German Orphanage Postcards

[apwright]

Thanks for showing us the faces to the names, Daniel. What wonderful photos. Little Ruth certainly was a goldiges Ding, wasn't she!

Here's the fourth card, as far as I can make out:

Meine l. Else!

Seit Sonntag ist deine l. Mutter

u. Käthe hier, es geht soweit Allen

G.s.D. [= Gott sei Dank] gut, wie geht es Dir? Schreib

doch bald einmal.

??? für heute herzliche

Grüße u. Küße von Deiner

Tante [illegible]

Onkel Willy, Julius [?und Ru]th

lassen [?grüßen]

[in a different hand:]

Liebe Else

Obzwar die Reihe an d[ich ist zu]

schreiben, will di[r ?von]

uns die besten G[rüße]

senden, ich bin seit [?Sonn]tag Abend

hier, die Lieben haben mich abgeholt.

Es gefällt mir ganz gut, auch l. Käthe

hat sich gut eingewöhnt, will aber

auch wieder lieber nach Bettenhausen

als hier bleiben. Nun für heute die

besten Grüße u. Küße von deiner Mama

[sideways:]

erwarte ein[en] großen Briefe.

Translation:

My dear Else,

Your dear mother and Käthe have been with us since Sunday. Everyone is well, thank God. How are you? Please write soon. ??? for today love and kisses from your aunt [name illegible]. Uncle Willy, Julius [?and Ruth] send their regards.

Dear Else,

Although it is [?your] turn to write, I want to send you our best regards. I've been here since [?Sunday] evening. The dear [relations] came and fetched me. I like it here a lot, and even dear Käthe feels quite at home now, but would prefer to return to Bettenhausen than remain here. So for today, lots of love and kisses from your Mama

[sideways]

expecting a long letter.

Adrian

P.S. I think what is written on the front of Else's card is "Käthe Schlößinger". Also, the signature on Card 2 may not be Helen, but I can't see "Fran" in there either.

[bob lembke]

Daniel;

I am so happy that more skilled people than I have galloped to the rescue. I hope by posting my first and very tentative effort my betters galloped to the rescue, probably out of pity. I do eventually get this stuff, but it takes time, especially as my German itself is weak.

A couple of notes that might be be useful as you search further. The Schlossinger name is repeatedly spelled with both one and two "ss"s. Don't forget to search on both variants.

The "o" was an Umlaut o, which I missed. (I haven't figured out how to print it on this text engine.) I believe that it is considered a seperate letter, not an "o" with an accent. At any rate, it also posed search problems. First of all, at least in that period, alphabetization, such as looking in an Adressbuch, or in the name index in a Rangliste, is different than we would use in English, and you have to search a bit more widely than only on the rules of English alphabetization. Luckily the Umlaut is deeper into the name, making the search easier.

The Umlaut "u" is often spelled "ue", especially lately, but in the WW I it seemed to be done both ways. So if you are searching you should look for Schlossinger, Schloessinger, Schlosinger, and Schloesinger, as well as two forms with the Umlaut. So there are six apparent variations of the last name to look for. The same applies to the Lowenstein last name, as far as the Umlaut goes.

I really have to go over my family correspondence from the period; fortunately I have about 50 letters and cards. They were the first things that I ever translated from German, and I have not gotten back to them, nor did I ever finish them then.

Daniel, I found a Hamburg address on my father's dogtag, and I knew that he never lived there, but that his mother, separated from his father, did. I made a "cold call" (probably really an e-mail) to the Hamburg City Archive, which had pre-war Adressbuecher, and a kind city archivist, over a 2-3 month period, sent me bits of info about my family, including an uncle and aunt I never heard of. With his final e-mail the archivist sent me a list of geneologists if I wanted to dig deeper. As I may have mentioned, on-line one can find Berlin Adressbuecher from 1799 to the 1950s. Perhaps there are other materials that might help you.

Good luck!

Bob

[fritz]

Hi Adrian, all...

Here's is little Else's card:

Can someone give me some sense as to why she would be in an orphanage if her mother (and perhaps her father too) were alive? Perhaps life was so hard for the family during the war they were unable to take care of them properly and sent them away where they would get better care?

There is something faintly written on the front of this card...can anyone make it out?

-Daniel

Kathe Schlösinger?

[ph0ebus]

Kathe Schlösinger?

Hi Fritz,

Hm. Not sure why Else's picture would have her sister's name on it.

I really cannot thank everyone enough for the time and effort put into this. I hope you enjoy the cards as much as I do. I wish I had the chance to have met her, but she passed long before I was born. I am concerned about what may have happened to little Julius and Ruth. Finding that out is high on my list of things to do, research-wise. If I find any more orphanage cards I will add them to this thread...I have a lot of stuff to go through!

Bob, your point about the spelling variants is well taken. As Alice Cooper once said, welcome to my nightmare! It is one reason I have made so little headway in researching this branch of the family.

Take care,

-Daniel

[ph0ebus]

Hi all,

I found another photo which confirms that little Julius Löwenstein, which based on the attire and overall appearance, seems to have been taken in the 1930's. So, he survived the Great War, but so far no info about how he and his sister fared in WWII.

I don't think I mentioned it previously but little Else Schlössinger ended up marrying Emanuel Stern, who is listed in my signature file and whom I have mentioned in a few threads previously. Her sister Kaethe Schlössinger, who also ended up in the Waisenhaus, married Julius Strauss, who also appears in my signature and whom I am still completely in the dark about, in terms of his service in the Great War. All I know is he had his picture taken in Nowo Alexandrowsk on June 7, 1918, and that he was a footsoldier with no apparent rank other than Private or KrFrw:

If anyone has any idea what unit was in that location on that date I would be very appreciative.

Thanks,

-Daniel

[ph0ebus]

Hi all,

Sadly, I just confirmed the family story that Käthe Löwenstein, who wrote several of the postcards above, died in the Holocaust:

http://www.bundesarchiv.de/gedenkbuch/dire...50&offset=0

I cannot find her husband, though, which is odd, given that he allegedly was also killed in the Holocaust around the same time. I also could find no record for Julius or Ruth, which might be a good thing.

Other than the database referenced above and the Yad Vashem database, any idea where else to look? I know I am skating towards an off-topic post, but if it helps, I am looking for now perhaps two Great War-era Prussian Army veterans who died in the Holocaust, Willi Plaut and Willi Löwenstein.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

-Daniel

[bob lembke]

Daniel;

Let me suggest peeking at this link: http://www.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/wertvoll/adressbuch.html It is something posted by Goethe University in Frankfurt a/M. They have Frankfurt a/M adressbooks from 1734 to 2005. Unfortunately, they do not seem to be on the Internet, like the Berlin Addressbook, which is on the Internet from 1799. On the homepage they have a copy of the Address book for 1734, and if you click on it to enlarge it, the cover says, at the bottom, "wie auch einem Juden=Kalender", indicating that the address book also includes a "Calendar of Jews", whatever that is. (I think that, at this period {no expert here, at all} that Frankfurt might have been rather "Jew-friendly", to coin an ugly phrase; was the German branch of the Rothschilds based in Frankfurt?) This seems to have been a privately issued book, and perhaps the Jewish community supported the inclusion of a Jewish directory.

Have you looked at, or had someone look at the German war graves' society Internet database? (I have only used it once, with difficulty, and don't have the web address at hand.) Possibly someone who was a veteran and then got caught in the Holocaust might be included, even if no grave is known. I am no student of the Holocaust, but understand that their were ironic things like WW I veterans having special status in camps, even salaries based on war service, although it might not have mattered much eventually. I have no detailed information , sources, etc.

I'll poke about a bit more.

Bob

[fritz]

Hi all,

My grandmother (Else Schlossinger) and her sister Kaethe were orphaned during the Great War and it is still a mystery to our family as to what happened and how they got there. I have obtained three postcards, two of which were written to my grandmother in the Waisenhaus (Orphanage) in Frankfurt Am Main in 1916 (one she sent herself) but I cannot make out the sender's name, the name of the Orphanage nor can I read the content. If someone would be kind enough to at least tell me who the senders were and, if you are interested, at least the gist of what the text says, I would be immensely grateful.

Here's card 1:

Here's card 2:

Here's the one my grandmother sent:

If you have questions for me please do not hesitate to ask.

-Daniel

Hello Daniel,

sorry, don´t know anything about German jews in Frankfurt. May be in Frankfurt was situated one of the excellent Jewish schools in Germany and the Orphanage was used as boarding-school?

By the way, I discovered this

Willi_Plaut.doc

[ph0ebus]

Hi Fritz,

Wow, that is fantastic. I had no idea where he was buried. I am still working out how we are related, but we'll figure it out at some point.

Take care,

-Daniel

[ph0ebus]

Hi all,

Resuscitating this thread with a little but of new information. My aunt found a naturalization document for Else and it lists her place of birth as Bettenhausen, Thüringen. Now, to figure out where records from Bettenhausen, Thüringen ended up, assuming they were not destroyed.

-Daniel

[ph0ebus]

Hi all,

Another loose end tied up, for those who may be interested...I found out what became of Julius Löwenstein. He was briefly interned at Buchenwald, then fled Germany to Shanghai in 1938, where he was caught up in the Japanese occupation of Shanghai, and was interned there until Shanghai was liberated. He then came to America in 1947, and lived out the remainder of his days in Oakland, California, passing away in 1990. I do not know what became of his descendants, or of his sister...at least not at the moment.

I am sorry to have found this all out only now...it would probably have been something to know him.

-Daniel

[egbert]

All thread pictures are missing

[ph0ebus]

All thread pictures are missing

DANG! That's a big problem. I'll see if I can fix at least my posts...tonight.

Daniel

[ph0ebus]

Hi egbert, all...

Pictures restored as best as I can, though of course they will be missing from people's replies, sadly. I think these were lost when Google Pages became Google Sites a while back, so all the links broke. Happy fun times!

If I missed any, just let me know.

-Daniel

[ph0ebus]

Julius Löwenstein, not long after the close of World War Two...

-Daniel

[egbert]

In the USA or still in shanghai?

[ph0ebus]

I am not certain. The building behind him looks damaged, so it might be in Shanghai.

-Daniel

[egbert]

Alright I have to post the following in this thread, as the original Wernigerode Löwenstein thread called "German signage" is not retrievable here on GWF anymore.

The following message to Daniel concerns the four Lowensteins, formerly residing in Wernigerode who owned a Mens Clothing Store.

Ruth, Käthe, Benjamin and Julius L.

Here are the latest pictures from Löwensteins Wernigerode store , just taken from the opposite cafe where we enjoyed a huge cheese cake:

The building seems to be remodeled , new paint , new windows.

 

 

[ph0ebus]

Thank you, Egbert!  It’s extremely touching to me that you revisit this place regularly and share photos.  It means a great deal.

 

Best wishes,

 

Daniel

[egbert]

Last Sunday I had my cheesecake in the cafe opposite of the Löwenstein's ex-house/store

 

[ph0ebus]

On 29/09/2021 at 03:15, egbert said:

Last Sunday I had my cheesecake in the cafe opposite of the Löwenstein's ex-house/store

 

Outstanding!  I hope to do the same one of these days.

Daniel