The Daily Life of the Village and Country Jews in Hessen (Part E)
The Daily Life of the Village and Country Jews in Hessen from Hitler's Ascent to Power to November 1938
Source: M. Kaufman, Yad Vashem Studies XXII, (Jerusalem 1992), pp.147-198.
Most village Jews had liquid assets, and in order to raise the necessary funds they were forced to sell their property at an enormous loss. Many hoped that despite the Nazis' anti-Semitic policies they would be able to hold on to at least part of the family property, which had been acquired through the labour of generations of their ancestors. This, too, was one of the reasons why Jews in villages and towns who had not yet been dispossessed tried to postpone their emigration 136 .
By 1937, however, most Jewish residents of the villages and small towns of Hessen realised that emigration was their only option. But then they discovered that finding a country that was willing to accept them was also no easy task. Very few countries were willing to accept impoverished Jewish emigrants; even Latin American countries proved reluctant to grant visas to those who declared they were farmers by profession. Only a handful succeeded in obtaining affidavits from relatives enabling them to emigrate to the United States; not many rich American Jews signed such documents on behalf of German Jews who were not their relatives 137 . Furthermore, the would-be emigrants had to overcome a host of bureaucratic obstacles, some of them raised by the consulates of the intended countries of destination. As many believed that leaving Germany could be accomplished easier from a large city, this also accounts for the movement of Jews from the countryside to the cities in the last years before the outbreak of the war 138 .
Many Jewish residents of small towns in Hessen committed suicide even before the riots of November 1938. Some of them had despaired of rebuilding their lives in Germany or abroad, while others felt entrapped with no possible way out. A Jewish doctor committed suicide even though all his emigration permits had already been arranged. It turned out that one of his women patients attempted to extort money from him, and when he complained to the police, they accused him of raping the patient and arrested him. A Jewish girl committed suicide because she had been forced to part from her non-Jewish fiancÉ, while another girl put an end to her life upon finding out she was not Aryan but half Jewish. These were by no means isolated cases in the towns and villages of Hessen 139 .
Daily Life of Children and Youth
Jewish children also felt the worsening situation after the Nazi take-over. In small villages, where all their friends were non-Jewish, they found themselves isolated and living in the shadow of fear. The Nazis lost no time in promoting serious anti-Semitic indoctrination, which embraced even young children; for example, first-grade pupils developed their writing skills by copying the sentence: 'The Jews are our disaster.' 140
However, despite Nazi control of the educational system, propaganda in schools did not have an immediate effect, at least not in all places. In the years 1933-1934, therefore, Jewish and non-Jewish children still befriended one another. In the localities where residents did not support anti-Semitic policies from the start, the children fared better 141 .
Nazi race theory was taught in secondary schools by means of visual and other 'aids,' and when teachers proved reluctant to teach this material, the school principal would take over. In one classroom the teacher, who met her pupils for the first time, chose a Jewish girl as an example of the 'pure Aryan type,' to the great amusement of her charges. A few teachers defended and even tried to protect their Jewish pupils 142 . However, in 1935, education toward racism began to bear fruit almost everywhere. We Jewish kids were always afraid,' related one young woman.
At school they forbade the pupils to play with us. I was assigned a seat at the back. In the school courtyard I always stood alone. I couldn't stay in the classroom, because they would drive me out. And all this because I was Jewish.'
Jewish children became targets of brutal attacks and harassment at school and on the streets by thugs and the Hitler Youth 143 . Members of this organisation were under a great deal of pressure to comply with the Nazi norms. In one case a boy who proved reluctant to sever his ties with a Jewish girl was expelled from the movement, and his father was fired from his job on the grounds of having failed to properly educate his son. Jewish children strolling on forest paths or in the fields were likely to be beaten by young Nazis 144 .
In the years 1935-1936, Jewish children in small towns and villages were forced to leave the public schools. Nazi Education Minister Rust ordered that Jewish and Aryan pupils be separated in the elementary schools before Easter of 1936 145 . Jewish children found themselves subjected to unbearable pressure. A handful of them continued to attend the public schools, but this was very unusual 146 .
Following the Nazi rise to power, many enrolled their children in Jewish schools; new Jewish educational establishments were added to the already existing Orthodox schools and the 'Philantropin' gymnasium in Frankfurt 147 . In the years 1933-1937, Jewish district schools ( Juedische Bezirksschulen ) were established in Mainz, Worms, Wiesbaden, Darmstadt and Bad-Nauheim 148 . The 'Philantropin' gymnasium and the Hirsch Orthodox School in Frankfurt opened their gates to Jewish children who had been expelled from gymnasium in small towns 149 . Many parents could not meet the costs of school fees, and some students also had their travel costs to consider. The school at Bad-Nauheim operated a weekday boarding school for seventy-five pupils, but students at the district school ( Bezirksschule ) in Mainz returned home every day.
The Jewish schools did not follow a single curriculum. Schools in Worms, Wiesbaden, Darmstadt and Fulda were elementary, whereas the curriculum of the Orthodox elementary school in Bad-Nauheim included supplementary subjects, and the pupils were required to attend the synagogue. Hebrew, agricultural training and crafts were important subjects. The school principal was a cantor who also served as a teacher; the other five teachers had worked previously in elementary schools in Upper Hessen.
Two Jewish schools operated in Mainz: the Orthodox 'Bondi' elementary school, founded in 1859 by the Orthodox synagogue, and the district school founded in 1934 by the Liberal synagogue. The 'Bondi' curriculum emphasised Jewish studies and Hebrew, whereas the district school followed the general curriculum of the Weimar period: German history and culture, French, English, with an added splattering of Hebrew and Jewish history. Most of the teachers were assimilationists who had been fired from their jobs in the public gymnasium in Hessen. The school boasted a modern gym in the basement of the synagogue, as well as a large soccer field. The Orthodox school in Fulda in the Rhoen mountains was a very important institution as it absorbed pupils from the general, natural-science oriented secondary school in Fulda, as well as Jewish pupils from villages in the district 150 . An attempt was made to establish a vocational school for the automobile industry in Ruesselsheim, where the 'Opel' plants were located, but the institution was closed shortly after its inception due to opposition on the part of the municipal council 151 .
Socially, Jewish children and youngsters in small towns fared a bit better than did their counterparts in the countryside. They found it easier to pursue social activities within the local Jewish milieu: meeting at friends' houses, games and parties in private gardens or in the enclosed backyards of the residences of the wealthy. On weekends the synagogue and its courtyard became an important meeting place for Jewish youngsters. Most had been enrolled at the Jewish towns' schools since 1935. On Saturdays and holidays many youths attended prayers and lectures in the synagogues, while on Sundays the synagogue was the venue for social games and sports activities 152 . The meetings among the young people in the small towns were not pervaded by any special ideological contents; these were much more pronounced in the youth movements and Jewish schools. Initially, most joined assimilationist Jewish youth movements, such as BDJJ ( Bund deutsch-juedischer Jugend ). With time, as Eretz Israel became the country of destination for growing numbers of Jewish youths, many of them joined Zionist youth movements such as Habonim and Youth Maccabi, the religious opted for Bahad 153 .
The riots of 1938 more or less ended the social life of Jewish youths in the villages and small towns. Only in the large cities were youth movements able to carry on with their activities for some time longer.
Final Expulsion of Jews from Villages and Small Towns
If in the first years of Nazi rule the living conditions of the Jews varied from one locality to another, from 1937 onward their situation worsened all over. In 1935, the Nuremberg laws were enforced everywhere despite some symptoms of resistance among local residents. Although a Gestapo report spoke of great enthusiasm among the population,' it also admitted that a human approach toward the Jews was still discernible', adding that it is to be hoped that this phenomenon could be eliminated soon.' 154
It is possible that the expulsion of the Jews from the towns and villages was carried out under the guidance of the authorities, although we have no explicit documentary evidence. We may surmise that the Nazis sought to concentrate the Jews in the large cities so as to facilitate the implementation of the anti-Semitic policy adopted in 1938, despite the mayors' dissatisfaction at the influx of Jews into their cities. In any event, the fact that the Jews were now concentrated primarily in the large cities facilitated their final expulsion from German soil ΓÇô initially through emigration, and later by deportation to the East for the purpose of extermination in the death camps.
In order to ensure that the trap was escape-proof and so as to facilitate the expropriation of the Jews' property, as early as 1935, the Gestapo ordered town and village leaders to prepare a card index ( Judenkarteien ) with files on each and every Jew within their jurisdiction 155 . A typical example of the Nazi policies aimed at eliminating the Jews was a decision by the village council of Goddlau, adopted on August 27, 1935, and thus coinciding with the enactment of the Nuremberg laws. Before 1933 there had been five Jewish families in the village. The decision was entitled 'Against the Jews and Their Servants,' and, in effect, it prevented the Jews from continuing to live in the village 156 . The Jews were forced to sell their houses, sometimes at ludicrously low prices and leave the settlement so that it would be 'clean of Jews' ( judenrein ). Some were even forced to carry out certain repairs in their homes before selling them 157 . On August 20, 1936, the mayor of the town of Hungen boasted to his district director: Up to now seven Jewish families have left our town, and we hope that soon the last Jew will depart.' 158 When all the Jews had been driven out, the local Buergermeister could announce proudly: We have cleansed the locality of the Jews.' 159
In 1938, Jewish graveyards in the small towns were closed, forcing the Jewish residents to bury their dead in the nearest city 160 . A handful of Jews remained in a number of small localities until 1942, when they were deported to the East, but most towns and villages of Hessen had been 'cleansed' of their Jewish residents by the middle of 1939 161 .
In the years 1933-1938, no organised acts of arson directed at synagogues took place in Hessen, and no operations for the concentrated deportation of Jews to camps were undertaken. Nevertheless, the Jewish residents of the small towns and villages had experienced their share of Nazi violence. The end of Jewish existence in Hessen marked the completion of yet another grim chapter in the policy of the liquidation of the Jews in this part of Germany.
References:
136.Interview with Aynor (Hans Sonneborn).
137.Kropat, p. 434; Kolb, p. 145; Schwabe, p. 145.
138.Margaliot, p. 334. On the difficulties associated with securing an affidavit, see Madeline B. Herzmann, 'A Community Responds,' Peck-Herschler, pp. 149-155; for a photograph of the affidavit form, see ibid ., p. 13; on the difficulties associated with obtaining an affidavit, also see conversations held by the author with Elsa May in 1989. In 1937, Elsa and her father tried to persuade many of the affluent Jews in Nashville, Tennessee, to send affidavits to their relatives in Germany, but everyone refused; see also Interview with Aynor.
139.Kropat, p. 434; Kaufmann, Gross-Gerau, p. 15; on the migration of Jewish residents from small towns and villages to large cities, see Frankfurt Reports, Gestapo Reports for Hessen-Nassau, p. 499.
140.On suicides in Bad-Nauheim, see Kolb, pp. 140, 146, 154; on the same phenomenon in the town of Hanau, see Schwabe, pp. 164-165.
141.Kurt Strauss testified that he had absolutely no recollection of the children playing with him, Ruehlig-Auer, p. 198; on anti-Semitic slogans, ibid. , pp. 75-76, and Schleindl, p. 207. Ilse Weisshaupt related that 'after 1933 school pupils put a distance between themselves and me, and cursedme when I rode my bicycle to school.' Ruehlig-Auer, p. 223. Mrs. Steinitz (Baum) also related that after the Nazi take over all her school friends broke off contact with her; Kolb, p. 136. In Oberbrechen the main teacher, K. I. Reifert, a Nazi extremist, systematically incited schoolchildren against their Jewish peers; testimony of Siegfried Lichtenstein who emigrated to Argentina, see Caspari/Oberbrechen, Kaufman Collection 072/48.
142.In the years 1933-1934, pupils of the Realschule in Oppenheim, dressed in Nazi uniforms of the 'Jungvolk,' protected their Jewish schoolmates from other children who tried to attack them. Relations between Jewish and non-Jewish children also continued under the Nazi regime and resumed after the war. Thus, for example, I. Schaefer of Geinsheim continued to befriend Jewish children; recollections of the author. Jewish pupils in Moerfelden, which had been under Communist influence before 1933, did not suffer from attacks by Nazi children until 1935; Ruehlig-Auer, p. 76.
143.Race theory in the Realgymnasium in Oppenheim was taught by the principal, Dr. Goertz, after the class tutor, Dr. Kreimes, a member of the Stahlhelm, proved reluctant to do so; conversation with Dr. Kreimes in Oppenheim in 1969. On race classes in the elementary school, see letter of Maria Fischer,Babenhausen documents, Kaufman Collection 072/48. Ilse Weisshaupt, a pupil in Moerfelden, was mistakenly pointed out as an example of the racial Aryan type; Ruehlig-Auer, p. 223. A teacher in the Hoehere Toechterschule in Heppenheim protected her charges and was dismissed from her post; Metzendorf/Heppenheim, Kaufman Collection 072/68. Two teachers and the principal in the school in the Catholic village of Oberbrechen protected their pupils, and the residents supported them. The Nazis vilified them as 'servants of the Jews' and 'servants of the priests' ( Pfaffenknechte ), ibid. , 072/63.
144.Testimony of Renate Rosenthal, Schleindl, pp. 160-161; Peck-Herschler, p. 83; recollections of the author.
145.Renate Rosenthal: 'When I saw my good friend, Horst Wasenmeier, dressed in the uniform of the Hitler Youth, I ran away from him. He chased after me and asked: Renate, why are you running away all of a sudden?' I told him: You are wearing this uniform, and you're one of them.'' Schleindl, p. 161. On the youthful love between Ruth Schwarz Brody and E., see ibid. , p. 146-147. The enamoured boy searched for Ruth even after the war, but she was already in the United States. These details were revealed by Ruth in a conversation with the author in 1989. On the incident during a trip, see Stern, pp. 54-66.
146.In the newspaper Gross-Gerauer Kreisblatt , of April 25, 1934, we find the following: 'The demand that a class taught by a class tutor be racially homogenous must be upheld. Racially alien pupils will surely restrict education possibilities in the unified classroom...' On the intent to remove Jewish pupils from school before Easter of 1936, see Ruehlig-Auer, p. 99; the last Jewish children left the school in Gross-Gerau in 1935, Ziegler, p. 17.
147.Ruehlig-Auer, p. 99. Martin Buber's granddaughters, for example, who attended the general school until 1938, were the exception; see Metzendorf/Heppenheim, Kaufman Collection 072/68.
148.On Jewish education after 1933, see Joseph Walk, 'Juedische Erziehung als geistiger Widerstand,' Die Juden im NS Deutschland , pp. 230-247.
149.On the Jewish school in Wiesbaden, see Paul Lazarus, Die Juedische Gemeinde in Wiesbaden 1918-1942 , New York, 1949, p. 19ff. On the school in Darmstadt, see S. Adler Rudel, Juedische Selbsthilfe unter dem Naziregime 1933-1939 , Tuebingen, 1974, p. 22; on the school in Worms, see Kurt Duewell, Die Rheingebiete in der Judenpolitik des Nationalsozialismus vor 1942 , Bonn, 1968, p. 117; on the Jewish district school in Mainz and the 'Bondi' Orthodox school, see Susanne Schloesser, 'Einstmal eine bluehende Gemeinde, heute nur noch Erinnerungen: Zum Leben und Selbstverstaendnis der Mainzer Juden,' Als die letzten Hoffnungen verbrannten, Mainzer Juden durch Integration und Vernichtung , Mainz, 1988, pp. 20-21; and recollections of the author, who, for three years, attended the Mainz district school; on the Jewish district school in Bad-Nauheim, see Kolb, pp. 155-156, according to Hilde Meyerowitz, 'Die juedische Bezirksschule in Bad-Nauheim,' in: Juedische Wohlfahrtspflege und Sozialpolitik , 1937, p. 182ff.
150.Testimony of Kurt Strauss, Ruehlig-Auer, p. 198; Caspari/Oberbrechen, p. 64; Kaufman Collection 072/ 63.
151.Otto Berger, 'Die letzten Jahre der juedischen Schule bis zu ihrem Untergang,' in: Buchenblaetter, Beilage der Fuldaer Zeitung fuer Heimatfreunde , November 28, 1981, p. 55.
152.Kropat, p. 431, according to Adler Rudel (see note 148).
153.Schleindl, p. 124, and photographs depicting social activities in the synagogue, ibid. , p. 27.
154.Interview with Aynor; Kaufmann-Jugend, pp. 46-47. On the BDJJ see Juedische Jugend im Uebergang, Ludwig Tietz 1897-1933 , Tel Aviv, 1980.
155.On the Nuremberg laws and their consequences in the countryside, see Peter Schmitter, Geschichte der Aplener Juden , Alpen, pp. 91-96; Otto Dov Kulka, 'Die Nuernberger Rassengesetze und die Bevoelkerung,' Vierteljahreshefte fuer Deutsche Zeitgeschichte , Heft 4/1984, pp. 582-624. See also Kassel Gestapo Report for October 1935, Gestapo Reports for Hessen-Nassau, p. 320.
156.The files contained the personal data of the Jew, details about his political affiliation before 1933, the name of the newspaper he had subscribed to, and the extent of his assets in Germany and abroad; see Span, p. 133. On compiling the files on Jews, see also the directive from the district office to the Buergermeister of the village of Woelfersheim, April 1, 1936, Woelfersheim documents, Kaufman Collection 072/ 24.
157.Schleindl, p. 244.
158. Ibid. , pp. 246-247, and Interview with Aynor.
159.Hungen B, p. 36.
160.Herz, p. 278; Menahem Kaufman, 'Nach 638 Jahren ausgeloescht,' Tribuene , Heft 107, 1988, pp. 136-138; Ziegler, p. 32.
161.According to Ziegler, on September 4, 1938 (prior to the November riots), the Jewish cemetery in Gross-Gerau was closed, and the Jews were forced to bury their dead in the city of Mainz. Ziegler, p. 32.
162.Gedern was declared 'free of Jews' in the middle of 1939, Diel/Gedern, Kaufman Collection 072/ 75.
