Embroidered tea cozy used by Austrian Jewish refugees to store family correspondence

Bruno Goldstein was born, with his twin brother Jack, in Vienna, Austria in 1935. His mother, Regina, was born in Baranov, Poland in 1905; his father, Heinrich, was born in Vienna, in 1903. On the twin’s 3rd birthday, the Germans marched into Vienna and Austria was declared part of the German Reich. The next year, the family moved to Belgium. After the Germans invaded Belgium in 1940, his father was arrested and sent to Gurs internment camp in Vichy, France. After his arrest, the boys, their mother, and their maternal aunt unsuccessfully tried to escape to England. On June 11, 1942, Germany began the deportation of Jews in Belgium. When the Gestapo blocked off the street and searched the apartments for Jews, the boys were home alone. They refused to open the door and the soldiers forcefully entered the apartment. Since Heinrich worked making coats for Germans fighting on the Russian front, the soldiers decided his work was too important to deport the family; they were allowed to stay. Before leaving, the soldiers beat Jack and Bruno for refusing to open the door. Months later, a neighbor told their mother about Pere Bruno Reynders, a Catholic priest who was hiding Jewish children in convents. At the age of 8, the brothers were sent to Pere Bruno in Maaseic. They were given new names and identity papers. A doctor drove them, covered in blankets, to the convent, Saint Jan Berchmans. On the way, German soldiers stopped them, asking for identification. The boys coughed; the soldiers believed they were sick and allowed them to pass. Shortly before the war ended, Jack became ill and their mother took both boys home from Saint Jan Berchmans and hid them. The family survived the war and emigrated to the United States in 1949. Regina’s sister, Fanny, survived in hiding, but Heinrich’s family perished after deportation to Opole, Poland. Heinrich passed away in 1966. Regina died in 1991.

Jack Goldstein was born, with his twin brother Bruno, in Vienna, Austria in 1935. His mother, Regina, was born in Baranov, Poland, in 1905. His father, Heinrich, was born in Vienna, in 1903. On the twin’s 3rd birthday, the Germans marched into Vienna and Austria was declared part of the German Reich. The next year, the family moved to Belgium. After the Germans invaded Belgium in 1940, his father was arrested and sent to Gurs internment camp in Vichy, France. After his arrest, the boys, their mother, and their maternal aunt unsuccessfully tried to escape to England. On June 11, 1942, Germany began the deportation of Jews in Belgium. When the Gestapo blocked off the street and searched the apartments for Jews, the boys were home alone. They refused to open the door and the soldiers forcefully entered the apartment. Since Heinrich worked making coats for Germans fighting on the Russian front, the soldiers decided his work was too important to deport the family; they were allowed to stay. Before leaving, the soldiers beat Jack and Bruno for refusing to open the door. Months later, a neighbor told their mother about Pere Bruno Reynders, a Catholic priest who was hiding Jewish children in convents. At the age of 8, the brothers were sent to Pere Bruno in Maaseic. They were given new names and identity papers. A doctor drove them, covered in blankets, to the convent, Saint Jan Berchmans. On the way, German soldiers stopped them, asking for identification. The boys coughed; the soldiers believed they were sick and allowed them to pass. Shortly before the war ended, Jack became ill and their mother took both boys home from Saint Jan Berchmans and hid them. The family survived the war and emigrated to the United States in 1949. Regina’s sister, Fanny, survived in hiding, but Heinrich’s family perished after deportation to Opole, Poland. Heinrich passed away in, 1966, and Regina died in 1991. Jack is a civil engineer residing in Maplewood, New Jersey, with wife, Rachelle Silberman Goldstein. Rachelle, 3 years old in 1943, and two of her cousins, were also hidden by Pere Bruno. He took them on a train from Brussels to Bruges where he placed them in a children’s nursery at a Dominican convent. A few months later a Resistance fighter stopped at the convent and gave her a doll from Rachelle’s mother and told her that her parents knew where she was. A year later, after the liberation of Belgium, her parents reunited with Rachelle in the convent garden.

The tea cozy was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2006 by Bruno Goldstein and Jack Goldstein.

United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Collection, Gift of Bruno Goldstein and Jack Goldstein