#and his maternal grandparents living in poland during the war

[bearsinpotatosacks]

Will someone please tell me how I started out at 11 intending to get a large chunk of a fanfic written, and now at 3:40 I have ended up researching Poland during WW2?

[bobemajses]

I was going to wait for my mom to give me the names of the shtetls, but everything is crazy with my IV meds for Crohn’s (Ashkenazi genes for the lose) and moving and so…

My mother’s maternal family is from Bessarabia. Most of them left, on the same passport that they kept mailing back, to New York in the 1910’s. Some came through Uruguay, like my great grandfather who was a gaucho and furniture salesman down there for many years. My grandmother was born in Queens and was the first female graduating class of Queens College. She worked in a canteen during the war and was advised to change her last name so as not to appear Jewish. Her brother served in Britain and survived a Blitz bombing outdoors. (The irony is this name was changed names they came to America!)

Her paternal family came from Southern Poland in the 1910’s as well. Not all came over and actually one of the towns they were from was Oświęcim which became Auschwitz. I only had two cousins from those who stayed who survived. Nearly all were murdered in Auschwitz. One cousin survived the camp. The other cousin hid with her two small sons in a church basement where she was required to do all their menial tasks in exchange for being hidden. One day, a nun told her the war was over. She didn’t believe it and went outside to see for herself. She hadn’t been in daylight for years and fainted. When she came to, her two sons were in a cattle cart. She never saw then again.

Interestingly enough, only one surname is Cyrillic in my maternal family. The rest are Germanic. My grandfather was born in Manhattan and his surname is shared with a prominent Nazi. Very uncomfortable. My grandfather served in WWII in Hawaii.

Unfortunately, I know extremely little about my dad’s family. His father’s family was from Warsaw and owned a hardware store and considered themselves fairly well-to-do. In the 1890’s, my dad’s paternal grandfather visited the city (NY) to consider moving there. He was appalled by the tenements and filth and couldn’t understand why anyone would leave their homeland. If he only knew. My grandfather was an electrical engineer in Warsaw.

My grandmother’s family was from a very small shtetl outside of Warsaw. She moved to Warsaw to work as a milliner. She had a very unusual surname and I’ve been unable to find anyone alive with it with whom I’m related.

My grandparents left Warsaw when the Germans invaded and made it to the Russian border. The guards were refusing to allow anyone in so there was a camp of refugees. One night, the guard opened the gate and turned his back. My grandparents got married at some point during this, probably by a minyan, and probably not legally binding, but any talk of this upsets my dad so I don’t know more.

They were deported to Siberia and put in a prison camp. My grandmother died of breast cancer before I was born (more of those great Ashkenazi genes) and my grandfather wouldn’t talk about it so all I know is that they considered themselves very lucky to have been ‘saved’ by the Soviets and ‘only’ imprisoned in a gulag. (I learned about intergenerational trauma relating this to my therapist ten years ago.) My grandfather parlayed his knowledge of electronics to serve as an electrician instead of mining coal. (He had to work on live wires with no gloves.) My grandmother was given wool to knit for the guards and their wives and received bread in return. Mt grandparents had a son there who died of measles and malnutrition at the age of two.

Shortly before the war ended, they were moved to Tashkent. Then the Soviets tried to force my grandfather into the army. The Americans were in Germany at this point. I have no idea how, but my grandparents made it to Germany and were put in Schwäbisch Hall Displaced Persons Camp. My dad was born there in 1947.

In 1949, they emigrated to New York. They had another son six years later.

Two things of interest: We did all the DNA sites and my parents are very distant cousins which is apparently common among Ashkenazi because of endogamy. Also, both my parents speak Yiddish. It’s my dad’s first language. However, my mother grew up with ‘southern’ Yiddish and my father ‘northern’ Yiddish.

We survived!

Thank you so so much for sharing this! This was a very interesting and emotional read for me, as I personally can relate to a lot of things in your text. Ashkenazi genes can be a burden in a lot of different ways, but, most importantly, they, we, our ancestors and their stories survived. I wish you all the best and wish I could talk with you sometime.

[moderndayamymarch]

WWII timeline & harry potter

saw some ppl arguing about if tom riddle was in the blitz/how affected he was by WWII

dec. 31, 1926: tom riddle is born

1926- 1937: riddle is raised in london orphanage (during this time he: kills and hangs a girl’s rabbit from the rafters, traumatizes two kids in a cave, and steals things)

c. 1938 (after dec. 31, 1937): dumbledore visits an 11 year old riddle to tell him about hogwarts

sept. 1938- june 1939: riddle’s 1st yr

sept. 1939- june 1940: riddle’s 2nd yr

sep. 1939: hitler invades poland and the uk declares war

jan. 1940- food rationing begins (clothing in june of 1941)

june 20, 1940: first nazi air operations begin flying over britain

1940-1945: towns on the south coast of england are targeted in “tip and run raids”

sep. 7, 1940- may 11, 1941- london blitz

sept. 1940- june 1941: riddle’s 3rd yr

sep. 1941- june 1942: riddle’s 4th yr

sep. 1942- june 1943: riddle’s 5th yr where he opens the chamber of secrets, kill myrtle (around june 13), and get hagrid expelled

1942: historic london cities (ex. york, canterbury, exeter) are bombed

aug. 1943: riddle kills his father, paternal grandparents, and frames his maternal uncle

sep. 1943- june 1944: riddle’s 6th yr where he at some point creates his first horcrux

jan. 22, 1944: second mini blitz

sep. 1944- june 1945: riddle’s 7th yr

mar. 17, 1945: final bomb dropped over hull

so riddle is at hogwarts when england declares war. he doesn’t directly experience the blitz as it ends a little over a month before hogwart’s term is done. he definitely sees the aftermath of the blitz and maybe spends the summer or part of the summer of 1941 in the countryside (if the orphanage evacuated for the blitz). he would have experienced the build up to the blitz as fears/rumors of bombings or poisonous gas attacks began in london as early as 1939. he was also at hogwarts for the second mini blitz in 1944 and the war ends before he graduates from hogwarts. idk where little hangleton is but he could experienced “tip and run aids” if hangleton’s on the coast and happened to be bombed while he was there. he did experience and deal with war rationing. but it doesn’t look like he would have directly lived through the london blitz or likely any of the smaller air campaigns.

you can however side eye dippet for telling tom in 1943 that he can’t stay at hogwarts over the summer and would be safer in london (a city that experienced horrific bombing less than two years ago, would experience a second bombing in less than a year, and continued to be a potential target for the rest of the war)

and everyone likes to talk about his trauma from the war as almost a mitigating circumstance for his behavior but so many ppl lived through the blitz and didn’t become neo nazis or blood purists.

[sollannaart]

Józef Poniatowski’s family album.

Part II. Grandparents, uncles, cousins (or 3 Stanisławs, 2 Konstncjas, Kazimierz and Michał )))

This week let’s continue talking about prince Józef relatives. In the previous post on the topic I wrote (and showed portraits) of Pepi’s parents and sister. So today there will be images and some information about others.

Let’s start with the grandparents. (Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find much about Poniatowski’s maternal ancestors, so this post will be about relatives from his father's side...)

This fancy gentleman is the father of prince Anrdzej and the progenitor of the family - Stanisław Poniatowski.

Portrait of Stanisław Poniatowski, unknown painter, 18th century

He was born in 1676, as a son of a petty nobleman from Lesser Poland. And died in 1762, having achieved the highest rank possible for a civil servants in the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth - the castellan of Kraków. (Speaking in modern terms Stanisław Poniatowski can be called a self-made man.)

Of course, the life of such a man was full of ups and downs. That is why telling you about him I would like to focus only on things, which IMHO had some similarities with the destiny of Stanisłasw’s grandson, prince Józef.

During the Great Northern War Stanisław took the side of the Swedish king  Charles XII and the latter’s protégé - as a king of Poland - Stanisław Leszczyński. (On the other side there were Peter The First of Russia and August II of Saxony, who had been elected as a Polish king.)

To the misfortune of the first party, one of the decisive battles of that war, the one Poltava in 1709, was lost, but this wasn’t a reason for Poniatowski to turn his back on Charles. On the contrary, Stanisław then saved life of his suzerain, and after that help him to flee to Turkey. And remained faithful the Swedidh king to the very end, till Charles’ death 10 years later. (Although for this reason Stanisław had to spend all these years abroad, taking care of various matters of the latter.)

Marcello Bacciarelli, Portrait of Stanisław Poniatowski, after 1758, National Museum in Warsaw

And only after Charles passing away, Poniatowski went to Poland and asked pardon from August II. And having received it, remaining a faithful servant of that ruler till the Saxon king’s death in 1732.

During the next interregnum, however, Stanisław supported again the candidacy of Stanisław Leszczyński, the former protégé of Charles II. And only under the pressure of circumstances (one of his youngest sons, his namesake Stanisław, the future last king of Poland, was kidnapped by the adversaries of the opposite, Saxon party, to forced Poniatowski to join them) he switched sides.

As for Stanisław’s private life - it was also not without complications. In 1710 he married Teresa Jasieniecka, a widow of a Lithuanian nobleman Ogiński. But shortly the wedding it turned out that Teresa’s financial state was not so well as expected, instead of money she possessed debts only. And it looks like it was the reason for Poniatowski to leave her. (Some sources even say that the couple eventually divorced).

Anyway, whatever happened with Teresa later, in 1720 Stanisław seemed to be eligible again, because that very year he married again, this time to Konstancja Czartoryska.

Per Krafft the Elder: Portrait of Konstancja Czartoryska, circa 1768, National Museum Kraków

Being born circa 1700 Konstancja was about 20-25 years younger than Stanisław’s, but this didn’t prevent the the marriage from being successful. The reason might have been that, though for Poniatowski this was again a kinda “strategic marriage” (because the Czartoryski family was very powerful), the bride was really in love with her groom. To such an extent that she married him despite her father’s will.

Marcello Bacciarelli, Portrait of Konstancja Czartoryska, 18th century

And, in general, Konstancja was so stubborn and willful, that in the family she was called “Chmura gradowa” (hail cloud).

As an example of her adherence to principles there might be recalled the story of her son Kazimierz duel with Adam Tarło. First she forced Kazimierz to challenge Tarło - though even by the standards of that time the reason doesn’t seem justified enough. An then, when the shooting happened with no harm to both sides and young men reconciled,  the mother made the son to challenge his former adversary twice. And that time the duel ended with a death, fortunately to her - not of her son.

And such a story was not a unique one. (And something prompts me that had Konstancja been alive in 1761, when her son Andrzej, prince Józef’s future father, was about to marry a Czech noblewoman Teresa Kinska, the princess Poniatowska might not have agreed to that union. But the latter died already in 1758, so it wasn’t hard for Andrzej to get agreement from his very old and ailing father...)

Now, let us move to the next generation of Poniatowskis. The most known of them (and who, btw, was the favorite son of his mother) is Stanisław Antoni. Because in 1763 he was elected to become the king of the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth (and, ascending the throne, changed his second name to “August”).

Johann Baptist von Lampi the Elder: Portrait of Stanislaus Augustus in a dressing-gown, between 1788 and 1789, National Museum in Warsaw

Do you remember that the second name of prince Józef was “Antoni”? Yes, he got it in honor of that uncle of his!

And later Stanisław August had a lot of influence on his nephew, taking care on young Pepi and his older sister Teresa after their father’s death in 1773.

But in my opinion it won’t be correct to call prince Józef the favorite of king Stanisław, the person whom the latter saw as his possible successor on the Polish throne. Why? Because there also was the oldest of Stanisław’s siblings children, the son of the above mentioned Kazimierz and the king’s namesake - one more Stanisław. (More about him - a little bit below.) And only for the short period from 1791, when that Stanisław withdrew from public life and emigrated to Italy, till 1795 Pepi’s candidature might have seriously been seemed as a possible royal successor.

Ok, now let’s look at Kazimierz. In addition to participating in that infamous duel the oldest of survived sons of the Poniatowskis was known for leading a rather riotous life. Having married a wealthy bride  Apolonia Ustrzycka he had a lot of money and spent them freely and sometimes rather eccentrically. In his greenhouses, for example, there were grown... pineapples! And he also brought  to Poland from Africa a bunch of monkeys (though all they died shortly because of the cold Polish climate (( )

Unidentified painter, Portrait of Kazimierz Poniatowski, second half of 18th century, Palace Museum in Wilanów

In his private life prince Kazimierz was also a real child of his time - he had several mistresses. And one of them he even drove around Warsaw naked - so that everyone could "see" her charms. (You see, prince Józef had people among his uncles to take examples from ))) And I must also mention, that Kazimierz had a loving affection for his nephew. And in the last decade of the 18th century, when Pepi was already living in Warsaw, the uncle willingly invited the nephew to his place and even supported him financially.

And despite that notorious style of life prince Kazimierz outlived all his younger brothers and died in 1800, being almost 80 years old.

And now a little bit information about Michał, the youngest of prince Józef uncles. He was destined by his parents for the clergy, and in the church hierarchy he “climbed” to the highest Polish rank - the Primate of Poland. (Though, as many sources state, prince Michal was a priest just in the spirit of his age - having mistresses and possible even illegitimate children.)

Marcello Bacciarelli, Portret of Michał Jerzy Poniatowski,  National Museum in Poznań, 18th century

And the circumstances of his death in 1794, in the age of 57 years only, still aren’t clear enough. That was the time, as you may remember, of Kościuszko’s Uprising, and Michał was among supporters of the king and the latter’s pro-Russian politics. So, when the primate became seriosly ill and then died there appeared rumors, that that might have been a suicide, in fear for being hanged, as those members of  Targowica Confederation who weren’t lucky to flee.

In relation with prince Józef I can name only one significant thing of Michał’s biography - it was who from him Pepi inherited Jabłonna village under Warsaw with its famous palace.

For the record I should also mention that the Poniatowskis-senior had also 2 daughters, Ludwika Maria and Izabela, but they didn’t seem to play significant roles in their nephew’s life.

And now let’s look at the third generation - Pepi’s cousins, children of prince Kazimierz.

This is the very prince Stanisław, whom I mentioned above:

Angelica Kauffman, Portrait of Stanisław Poniatowski (1754-1833), 1786

Very well educated and economically talented, he carried out a lot of reforms in his vast estates in Ukraine, and made these land prosper. Being interested in art, he founded a painting school in Warsaw. More than once a member of the Sejm, elected marshal of the knighthood of the Permanent Council, member of the confederation of the Four-Year Sejm and... not a popular figure among the the nobility (szlachta).

Because of the latter reason in 1790 there arose a conflict between prince Stanisław and his adversaries, after which the prince resigned from all his post and abroad.

Portrait of Stanisław Poniatowski (1754–1833), attributed to Johann Baptist von Lampi the Elder, 18th century

He settled in Italy, where he owned estates, and unlike his cousin Józef, never returned to public life.

As for Stanisław’s private life - well, it also looked like a suitable plot for a romance novel. The prince met his future wife in Rome, when he was already in his fifties. She was thirty years younger than him and... a wife of his neighbor.

Her name was Cassandra Luci, and she was a common woman, beaten by her cruel husband. And one day, trying escape from an attack, she knocked on prince Poniatowski’s door, was allowed to enter his residence, and stayed with the latter forever.

First, of course, Cassandra served in Stanisław’s residence just as servant, becoming the housekeeper. But soon she answered his feelings, and... by 1816 the couple had already 5 children - 2 sons and 3 daughters. And when in 1830 Cassandra’s husband died, Stanisław was finally able to marry her.

And all the Poniatowskis living now in France are descendants of this couple. Or, to be more precise, of their second son Joseph Michael.

Relating to prince Józef - it looks like his cousin Stanisław didn’t have much affection on him. They met a couple of times before Pepi moved to Warsaw in 1788, definitely had chances to see each other between that time and the year when Stanisław emigrated, but that’s all. And much more close prince Józef was with his other “probably” cousins - the sons of king’s mistress, Elżbieta Grabowska. (But this definitely goes out the topic of this post.)

So, let’s move to the last person of today’s article, prince Stanisław’s younger sister princess Konstancja. 

Marcello Bacciarelli, Portrait of  Konstancja Tyszkiewicz, nee princess  Poniatowska,  circa 1775

And, I have to admit, she didn’t play any significant role in Pepi’s life either. (Though her daughter, Anetka, might have had - but about the latter I will write later, when the time comes to publish next post of prince Józef women.) But the reason I am writing about this Konstancja now is that her husband’s surname was Tyszkiewicz, just like the surname of the Pepi’s sister Teresa’s husband.

If you ask me whether those two Tyszkiewiczs were relative, I would answer you that they were very distant ones, because last common ancestor was the progenitor of the Tyszkiewicz family, named Tyszka, who lived in the 15th century. 

As for why the king decided to marry both his nieces to the Tyszkiewicz family - on this question I don’t either have an answer. But I can quote you a verse which was written in Poland that time:

Tyszkiewicza

Król policzą

Między bliskich swoje

Dał jednemu

Dał drugiemu

Swych synowic dwoje

(Translation: The king counts the Tyszkiewiczs among his relatives, he gave to one of them and to another two of his nieces)

And because of these two Tyszkiewiczs, and the fact that Anetka Potocka née Tyszkiewicz is sometimes called prince Józef’s niece (though in fact they were first cousins once removed) Teresa Poniatowska, Pepi’s sister is, in these cases, called her mother, which is not at all true. And eery time I write such a statement it that makes me cringe. That is why I felt I ought to write about Konstancja, for the people know that there was one more Mrs. Tyszkiewicz, and that she was Anetka’s real mother.

Well, that’s all for today. and I hope I didn’t make you much tires with untangling all these family ties? ))

[arrowreport7-blog]

'I promised I would continue to tell his story': Remembering Kristallnacht 80 years later

The story belonged to his father, but Schaumburg resident Ron Coppel recites the tale like it's his own.

It was February 1938, and the place was Moers, Germany. Thirteen-year-old Werner Coppel -- that's Ron's dad -- was celebrating his bar mitzvah in the local synagogue, reading from the Torah for the first time before his family and community.

But the Nazis were in power, and outside they were marching and singing loudly.

Inside the temple, young Werner couldn't shut out the angry voices. Years later, he told his son what he heard.

"Translated, it was: 'When Jew blood splashes from our knives, life will be twice as good,'" Ron Coppel said.

Nine months later, on Nov. 9 and 10, 1938, Nazis burned the Moers' synagogue as part of a violent pogrom against Jews across Germany, Austria and occupied Czechoslovakia.

The attacks came to be known as Kristallnacht -- the Night of Broken Glass. In addition to synagogues, hate-fueled mobs ransacked, vandalized and torched Jewish-owned homes and businesses. Nearly 100 Jews were killed and thousands were arrested and sent to concentration camps.

It was the start of the Holocaust and the systematic extermination of some 6 million Jews and millions of non-Jewish Soviets and Poles, Roma and others by the Nazis during World War II.

Werner Coppel was imprisoned in a concentration camp during the Holocaust but survived. His parents and younger brother weren't as fortunate. Many Chicago-area Jews have similarly tragic stories of relatives taken from their homes, never to return.

On this 80th anniversary of the Night of Broken Glass, we remember.

A family obligation

A retired sales executive, Ron Coppel volunteers as a docent at the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Skokie. He talks with visitors about the Holocaust and his father's experiences.

It's a family tradition. Before his death in 2016, Werner Coppel often spoke to students and civic organizations about the Nazis' atrocities -- and Coppel felt driven to keep the mission alive.

"I promised I would continue to tell his story," the 70-year-old Coppel said.

Werner Coppel was arrested by the Gestapo in April 1943 and sent to the Auschwitz III-Monowitz labor camp.

Werner's father was killed in a Latvian ghetto and his mother was killed at Auschwitz II-Birkenau. Werner's younger brother, Guenther, likely died with their mother.

In January 1945, the Nazis evacuated the Auschwitz complex as the Soviet Army approached, marching nearly 60,000 prisoners -- including Werner -- away from the camps. After learning prisoners were being shot, Werner and two other men ran into the woods and escaped.

"He could hear the bullets whiz by as he ran," Coppel said.

Werner returned to Germany after the war and in 1946 married a half-Jewish woman named Trudy. Her father had been killed in the 1930s for being Jewish, but she and her mother were spared.

Ron was born in 1948, and the following year the family immigrated to the U.S.

Coppel and his younger brother, Steve, learned about their father's ordeal in bits and pieces as children, sometimes overhearing conversations with other survivors.

Coppel learned more when his father began speaking publicly. Because of his father's words, Coppel began protesting any prejudice he witnessed.

That philosophy remains strong.

"You have an obligation to speak up," Coppel said. "You have to put your foot down and say, 'Not in front of me.'"

A concrete reminder

Fred Bernheim was a 9-year-old boy living in Laupheim, Germany, when Nazis marched his father and other Jews to the local synagogue on Kristallnacht and forced them to watch the building burn to the ground.

"He followed (his father) on his bicycle and hid in the bushes and watched while the Jewish men were made to kneel while they burned down the synagogue," said Bernheim's daughter, 55-year-old Lisa Lavin of Bannockburn.

Bernheim, his younger sister and his parents immigrated to the U.S. in 1939 and settled in Chicago. Decades later, after establishing a career as an architect, Bernheim designed a new synagogue in Northbrook for Temple Beth-El, one of the region's oldest Jewish congregations.

His inspiration was the Laupheim temple. In particular, two pillars outside the synagogue's sanctuary represent the towers of the former German temple.

Bernheim died in 2013. Two years later, one of the Beth-El pillars was dedicated in his honor.

Bernheim's daughter and her family remain members of the congregation, which includes hundreds of Jews from across Chicago and the North and Northwest suburbs.

"I am blessed to belong to this synagogue," said Lavin, who lost maternal relatives from Poland in the Holocaust. "I can simply sit in the sanctuary and know that my dad designed the space and was inspired by his own sanctuary."

The Laupheim temple never was rebuilt. However, a museum in Laupheim documents the town's former Jewish community. Among the items on display are side-by-side photographs of the old Laupheim synagogue and Temple Beth-El.

That association adds to the holiness of the Northbrook building, Temple Beth-El Rabbi Sid Helbraun said.

"Every time I give a tour of our building, I tell Fred's story," he said. "When I share the story with visitors, they are always touched by a spark of that holiness."

'A useful skill'

Long Grove resident Toby Kriss' parents survived the Holocaust, as did her maternal grandparents. But her paternal grandparents and other relatives were murdered by the Nazis.

The Holocaust, Kriss said, "informs everything about who I am."

A retired marketing researcher, Kriss had what she described as a "rudimentary understanding" of her family's role in the Holocaust by the time she was in grade school.

"My dad had nightmares and would scream out in the night," Kriss, 64, recalled. "I didn't have grandparents. I didn't have aunts and uncles."

Kriss' mother, Florence, was Lithuanian. In 1941 when she was about 13, Florence and her parents were forced into the Vilna Ghetto in Lithuania and then the Theresienstadt concentration camp in what is now the Czech Republic. All survived.

Florence's brother, however, was killed in the ghetto.

Kriss' father, Marvin Ridzinski, was Polish. He, five siblings and his parents were sent to ghettos and concentration camps when he was about 22. Marvin Ridzinski was the only one who survived, thanks in part to being a talented tailor.

"He had a useful skill for the Germans," Kriss said. "He would sew uniforms."

Every time Ridzinski was transferred to a different camp, his sewing machine went with him.

At one camp, a German soldier asked Ridzinski to make a pair of pants for his girlfriend. The soldier was so pleased with the job that he sneaked Ridzinski food as a reward.

"(The soldier) told him to tie his pants closed at the ankles and gave him extra rations to drop down his pants legs," Kriss said.

Kriss' mother didn't talk much about the horrors she experienced. Her father, who ultimately was liberated from the Buchenwald concentration camp by the U.S. Army in April 1945, was more open and stressed the importance of remembering.

They died in the 1980s.

Through the generations, Jews have assimilated in the U.S. and anti-Semitism has become less of a concern -- until the recent rise of white nationalism.

A founding member of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and a member of other Jewish groups, Kriss worries the current overt bigotry could turn into a movement like the one that swept through Europe in the 1930s.

She was particularly shaken by the Oct. 27 massacre at a Pittsburgh synagogue that left 11 Jews dead.

"Now we all need to be more vigilant," Kriss said.

Source: https://www.dailyherald.com/news/20181109/i-promised-i-would-continue-to-tell-his-story-remembering-kristallnacht-80-years-later