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Erika Timm, 1944
© Archiv Evangelische Stiftung Alsterdorf

Erika Timm * 1943

Andreasstraße 35 (Hamburg-Nord, Winterhude)

HIER WOHNTE
ERIKA TIMM
JG. 1943
EINGEWIESEN 1944
ALSTERDORFER ANSTALTEN
"VERLEGT" 3.8.1944
KINDERFACHABTEILUNG
HEILANSTALT UCHTSPRINGE
ERMORDET 24.8.1944

further stumbling stones in Andreasstraße 35:
Siegmund Czaczkes, Leonie Czaczkes, Gregor Czaczkes

Erika Timm, born on 16 May 1943 in Hamburg, "transferred” on 3 Aug. 1944 from what was then the Alsterdorf Asylum (Alsterdorfer Anstalten) to the Uchtspringe "State Sanatorium” ("Landesheilanstalt” Uchtspringe), died on 24 Aug. 1944

Andreasstrasse 35, Winterhude

Erika Timm was born in Hamburg on 16 May 1943. She was the third child of Ewald Timm, born on 31 July 1900, and Auguste, née Siegmüller, born on 8 May 1904. The couple had married in Bad Lauterberg in the Harz Mountains in 1938. The father, a native of Hamburg, ran a grocery store in Winterhude at Andreasstrasse 35 until he was drafted into the German Wehrmacht. His wife, born in Hameln, had worked as a secretary before their marriage. Erika’s brother Manfred, born on 6 Nov. 1939, had been born prematurely and he died on 25 Nov. 1939 in the pediatric ward of St. Georg General Hospital. Her sister Annegret was born on 9 Apr. 1942.

Shortly after Erika’s birth, the pediatrician K. H. Keck, who ran his practice at Gryphiusstrasse 5, noticed that she had been born with Down’s syndrome (trisomy 21) and on 31 Mar. 1944, he referred her to the former Alsterdorf Asylum (Alsterdorfer Anstalten; today Evangelische Stiftung Alsterdorf) for admission. Erika was admitted to Alsterdorf on 14 Apr. 1944. She was initially admitted to the children’s infirmary.

The institutional physician Gerhard Schäfer confirmed the diagnosis. In his medical report, he described Erika as a "child in good nutritional condition, developed in accordance with her age.” According to this, she had not spoken a word during the admission procedure, but had made efforts to do so. She was of friendly character, he went on, and laughed when people engaged with her.

Staff recorded in Erika Timm’s patient record that she was very clean "on her things,” i.e., clothing, and body, when she was admitted. She had responded to sounds and movements. Four months later, on 3 Aug. 1944, it was noted that she was a very weak child, had no stability within herself at all, and could not yet sit. Erika was fed with porridge, but she ate very little. She looked around attentively and played with her hands and feet or with a ribbon.

In the meantime, Erika’s mother had moved from bomb-damaged Hamburg to Bad Lauterberg in the Harz Mountains. There, she received a letter from the Osterode public health department urging her to send her daughter to the "children’s special ward” ("Kinderfachabteilung”) of the Uchtspringe "state sanatorium” near Stendal "for treatment.” Apparently, the Alsterdorf Asylum had arranged this by reporting Erika to the "Reich Committee for the Scientific Registering of Serious Hereditary and Congenital Illnesses” ("Reichsausschuss zur wissenschaftlichen Erfassung von erb- und anlagebedingten schweren Leiden”).

Within the context of the Nazi "child euthanasia,” doctors, midwives, hospitals, and maternity hospitals as well as employees of the welfare authorities had been obliged since Aug. 1939 to register newborns and small children with certain "severe congenital conditions” – this also included children with Down’s syndrome – by means of a registration form and to report them to the responsible health authorities (later, the age of the children was raised from initially up to three to 16 years). So-called evaluators of the above-mentioned "Reich Committee” in Berlin determined the fate of the children based on the registration forms. If they put two red plus signs on a registration form, this meant, in Nazi diction, that the locally responsible persons were authorized to "treat” the child, but in reality to kill him or her.

The term "children’s special ward” was used in the Nazi German Reich as a euphemism for special psychiatric facilities in hospitals as well as sanatoriums and nursing homes that served the purpose of "child euthanasia,” i.e., the research on and killing of children and adolescents who had physical or mental disabilities.

Auguste Timm informed the management of the Alsterdorf Asylum on 23 July 1944, "I have received a request from the responsible health authority in Osterode/Harz, as an intermediary of the ‘Reich Committee for the Scientific Registering of Serious Hereditary and Congenital Illnesses, Berlin W9,’ to take our child Erika, who is currently being cared for by you, to the children’s special ward at the state sanatorium in Uchtspringe, District of Stendal, for treatment. My husband is currently on vacation and we are willing to take the child there. Currently, we are waiting for information from Uchtspringe about the date of admission and I am writing to you today to inform you. At the same time, please let me know immediately how far Erika has progressed in the meantime and whether it is still possible to transport her without a stroller, perhaps only with a large pillow. I do not live in Hamburg currently, which makes everything very difficult. I would therefore be grateful for any advice.” A letter of reply is not found in the patient file.

During the first phase of the "euthanasia” program, the Uchtspringe "state sanatorium” served as an intermediate institution for the "euthanasia” killing centers in Bernburg and Brandenburg until mid-1941. In June 1941, under the direction of director Ernst Besse, the institution was given a "children’s special ward” where killings were carried out. The children died through overdosed administration of drugs such as Phenobarbital (Luminal) or morphine.

Erika Timm was taken to Uchtspringe by her parents on 3 Aug. 1944. She died three weeks later, on 24 Aug. 1944, at the age of 15 months.

As far as we know today, Erika Timm is the only child who was transferred from the Alsterdorf Asylum to the Uchtspringe "state sanatorium.”

Translator: Erwin Fink
Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: May 2021
© Susanne Rosendahl

Quellen: StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2943 Nr. 421/1900; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 13282 Nr. 1745/1900; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 1114 Nr. 595/1939; Evangelische Stiftung Alsterdorf, Archiv, Sonderakte V 114 Timm, Erika; Michael Wunder, Ingrid Genkel, Harald Jenner, Auf dieser schiefen Ebene gibt es kein Halten mehr. Die Alsterdorfer Anstalten im Nationalsozialismus, 3. Aufl. Stuttgart 2016; Andreas Kinast, "Das Kind ist nicht abrichtfähig …" Euthanasie in der Kinderfachabteilung Waldniel 1941–1943 Hrsg.: Landschaftsverband Rheinland, SH-Verlag, 2010, www.beckassets.blob.core.windows.net (Zugriff 6.11.2019); Hildegard Wesse; Kriemhild Synder, Die Landesheilanstalt Uchtspringe und ihre Verstrickung in nationalsozialistische Verbrechen in Psychiatrie des Todes, NS-Zwangssterilisation und "Euthanasie" im Freistaat Anhalt und in der Provinz Sachsen, S.75, stgs.sachsen-anhalt.de (Zugriff 6.11.2019).