Life_under_Siege_The_Jews_of_Magdeburg_under_Nazi_Rule.pdf

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their deportation to Theresienstadt in October 1942, Otto Herrmann wrote to his
sister on 29 July 1942. His letter was imbued with hope and relief at having
received correspondence from his daughter, Inge, six weeks prior. In her letter,
Inge-Ruth, who was already a young nineteen-year-old woman, wrote:
Are you alright? I miss you sadly. My health is good. Looking forward to a
happy reunion. Fondest love! 149
The neatly penned correspondence from both the Herrmanns and their relatives,
the Mannebergs, from Theresienstadt continued to be sent to Sweden up until their
deportations to Auschwitz in October 1944. 150 The only letter ever to reach the
Herrmanns’ daughter in Sydney arrived via Sweden, when Betty Caspari
forwarded it on. 151 Her recollection of its receipt in Sydney is vivid:
I had a letter from Theresienstadt, only one, and that was it then. But they
wrote through the Red Cross to Sweden, to my aunt there, and she sent it on.
But you should have seen it – it was all cut out, everywhere. This was in
1944. 152
Not dissimilar to her travelling companion, Gisela Jankelowitz, Inge-Ruth
Herrmann was also unsuccessful in her attempt at facilitating the emigration of her
parents and there was no reunion. Her entire immediate family and the majority of
her extended family perished. 153
When Hemmi Freeman left for England prior to the Reichskristallnacht, he
sailed from Hamburg, later docking at Cherbourg, before disembarking in
nine-page manuscript was translated from the original German into English by the
author of this thesis in 2004.
149
Private correspondence from Otto and Regina Herrmann, 29 July 1942, Private
Archive of I. Poppert, op. cit.
150
Private correspondence from the Herrmann and Manneberg families, 8 August
1943 – 17 August 1944, ibid.
151 Poppert, op. cit., 9 January 1998.
152 Ibid.
153 The lives and fates of the members of the Herrmann family have also been
discussed in previous chapters, particularly in Chapters Two and Four.