Minna Benjamin
* 1871

Minna Benjamin, born on 9 Feb. 1871 in Hamburg, deported on 15 July 1942 to Theresienstadt, deported further on 21 Sept. 1942 to Treblinka
Rosalie Benjamin, born on 22 Aug. 1874 in Hamburg, deported on 15 July 1942 to Theresienstadt, deported further on 21 Sept. 1942 to Treblinka

Isestraße 61

The married couple Isaak Benjamin (1821–1914) and his wife Sara, née Hirschberg (1832–1914), the parents of Minna and Rosalie, lived in Hamburg since 1871 at the latest. Isaak Benjamin worked there as a cap maker and later had his own cap-manufacturing plant. His wife was a native of Hamburg. In 1871 and 1874, the two daughters Minna and Rosalie were born in the Hanseatic city. The apartment at Wexstraße 16 (Hamburg-Neustadt), where the family had lived since 1885, was located in an area characterized by Jewish infrastructure (synagogue, school, and [charitable] residential homes). By 1892 at the latest, the couple belonged to the German-Israelitic Community in Hamburg.

Following their parents’ deaths in the spring of 1914, the two sisters had to give up the apartment on Wexstraße. In 1918, they lived, among other places, at Grindelallee 53 (Rotherbaum) and from 1923 until 1932 at Isestraße 61 (Harvestehude). The Hamburg directory from 1923 and 1932 lists both of their names, which points to separate apartments within the same house. For the 1920s, no membership in the Jewish Community is indicated.

Probably until 1930, Minna Benjamin worked in the store of the clothing manufacturer H. & R. Aronstein (women’s underwear and baby linen, women’s negligee factory, bed linen, and table linens) at Neuer Wall 12. As of 1931, she was listed as a member of the Jewish Community, though not paying any dues. One can assume, therefore, that she was unemployed at that time. From approx. 1940 onward, she depended on welfare assistance.

In 1923, Rosalie Benjamin registered her own "finery store” ("Putzgeschäft”) at Steinweg 83/84 and later at Lübecker Straße 41 (today: Wandsbeker Marktstraße/ at the corner of Wandsbeker Allee). Finery goods stores belonged to the clothing industry and offered goods for "trimming up” [German "(her)ausputzen”] clothes: This included textiles (ribbons, lace, embroideries), spangles and sequins, as well as decorative plumes. She was listed as a tax-exempt member of the Hamburg Jewish Community as of 1938. In 1940, she received a small pension amounting to 43.60 RM (reichsmark) a month.

Around the mid-1930s, the unmarried sisters moved to Litzowstraße 12 (Wandsbek). Before 1938, they became subtenants at Grindelweg 4a (Rotherbaum) with Anna Blumenthal, née Metz (1876–1942?). The last residential address indicated for the Benjamin sisters and the widowed Mrs. Blumenthal is Kleine Schäferkamp 32 (Eimsbüttel). This building of the charitable Samuel-Lewisohn-Stiftung, a residential home built in 1890, was used by the Nazi rulers as a "Jews’ house” ("Judenhaus”) in the course of preparations for deportations.

Together, the sisters were deported to the Theresienstadt Ghetto on 15 July 1942, then deported further to the Treblinka extermination camp on 21 Sept. 1942 and killed.
A Stolperstein was laid for Anna Blumenthal at Grindelweg 4a (Eimsbüttel).

Translator: Erwin Fink (2015)
Kindly supported by the Hermann Reemtsma Stiftung, Hamburg.