Star of David badge printed Jood worn by German Jewish boy

Rene Wolfgang Schönfeldt (Schoenfeldt) was born on February 8, 1932, in Berlin, Germany, to Jewish parents, Hans Phillip and Hanna Goldmann Schonfeldt. Hans was born in Berlin to Willi and Marie Schonfeldt on March 14, 1902. Hanna was born on September 8, 1903 in Berlin. In January 1933, Hitler was appointed Chancellor and the Nazi dictatorship was firmly established by summer. The regime immediately enacted laws to persecute and disenfranchise the Jewish population. Hans, Hanna, and Rene fled to the Netherlands that year and settled in Hilversum. In May 1940, Germany invaded the Netherlands. The occupation government was led by SS Reich Commissar Seyss-Inquart and anti-Jewish policies were immediately put in place. On January 9, 1941, Rene and his parents were sent to an internment camp in Westerbork, first set-up to hold non-Dutch Jews. It then became a transit camp which also processed and detained Dutch Jews prior to deportation to extermination and concentration camps in the east. On April 29, 1942, all Jews were required to wear Star of David badges at all times. By summer, there were frequent departures of large scale transports of Jews to the east. On September 4, 1944, Rene, Hans, and Hanna were deported to Theresienstadt ghetto-labor camp in German occupied Czechoslovakia. Soon after their arrival, on September 29, his father Hans was sent to Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland. Near the end of the war in spring 1945, the German were evacuating camps in the east and sending inmates to Theresienstadt. Rene searched each arriving transport, hoping to find his father, but he never saw him again. Rene and his mother were in Theresienstadt when it was liberated by Soviet troops on May 9, 1945. Rene and his mother Hanna were repatriated to the Netherlands. His father was presumed killed at Auschwitz. Hanna married Ulrich (Martin) Gross on July 16, 1947, in Hilversum. Ulrich, born July 11, 1885, was also from Berlin. The three immigrated to the United States on October 16, 1948, sailing from England to New York on board the Queen Elizabeth. They settled in California. Rene changed his name to Ronald Waldo Schonfeld. He married Barbara in 1974. Hanna, 101, passed away on May 11, 2004.

The badge was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 1989 by Ronald W. Schonfeld.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Barbara and Ronald W. Schonfeld In memory of Hans Schönfeldt

Funding Note: The cataloging of this artifact has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany.