Life_under_Siege_The_Jews_of_Magdeburg_under_Nazi_Rule.pdf

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The worst thing was to leave my grandfather, who was over eighty then, and
my uncle, behind. I didn’t go back to Schönebeck before we left, but my father
had to; I was told all of this while I was still in Hamburg. When it was all
cleared and when we knew we had the chance to get out by ship, I left for
Berlin. We left for Trieste around about the tenth of February. We had to leave
my grandfather and his eldest son, my uncle, behind. My grandfather was sent
in 1942 to Theresienstadt. 101
The activity prior to their departure is indicative of both the chaos at that time and
the rigidity of German bureaucracy. Because Schönebeck was the registered
domicile of the family, Dr Jeruchem could only finalise both legal and taxation
requirements there, in spite of the fact that they had been living in Berlin since
July 1938. Once this was finalised, the family members co-ordinated their arrival
in Wilmersdorf, at the home of Dr Jeruchem’s father. When the family did depart
from Berlin in February, it was the last time they saw their relatives again. The
fate of Hans Jensen’s uncle, Georg Jeruchem, remains unknown to this day,
despite international searches. His grandfather, David, was deported from Berlin
to Theresienstadt on 18 August 1942. He died there on 22 November 1942, four
months from his ninetieth birthday. 102
Hans Jensen recalled the unusual situation they faced on the train to Trieste:
We sat down and these two elderly people said to us, please don’t talk to us,
we are being accompanied by the Gestapo. We got absolutely terrified:
“What do you mean? We should not talk to you?” I learned that these two
people came from a little place somewhere in southern Germany, where they
had been living all their lives. The people there were so friendly with them,
that they decided that these people should leave Germany protected, Jewish
Germans, protected by the Gestapo – so that they get over the border without
any fuss. And that’s exactly what happened!
We came to the border, and everybody had to leave this train and the
Gestapo officer said: “You stay here!” This applied to us too because we
were in the same compartment. So we did not have to go outside and open up
all the stuff there. And so that’s how we left Germany! We managed to get
over the border to Trieste. But in Trieste, where we were all, more or less,
herded into a place where we could sleep on stretchers. Then I realised how
101 Jensen, op. cit., 14 June 1999.
102 Institut Theresienstädter Initiative, ed., op. cit., p. 99.