Heilbronn and Wertheim families papers
Extent and Medium
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Creator(s)
- Heilbronn family
- Wertheim family
Biographical History
Hugo Heilbronn (1900-1964) was born in Geisig, Germany to Louis and Rosa Heilbronn. Else Wertheim Heilbronn (1911-1998) was born in Brünen, Germany to Levy and Selma Wertheim. Hugo immigrated to the United States in 1938, and Else and their daughter Ruth (b. 1935 in Lahnstein) followed in 1939. Hugo’s parents Louis (b. 1869) and Rosa Heilbronn (b. 1873), sister and nieces Hannah (b. 1905), Irmgard (b. 1931), Elsbeth (b. 1933), and Helga Tobias (b. 1938), and aunt Emmy Rosenthal (b. 1884) were deported to Łódź in October 1941 and were later killed at Auschwitz. Hannah’s husband Louis Tobias (b. 1907) survived Łódź and Auschwitz and immigrated to the United States in 1946. Emil (b. 1874) and Kathinka Heilbron (b. 1883) and Lina Rosenthal (b. 1898) were deported from Frankfurt to Kowno and killed there in November 1941.
In December 1941, Else Wertheim Heilbronn's mother and brothers Selma (b. 1877), Walter (b. 1904), and Pau Wertheiml (b. 1915) were deported from Düsseldorf to Riga, where they are presumed to have been killed. Her sister Henny (b. 1905) and brother-in-law Simon Strauss (b. 1901) were deported to the Gurs concentration camp in France in October 1940, transferred to Les Milles and Marseilles in late 1941, and transferred via Drancy to Auschwitz in August 1942, where they were killed.
Archival History
United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Acquisition
Funding Note: The cataloging of this collection has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.
Ruth Gottlieb donated the Heilbronn and Wertheim families papers to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2006.
Scope and Content
The Heilbronn and Wertheim families papers consist of correspondence to German Jewish immigrants Hugo and Else Heilbronn in Pennsylvania from their Heilbronn and Wertheim family members in Germany, England, Belgium, and Rhodesia and French concentration camps at Gurs and Les Milles; correspondence arranging aid for relatives in Germany and France; and a 2005 newspaper article in which Ruth Gottlieb, daughter of Hugo and Else Heilbronn, describes her family’s experiences of Nazi persecution in Germany and immigrating to the United States in 1939. Ruth Gottlieb’s article describes her very early years in Nazi Germany, restrictions on her father’s cattle business, the destruction of family property during Kristallnacht, immigration to the United States, their efforts to bring their relatives to America, and learning that most of their family was killed in the Holocaust. Correspondence consists of letters to the Heilbronn family in Pennsylvania from their relatives in Europe. Letters from Henny and Simon Strauss describe conditions in Gurs and Les Milles and their desperate need for money. Letters from Louis, Rosa, Lina, Kathinka, and Emil Heilbronn, Hannah and Louis Tobias, Emma Rosenthal, and Selma and Walter Wertheim describe their lives in Frankfurt and Wesel, Germany, family news, health, their difficulties arranging emigration and pleas for help, and news about the deportations of relatives and friends. Letters from Henny and Simon Strauss describe life in Gurs and Les Milles and their desperate need for money. Letters from Selma Heilbronn and Helga, Ilse, and George Feilmann in England, from Sally Heilbronn in Rhodesia, and from Fred and Alice Strauss in New Jersey describe their concern for their relatives in Europe. Packages, travel, and tracing documents consists of correspondence with aid organizations and travel companies that documents Hugo and Elsie Heilbronn’s efforts to arrange money, packages, affidavits, and transportation for their relatives in Europe and to locate them after their correspondence ceased.
System of Arrangement
The Heilbronn and Wertheim families papers are arranged as three series: I. Personal narrative, 2005, II. Correspondence, 1941-1943, III. Packages, travel, and tracing documents, 1940-1944
Corporate Bodies
Subjects
- Concentration camp inmates--France--Correspondence.
- Jews--Germany--Frankfurt am Main.
- Frankfurt am Main (Germany)
Genre
- Document
- Photographs.