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Gertrud Ehrenberg (née Jacobsen) * 1898

Grindelhof 64 (Eimsbüttel, Rotherbaum)

1941 Minsk
ermordet

further stumbling stones in Grindelhof 64:
Ernst Reinhold Ascher, Nanni Ascher, Chana Ascher, Carl Cohn, Carmen Cohn, Hans Cohn, Julius Cohn, Inge Ehrenberg, Lotte Ehrenberg, Blanka Ehrenberg, Manfred Lewinsohn, Richard Lewinsohn, Max Renner

Blanka (Blanche) Ehrenberg, née Steinberg, b. 6.4.1868 in Hamburg, deported to Theresienstadt on 7.15.1942, perished there on 1.29.1943
Gertrud Ehrenberg, née Jacobson, b. 2.2.1898 in Hamburg, deported to Minsk on 11.18.1941, murdered
Inge Ehrenberg, b. am 1.18.1933 in Hamburg, deported to Minsk on 11.18.1941, murdered
Lotte Ehrenberg, b. 7.3.1936 in Hamburg, deported to Minsk on 11.18.1941, murdered
(Kurt Ehrenberg, b. 4.17.1892 in Hamburg, deported to Minsk on 11.18.1941, murdered)

Grindelhof 64

The commemorative stones for the Ehrenberg family bear witness to the annihilation of three generations of a Hamburg Jewish family.

Kurt Ehrenberg’s mother, Blanka, was born in Hamburg. She was the daughter of the businessman Hirsch Steinberg and his wife Friederike, née Schoeneberg, and had several siblings. Only her brother Paul is known by name; he survived in a "mixed marriage.” His son, Werner Steinberg, in 1987 reported in the newspaper, Die Zeit, about his experiences and in so-doing mentioned his Aunt Blanka. Werner Steinberg’s eye-witness account can be found in the publication, "Where Their Roots Were,” concerning the Jews in Hamburg-Eimsbüttel.

On 13 September 1889, Blanka married the businessman Ludwig Rudolf Ehrenberg. He, too, was born in Hamburg on 16 March 1862, and also came from a Jewish family. His father, Rudolph Ehrenberg was in possession of a Hamburg Letter of Citizenship since April 1861 and was a qualified interpreter and teacher of the natural sciences, as well as Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish. His mother Emma Melusina, née Benjamin, was no longer alive at the time of the wedding. Ludwig Ehrenberg had at least one brother, Franz Rudolph, who also survived National Socialism in a marriage to a non-Jewish woman.

By 11 March 1890, Ludwig and Blanka Ehrenberg already had their first son, Bruno Rudolph. There followed on 17 April 1892 Kurt Hermann. Both children were born at home in St. Georg, at Steindamm 21. For a time, the young family moved around frequently. While Blanka’s father-in-law Rudolph remained settled at Alsterarkaden 12, from 1896 until his death in 1911, Blanka, from 1899, Ludwig, and their two sons lived at Altonaerstrasse 38, from 1902 at Faberstrasse 6, from 1905 at Rellingerstrasse 22, and in 1906 at Heussweg 29. In 1915, they moved to Winterhude at Goldbekufer 28, where they remained for the next 24 years.

Kurt Ehrenberg’s path through life led him to the sea. During the First World War, his cousin Werner Steinberg recalled, Kurt had been in the navy. Afterwards, he worked until 1937 as purser on a variety of ships of the HAPAG shipping company. On 9 June 1931, when he married Gertrud Hedwig Jacobson of Altona, he gave his address as Goldbekufer 28--perhaps, as a seaman, he lived with his parents when he had shore leave.

Gertrud Jacobson was born on 2 February 1898. Until 1933, her parents, Siegmund and Mary, née Rothenburg, operated a firm dealing in products for the theater at Rentzelstrasse 14. Gertrud also had a brother. He stayed in South America during the Nazi era and was the only member of the family to have survived.

Kurt and Gertrud Ehrenberg’s marital happiness lasted only a short time, for a week after their wedding, on 15 June 1931, Kurt’s brother Bruno died in his apartment at Cäcilienstraße 4 in Winterhude. It was Kurt’s father-in-law Siegmund Jacobson, who reported Bruno’s death to the registry office. Bruno Ehrenberg left behind his wife Thekla Maria Toni, née Kramer, who was born on 9 June 1895. She was the daughter of an Evangelical Lutheran tailor.

Blanka Ehrenberg, her husband Ludwig, and daughter-in-law Thekla continued to run Bruno’s southern wines import firm, which he had founded in 1921, until its dissolution on 12 May 1939. Thekla married again in 1933, divorced, and married once more in 1938; however, none of this seemed to trouble her connection to the Ehrenberg family.

Kurt Ehrenberg and his wife Gertrud lived in the first years of their marriage with Gertrud’s parents at Rentzelstrasse 14. It was there that they had their first daughter, Inge Friederike Flora. At the end of 1933, the young family moved to their own apartment at Semperstrasse 74 in Winterhude, remaining there until 1939. The relevant address directory lists Kurt as "Master Purser of the Merchant Marine.” At Semperstrasse on 3 July 1936, a second daughter was born, Lotte Julia Martha. By 1932 at the latest, Kurt and his wife were also members of the Jewish Congregation; their daughters were also considered members.

In September 1937, Kurt Ehrenberg was dismissed as purser from the HAPAG line. Following this, he worked as a language teacher.

On 23 June 1939, Kurt’s father, Ludwig Rudolph Ehrenberg died at 77 years of age. His mother Blanka left the apartment on Goldbekufer and moved together with Kurt and his family to Grindelhof 64. This was not a voluntary move, for no one in the family had ever before lived in the Grindel quarter. Further, the Reich Law concerning the "rental arrangements with Jews,” had abolished their free choice regarding habitation on 30 April 1939.

As can be seen from the few remaining documents, Kurt Ehrenberg earned scarcely anything as a language teacher--from 1938, he no longer paid the Communal Religion Tax. An accounting from June 1940 calculated the family’s "assets” as RM 31 in savings and the surrender value of a life insurance policy valued at RM 2500. Both were confiscated in November 1940 "for the benefit of the German Reich.”

In the few weeks before their deportation, Kurt, Gertrud, and their daughters had to move into the apartment of Valentina and Erna Brociner at Grindelhof 83 (see Grindelhof 83). Leopold Bielefeld was also forcibly quartered there (see Grindelhof 83).

Kurt Ehrenberg and Leopold Bielefeld were deported to Minsk on 8 November 1941 and murdered there.

Ten days later, on 18 November 1941, Gertrud, Inge, and Lotte Ehrenberg, as well as Erna and Valentina Brociner, were carried off to Minsk and murdered.

The transport list to Minsk for 18 November 1941 named "Grindelhof 64” as the address for Gertrud, Ingen and Lotte Ehrenberg. The accounting, which the Schlüter auction house later presented concerning the auctioning of objects from the Brociner apartment, listed among other things, two beds, leading to the conclusion that the whole family and not just Kurt Ehrenberg had been housed there.

Blanka Ehrenberg had to leave her home at Grindelhof 64, probably in early 1942. She was assigned a stay in the "Jew house” at Kielortallee 22. There, she received the order for deportation to Theresienstadt on 15 July 1942.

Her nephew Werner Steinberg recalls:
"My dear Aunt Blanche, along with the other old people, had to board a police guarded truck, which transported her from her apartment in the Oppenheim Foundation to a collection point at the Sternschanze Railway Station. Before she boarded the truck, my mother and I embraced her once, and for the last time. I could just barely get myself out of her apartment as the Gestapo officials were already noisily dividing up what was left behind. The evacuation of the Jews did not happen in the dark of night and fog, but rather in the broad daylight of a summer afternoon. In spite of this, the street was bereft of people and curtains did not move. A macabre quiet.”

Blanka Ehrenberg died in the Theresienstadt ghetto on 29 January 1943. According to her death notice by the Council of Elders, she suffered from diverse maladies, but died of heart failure.

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

© Carola von Paczensky

Quellen: 1; 2; 4; 5; 8; 9; StaH 231-7 Handelsregister A1 Bd. 118 Nr. 26916; StaH 314-15 Oberfinanzpräsident J2/188; StaH 332-3 Zivilstandsaufsicht A 50, 1868; StaH 332-5 Standesämter 2737 u. 906/1889, 2216 u. 807/1890, 2277 u. 1102/1892, 13628 u. 221/1931, 9853 u. 1367/1931, 2372 u. 1902/1895; 1103 u. 399/1939; 654 u. 879/1911, 14106 u. 243/1931; StaH 314-15 Oberfinanzpräsident R 1940/0733; StaH 351-11 Amt für Wiedergutmachung 14188 u. 1057; StaH 522-1 Jüdische Gemeinden 992 e 2 Bände 2, 3 u. 4; StaH 552-1 Jüdische Gemeinden 391 u. 392 Mitgliederlisten; StaH 741-4 Melderegister K6033; Hamburger Adressbücher; Steinberg: Im Grunde, S. 171–178; Ohne Autor: Freunde; www.holocaust.cz/de/datenbank-der-digitalisierten-dokumenten/dokument/93432-ehrenberg-blanka-todesfallanzeige-ghetto-theresienstadt (letzter Aufruf: 1.6.2016).
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