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Passauer Str. 5

Passauer Str. 5

Tempelhof-Schöneberg, A retirement home now stands here
View of Passauer Straße from Augsburger Straße, 1905, photographer unkown. Source: Collection Ralf Schmiedecke, Berlin
At least 17 Jewish people were forcibly housed in this late-19th-century building on a street off Kurfürstendamm, near KaDeWe department store. Most of the building’s Jewish residents were deported and murdered. The property was owned by the Zucker family, many members of which lived here or were forced to live here.

The spacious five-story residential block was built in 1895/96. The businessman Heinrich Baruch Zucker bought the property in 1898. He was married to Minna Altmann. Their three daughters Selma, Gertrud, and Margarete also lived in the building; their three sons Franz, Hermann, and Max, lived here for a time. In 1932, their fourth daughter, Eva, also moved in here with her husband Alfons Kempner.

After their parents’ death in 1922, the four Zucker sisters inherited the property. They also inherited a share in the Berlin Zoo, which entitled them to free admittance at any time. In 1933 they were obliged to take out mortgages on the property in order to pay the various extra levies that the Nazi state demanded as “compensation”. On February 7, 1944, the land registry office received notification of a transfer of ownership from the Berlin-Brandenburg Chief of Finance: The property at Passauer Straße 5 and the sisters’ other assets had passed to the state as the “Jewesses” had been “deported”.

By the end of the war in 1945, Passauer Straße 5 lay in ruins. The sole surviving member of the family, Hermann Zucker, who had lived in England since 1940, filed for restitution in 1949. He died on April 7, 1950, of stress-related conditions caused by Nazi persecution, as noted in his compensation files.

His widow, Anna Amanda Sophie Zucker, pursued the compensation proceedings further. In 1950 the compensation court ascribed the property to her. Its value had considerably diminished due to bomb damage; in 1952 the land was cleared.

Architectural drawing of the new building at Passauer Straße 5, 1895. Source: Bauaktenarchiv Tempelhof-Schöneberg

Apartments

Street-facing building, 2nd floor

2nd
Apartment Kempner

Eva and Alfons Kempner moved into a 5-room apartment on the second floor of the street-facing building in 1932. Eva Kempner, née Zucker, co-owned the property at Passauer Straße 5 with her three sisters. Her husband, Dr. med. Alfons Eduard Moritz Kempner, was a government medical councillor and physician specializing in internal medicine and nervous diseases. He practised the Protestant faith but was classified as Jewish and persecuted by the Nazis because he had a Jewish wife and a Jewish father. On June 14, 1937, his license to practise as a physician was revoked. Stripped of his doctor title, he was subsequently authorized to treat only Jewish patients. In the early 1940s, the Kempners lived in two rooms of the apartment. The other rooms were occupied by Eva Kempner’s sisters Gertrud, Margarete, and Selma Zucker, who had been forced to move from their homes on the third floor. All the sisters performed forced labor.

For a short time, Alfons Kempner’s brother Dr. Franz Kempner also lived in the apartment. A lawyer by profession, he had been a state official in the Weimar Republic and was now actively involved in resistance against the Nazis. He was arrested following the assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler of July 20, charged with high treason, and executed on March 5, 1945. Alfons and Eva Kempner were deported to Theresienstadt where Alfons Kempner died on November 11, 1942. Eva Kempner was deported further on January 23, 1943, to Auschwitz, where she was murdered. Her sisters Gertrud, Margarete, and Selma were deported in March 1943 to Auschwitz and murdered.

A music student occupied one room of the apartment. His name was Heinz Martin Hagelberg and he played clarinet and saxophone. He had lived with his relatives Georg and Helene Rosenstock at Yorckstraße 60 before being allocated compulsory accommodation at Passauer Straße 5. On June 26, 1942, Heinz Hagelberg was deported to Maly Trostinez near Minsk, where he was murdered.

Street-facing building, 4th floor

4th
Apartment Lichtenstaedt

Alfred Lichtenstaedt held the lease on the apartment on the fourth floor of the street-facing building but did not live there. The Lichtenstaedts were related to the Kempner family. Though classified as Jewish and persecuted, Alfred Lichtenstaedt and his wife survived the Nazi regime.

In 1939 the Lichtenstaedts sublet a partly furnished room in the apartment to husband-and-wife Minna and Siegbert Salomon Just. They had previously lived at Neue Bayreuther Straße 3. They managed to save their daughter Gerda Lisalotta by sending her to the United Kingdom on a kindertransport. Minna Just was made to perform forced labor for Siemens-Schuckertwerke AG in Berlin-Siemensstadt. Siegbert Just was a forced laborer for Schmidt & Co. GmbH in Wedding. In early March 1943, they were separated by the Gestapo and deported on two different transports to Auschwitz, where they were murdered. The Nazi state sold their furniture and clothing for RM 1,024.20.

Gerhard Priebatsch, born on December 9, 1922, was another temporary subtenant in the apartment. He had lived with his parents Dr. Walter Priebatsch and Rosa Priebatsch, née Kassel, on Potsdamer Straße until their deportation in October 1942. On March 6, 1943, Gerhard Priebatsch was deported to Auschwitz, where he was murdered.

Stefanie Kolodzinsky also lived in Alfred Lichtenstaedt’s apartment for a time. She had lived with her mother Margarethe Kolodzinsky, née Kirstein, on the second floor of the rear building at Babelsberger Straße 47 until Margarethe’s death on September 22, 1940. 16-year-old Stefanie was then allocated housing at Passauer Straße 5. Like Minna Just, she was made to perform forced labor for Siemens-Schuckert, Gartenfeld. On January 21, 1944, Stefanie Kolodzinsky was deported to Theresienstadt. From there she was deported on October 19, 1944, to Auschwitz, where she was murdered.

Deportation list noting the name Stefanie Kolodzinsky and her address, Passauer Straße 5. Source: Deportationsliste “100. Alterstransport”, 1.2.1/127213195/ITS Digital Archive, Arolsen Archives

Another room was occupied by Siegfried Rehbock, until he was deported on March 3, 1943, to Auschwitz-Birkenau. His sister Martha Westheimer, née Rehbock, managed to escape with her husband Alexander and son Horst to the United States.

Jewish Religious Association Berlin file card on the planned emigration to the United States of Alexander and Martha Westheimer, née Rehbock, and their son Horst, 1941. Source: 1.2.4/12678492/ITS Digital Archive, Arolsen Archives
Horst Westheimer’s deregistration, February 21, 1941. Source: 1.2.4/12678493/ITS Digital Archive, Arolsen Archives

Husband-and-wife Gertrud and Alfred Schlesinger had lived at Eisenacher Straße 59 before being made to move into the building at Passauer Straße 5 in around 1940. On April 2, 1942, they were deported to the Warsaw ghetto and from there to Trawniki, where they were murdered.

Business premises

On the first floor of the street-facing building, Max and Wally Blaustein ran the perfumery Max Blaustein Parfum-Import. In 1937, the Blausteins emigrated to Prague, then to Paris, and finally to New York. A non-Jew took over their perfume business. Another business on the first floor was a cake house and café, run since the 1920s by John Landau. Following his arrest and imprisonment in Sachsenhausen concentration camp, his wife Luise managed to arrange a passage to Shanghai for them both in August 1939. A physician named Alfred Bruck had set up his practice on the third floor of the street-facing building in 1923. He gave up his practice in April 1933 after the Nazis’ rise to power and introduction of the “Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service”.

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Neighborhood

Records show that a neighbor of the Kempners’ asked to purchase their furnishings after their deportation. But there were other interested parties, including an SS Untersturmführer from Zehlendorf. A dispute ensued over who obtained which items of the “Kempner Jew furniture” – as the couple’s belongings were then disdainfully described.

The permanent exhibition „Wir waren Nachbarn“ in Rathaus Schöneberg offers more insights into everyday Jewish life in the Tempelhof-Schöneberg district.

Author

Katharina Kretzschmar

In remembrance of the Jewish residents of Passauer Straße 5

Evelyn Blaustein

Born August 29, 1928, in Berlin
Escaped to the United States 1941
Survived

Max Blaustein

Born January 7, 1896, in Posen (Poznań)
Escaped to the United States, 1941
Survived

Wally Blaustein, née Baruch

Born May 31, 1898
Escaped to the United States, 1941
Survived

Heinz Martin Hagelberg

Born January 12, 1925, in Chemnitz
Deported June 26, 1942, to Maly Trostinez extermination camp near Minsk, murdered

Marcus Herbert

Born July 5, 1906, in Hamburg
Probably escaped to the United States 1941

Gerda Lisalotta Just

Born December 30, 1922, in Crossen (Oder)
Kindertransport to England 1939
Survived

Minna Elisabeth Just, née Rosenbaum

Born November 27, 1895, in Crossen (Oder)
Deported March 1, 1943, to Auschwitz, murdered

Siegbert Salomon Just

Born December 1, 1888, in Crossen (Oder)
Deported March 2, 1943, to Auschwitz, murdered

Dr. Alfons Eduard Moritz Kempner

Born September 8, 1878, in Bydgoszcz
Deported October 3, 1942, to the Theresienstadt ghetto, died November 11, 1942

Eva Kempner, née Zucker

Born August 31, 1886, in Berlin
Deported October 3, 1942, to the Theresienstadt ghetto, deported January 23, 1943, to Auschwitz, murdered

Stefanie Kolodzinsky

Born December 15, 1924, in Berlin
Deported January 21, 1944, to the Theresienstadt ghetto, died there

John Landau

Born February 7, 1879, in Berlin
Incarceration KZ Sachsenhausen June 18, 1938, to August 12, 1939
Escaped to Shanghai
Survived

Gerhard Priebatsch

Born December 9, 1922, in Berlin
Deported March 6, 1943, to Auschwitz-Monowitz, declared dead

Siegfried Rehbock

Born June 18, 1884, in Gehaus (Sachsen)
Deported March 3, 1943, to Auschwitz-Birkenau, murdered

Alfred Schlesinger

Born August 3, 1881, in Görlitz
Deported April 2, 1942, to the Warsaw ghetto, then to Trawniki concentration camp, did not survive

Gertrud Schlesinger, née Horwitz

Born June 18, 1895, in Jauer (Silesia)
Deported April 2, 1942, to the Warsaw ghetto, then to Trawniki concentration camp, did not survive

Bertha Teppich, née Wolffberg

Born December 11, 1887, in Stolpe
Escaped December 11, 1939, to Argentina
Survived

Alexander Westheimer

Born October 12, 1880, in Schluchtern
Escaped 1942 to the United States
Survived

Marta/Martha Westheimer, née Rehbock

Born January 21, 1889, in Gehaus (Sachsen)
Escaped 1942 to the United States
Survived

Horst Westheimer

Born January 23, 1927, in Berlin
Escaped 1942 to the United States
Survived

Gertrud Zucker

Born August 4, 1896, in Berlin
Deported March 3, 1943, to Auschwitz, murdered

Margarete Zucker

Born March 23, 1889, in Berlin
Deported March 3, 1943, to Auschwitz, murdered

Sara Selma Zucker

Born July 27, 1883, in Berlin
Deported March 3, 1943, to Auschwitz, murdered