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Rosa Rebecka Löwenberg (née Seewald) * 1865

Heymannstraße 6 (Eimsbüttel, Eimsbüttel)

1942 Theresienstadt
ermordet 20.01.1944

further stumbling stones in Heymannstraße 6:
Michaelis Löwenberg, Henny Löwenberg

Michaelis Löwenberg, born on 20 Oct. 1856 in Wunstorf near Hannover, flight to death on 13 Oct. 1940
Rosa Rebecka Löwenberg, née Seewald, born on 18 June 1865 in Frankfurt/Main, deported on 15 July 1942 to Theresienstadt, died there on 20 Jan. 1944
Henny Löwenberg, born on 10 Mar. 1892 in Hannover, deported on 11 July 1942 to Auschwitz

Heymannstrasse 6

The real estate agent for houses Michaelis Löwenberg was the son of Ephraim Abraham and Zaire Löwenberg, née Schragenheim or Schrepenhain. He was born in Wunstorf in what is today Lower Saxony. In the year of his birth, Wunstorf still belonged to the Kingdom of Hannover, which became a Prussian province only in 1866. In the mid-nineteenth century, the town had a significant Jewish community, made up of nearly 90 members in about 1860. The town’s population numbered 2,280 persons overall at the time. In real estate and building files in Wunstorf, various Löwenbergs are listed, working there as grain traders, tobacco producers, merchants, and vegetable tanners. On the Wunstorf Jewish Cemetery, there is the grave of an Efraim Löwenberg, who died in 1858. He was perhaps Michaelis’ father. One Mosche Löwenberg was buried there as well in 1883. He was a son of Efraim and thus maybe a brother of Michaelis.

The parents of his wife, Rosa Rebecka, who according to the Memorial Book was born in Frankfurt/Main, were Meir (Meier, Meyer, Mayer) and Henrietta (Jettchen) Seewald, née Oestreich. Michaelis and Rosa Rebecka were married in May 1891 in the Hessian town of Babenhausen, where her father and her sisters lived and where she had probably grown up. For the year 1875, four male and six female persons are documented for the Seewald family in Babenhausen at Fahrstrasse 26. In 1867, 84 persons of the Jewish faith lived in the town, that is, 3.7 percent of the fewer than 3,000 inhabitants. Rosa Rebecka’s mother Jettchen passed away as early as Apr. 1876. A gravestone for her with Hebrew inscription is located in the Jewish Cemetery in Babenhausen. We do not know how many siblings there were. One sister, Scheinle, died while still a child. A gravestone exists for her, too. For 1884, Mayer Seewald is also documented as a house owner, and in the year 1900, the names of Julius and Willy Seewald are listed. Both were probably brothers of Rosa Rebecka. Julius still lived in Babenhausen as late as 1931. One contemporary witness recalled that the Seewalds traded in building materials.

Both spouses came from small towns. After getting married, they lived probably until about 1910 in Hannover, where four daughters were born at short intervals: Henny (in 1892), Else (in 1893), Flora (in 1895), and Irma (in 1897). Starting in 1910, entries can be found in the Hamburg phone directory. Michaelis Löwenberg operated a real estate agency at Kaiser-Wilhelm-Strasse 82 and, until about 1918, at Gerhofstrasse 2. The residential quarters were located at Rutschbahn 26 in those days. From there, the family moved to Heymannstrasse 6 (then called Liliencronstrasse). The five-story apartment building of the Malereigesellschaft (the Painters’ Association, a cooperative), built in clinker brick style (at Schlankreye 3/25, Bogenstrasse 43/47, Heymannstrasse 6/10) was constructed in 1927. Probably the Löwenberg couple moved there along with daughter Henny as soon as the building was finished.

Henny Löwenberg was the only unmarried daughter. She lived with her parents and cared for them. An entry on the father’s Jewish religious tax (Kultussteuer) file card reads: "is provided for by the daughter!” Henny Löwenberg worked as a commercial clerk for the John M. Meyer banking house on Börsenbrücke, a position she lost probably at the end of 1936 due to persecution. Later, she found one more job at the Jewish hospital. Her last place of residence was, like that of her parents, the May Stift at Bogenstrasse 25.

In this house, Michaelis Löwenberg attempted to take his life on 6 Oct. 1940. He was admitted to the Israelite Hospital on Johnsallee, where he died on 13 October. On the death certificate, the physician Rudolf Borgzinner diagnosed as the cause of death a scalp wound and myocardial insufficiency.

From the building at Bogenstrasse 25, turned into a "Jews’ house” ("Judenhaus”), Henny was deported to Auschwitz on 11 July 1942. A few days later, on 15 July 1942, her mother, Rosa Rebecka, was deported to Theresienstadt, due to her age.

On 1 Jan. 1941, daughter Else married the Jewish man Max van der Walde, born in Emden in 1890. The van der Waldes had a daughter Caroline (born in 1921) and a son Simon (born in 1924). Else worked as a housekeeper in the Home for Jewish Girls (Heim für Jüdische Mädchen) at Innocentiastrasse 21. Stolpersteine are located there for Else and Max van der Walde and their two children, who were all deported to Minsk in 1941.

Flora Löwenberg was married to Willy Sänger (see entry on the Sänger family). For Irma Löwenberg and her husband Bruno Schragenheim, Stolpersteine are located at Brahmsallee 13.

Addendum: On 18 Aug. 1942, two silver soupspoons and two silver teaspoons belonging to Henny Löwenberg were publicly auctioned off, yielding proceeds of 15 RM (reichsmark). This is the last trace found of the family.


Translator: Erwin Fink
Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.

Stand: March 2017
© Susanne Lohmeyer

Quellen: 1; 4; 5; 7; Hamburger Fernsprechbücher; HAB II 1931; StaH 214-1 Gerichtsvollzieherwesen, 463; StaH 331-5, 3 Akte 1940/1770; StaH 332-5 Standesämter, 8169 und 514/1940; StaH 351-11 AfW 090132 Jack Black; Auskunft vom Stadtarchiv Wunstorf; Juden in Niedersachsen, Bd. 2, S. 1591ff.; Helga Schmal, Eimsbüttel und Hoheluft-West, S. 60; Klaus Loetsch u. a., Die Juden von Babenhausen, S. 231ff.; Kleinanzeige Hamburger Familienblatt vom 1.10.1936.
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