Sigmund Marx

By the early to mid-1930’s, life in Lichtenfels was becoming more difficult for all of us. National Socialism (Nazism) had been on the rise since the early 1930’s. Adolf Hitler rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then taking the title of Führer in 1934. Once the Nuremberg Race Laws were passed in 1935, our lives changed drastically. Our lives became restricted and isolated, as we were systematically stripped of our rights and dignity. Our dreams were being brutally cut short by escalating Nazi persecution. Our non-Jewish neighbors, dear friends, and colleagues were beginning to distance themselves from us. Our family began to plan our emigration before life became untenable.

On the night of November 9, 1938, later called Kristallnacht (“The Night of Broken Glass”), the local Nazis, led by a ruthless officer named Fränkel “Franz” Fischer, threw a brick through the first-floor window of our home. It landed in Marion’s cradle. Thankfully, she wasn’t in it at the time. I can’t bear to think what would have happened to her if she had been sleeping in there. Frieda immediately scooped up Marion and ran upstairs to Alfred and Ellen’s apartment. Ellen had instructed Inge to take Hanne and Marion to their tenant’s apartment on the third floor where they would hide. Ellen and Alfred’s tenant was not Jewish, but was willing to help both Marx brothers and their family. They hid the three girls in a closet, helping to keep them quiet while the Nazis ransacked and searched our home.

The next hours were horrifying. The Nazi rioters stormed our apartment, as well as my brother’s apartment on the second floor. They smashed every window and broke every piece of glass, crystal, and china in our homes. They threw all our possessions out the windows; most landing on the beautifully tended rose garden that Ellen toiled in day after day. It was a nightmare with the deafening sound of breaking glass everywhere. We didn’t know it at the time, but not only were Jewish homes being destroyed, but so too was our synagogue and all Jewish businesses in the community: our business and my wife’s family’s business included. The Nazis took all that we owned. They took our homes, our businesses, which we were required to liquidate, our cars, and our driver’s licenses.

I, along with my brother Alfred and brother-in-law Alfred Oppenheimer, Frieda’s brother, were arrested and thrown in the local jail. Thankfully, we were released after a few days. I immediately began to plan our escape out of Lichtenfels and Germany. We also heard that some men in the area had been sent to  and had been released from Dachau concentration camp, a few hours south of Lichtenfels, not far from München. I knew that if we stayed, we might be sent to Dachau or some other concentration camp. We had heard horrible stories about the conditions in the camp. We were horrified and desperate to get out of Germany.

Like my brother, I had already begun to research getting affidavits or letters of assurance to emigrate to America. Through a client’s relative, people we didn’t know, we were able to secure the proper paperwork to leave. We also were incredibly lucky to have people help us along the way. One such person was Wilhelm Aumer who had risen through the ranks in the Lichtenfels District Office to become the Superintendent. Aumer was not Jewish, yet he acted according to the standards of humanity and decency which were more important to him than the inhumane Nuremberg Race Laws. He took great risk and stamped our passports on December 19, 1938, allowing us to flee Germany. Without his bravery, I don’t know what would have happened to us.

By now, Jews were desperately trying to get out of Germany. Luckily for us, in April 1939, we were finally able to leave Germany and emigrate to England. We were sponsored by a family whom we didn’t know. The kindness of strangers was overwhelming. We made our way to Wimbledon and stayed in a home; the “Lincoln House” provided by the Jewish community. We quickly bonded with others in the house.

After about a year and a half, we had begun to save money, and our lives became easier. I learned through a cousin in Newark, New Jersey, that there was a factory where furs were dyed that had positions to be filled. Because of my experience from “Marx & Bäuml” in Lichtenfels, I inquired and was offered a management position in the company. This was a huge opportunity for us to improve our circumstances. We packed up all that we owned, which wasn’t much, and moved north to New Jersey. There was uncertainty and doubt that crept into my mind about leaving everything that had become familiar and comfortable, but I was willing to take that risk and work hard to take care of my family.

My darling Frieda completed a sewing machine course and was soon offered work. She quickly excelled in this field and contributed significantly to our family finances.

Thinking back about the conditions we left in Lichtenfels, emigrating to America was for us the only way to go. We gave up a very comfortable life in Lichtenfels, but we had no choice, as my beloved Germany systematically stripped us of our rights, discriminated against us, and brutally cut our dreams short through oppression and persecution. Germany turned its back on us. I will never, ever, forgive or forget.

I consider America the best country in the world, because everybody that likes to work, and work hard, and has the ability and knowledge, can become successful. If we didn’t have a chance to go to America, we would have been killed in the concentration camps. Of this, I have no doubt. America was our only hope.

Postscript:

Sigmund and Frieda never heard from Betty, Alfred, and Ani Oppenheimer ever again. It was an unimaginable loss that would leave a gaping hole in their hearts. As word came out of Europe about the death of millions of Jews, they regrettably accepted the fact that their beloved family members were exterminated at the hands of the Nazi regime. Over the years, they most likely learned their family members were deported on a train heading for Poland and the Sobibór extermination camp in June 1942.

Sigmund Marx died on January 23, 1980, at the age of 80. Frieda Marx died in May 1958 at the age of 50. Marion Marx grew up and after graduating High School, attended nursing school and became a registered nurse. At the age of 20, she fell in love and married David in 1956. They had three daughters: Debra, Lisa, and Linda. Marion died on May 30, 1995, at the age of 59.

In November 2018, to coincide with the 80^th commemoration of the November pogrom, Sigmund’s granddaughters traveled to Lichtenfels to reclaim their grandfather’s driver’s license which had been confiscated by the Nazis shortly after Kristallnacht.

Sigmund Marx’s license was one of the thirteen licenses discovered in 2017 while the town was digitizing town records and became a part of the “13 Jewish Driver’s Licenses” research project by the students at Meranier Gymnasium.

Sigmund’s granddaughters met the District Administrator of Lichtenfels, Christian Meissner, Mayor Andreas Hügerich, Town Archivist Christin Wittenbauer, Upper Franconia Curator Prof. Dr. Gunter Dippold, the students and their history teacher, and Manfred Brösamle-Lambrecht who lead this extraordinary and important remembrance research project.

During their visit, they also witnessed the installation of Stolpersteine in front of the former Marx residence, their last known freely chosen residence. Each stone starts with these words: “Here Lived.” Stones were laid in honor and memory of: Johanna Marx, Sigmund Marx, Frieda Marx, Alfred Marx, and Ellen Marx. Here lived the Marx family and their names were brought back into the light from a dark, horrific past.

*Chaim Rodoff: After Kristallnacht, it became life threatening for Jews to remain in Germany. Like many others before him, Chaim applied for exit visas for the United States in 1940. His wife, Rosa’s brother, and cousin in New York vouched for them. Chaim applied for ten visas but was only approved for three. Chaim and Rosa had the impossible decision to decide who of their eight children would get the visas. Their only son and his two younger sisters left Germany on May 31, 1941 and reached New York by ship via Lisbon.

On January 21, 1942, they were deported from Leipzig to the Riga Ghetto where they were forced to work hard labor. In the summer of 1943, they were taken to the Riga-Kaiserwald concentration camp. That November, Rosa and her youngest daughter were taken to Auschwitz where they were immediately sent to the gas chambers. Four of the children died in Riga-Kaiserwald in June 1944. Chaim also died there, but the date is unknown.

Chaim Rodoff was 50 years old

Rosa Rodoff was 45 years old

Irma Rodoff was 20 years old

Twins Dorothea and Eva Rodoff were 12 years old

Puja Jutta Rodoff was 11 years old

Bela Rodoff was 4 years old

**Sigmund, who lived out the last years of his life with daughter Marion’s family would cry out in his sleep, “Leipzig! Leipzig!”  His granddaughter, Lisa, would often wonder what this meant but her grandfather would never discuss what happened in Germany. It wasn’t until 2019, when Lisa learned the fate of the Rodoff family through the extension of the “13 Driver’s Licenses” project that she imagines her grandfather was haunted by the fact that he was unable to save his dear friend and family who ultimately perished at the hands of the Nazi regime.