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Henny Hirschfeldt (née Burchard) * 1880

Grindelallee 88 (Eimsbüttel, Rotherbaum)

HIER WOHNTE
HENNY HIRSCHFELDT
GEB. BURCHARD
JG. 1880
DEPORTIERT 1941
MINSK
ERMORDET

Henny Hirschfeldt, née Burchard, b. 9.3.1880 in Neubukow, Mecklenburg, deported to Minsk on 11.18.1941, murdered

Grindelallee 88

The Burchard family seems to have been long-settled in Henny’s birthplace of Neubukow, for it is documented that a Hirsch Baruch, from Neubukow, adopted the family name Burchard in 1813. This took place in connection with a decree of the duke of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, prescribing that the Jews of the land adopt legal family surnames, in order to be better able to raise "contributions” from them.

In Neubrandenburg, on 12 April 1907, Henny married Eduard Hirschfeldt, also from Mecklenburg, who was born in Teterow on 12 January 1878. Eduard’s parents were Louis Hirschfeldt and Dora, née Burchard. He had three brothers: Franz, b. 5 February 1882, Walter, b. 9 February 1884, and Georg, b. 18 February 1887. The Hirschfeldt family, too, must have long resided in Teterow, for the above-mentioned decree led a Kiewe Hirsch, of Teterow, to adopt the name Kiewe Hirschfeldt in 1813. In 1882, a Louis Hirschfeldt of Teterow was issued a patent for a sorting sieve to be used in grain processing. It is probable that he was Eduard’s father. The letter of patent is housed in the German Historical Museum of Berlin.

At the beginning of the twentieth century, Louis Hirschfeldt and his wife moved to Hamburg. It is probable that he was accompanied by his son Eduard, about whom it is known that he had lived in Hamburg since May 1904. On 11 December 1911, both were given Hamburg Letters of Citizenship. Franz Hirschfeldt came to Hamburg in 1906 and received the Letter of Citizenship on 30 May 1913. By 1919 at the latest, Walter Hirschfeldt had come to Hamburg where he lived at Grindelhof 10-12, with his wife Bertha, née Kaufherr, b. 16 May 1880, and their son Kurt Peter, b. 9 July 1931; later they moved to Steindamm 6III. From 1929, he was issued a new Communal Religion Tax record on which neither his wife nor son were listed, indicating a separation. He left Hamburg in 1934 and registered with the Jewish Congregation in Mersch, Luxemburg. It is unclear whether his wife and son accompanied him, however, they do not appear on any lists of victims. Walter Hirschfeldt worked in Lintgen, Luxemburg as a poultry dealer. Following the invasion of the German army, he was arrested and brought to the Rivesaltes camp in southern France. From there, on 11 August 1942, he was sent to Drancy and on 14 August 1942 again deported to Auschwitz. The date of his death is unknown.

Louis Hirschfeldt died in 1916; his wife Dora, who was dependent on the support of her sons, apparently lived with Walter at Grindelhof 10/2. She died in 1925.

After his marriage in 1907, Eduard Hirschfeldt brought his wife Henny to Hamburg. Their daughter Margot was born in the Hanseatic City in 1909. Eduard was in commerce and ran a white and woolen goods business at Grindelallee 80. Apparently, he was successful, because the Hamburg directory for 1931 listed him as the owner of houses at Grindelallee 78-90 and Steindamm no. 55. He lived with his family in a house at Grindelallee 88. There are no surviving reports as to how the antisemitic chicaneries of the Nazi State affected the Hirschfeldts in the early years of the regime. On 16 June 1936, however, Eduard Hirschfeldt signed a contract selling the properties at Grindelallee 86-90 to Friedrich Busch and Walter Seifert. With the proceeds of RM 54,000, mortgages and other debts had to be settled, after which there remained RM 14,067 paid to the seller. It is to be assumed that these sales took place under pressure; contracts at this point in time did not yet have to be approved by the District Economic Advisor and could therefore be concluded under "halfway reasonable terms and conditions” (Frank Bajohr, Aryanization in Hamburg, Chapter 4.)

It was in 1938, that Eduard Hirschfeldt had to sell his firm and the rest of the houses, under different circumstances. Now, all "Aryanization” contracts had to be put before District Economic Advisor Otte, who made sure that, as the Hamburger Tageblatt made known on 2 December 1938, "the Jew would not get an inappropriately high price.” That meant, among other things, the intrinsic value of a firm, the "good will” reputation it had established, would not be remunerated, rather only the warehouse at the acquisition price and the inventory. Even that negotiated sum would regularly be "corrected” to a lower amount by the Economic Advisor. The price of the properties and houses were thus considerably reduced and very little, or none at all, of the proceeds went to the seller. Following this model, the "Aryanization” of Eduard Hirschfeldt’s remaining property was processed. His firm was surrendered to an "Aryan” buyer on 31 December 1938. "Paid” was the at cost price of the inventory; the "good will” remained unremunerated. The buyers, Feldmann and Langhein, dissolved the "Jewish” firm on 17 March 1939 and opened a "new” business in the same place with the old inventory. Concerning the sale of the properties at Grindelallee 78-80 (to Günter Langhein) and Steindamm 55 (to Otto Kurz) in 1939, documentation from the Chief Financial Authority has survived. As a result of this forced sale, the accountant Karl Candidus made the following reckoning to Eduard Hirschfeldt on the day of record, 31 December 1938:

Business assets: RM 6,538.87
Grindelallee 80 (sale price RM 78,000/debit RM 77,010) RM 990.00
Steindamm 55 (sale price RM 48,400/debit RM 41,510) RM 6,890.00
add RM 14,418.87
minus expected increase in value and property transfer
tax, transfer fees, and costs RM 13,500.00
remainder RM 918.87

Since the properties were already in Hirshfeldt’s possession for a few years, and because the buying price exceeded the debits (providing that there were mortgages but no special taxes), one can deduce a severe undervaluation. Despite this, the seller was allowed RM 14,000 from the sale. After the levies exacted by the state specifically and only from Jews, there remained about RM 900. Since Henny Hirschfeldt did not possess a fortune of her own, no "security order” was issued for the couple, which was customarily imposed on Jewish property owners of greater means. The attorney Rembert Müller affirmed in a letter of 1947 that: "The assets of the Hirschfeldt couple fell […] completely victim to so-called Aryanization.”

The Hirschfeldts had to give up their home at Grindelallee 88 and move to Haynstrasse 9 in Eppendorf, where their daughter Margot was already living with her son Michael (b. 30 August 1931). She had married Alfons Haas, who was born in Borken, Westphalia on 3 January 1895. He came from a prosperous family in Borken. His father, Moses Haas, had established a furniture factory there, which was carried on by his sons. Alfons and his brothers Harry (b. 7 September 1891) and Leo (b. 4 December 1896), as well as their mother, Ricka Haas, established an autonomous branch in Hamburg at Billstrasse 156-158: the Brothers Haas & Co. In September 1938, they had to sell their enterprise to "Senior Group Leader Ulrich and Major Lofink and a certain Mr. Meyer, who were members of the Nazi Party,” as Harry Haas wrote (in English) to the British military administration in Hamburg. Ulrich and Lofink were former employees, who, like Paul Friedrich Meyer, according to Harry Haas’ estimation, did not have the means to pay a fair price. Nevertheless, a purchase price of RM 395,000 was agreed upon, which was to go into a blocked account. Whether this relatively high amount was paid completely, we do not know. Lesser amounts were conceded to the old owners for living expenses; the rest of the money was confiscated "for the good of the Reich” in 1941. The new owners formed a general partnership soon after the takeover and continued the firm under the name: Ulrich, Lofink & Co.

Alfons Haas, according to the data on his Communal Religion Tax record, left Germany in June 1939 and went to the Netherlands. However, his nephew Hans Friedrich Gans reported to the Office of Reparations: "[Alfons Haas] first came from Hamburg to Borken to visit his mother in November 1938 because he believed that he would be safe there. But when the Night of Broken Glass occurred in Borken, too, he went over the unmanned border in the dark of night into the Netherlands. There he met up with his cousins Leo and Erich Haas, who had also emigrated from Germany. He was initially arrested by the police in Winterswlyk because he had no sort of papers on him and was then interned in the Reuver Cloister. Then, as a refugee without papers, he came to the Westerbork camp.” Westerbork was built by the government of the Netherlands to house "paperless” Jewish refugees. When the German army marched into the Netherlands in May 1940, it put Westerbork’s inhabitants in deadly peril. For Alfons Haas to leave the country, it would have cost RM 53,930 to meet the "Reich Flight Tax,” as well as RM 42,400 for the "Jewish Assets Levy” and an emigration payment of RM 8,666, which was to be paid to the Jewish Religion Association of Hamburg, all from the above mentioned blocked account.

Margot Haas remained with their son in Hamburg. She gave up the apartment at Parkallee 5 and moved to Haynstrasse 9. Her parents Henny and Eduard Hirschfeldt took her in, after she had lost her assets. Together they moved one more time, to Hahynstrasse 10. On 19 October 1941, Eduard Hirschfeldt died from unknown causes. He was interred in the Jewish Cemetery in Hamburg-Ohlsdorf.

A month later, on 18 November 1941, the rest of the family--Henny Hirschfeldt, Margot and Michael Haas--were deported to Minsk. They were not among the few that survived that ghetto.

Alfons Haas was taken from Westerbork to Theresienstadt on 4 September 1944. Only a few weeks later, on 29 September 1944, he was assigned to a transport bound for the Auschwitz extermination camp. On 17 March 1959, the Netherlands Red Cross informed the Office of Reparations that he had been sent to the Golleschau work camp on 6 October 1944. His prisoner number was B 11199.

Golleschau was a satellite camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau. It lay approximately 37 miles southwest of Auschwitz; the inmates there performed heavy physical labor in a cement factory and stone quarry. On 19 January 1945, Alfons Haas was "evacuated” from Golleschau in the direction of the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, but he never arrived there. He probably died on this death march, either shot or from exhaustion.

According to the opinion of the Dutch, Alfons Haas was considered to have "died on 2 February 1945 in Central Europe.” The German authorities fix his date of death and that of his wife and son on 8 May 1945.

Alfons‘ brother, Harry, returned to Hamburg in 1948 and died there on 25 May 1948, "on the way to the Harbor Hospital.” He had supposedly been invited as a witness at the trial of a war criminal and in his excitement at the course of the trial suffered a fatal heart attack.

Commemorative stones for Alfons, Margot, and Michael Haas have been laid at Parkallee 5, in Harvestehude.

Translator: Richard Levy
Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

© Ulrike Sparr

Quellen: 1; 2; 4; 5; 8; StaH 232-5 Nachlassgericht Hamburg, Vormundschaftswesen 776; StaH 351-11 Amt für Wiedergutmachung 13208 (Haas, Harry u. Alfons) u. 1362 (Gans, Helene); Bajohr, "Arisierung"; Francke/ Krieger: Die Familiennamen; Hamburger Adressbücher 1930–1940; www.dhm.de/datenbank/dhm.php?seite=5&fld_0=03621750 (letzter Aufruf: 29.7.2014); http://suomenhirvi.piranho.de/gegenvergessen/ moseshaas.htm (letzter Aufruf: 22.7.2014); http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/KZ_Golleschau (letzter Aufruf: 7.8.2014); www.bundesarchiv.de/gedenkbuch/chronicles.html.en?page=3 (letzter Aufruf: 10.9.2014); www.ushmm.org/online/hsv/person_view.php?PersonId=3534928 (letzter Aufruf: 10.9.2014); www.ushmm.org/online/hsv/person_view.php?PersonId=510136 (letzter Aufruf: 10.9.2014); www.ushmm.org/online/hsv/person_view.php?PersonId=1532302 (letzter Aufruf: 10.9.2014); www.us hmm.org/online/hsv/person_view.php?PersonId=5334153 (letzter Aufruf: 10.9.2014); http://de.wikipe dia.org/wiki/Camp_de_Rivesaltes (letzter Aufruf: 10.09.2014).
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