Jenny Joachimsohn and her daughter Käthe had to leave the apartment on April 10, 1943, and move into compulsory accommodation at Heilbronner Straße 22. From there, they were deported two months later to the Theresienstadt ghetto. Jenny Joachimsohn survived. Her daughter Käthe was deported on October 23, 1944, to Auschwitz, where she was murdered.

After his wife’s death, Alexander Beer sublet a furnished room to Hedwig Ehrlich. She moved in here in August 1942. However, in the declaration of assets that she completed shortly before she was deported to Auschwitz, she stated that she did not pay any rent. It is likely that Elisabeth Sussmann also lived in the apartment. This is indicated by a handwritten remark next to her name on the deportation list. Hedwig Ehrlich was deported on February 19, 1943, to Auschwitz; Elisabeth Sussmann a short time later, on March 3, 1943. They were both murdered there. Alexander Beer was deported a few weeks later, on March 17, 1943, to the Theresienstadt ghetto, where he died a year later.

Edith Littmann, née Eisenstädt, and her husband Hans moved into a 1.5-room apartment without a kitchen at Blumeshof 15 in November 1942. They paid a monthly rent of Reichsmark 80. They had previously lived at Bochumer Straße 19, where they were registered as resident in May 1939. Hans and Edith Littmann were deported on February 19, 1943, to Auschwitz.

About a month later, the apartment was passed to Johann Ostwald, a Propaganda Ministry employee and member of the SS whose previous apartment at Kaiserallee 134 had been damaged in an air raid. Ostwald then negotiated with Edgar Hering, the new, non-Jewish owner of the property, and the Berlin-Brandenburg Chief of Finance (OFP) to have the apartment renovated free of charge.

In about 1934, Fritz and Helene Lamm, née Meyer, moved into a rented apartment on the second floor of the street-facing building. Fritz Lamm, a lawyer, worked for the Jewish Community of Berlin and was deputy chairman of the Jewish Welfare Office. He and his wife last occupied 3.5 rooms.

Anna Bernstein, née Schuster, a widow, and her brother Ludwig Schuster, who also worked for the Jewish Community of Berlin, moved into another unfurnished room in March 1941. Anna Bernstein was deported on September 23, 1942, to the Theresienstadt ghetto, where she died a year later, allegedly having taken her own life. Her brother Ludwig Schuster was also deported to Theresienstadt, in spring 1943. The Iron Cross he was awarded during the First World War is noted on the deportation list. Ludwig Schuster died in autumn 1944.

Fritz Lamm was arrested on November 9 or 10, 1942, and sent to Sachsenhausen concentration camp. He was murdered a few weeks later, on December 3, 1942. Helene Lamm probably did not know her husband had died when she was deported just a few days later, on December 9, 1942, to Auschwitz, where she was murdered.

Max and Cecilie Rosenthal held the lease on this apartment. They had been forced to sell their luxurious house on Rauchstraße following the introduction of the Jewish property tax. Their apartment at Blumeshof 15 had 4.5 rooms, a kitchen and a bathroom. They paid Reichsmark 160 per month.

In September 1941, the Rosenthals sublet a room to Bertha Falkenberg and Johanna Ginsberg. The sisters had been forced to give up their apartment at Trendelenburgstraße 16, sell almost all their furniture and take this room for Reichsmark 60 per month. They were deported on August 26, 1942, to the Theresienstadt ghetto. Bertha Falkenberg survived: She was among the prisoners released to Switzerland in February 1945. Johanna Ginsberg died on March 7, 1943, in the ghetto.

Martha Henschke, née Meyer, and Else Marx, née Löwenthal, shared an apartment on the third floor from March 1939 on. Both widows, they equally shared the rent of Reichsmark 160. Else Marx occupied one room, which she shared with her sister Betty Löwenthal from April 1939 on. Martha Henschke was a leading member of the Berlin Jewish Community and head of a department for homes for the elderly and people with special needs. Martha Henschke wrote in her declaration of assets shortly before her deportation that she occupied two rooms and the hallway.

In late August 1941, Emilie Leichtentritt moved in as a subtenant. She had previously lived in Dr. Julius Magnus’ apartment on the second floor. Another furnished room in the apartment was sublet to Lilli Rosenberg in April 1942. She stated that she lived as a subtenant with Else Marx. Herbert Rosenthal, however, who moved in at an unknown point in time and only occupied a “sleeping place”, stated that Martha Henschke was the main tenant. Emilie Leichtentritt was the first of the apartment’s occupants to be deported. She was sent on January 19, 1942, to the Riga ghetto. Else Marx and her sister Betty Löwenthal were deported on October 3, 1942, to the Theresienstadt ghetto. Two weeks later, on October 19, 1942, Herbert Rosenthal was deported to the Riga ghetto and from there, a year later, to Auschwitz. Martha Henschke was probably deported with ten other Berlin Jewish Community employees on December 9, 1942, to Auschwitz, where she was murdered on June 3, 1943. Lilli Rosenberg was deported on February 19, 1943. None of the occupants survived.

Hertha Urbach lived with her small children Ruth and Lothar in one room in the basement apartment in the rear building from 1938 on. She paid a monthly rent of Reichsmark 20.32. In May 1941, a subtenant named Martin Israel moved in, who paid Reichsmark 20 for a “sleeping place”. Both adults worked as forced laborers: Hertha Urbach in the Siemens-Schuckert factory; Martin Israel in the Fritz Müller paper factory. All the members of the household were deported on February 19, 1943, to Auschwitz and murdered.

Alfred and Gertrud Lipkowitz were the main tenants of this apartment in the rear building. They lived in two rooms with their children Ralf and Bela, and paid Reichsmark 50 rent. In 1940 Regina Moskiewicz moved in as a subtenant of the family, paying half the rent. The Lipkowitz family and Regina Moskiewicz were deported on February 19, 1943, to Auschwitz and murdered. About a month later, the apartment was assigned to Hans Nebel, a metal worker.

Wilhelm Zwillenberg, a musician, lived here with his wife Pauline Zwillenberg, née Goldstücker. They both managed to escape in October 1939 via Italy to Palestine. For this reason, the apartment cannot be considered a forced home.

The only person known to have occupied this small 1-room apartment with a kitchen, hallway, bathroom and attic was Flora Lazarus, who moved in here in July 1934. In the declaration of assets that she completed shortly before her deportation, she stated that she paid a monthly rent of Reichsmark 47.50. Flora Lazarus was deported on September 7, 1942, to the Theresienstadt ghetto and survived. In January 1943, her apartment was rented out again; to whom is not known.

The main tenants of this 1-room apartment were Franziska Grodka and her husband Arthur Grodka. They moved here from Kurfürstenstraße 124 sometime after the national census of May 1939. They paid Reichsmark 47.50 rent per month. The Grodkas were deported on March 12, 1943, to Auschwitz and murdered.

Who the main tenants of this apartment were is not known. Husband-and-wife Siegfried and Dorothea Frank moved into one room as subtenants in 1939. They paid a monthly rent of Reichsmark 30. The Franks were deported on November 29, 1942, to Auschwitz, where they were murdered.

Johanna Latte apparently lived alone. There are no indications that her modest apartment, for which she paid Reichsmark 50 per month, was used as compulsory accommodation. Johanna Latte was deported on September 7, 1942, aged 72, to the Theresienstadt ghetto, where she died some weeks later, on November 26, 1942.

Gestapo records show that Blumeshof 15 was the last known Berlin address of Ellen Rosenbaum, née Jacoby. Her husband Heinz Rosenbaum evidently stayed in the apartment at Neue Winterfeldtstraße 28 that the couple had previously shared. Little information on the Rosenbaums has survived. They evidently managed to escape before they were enlisted for deportation. Ellen Rosenbaum emigrated on November 18, 1936, to South Africa and was robbed of everything she owned by the German state. Heinz Rosenbaum fled on September 1, 1936, to an unknown destination, possibly New York. Both had their German citizenship withdrawn after emigrating. What happened to them later is not known.

Alexander Jacoby was one of the Jewish people who managed to escape from Germany before the mass deportations to extermination camps began. Where exactly and for how long he lived at Blumeshof 15 is not known. In the Berlin directory of 1935, he is listed as working in the real estate sector. He owned a property at Oranienstraße 21 in Kreuzberg. During or shortly after the November pogrom of 1938, he was arrested and jailed in Sachsenhausen concentration camp, where he was given the prisoner number 9115. He was released on December 13, 1938. Two weeks later, his business was deleted from the commercial register. He fled to the United Kingdom on July 18, 1939, and his property and all his assets, including the building at Oranienstraße 21, fell to the German state. On October 7, 1939, he was released from internment in Bradford, England. It is noted on his release paper that he was an estate broker. He was granted US citizenship in New York in November 1952.

Alfred Witkowski, a physician, had lived at Blumeshof 15 for many years before he was arrested in November 1938 and imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. His wife Hedwig Witkowski, née Mosse, was a member of the Berlin Jewish Community Council – like Bertha Falkenberg, her neighbor on the second floor. Hedwig Witkowski was a cousin of Martha Mosse, head of the housing advice office. Alfred and Hedwig Witkowski fled on May 15, 1939, to Australia. The Witkowskis’ property, including a number of buildings owned by Hedwig Witkowski, was confiscated by the state in 1942.

The area around Blumeshof 15 was a sedate, middle-class neighborhood of villas and grand residential buildings in leafy surroundings, close to Berlin’s central Tiergarten park. Many well-known public figures lived in the street, including members of the Jewish Community of Berlin. But there was also a significant site of anti-Jewish persecution on the street: The Reich Culture Chamber, responsible for ostracizing and ousting numerous Jewish artists, was located at Blumeshof 2-6.