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Martin Lentfer * 1875

August-Krogmann-Straße 100 (Versorgungsheim Farmsen) (Wandsbek, Farmsen-Berne)

entrechtet gedemütigt
Flucht in den Tod 03.01.1938

further stumbling stones in August-Krogmann-Straße 100 (Versorgungsheim Farmsen):
Ludwig Döpking, Richard Elkeles, Wanda Hoffmann, Gustav Remi

Martin Hermann Heinrich Lentfer, born 12 Nov. 1875 in Hamburg, death by suicide 3 Jan. 1938 at the Farmsen Care Home

August-Krogmann-Straße 100

Martin Lentfer was born in Hamburg to the tailor Hans Lentfer and his wife Julie, née Wolf. Like his father he trained to be a tailor. He lived at the Farmsen Care Home from 25 June 1926 until his death. There he was a "resident guard,” and worked at the institution’s reception desk. He enjoyed his work very much. He had previously been arrested for begging, which was probably the reason that he was forced to live in Farmsen. He also liked to drink.

On the first two days of 1938 he had leave from the home. He returned early, on 1 January 1938, but left again on the next day around 1:00 p.m., then returned around 7:00 that evening, lightly intoxicated. On 3 January 1938 he was contacted by the police because a drunken bricklayer had filed charges of homosexuality against one of the residents of the home. After he was questioned, he was no longer under suspicion, although he had been on leave from the institution and in the vicinity on the day of the incident.

On the evening of the same day, around 8:30 p.m., Martin Lentfer was found dead. He had hanged himself on the institute’s premises.
We do not know if Lentfer was homosexual. Since he committed suicide after his questioning about an incident related to the laws against homosexuality, a Stolperstein was laid at the entrance of the Farmsen Care Home at August-Krogmann-Straße 100, in memory of his fate as a victim of the persecution of homosexuals, and as a reminder of the persecution of those the Nazis classified as "anti-social.”


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

Stand: March 2017
© Bernhard Rosenkranz(†)/Ulf Bollmann

Quellen: StaH 331-5 (Polizeibehörde – Unnatürliche Sterbefälle), 70/38; Bernhard Rosenkranz/Ulf Bollmann/Gottfried Lorenz, Homosexuellen-Verfolgung in Hamburg 1919–1969, Hamburg 2009, S. 231.