Jewish Women in Nazi Germany before Emigration (Part D)
Source: Marion Kaplan, ΓÇ£Jewish Women in Nazi Germany before EmigrationΓÇ¥ in: S. Quack, (ed.), Between Sorrow and Strength, Women Refugees of the Nazi Period , (Cambridge, 1995), pp. 11 - 48.
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Not only were men inclined to trust their own political perceptions more than those of their wives, but their role and status as breadwinner and head of household may also have contributed to their hesitancy to emigrate. One housewife described her attempt to convince her husband to flee: 'A woman sometimes has a sixth sense ...I said to my husband, "You know, I think we will have to leave." He said, "No, you won't have a six-room apartment and two servants if we do that." But I said, "Okay, then I'll have a one-room flat with you. But I want to be safe." Despite his reluctance to leave, she studied English and learned practical trades for emigration, including sewing furs, making chocolates, and doing industrial ironing. After his arrest and subsequent release by the Gestapo, the couple left Germany and she supported the family in Australia' 108 .
Women's subordinate status in the public world and their focus on the household may have made them more amenable to the kinds of work they would have to perform in places of refuge. In England and the United States, for example, refugee wives frequently "made do" for the duration, working as domestic servants, whereas husbands attempted to re-establish their business or professional careers. When husbands became butlers and wives maids, the husband often experienced a loss of status more intensely. A daughter described how her mother, formerly a housewife and pianist, cheerfully and successfully took on the role of maid, whereas her father, formerly a chief accountant in a bank, failed as a butler and barely passed as a gardener 109 . Even when both sexes fulfilled their refugee roles well, women seemed less status conscious than men. Perhaps women did not experience the descent from employing a servant to becoming one to the same degree as men because their public status had always been derived from their father or husband anyway.
A combination of events usually led to the final decision to leave. For one woman, who wrote that, 'every Jewish person "knew a decent German" and recalled that many Jews thought "the radical Nazi laws would never be carried out because they did not match the moderate character of the German people," the decision was induced by the abuse her husband and children faced and by the difficulties of running a household after the Nuremberg Laws.' 110 .
For those who had not yet made a decision, the violence of the November Pogrom definitely tipped the balance toward emigration. The pogrom provided another example of the contradictory behaviour of Germans toward Jews - the mixture of rampant viciousness with occasional kindness. As mobs attacked and burned Jewish homes, businesses, and synagogues, one woman recalled the events as follows: 'While I was sweeping up some of the debris, I noticed another mob of hoodlums, among them women. They were armed with axes as they approached . . . [and] proceeded to ransack the entire house ...Everyone who could have given us shelter was in a similar situation. Then I thought of Anna K., the former parlour maid . . . Soon we were on our way in hope that there would be some straw bed in her barn ...She had two such beds, but we would have to leave early the next day ...because her brother had become a member of the SA [Sturmabteilung or storm troopers]' 111 . Whereas up to this point the number of Jewish emigrants per year had fluctuated between 21,000 (1935) and 40,000 (1938), it became a mass flight reaching 78,000 in 1939 112 .
This is not to imply that the writing was always clearly on the wall. That conclusion emerges largely with the advantages of hindsight. In the 1930s Nazi 'deception and cynical dishonesty served the purpose of tranquillising the Jewish community.' 113 More significant, perceptions by Jews of their predicament were not the only factor affecting emigration. A major obstacle to mass emigration lay in the occupational and age structure of the Jewish community - middle-aged and elderly business people who would face grave difficulties in resettling. Most important, the restrictions of foreign countries against immigrants prevented escape. In July 1938 the thirty-two nations assembled at the Evian Conference "regretted" that they could not take in more Jews. The New York Herald Tribune concluded: "Powers Slam Doors Against German Jews." 114 A final obstacle to emigration was simply lack of luck, for most would-be emigrant did not have the good luck of having relatives or friends abroad who could sponsor their admission into a country of refuge.
Why Women Stayed Behind
A gender analysis of the desire to emigrate highlights women's different expectations, priorities, and perceptions. It does not follow, however, that more women than men actually left. In fact, the opposite seems to be the case. Fewer women than men led Germany. Why was this so?
There were still compelling reasons to stay, although life became increasingly difficult. First, women, especially young women, could still find jobs in the Jewish sector of the German economy more easily than could men. 115 As Jews were expelled from German social welfare programs the social service sector within the Jewish communities grew. This Jewish sector hired ywomen for domestic, welfare, or educational jobs as social workers, nurses, administrator in hospitals or homes, and teachers or administrators in home economics schools 116 .
Whereas the employment situation of Jewish women helped to keep them in Germany, that of men helped get the men out. Some husbands or sons had connections abroad that facilitated their immediate flight, and others emigrated alone to establish themselves and then send for their families. Women's organisations agreed that wives should not "hinder" husbands from emigrating alone if there was no alternative. They argued, however, that it was often no cheaper for men to emigrate without their wives. A single man still had to pay nearly as much for rent, meals, and laundry service as if a wife ran the household. Besides, women could earn the extra income necessary to establish the family or act as breadwinners "at lint." Most important, they stressed that women were necessary because they gave men support and advice 117 .
Another compelling reason that more women remained behind was the fact that before the war, men faced more immediate, physical danger than women did and were forced to flee promptly. In a strange twist of fortune, the men interned in concentration camps during the November Pogrom were released only upon showing proof of their ability to depart from Germany immediately. Families - mostly wives and mothers - strained every resource to provide the documentation to free these men and send them on their way. Furthermore, as more and more sons left, daughters remained as the sole caretaker for elderly parents. One female commentator noted that she knew of 'a whole slew of young women who can't think of emigration because they don't know who might care for their elderly mother in the interim, before they could start sending her money. In the same families, the sons went their way without any thought.' 118 By 1936 the League of Jewish Women saw cause for serious concern regarding the 'special problem of the emigration of women, which is often partly overlooked and not correctly understood.' 119 Not only did it seem to the League that far fewer women than men were leaving, but also that if the trend continued, it feared Jewish men of marriageable age would live abroad and would intermarry while Jewish women would stay behind in Germany with no chance at all of marrying. The League reminded parents of their 'responsibility to see their daughters too.' 120 [even if daughters] 'feel stronger psychological ties to their families than sons do, [which] probably lies in the female psyche' 121
Still, by as late as January 1938, the Hilfsverein , one of the main emigration orga, announced that 'up to now, Jewish emigration . . . indicated a severe surplus of men.' Blaming this on the "nature" of women to feel closer to the family and home, and on that of men to tend towards greater adventurousness, the Hilfsverein echoed the League of Jewish Women in warning that Jewish women would no longer find marriage partners in Germany and that Jewish men would either intermarry abroad or marry Jews of a different culture, making the marriage more precarious. The Hilfsverein suggested that couples marry before emigrating, encouraged women to prepare themselves as household helpers, and promised that women's emigration would become a priority 122 . Yet, only two months later the Hilfsverein announced it would expedite the emigration of only those young women who could prove they had a minimal competence in household skids and who were willing to work as domestics abroad 123 .
That some women and men took the advice to marry, or came upon the idea on their own, can be seen from marriage ads in Jewish newspapers for 1936. Ads for spouses frequently included the requirement that the future spouse be amenable to emigration. For example, one woman advertised that she sought a 'marriage partner . . . with the possibility of emigration,' and another ad gave the value of a woman's dowry in Swiss Francs. A businessman offered a 'pretty, healthy, and young woman' the opportunity to join him in settling in Palestine 124 . By 1938 almost every ad announced the desire or ability to emigrate: Those with "affidavit in hand" were probably those most sought after 125 . In addition, it looks as though fewer women than men received support from Jewish organisations in order to emigrate. The number of emigrants supported by the emigration section (Wanderungsausschuss) of the Central Organisation of Jews in Germany (Reichsvertretung der Juden in Deutschland) in 1937 was 7,313 (the Hilfsverein supported 5,762 and the Palestine Bureau of the Jewish Agency [Palaestina-Amt] supported 1,551). This broke down to approximately 4,161 men and 3,041 women. Of the women going to places other than Palestine, 40 percent had no occupation and 15 percent claimed to be domestics 126 .
Moreover, young women and their families were often reluctant to consider Palestine and the kibbutz as an alternative for daughter. One survey of graduating classes from several Jewish schools in late 1935 showed that 47 percent of the boys and only 30 percent of the girls considered Palestine as a destination 127 . And those who actually wound up in Palestine, according to other surveys, seemed to prefer the cities. The majority of German-Jewish girls and young women did not take advantage of available positions on kibbutzim or in agricultural training centres. They preferred jobs as cooks or milliners (better jobs, in such fields as social work, kindergarten teaching, and nursing, were much harder to find) 128 .
Although emigration consultants encouraged young women to take up the adventures of kibbutz life, articles appearing on Palestine, often written by committed Zionists, must have given the women pause. In one such presentation, the (male) author described a situation in which eight young women cared for fifty-five young men. Besides cooking, they washed "mountains" of laundry, darned hundreds of socks, and sewed ripped clothing, working long days and into the night. But even more was expected of them. They were to do the emotional housework as well: 'A friendly word at the right time will bring a young man who once had a dozen shirts of his own and has now noticed that his last carefully maintained shirt has been taken by another to his senses ...Whether the kibbutz thrives lies in the hands of the girls! They have to mother one, be a comrade to the other... and have the endlessly difficult task of always remaining in a good mood, always smiling and being friendly' 129 . A woman responded by arguing that young men should learn to control themselves and not "bellow" as though they were heads of household (!) and that only together could men and women build good will. She added that women needed far better preparatory training for their strenuous assignments 130 . Such exchanges, plus the numerous news items regarding Arab-Jewish discord and the appeals to women to assuage anger and to teach conciliation to their children regarding the Middle East, doubtless left most young women looking elsewhere for refuge 131 . Statistics for the first half of 1937 indicate, for example, that of those taking advantage of Zionist retraining programs 132 , only 32 percent were female 133 .
The growing disproportion of Jewish women in the German-Jewish population also resulted from the fact that there were more Jewish women than men in Germany to begin with. Thus, to stay even, a greater absolute number of women would have had to emigrate. In 1933, 52.3 percent of Jews were women, a result of such factors as male casualties during World War I and more conversions and exogamy among Jewish men. The slow rate of female emigration meant that the female proportion of the Jewish population rose from 52.4 percent in 1933 to 57.5 percent by 1939 134 . Because many of the young had emigrated by 1935, the percentage of elderly Jews - among them a large number of widows - also increased proportionately. In 1933 there had already been 1,400 women to 1,000 men over the age of 65 135 . By October 1938, 11,000 elderly Jewish women were in need Winter Relief ( Winterhilfe) [Jewish Winter Aid] 136 . In short, in slightly less than eight years, two-thirds of German Jews emigrated (many to European countries where they were later caught up in the Nazi net), leaving a disproportionate number of the elderly and of women 137 . Jewish newspapers took note of this fact with a touching article about elderly women whose children had emigrated, whose living quarters were far smaller than they were accustomed to, whose help had disappeared, whose finances were meagre. Thrown together, sometimes in old-age homes, sometimes as paying guests in the homes of other Jews, these women passed their days in memories of better times. Financial worries plagued them, but they were even more tormented by not knowing their children's exact whereabouts or circumstances. They comforted each other, a 'community of old people, who supported, . . . and consoled each other.' 138
The statistics, memoirs, and interviews all give the impression that the Nazis, whose propaganda trumpeted the threat of Jewish men as rapists, thieves, and crooks, murdered a very high percentage of elderly Jewish women 139 .
References:
108 John Foster, ed., Community of Fate: Memoirs of German Jews in Melbourne (Sydney, 1986), 28ΓÇô30.
109.Lore Segal, Other People's Houses (New York, 1958).
110.Memoirs of Charlotte Hamburger, LBI, 41, 46.
111. LBI News , no. 56 (Summer/Fall 1988): 4ΓÇô5.
112.Statistics come from Richarz, Juedisches Leben , 53.
113.Herbert Strauss, ΓÇ£Jewish Anatomy within the Limits of National Socialist Policy: The Communities and the Reichsvertretung,ΓÇ¥ in Paucker, ed., Jews in Nazi Germany , 126. See also Schleunes for the confusing plethora of decrees and exceptions.
114.Rita Thalmann and Emmmanuel Feinermann, Crystal Night (London and New York, 1974), 22.
115. JWS , 1937: 7ΓÇô13, 27.
116. Home care assistants ( Pflegerinnen ) were recruited among women who were previously sales personnel, independent business people, nurses' aides, artists, kindergarten teachers, and housewives. JWS , 1937: 78ΓÇô81. Avraham Barkai has discovered that some Jews protested against Jewish women who worked in the social service sector of the Jewish communities as ΓÇ£double earnersΓÇ¥ (women whose husbands also had jobs). Also, he has found letters to the editor of the CV-Zeitung ΓÇô the newsletter of the Central Association (CV) of German Citizens of the Jewish Faith ΓÇô proposing that these women should become domestics in order to let older and more experienced men who needed jobs take their place. Barkai, ΓÇ£Existenzkampf,ΓÇ¥ 163.
117. BJFB , Dec. 1936: 5.
118. BJFB , April 1937: 5. A daughter recalled urging her parents to leave Germany after she experienced antisemitismin school: 'Uppermost in my mother's mind was that she would not leave her mother behind alone...' Memoirs of Ruth Glaser, LBI, 18. See also Erika Guetermann, ΓÇ£Das Photographien Album,ΓÇ¥ in her memoirs, LBI, for another example of a woman who would not leave her parents and was later killed by the Nazis.
119. BJFB , Dec. 1936: 1. Also, among Eastern European Jews who returned east between 1934 and 1937, the majority were male even though almost half of them were married. Maurer, ΓÇ£Auslaendische Juden,ΓÇ¥ 204.
120. BJFB , April 1937: 10.
121. BJFB , Dec. 1936: 1.
122. CV-Zeitung , Jan. 20, 1938: 5. Statistics are hard to come by. The American Jewish Year Book for 1938 indicated that during 1936ΓÇô7, 54 percent of Jewish immigrants to the United States were male and 46 percent were female (three-fifths of the entire Jewish immigration was from Germany), IF , Oct. 27, 1938.
123. CV-Zeitung , March 3, 1938: 6. This article was written by Hannah Karminski, who also encouraged women to take household preparations seriously.
124. IF , March 5, 1936.
125. IF , Oct. 13, 1938: 16.
126. Informationsblaetter , Jan./Feb. 1938: 6ΓÇô7. The Hilfsverein supported 3,250 men (56.4%) and 2,512 women (43.5%). The Palestine office supported 911 men (63%) and 529 women (36.7%); 111 people were not categorised as male or female. These are all the figures because about 16 percent of the Hilfsverein emigrants and 16 percent of those heading for Palestine did not require financial support but are included in the overall statistics.
127.These surveys were of 130 graduating from Jewish Volksschulen and a higher school in Frankfurt/Main, Oct. 1935. JWS , 1935: 188.
128. JWS , 1933ΓÇô4: 169.
129. IF , Jan. 16, 1936.
130.Ibid.
131 IF , June 25, 1936.
132 Hachulz, Habonim, and Makkabi Hazair.
133 Informationsblaetter , Aug./Oct. 1937: 60.
134 Richarz, Juedisches Leben , 49.
135 Rosenthal, ΓÇ£Trends,ΓÇ¥ 248.
136 BJFB , Oct. 1938: 4.
137 Richarz, Juedisches Leben , 61.
138 IF , Jan. 16, 1936.
139 Of the German-speaking Jews deported to the Lodz Ghetto in 1941, 81 percent were over the age of 50 and 60 percent were women. Of the 4,000 Berlin Jews in that transport, 94 percent were over sixty. Avraham Barkai, ΓÇ£Between East and West: Jews from Germany in the Lodz Ghetto,ΓÇ¥ Yad Vashem Studies 16 (1984): 282ΓÇô3. See JWS (1937): 96ΓÇô7, for statistics on the German Reich; JWS (1937): 161ΓÇô3 (Hessen-Nassau); and JWS (1937): 200ΓÇô1 (Koenigsberg). Also, see the Memoirs of ΓÇ£Tante EmmaΓÇ¥ in the M. Gruenewald collection, LBI. When the last Jews of her small town were deported, it was ΓÇ£almost only elderly women,ΓÇ¥ 31.
