer" Ärzte in Hamburg 1933 bis 1945 (Studien zur jüdischen Geschichte, Bd. 11), Hamburg 2009; Wolfgang Voigt/Helmut Frank/Ulrich Höhns: Hans und Oskar Gerson. Hanseatische Moderne, Bauten in Hamburg und im kalifornischen Exil 1907–1957, Hamburg 2000, S. 73, 75; Paul Braun 18/02/1898 à BERLIN, Convoi n° 27, https://ressources.memorialdelashoah.org/resultat.php?type_rech=rap&bool%5B%5D=&index%5B%5D=noms_tous&value%5B%5D=Braun&bool%5B%5D=AND&index%5B%5D=prenoms_tous&value%5B%5D=Paul&bool%5B%5D=AND&index%5B%5D=fulltext&value%5B%5D=&spec_date_naissance_start=&spec_date_naissance_end=&naissances_tous=&adresses_tous=&biographies_tous=&id_pers=*&spec_expand=1, eingesehen am: 28.3.2022; Death Fanny Semon, https://www.freebmd.org.uk/cgi/information.pl?r=231726386:2097&d=bmd_1646647063, eingesehen am: 29.3.2022; Kunstverein in Hamburg, Digital Archiv, https://www.kunstverein.de/en/institution/digitales-archiv/institutionsgeschichte/p2#gallery-4, eingesehen am: 28.3.2022. Herzlichen Dank an Madette Braun und Martin Friedburg!
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