User:Virtualiter/Albert Hirsch (Elmshorn)

Albert Hirsch (September 24, 1878 in Mogilno, Posen - December 1, 1941) was a canning manufacturer from Elmshorn and the last head of the Elmshorn Jewish community.

Family
His parents were the master butcher Wilhelm Hirsch and Ernstine, née Baszynska.

On November 15, 1919, he married the widow Gertrud, née Schmerl (- September 16, 1938) in Elmshorn, who brought her son Horst Karlik into the marriage. The family lived at Lornsenstr. 35. On October 16, 1920, their son Heinz-Walter was born. Horst emigrated to Peru before 1938.

After Gertrud's death, Frieda Dieseldorff ran his household. He reported to friends: ".. Frida is his right-hand man and she has great privileges because she has a mixed-race son and an Aryan son, she gets a clothing card, more food on the card, doesn't have to wear the Star of David and can go to any shop and it benefits Albert."

Life
Albert Hirsch came to Elmshorn in 1919 after serving in the First World War, where he set up his „Holsteinische Konservenfabrik" (Holstein Canning Factory) at the beginning of the 1930s. In the winter of 1930, the „Landwirtschaftlich Wochenblatt für Schleswig-Holstein“ (Agricultural Weekly for Schleswig-Holstein) reported: "Beetroot is currently unsaleable. Our colleague Albert Hirsch, who for the first time this winter, shares the same view. He processed beetroot and immediately bagged 1200 cwt. Based on our many years of experience, he will remain so for the most part despite a lot of regular advertising. Some of our colleagues in Ottensen and Bahrenfeld are still holding on to even larger quantities."

The factory's decline began with the onset of National Socialism. In 1938, the factory was Aryanized and Wilhelm Bull took over. On November 9, he and his son were sent to KL Sachsenhausen for a few days. The Commerzbank in Elmshorn transferred the shares he held in the Berliner Kraft und Licht AG to the Prussian State Bank. In return, the bank received a commission of 1.2 percent of the value shares at Hirsch's expense.

Like his stepbrother, Heinz-Walter Hirsch emigrated to Lima in February 1939, where he founded the successful car import business Auto-Hirsch S.A. with his American wife Frances Elizabeth and now lives in Florida.

Albert Hirsch, the last head of the small community, remained behind. On September 5, 1940, the National Socialists extorted an agreement from him that no more burials would take place in the Jewish cemetery in the future.

In November 1941, he received his deportation notice to Riga. On December 1, he hanged himself in the Ohlsdorf cemetery, where his wife Gertrud is buried.

A street in Elmshorn is named after him.

Literature

 * Harald Kirschninck: Was können uns die Gräber erzählen?: Biografien und GeschichtenS. 185f (Online)
 * Harald Kirschninck: Juden in Elmshorn
 * Harald Kirschninck: Die Geschichte der Juden in Elmshorn 1918–1945