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Baruch Hirsch Goldschmied’s cousins Here are families that were cousins of Baruch Hirsch Goldschmied. This research contains a close connection consisting of 3 brothers and a sister (the sister married a man whose sister married one of her brothers). There was some ‘good luck’ in that I found two young men who were saved, working in (the Righteous) Oskar Schindler’s factory in Krakow. There is also, in this document, explicit horror (of course, all of the Holocaust was hell on Earth, but most remained hidden from ‘the rest of the world’) This document features three sets of photographs, of three members of the close family aforementioned, obtained from Auschwitz files, where the fate of all of these – innocent - men was most dreadful. I begin with the Goldschmieds (Baruch Hirsch’s father’s side of the family, from Klasno, Wieliczka and Krakow. They mostly originated from Klasno (which merged into the nearby town of Wieliczka), where Baruch Hirsch Goldschmied) was born. In Holocaust records, Wieliczka is usually linked to Krakow, latterly part of the greater Krakow area. Krakow itself, seemed a natural place to move to, where before the war, Jews seemed able to flourish. The Schmerlowitz families (from Krakow) were relatives of from his (first) wife’s side. These have all been verified as first cousins, via the early family tree produced by Professor Dan Hirschberg. He has not compiled a Goldschmied family tree, but has added some of the Goldschmied family where they occur on the Schmerlowitz one. (However, he has provided some assistance with my own work). Leiser, Symche, Saul Rafael, and Fietsche were (Goldschmied) siblings, born in Wieliczka; I found (sadly, Holocaust) records of many of them and their families. The following is a marriage (‘m’) record of brother, Saul (Rafael); who married Chana (Hannah)- Rachel Buksbaum (or Birskbaum). Note Saul’s parents’ information. Aron Goldschmied, who was from Wieliczka (Klasno to be exact). Aron is a strong Goldschmied family name, including Baruch’s children and grandchildren (Baruch Hirsch’s grandfather was also Aron Isaac). Interestingly The name ‘Honig’ crops up a couple of times on family1941 Census records (possibly as witness to the signing and validity of the Jewish Census, in Krakow). Baruch Hirsch’s first wife, Rachela Temerle’s Maiden name was a Schmerlowitz (after her mother’s surname) , and her father’s surname was Ozerowitz. Often you get families marrying into the same ‘other’ families, through familiarity, and/or social opportunity. Wieliczka Aron GOLDSCHMIED Saul - Rafal 1929 M Ozerowitz Bluma OZEROWITZ Dawid Chana - Wieliczka BUKSBAUM 1929 M Rachel Mirla HONIG Blume OZEROWICZ (born 7th February 1859, Krakow), married Aron Goldschmied (born in August 1866, in Klasno. Aron was the son of Abraham Meyer, who was a son of Symche and Necha. Note that Blume’s parents were also Szmerlowitz (same family tree as Rachela Temerle). Marriage record Aron and Bluma The occupations of the families include: watchmakers, goldsmiths, a family of artistic sign-writers (likely working in metal; Baruch Hirsch was a tin-smith, and there was a huge firm of plumbers. The women often appear to be seamstresses, utilising the ‘Goldschmied/goldsmith’ talent for good hand-eye coordination, patience and attention to detail. There were also teachers and at least one pharmacist, a couple of medical doctors, cosmetic and perfume scientists, merchants, businessmen, one carpenter, at least one printer. Before I begin, let me contextualise the Holocaust material used here (largely from the Yad Vashem and United States Holocaust Memorial Museum databases). Most of the forms and photographs are from the1940 enforced census. ‘…Before the German-Soviet invasion of 1939, Kraków (Cracow) was an influential centre for the 60,000–80,000 Polish Jews who had lived there since the 13th century. Persecution of the Jewish population of Kraków began immediately after the German troops entered the city on 6 September 1939 in the course of the German aggression of Poland. Jews were ordered to report for forced labour beginning in September 1939. In November, all Jews twelve years or older were required to wear identifying armbands. Throughout Kraków, synagogues were closed and all their relics and valuables confiscated [stolen] by the Nazi authorities. Kraków was made the capital of the General Government (the part of occupied Poland not directly incorporated into Germany), and by May 1940…under Nazi orders, all Jews were to be cleared out of Krakow. Massive deportations of Jews from the city ensued. Of the more than 68,000 Jews in Kraków at the time of the German invasion, only 15,000 workers and their families were permitted to remain. (They had to wait in queues for hours, completing ID forms and permit requests, they went back and forth, with more paperwork – the Germans making it as troublesome as possible). All other Jews were ordered out of the city, to be resettled into surrounding rural areas of the General Government…’ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krak%C3%B3w_Ghetto) From May 1942, Jews were sent to (forced labour) concentration camps, such as Krakow Plaszow or Auschwitz Birkenau. In March 1943 the ghetto was ‘liquidated’, about 2,000 were killed in the streets, others deported to concentration camps and murdered there. Plaszow ‘The camp of Plaszow was originally designed to be a work camp. However, like many other Nazi camps, shortages of food existed, prisoners starved or were worked to death, or summarily shot for no reason. The camp had been opened in December 1942. More than 150,000 civilians were held prisoner in Plaszow. One use of slave labour was to obliterate all trace of earlier mass murders. At Himmler's instigation, a series of special units, known collectively as Unit 10051, were forced to dig up the putrefied corpses of those slain, to burn them, and scatter the ashes. This work took nearly two years and involved exhuming more than two million corpses. At Plaszow, in January 1945 a Unit 10051 was forced to exhume 9,000 bodies from 11 mass graves. Other units, working at different times at the murder sites, were themselves murdered once their work was done. The SS wanted no trace to survive either of their crimes, or of the slave labourers who were being forced to hide them. The conditions of life in this camp were made dreadful by the SS commander of the camp Amon Goeth. A prisoner in Plaszow was very lucky if he could survive in this camp more than four weeks. After the liberation, commander Amon Goeth had been turned over to the Polish officials, tried, sentenced to death and hanged. The camp shown in Spielberg's film "Schindler's List" is the exact description of Plaszow [see Oskar Schindler]. Life for the inmates was usually short and miserable. As the Russian forces advanced further and further westward, the Germans began the systematic evacuation of the slave labour camps in their path. From the camp at Plaszlow, many hundreds were sent to Auschwitz, others westward to Mauthausen and Flossenburg on January 18th, 1945, the camp was evacuated by death marches, during which thousands of prisoners died from starvation, disease or were shot if they were too weak to walk. The last prisoners were transferred to Germany on January 16, 1945.‘ (https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/plaszow-history-and-overview) Women (at Plaszow) being used like horses, to pull heavy waggons. Regarding the material; forms / photographs ‘…Over 19,000 registration forms for the Jewish inhabitants of Kraków (Cracow, Krakau), Poland, created in the summer of 1940. Registration forms for the Jewish inhabitants of Kraków, Poland, which were created under the direction of the Jüdische Gemeinde in Krakau (Jewish community in Kraków), in response to a Nazi order, mostly during July and August 1940…’ https://www.jewishgen.org/databases/Poland/KrakowGhetto.htm I begin with the four siblings and their families. Lobl (Loebl) and Fietsche Goldschmied and family Lobl Klingenholz Lobl was born on 27th June 1895 in Krakow. (He was the son of Elias and KreindlaI, and the brother of Regina) He was an ‘expert / master perfumer’ (he created perfume compositions), and was also a businessman. Lobl Klingenholz’s signature Lobl was arrested, and deported to Auschwitz along with brothers-in-laws: Leiser and Simche Goldschmied. Their heads was shaved and police photographs taken in Auschwitz. Lobl Klingenholz: Auschwitz police mug shots The Auschwitz mug shots, according to Helen Tichauer, a survivor who worked in the Auschwitz Bauleitung, were taken only of inmates (Jews as well as non-Jews) who arrived in Auschwitz through the penal system. The photographed Jews had at some point been 'arrested' and were regarded in the first instance as criminals, though they may have been arrested for as marginal an offence as violating curfew, posing as Aryans or appearing on a membership list of a Bundist or Zionist organization. All of the mugshots pre-date the mass deportations in the Autumn of 1942 and therefore have no bearing on Jews who were or were not selected for forced labour rather than the gas chambers. Ironically, none of the people photographed would have been sent to the gas chambers. They were called 'Karteimässig' (card indexed). Those who arrived as 'prisoners' were 'sentenced' and could not be discharged, but neither could they be gassed. Often, however, they were shot, or hanged, or beaten to death, sometimes only days or weeks after arriving at Auschwitz. The photography was done under SS auspices in a police-like environment through the Erkennungsdient (identification department). Of a total of 38,000 mug shots that were taken at Auschwitz , less than 10% were of Jewish prisoners. The vast majority were of Polish, Germans and Czech prisoners. (United States Holocaust Museum information and collection of photographs) Lobl was murdered on 19th February 1942. Feitsche (née Goldschmied) d. Holocaust? Feitsche was born on 22nd November 1895 in Wieliczka (likely Klasno at that time). (She was tthe daughter of Aron and Bluma; the sister of Leiser, Symche and Saul Goldschmied). Fietsche was a school-teacher. She married Lobl Klingenholz, and moved to his home city of Krakow in 1921. They had at least two children; a daughter, Judyta (Judith) aged 19 or 20 and a son, Aron (survived). Felicja Sara was the name recorded on her husband’s death record at Auschwitz. ‘…August 17, 1938: The Executive Order on the Law on the Alteration of Family and Personal Names requires German Jews bearing first names of “non-Jewish” origin to adopt an additional name: “Israel” for men and “Sara” for women.