Generalkonsul Olof Herman Lamms arkiv, A

The series is part of the archive of the Swedish Jewish diplomat and businessman Consul General Olof H Lamm. It contains the personal correspondence of Lamm and his wife, Signe Lamm, with family, friends, and acquaintances about private matters, business, diplomacy, and issues regarding Jewish organizations, primarily about Jewish relief.

The first 32 volumes of the collection primarily contain correspondence with Lamm’s family, including his father, the liberal politician Herman Lamm, his brothers, the Vice President of the Swedish National Bank, Erik Lamm, and the literature scholar Professor Martin Lamm, his aunt Emma Zorn and her husband, the artist Anders Zorn, as well as members of the Warburg and Philipson families. Volumes A 30–31 consist of Lamm’s correspondence with Sigmund and Eva Warburg in London and with the banker Erich M Warburg. In their correspondence, Lamm and the Warburgs focus primarily on the situation for Jews in Nazi Germany, discussing the responses of various states to the persecution of German Jews and exchanging information on possible safe havens for refugees in Europe, North America, and South America. Additionally, they discuss their attempts to lobby governments to provide support and housing to Jewish refugees in Sweden and Great Britain as well as in the United States and South America. In volume A31, Lamm criticizes the censorship of anti-Nazi opinions in the Swedish press. Correspondence of similar character can be found in volume A46 between Lamm and Eduard Hartvig, ranging from 1932 to 1946, and in volume 33 there is a letter from the archaeologist Axel Boëthius from 1933 in which he elaborates on the importance of the social, political and economic circumstances following World War I for the rise of the Nazi regime in Germany.

Volume A34 contains Olof and Signe Lamm’s correspondences with renowned army nurse Elsa Brändström. The Lamms maintained contact with Brändström both prior to and during the war years, with Brändström employing Lamm’s help in assisting German Jews fleeing persecution. The volume includes Lamm’s efforts to help banker and philanthropist Henry H Arnold acquire transit visas to flee Nazi-occupied Norway and reach the United States. Volume A 53 contains correspondence between Olof Lamm and Ragnar Sachs about finding suitable accommodation for Laurence Steinhardt upon his appointment as the U.S. ambassador to Sweden in 1933. The same volume contains multiple letters signed “Svenska Fosterlandsvänner” (Swedish Friends of the Fatherland) addressed to Lamm and Josef Sachs, the owner of Sweden’s foremost Department store in Central Stockholm, in 1938. The letters contain requests for Lamm and Sachs to scrutinize the contents of the weekly paper Vecko-Journalen (owned by the Swedish Jewish publishing family Bonnier), which the Swedish Friends of the Fatherland found un-patriotic and harmful.

Volumes A 54 and 55 contain Lamm’s correspondence with the Dutch-American historian Hendrik Willem van Loon. The correspondence includes Lamm’s attempts to have Van Loon persuade President Roosevelt to accept a larger number of German Jewish refugees in the U.S. Contained within is also Lamm’s commentary on the worsening treatment of German Jewry, as well as on the restricted efforts of the Swedish state and Swedish humanitarians to provide relief to Jewish refugees. In addition, Lamm offers commentary on Van Loon’s book 1938 Our Battle – Being One Man’s Answer to ‘My Battle’ by Adolf Hitler. The correspondence also includes Lamm’s commentary on contemporaneous political figures and leaders, including Neville Chamberlain, Zog I of Albania, and Benito Mussolini.

Alphabetically and chronologically arranged.