Life_under_Siege_The_Jews_of_Magdeburg_under_Nazi_Rule.pdf

The references to these three surnames were meant to target the Jewish
community. Jews had good reason to feel uneasy, as both the newly appointed
Nazi officials for the local and regional administration, together with the city’s
mayor, were virulent antisemites. Kurt Sabatzky, head of the Centralverein (CV)
in Leipzig. described Rudolf Krause, the Nazi Party’s Kreis- und Abschnittsleiter
for Magdeburg as ‘an especially unpleasant devourer of Jews.’ 9
When the boycott of 1 April 1933 took place, Jewish shops in Magdeburg
were forced to close. Customers and passers-by were photographed and molested
by the Sturmabteiling (SA). Above all, much curiosity was displayed on the part
of the city’s citizenry. As in other parts of Germany, the boycott was not as
successful as the most radical elements of the Nazi Party had anticipated. The
majority of interviewees recalled the boycott, a number experiencing it
themselves. Otto and Regina Herrmann, who lived in Wolmirstedt bei
Magdeburg, owned and operated three separate businesses: a manchester shop in
Wolmirstedt, which included men’s and ladies’ wear, a woollen goods shop in
Magdeburg and an apron factory in Magdeburg, which Otto Herrmann held in
partnership with a non-Jew, Kurt Jäger. Jewish shop owners reacted with fear and
avoided contact with non-Jews during the boycott. However, in a small town such
as Wolmirstedt, where everyone knew one another and where the Herrmann
family was well known and respected, their shop was not forced to close, even
9 Kurt Sabatzky, Meine Erinnerungen an den Nationalsozialismus, undated, File ME
541; MM65, LBIA NY, op. cit., p. 26. The cited quotation is the author’s translation
from the original German which reads: ‘Magdeburg selbst wurde sehr bald der
unangenehmste Platz für die Juden in meinem Bezirk. Hier saß der Kreis- und
Abschnittsleiter Krause, der neben dem Gauleiter Loeper in Dessau, ein ganz
besonders unangenehmer Judenfresser war.’
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