June 1941–September 1941: Germany invades Greece
The long gap between the last letter and the postcard dated 14 June can be assumed to be the result of the invasion of Greece by Germany in April 1941. The Italian invasion the previous autumn had led to a six-month war between the two countries in which Greece was largely successful, forcing Germany to come to the aid of its fascist ally and postpone plans to invade the Soviet Union. German troops entered Greece via Yugoslavia and Bulgaria and captured Thessaloniki by 9 April when Greek forces surrendered.
Greece suffered greatly during the occupation. The country’s economy was already weak even before the Italian invasion of October 1940. There followed a ruthless economic exploitation by Germany. Raw materials and foodstuffs were requisitioned, shops cleared out, and the Greek collaborationist government was forced to pay the cost of the occupation, giving rise to inflation, further exacerbated by a ‘war loan’ Greece was forced to grant to the German Reich which severely devalued the Greek drachma. Requisitions, together with the Allied blockade of Greece and the ruined state of the country’s infrastructure, led to the emergence of a powerful and well-connected black market. The food situation became critical in the summer of 1941 and resulted in the Great Famine which reached its peak during the winter of 1941–42.
Historian Mark Mazower writes: ‘By November shop-shelves were bare and black market prices had soared’ and that death tolls rose alarmingly and continued at a high rate until the spring of 1942. It has been estimated that approximately 300,000 people died during the Axis occupation of Greece as a result of famine and malnutrition. Mazower suggests that the famine may have delayed further persecution of the Jews ‘because the military authorities understood the economic importance of the Jews for the city [Thessaloniki] and felt the famine was not a good time to disrupt trade further’.i
In the letters that follow there are many references to food shortages in Greece, which Marie considers to be worse than the situation faced by the Jewish population in Prague (as indeed it was).
Undated, received 4/7/1941
This letter is difficult to place as it is undated, but it is likely that it was written during the period when mail was not getting through, possibly in mid-April. Letters were being held up and this one wasn’t delivered until after Marie’s card and letters of June had arrived. Any letters Marie wrote between mid April and mid-June apparently never reached Ernst.
My beloved
It is already 18 days since I had any news from you. I know it can’t be helped and yet it is terribly difficult to bear life like that. I keep re-reading your last but one letter where you say that we must keep telling ourselves that the other one is well and in that way banish all worries. Well yes, I am trying to, but it is very hard. I confidently hope that you and all your loved ones are well. My thoughts are constantly with you all. So far I am quite well, except that the anxiety about you completely ruins my existence. It is also very depressing that the ‘friends’ are so lazy about writing.
I met Emil briefly at Aunt Lidi’s.1 He is well, but also anxious about his brother. Next Sunday he is coming here with the aunts for a cup of tea and if thoughts can reach over the great sea your ears will be burning that afternoon. And now farewell! I end my letter in the way you know, send many greetings to all our loved ones and am
Your Mitzi.
Postcard (by airmail)
Karlín, 14/6/1941
Dear Ernst
Your card of 8/6 gave me enormous joy and at the same time I understood that, if it is possible, something will come from you in the next few days. I was all the more happily surprised that my hope and wish to have news of how you and your loved ones are was fulfilled. Now we will resume our exchange of thoughts. I hope that my mail will be delivered. Your brothers are well. Emil was here two days ago. I am in good health and live as usual. Apparently Alois has a lot to do. I am not very happy about the ‘friends’ because I haven’t seen their handwriting for a year. That’s really strange. I am always glad to have their greetings but I am no longer quite convinced [about their wellbeing] though I don’t know why.
Warmest greetings to you and all your loved ones.
Your (unsigned)
Karlín, 14/6/1941
My beloved Ernst
Can you imagine how indescribable my joy was when today I got your card of the 8th? That’s a weight off my mind and I can think and live again a little more easily. But thank you, my good one, with all my heart, for being so kind and sending me news so quickly, I shall never forget it. It tells me so much in every way. If only I could, how I would reward you for your kind and loving attentiveness. I was imagining all sorts of things, even though I told myself a hundred times that you, a former front line soldier,2 would take all that happens calmly and collectedly. It’s just very bad for the nerves to be without news for months when your letters are in fact everything that makes life worth living.
When eight days ago your belated letters of 1 and 3 April arrived, I knew that I would know at the latest by the 15th where you are. Our newspapers wrote that the post, including airmail, only went to Athens. So there was nothing left for me to do but to hope and wait. Yes, my treasure, that was a precious birthday gift,3 believe me, and I thank you again for it and for your good wishes. I knew you wouldn’t forget. Now I am going to beg you to write lots and lots about how you are, whether you still take your regular walk in the garden, whether you are already swimming in the sea, in short, everything you do.
My life goes on fairly monotonously. In the morning I am at home, in the afternoon between 3 and 5 o’clock the shopping gets done,4 then I am with my family. Either we go for a walk or we are at Irene’s, or at my place, sometimes at friends. From 7.30 I am back at home and then I do all sorts of work. I am so longing for a direct sign of life from the ‘friends’ but to no avail. I haven’t seen their handwriting for a year and that hurts me very much. I am really very anxious and doubt the truth of what I am told. Or is it just my longing for them?
My mother is somewhat better, to the extent that the inflammation has died down and there is no immediate threat to life. That is a big step forward and one must thank God for it.
And because I am so full of longing for you at the moment I am going to end this letter because of the pain I have at knowing that [being together] simply cannot be. I send you my love, a dozen sweet kisses, hug you tenderly in my heart and am
Your Mitzi
My beloved Ernst
Today I was at Tante [aunt] Lidi’s and my mother, my sister and [aunt] Hulda5 were there too. I am very sorry for aunt, she is not at all well. She is in a very bad way mentally, misses being active and the income from her little shop which she gave up. Fortunately she still has her flat, she lets part of it, stopped having a maid and does everything on her own. Of course she has lost a lot of weight which in her case was actually no misfortune, but being completely alone is terribly hard for her and in addition she has almost no money. That’s really hard. I think she has always had a prejudice against me and I could hardly consider her as a close friend, but her situation as an old lady makes me very sorry for her and I am trying to comfort her and cheer her up, at least with words, and sometimes I succeed.
It is very interesting to observe how most people – I mean above all, people of our age, and a little younger and older – simply cannot get rid of their ideas of possessions and wealth, how hard they find their losses, how anxious they are about the future. They are still unable to grasp that we are living in completely different times, that worrying is pointless, that one has to leave God to take care of things. I often wonder whether I am perhaps irresponsible in that I am not getting all worked up about what might happen in the future. No-one knows what it will bring, so why should one spoil the present? Who knows whether one will live to see that time and in any case one is not obliged to carry on living. I can no longer spend my time worrying about the future ever since I realized that precautions, plans and preparations are pointless, that everything always happens very differently from how one expects. That is what our times have taught us.
Oh how I would love to see you and speak to you now. I feel as if I should be with you at this moment. To know that I can’t be yours depresses me terribly and I am very upset by it.
Now I am going to stop. I embrace you with dearest love, kiss you ten times and am
Your Mitzi
Karlín, 22/6/1941
My beloved Ernst
And yesterday, Saturday, your letter arrived and I am once again so very happy!
I imagine the little house in the vineyard is delightful. If you can send photos, take one of it and of yourself working there, please, please do! I wonder whether you will be allowed to send the picture of yourself that you meant to send. Here no enclosures are allowed, the letters are handed in at the counter unsealed and are only sealed when they have been checked by the official. I can well believe that you used to think that I was ‘not so joyful’. Firstly, most people only knew me in my professional capacity and there I certainly did not make the best impression, and secondly Emmerl didn’t like me to behave in a free and uninhibited way in company, so that my true nature was never really seen except by a very small circle. I have to say it again: just picture for yourself an older Edithel – she is my child after all. Just as she behaves with those around her, exactly so will I behave with you.
You have almost too good an opinion of me, if you think that I am exercising my brain a lot. This is particularly not the case now as, since I have been busy working more with my hands, I have given up my Spanish and Czech lessons because they cost me too much and I couldn’t afford the expense and even less the time for studying. But I have learnt a lot more Czech through contact with people, understand a lot and can even speak it if need be.6
Beloved, you write: ‘I have a feeling it might be possible to come.’ My heart stopped for a moment when I read that. And then I am supposed to decide whether you can leave again! That I should let you go again? Unthinkable! You have given me a hard puzzle to solve. I can’t give you a definite answer today, but I feel already that I will have to say you should wait a little longer. You need have no worries about your upkeep during your stay here because obviously we would share everything.
You want to know what I have been doing the whole time. Well, I do a lot of work at home. On fine days we go to our favourite place where there are benches to rest on. That is the plateau behind the cathedral, the Hirschgraben, in a little hollow with a view of the Loretto Church, my favourite church.7 We sit there and darn stockings, etc. And another place we go to be in the open is the old cemetery.8 Here, too, the blossom is over, only the acacia is still wonderful – that will be the last of the blossom.
I send you an extra kiss for the birthday greetings you sent me. How lovingly you wrote to me. My treasure, for your birthday I hope I will be able to give you my wishes in person. Keep well and happy and write soon to your unspeakably-longing-for-you
Mitzi.
Karlín, 25/6/1941
My dearest Ernst
In your letter today, of 15/6, you say you are unhappy that you have still got no news from me. I hope that in the meantime you have been inundated by my letters. You ask whether I am healthy and happy. Yes, my treasure, I really am. Since I have been getting news from you again I feel quite changed. Please don’t think I’m being conceited, but all the people I know ask me how it is that I look so marvellous – people notice it from far off. Apparently I look so much younger.
I am delighted with what you write about yourself and thank God that I hear such good news, touch wood, about you. If I were there I wouldn’t allow you to go for such a hike in the heat of the midday sun, particularly at this time – that is too much! But you must be feeling healthy and strong and your body has adapted itself brilliantly to the climate.
Do you know, treasure, what is now giving me pleasure? Now and again I send a 2 kg parcel to Poland, to some Viennese people who have emigrated9 there. You should read their thank you letters!
In everything I do I see you around me. I see before me Haus Lanner10 and our flat inside it. It is a Sunday evening, you are coming to visit. Then there is the sound of the doors on the ground floor, I hear your dear, booming voice, which always delighted me so, then the happy greeting, the strong handshake. Everything comes alive to me. And how will it be when we do see each other again? Can you imagine it? I can: it will be wonderful, as beautiful as paradise.
At the moment I am reading a book that you probably know but in case you don’t, I recommend it to you. It is ‘The Good Earth’ by Pearl S. Buck.
How are things with Salvator’s business?11 Has he still got stock to sell, and how is it going?
What are the children, Mädi and Bubi,12 doing? Mädi must already be a young lady. Irene, who loves teasing me and who knows too that I am very vain, keeps saying ‘Just wait, you will soon be a great grandmother!’
Treasure, even if there was no news for a while you should not be anxious.13 And now I am going to lie down and dream of you, the most beautiful dream a person can have.
I hug you lovingly, kiss you many times, and am
Your Mitzi
My beloved
Today I received your letter of 22/6. Can you imagine how good for me your gentle solicitude is? Of course it hurts me to see my mother growing old and it’s often very much on my mind. She longs so much to see the children and I hope for it for her sake above all. May God grant it. I don’t actually know how it is for other people but my love for Mutti was boundless, and she was an exceptional mother, she was often able to help me over many hurdles. In times of trouble I often thirsted for a word from her which would resolve everything and when it came I could breathe again. That is how important her opinions were to me. But that has changed utterly, particularly since we have been living in Prague. Mutti has become hard, too hard to my mind, and too sharp in her judgments, so I can’t feel close to her any more. It isn’t like it used to be. Is it because of old age or circumstance, or both together? I always imagined an old lady as thoughtful and kind. When I sometimes come home disappointed I think to myself that perhaps it has to be so, so that I don’t depend completely on my little old mother.
The ‘friends’ send their greetings again, but that is so very little. Each time one hears that they are supposed to be getting on well, I would just like to hear something more definite but there’s nothing one can do. Whether your letters can take their place, well, that is a question! Just wait till I have you here, or I am with you, then you will discover the answer. Your letters are everything to me, you know that very well. Today I could express myself to neither of the children as I can to you. This bond is unique. But despite that I would just really like to know how they really are.
Something in your letter shows a certain discontent; try if you can not to get involved, especially if you can’t change anything, I beg you. Please don’t be offended, keep your good humour, don’t let your good, decent soul be saddened. I will make it all up to you when we belong to each other, as far as I am able. It is delightful about Mädi, that she looks after you so well. She is a treasure of a child. And when we have our home, we will invite her and repay her many times over, treating her like our little child.
I have never baked potatoes in the open air, although I lived in the country until I was 12 years old. My childhood was very quiet, I was a great dreamer, played mostly with dolls and flowers. But I have another memory involving you from when we lived in Buchau,14 when you and one of our uncles carried us around the Ringplatz as angels; can you still remember?
Your fruit is pretty expensive, but it is available. In other places it is both expensive and a rarity. You don’t seem to have ration cards and can buy what you want.15 Enjoying vegetables has now become common here too and I think it is a healthy way of life. One doesn’t need to find a sanatorium for dieting, so every situation has advantages which one shouldn’t underestimate.
Eman wrote to me that he has written to you. He is a fine scallywag, he makes jokes! He writes about my kisses to you, that he took some of them, but he is sending you some of his own instead. I laughed a lot! If he would only tell me more about the ‘friends’. They write to him every week. He always writes the same thing to me, just a few words.
Photo 5 Mutti (Marie’s mother, Louise Rosenberger).
Now I am going to go to sleep and will dream of you all the time. My sweet one, farewell. I hug you tenderly, send you a dozen sweet kisses and am yours alone.
Mitzi.
Karlín, 9/7/1941
My beloved
When I handed in my last letter to you I wanted to enclose the local Jewish newspaper, but unfortunately it isn’t possible. I can’t understand why one can’t do it from here when you can receive the paper from Vienna.16
A few times I have meant to write to you a bit of news from home. Petter Louise walks dogs because he is too old for any other work. Laura Heller cuts out skirts. My little friend pleased me very much. I am very happy because I gather that she is working again in her former profession.17 That would be a great step forward, also the knowledge that she is leading a proper, regular life. I was often chided for encouraging her too much in her studies and in languages and that I didn’t teach her to be practical, etc. That was, of course, wrong but nobody could know what the future would bring. Above all, I knew that she took great pleasure in learning, in knowledge, in her evident results and successes. I could see fulfilled in her what was denied to me in my youth and I knew too that we often had the same taste in that regard. It is true that I didn’t consider above all what the practical outcomes of her studies would be but I thought that if she had her doctorate and had mastered several languages she would always be able to earn her living. Now she already has two years’ experience in a bank and recently the wide experience as a cook and maid in America.18 So my treasure, you can imagine how I swell with pride when I imagine that I did advise my friend well, that she now apparently has a wonderful job, suiting her abilities.
This week I am all alone in the flat because the couple [the Vaceks19] have gone away for a week’s rest. It is very peaceful.
Continued 10/7
Today your letter of 2/7 arrived and I am very happy with what you write. I am very glad that you are not going on so many long walks in the great heat, so that you don’t lose all your little bit of fat! The life you describe yourself as living is like ours in many ways now. I myself have yoghurt every evening – it isn’t rationed yet – tomatoes often, cucumbers, and cheese if I can get it. For simplicity’s sake I prepare meat once a week and make it last two or three meals. Apart from that I have vegetables, and from time to time, when I am not too lazy to prepare it, cake or dumplings, or Bohemian desserts, but it really isn’t worth it for one person. One can make coffee from grain, with things added, and it tastes very good. I buy curd cheese as often as I can get it. It’s a food which is much in demand and particularly useful for various kinds of dumplings. But I am very sorry that you have so little variety. Do shops close for everyone at the same time or only for some?20 I obey all the orders exactly and have only one great wish, that I shall always be able to keep them strictly.
Ernst, if you could see your friend Motz from the coffee-house, and how thin and altogether unwell he looks, you would shake your head.
Mutti is suffering. She is uneasy all the time, mostly irritable and on edge, always offended if things don’t happen the way she wants, and my sister doesn’t have an easy time at all with her.
All yours, Mitzi.
Karlín, 14/7/1941
My much beloved
Today brought me your letter of the 5th which will make me full of joy again. I go about my work cheerfully, absolutely refusing to let my feeling of happiness be soured. And there are certainly enough unpleasant things, believe me.
And now to your epistle: there’s no need to fear that nature will impose her limitations, my treasure, as I know very well that we two are no teenagers. We are wonderfully suited in our ages. And as I see in the weekly wedding announcements in the Jewish newspaper, where plenty of people seek and find each other, we are perhaps no exceptions.21
How do I imagine our first meeting? Ha, my sweet, that is a question! The immediate effect of seeing each other again would be the same, wherever it might happen. To see you, to fall into your arms in the most natural way, the surroundings would disappear for me, wouldn’t matter at all. To look for our home – mine, yours, another – would for the time being be unimportant. I would first look deep into your eyes, wait to hear what you wanted to say, or not, and leave it to you to decide what to do next. I would certainly be wondering over and over whether it is true, is it really him, is it not a dream? Next I would wish to spend a few days of complete peace with you, to hear all about you, to be able to look at you without interruption. I would need a long time to digest the reality, even when you were sleeping I would have to watch you and keep assuring myself that the dream had become reality.
And now, how did you imagine it? And where? That is a question only God can answer, because I don’t think any human being can do that today. I would like most of all to stay here, but that doesn’t depend on me, as you know, but on the end of the war and on you.
Erika enthuses about medicine. A fine thing to study, even if it is quite strenuous for women’s nerves. I thought that she would soon be grown up, that was to be expected. I have learnt from my experiences of the education of the young and if I had grandchildren whom I had to counsel, there is just one thing I would advise. Whatever their future, both girls and boys absolutely must, from their earliest childhood, along with training for a job using the brain, become thoroughly competent in some kind of work using their hands. Then the parents will truly have equipped their children in the best way possible.
I don’t deserve the praise for the money I spent on the Viennese: once one knows what unspeakable misery reigns among these people then it is indeed only one’s duty as human beings to do one’s little bit.22 It’s sad that you regret your decision to go to Greece. I can really understand it now and I am upset for you. But please don’t forget that it was surely Thesa’s heartfelt wish to see her children and it must be a comfort for you to have fulfilled that wish.
The landlady has given me notice again, but it actually isn’t valid so I’m ignoring it.
And now, a sweet, gentle kiss, then a saucy one, then a few very passionate ones. I am not upset, so just stay healthy and cheerful and hopeful.
A tender embrace from your Mitzi.
Karlín, 18/7/1941
My dearly beloved
Your letter of the 9th gave me great joy, as always. It came just after an accident, which luckily had no serious consequences. The maid was clumsy and caused the bookcase to fall on me. Nothing much happened – just a bleeding knee, which put paid to my going out today, and then I became completely reconciled with the momentary shock and pain because a letter from you can do a lot.
Regarding your wounded feelings as a father, you really should not take offence, my treasure, because it helps no one and damages you, and me with you. Please don’t forget that you and Hella have a similar nature, both of you mean well by each other and yet you can’t treat each other as you would like. Neither of you is to blame; it is your nature which is the cause, as happens with people with such distinctive characters. There is no question of her not loving you, it just seems like that to you. Perhaps it is even jealousy? Just be patient a bit longer, then I will make up for as much as possible.
If I were in your position I would look for various distractions so that you have the diversions you need. Don’t laugh at me, Ernstili, if I advise you to prepare some meals for yourself from time to time. Here many men deal with the cooking when circumstances demand it, so it would not be a dishonourable activity for you but simply good for your daily well-being and your health but also a distraction.
Photo 6 Hella and Salvator Cougno.
It will be another weekend without you. I am invited out tomorrow and Sunday but I don’t enjoy it without you. When I look at a group of gentlemen I know I could so easily imagine you among them.
I embrace you very tenderly, kiss you many times and am
Your Mitzi.
Dearest, do you realize it will soon be a year since we admitted our love to each other?
My beloved Ernst
Who can describe my disappointed face when this morning, cheerful and expecting your letter – due yesterday and therefore awaited with certainty and longing – I opened it and saw that there had been a mix-up. I received a letter from Athens from a daughter to her mama. Unfortunately the letter contains neither the address of the sender nor of the recipient. Perhaps the letter you sent to me will be returned to you and will then arrive as intended.
I have to smile a little at all this when I picture the face of the unknown mama getting your letter. What do you think, Ernstili? Will she see the funny side?
I am fairly well, I still have to use a stick as my knee isn’t quite right yet. I was at the doctor’s yesterday because I was worried I might have a torn ligament, but luckily I don’t. I really had a very lucky escape because I might have been killed outright.
I long so desperately for you, so that I would prefer to stay at home all the time like a hermit because nothing makes me happy at the moment and now I will be lucky if I get something from you this week. How long will this situation last?
I will stop for today and hope and pray that you, beloved, are healthy and optimistic. I hug you most dearly, kiss you in my usual way and then long indescribably for you.
Your Mitzi
Karlín, 25/7/1941
My dearest Ernst
I really ought to leave out my second letter this week because I still haven’t had one from you. Even if the mix-up was not your fault, you were a little bit to blame because your handwriting is very similar to the German lady’s. But as you see, I’m not like that, so I will stick to my schedule. But I am just very sad and out of sorts this week and I have even cried twice, which is very unusual for me, just because nothing came from you.
Above all, I am annoyed at Irene, who regularly asks me ‘Have you got any news?’ I just say yes or no. When she heard that I took from your envelope a letter from a mama to her daughter [sic], she laughed heartily. She thought it was so funny; it felt to me like schadenfreude. I thought I was going to scratch her eyes out, I was so angry, but I didn’t show it and every day when we speak to each other she mentions it and laughs all over again. What a silly goose, don’t you think?
My injured knee is unfortunately still giving me trouble; I have been to the doctor who found nothing but I can only walk with a lot of pain, and walking, which I keep forcing myself to do, tires me quite a bit. And just at this very time I have to be running around incessantly because I have to find another warehouse. It is terribly difficult to find one, almost impossible. But I absolutely have to find one because I have a lot which must be stored, and also, if I had to move, I would really rather store my furniture etc., and only in the worst case give it away. I would rather not be parted from my things. Every day I go out looking, enquiring, putting up adverts. I am also worried about moving things into store, as on my own I can hardly do anything. Irene is helping me a lot in my search but up to now we have little in prospect. If you were here I know you would help me.
Dearest, this week I baked yeast cakes with quark, cherries and crumble. I tell you, they were so good that I even received rare praise from my mother and I was so pleased with this success. What would I have given to be able to put that in front of you!
There’s no longer any free time in the afternoon because shopping hours are limited to between three and five o’clock. Then one really has to pull oneself together and go and buy something. You will rightly think that one person on her own surely doesn’t need to shop every day, but one has to take care not to let one’s suppliers forget that one is still alive, otherwise one is trampled on everywhere, because every day is fish day but not catch day, as the old saying goes, which means that one doesn’t get every day what one actually wants.
My treasure, you can surely well imagine how funny all of that seemed to me at first, I who was used to sending for something from the cellar or the shop when I needed it, but even more so the strange behaviour of certain suppliers who show favour to one and not to another. As far as possible I have chosen nice people and I manage well with them. It is nevertheless a skill in a city like Prague, with its particular peculiarities, such as that a Jewish woman must absolutely speak Czech and they make it very difficult for her if she speaks German.23 Yet today Prague is a city where both languages are equally heard. All notices are in both languages. I can make myself quite well understood but I make mistakes when I speak, which I find rather disagreeable as I was always very proud about speaking faultlessly in my mother tongue. But I must say that I often come across very good and nice-natured people, the working class people in particular have a kindness which is moving and exemplary. I have not yet, thank goodness, been insulted by anyone, either with a word or a look, and hope it may remain so. Naturally, I behave very discreetly everywhere and stand back as much as possible. It also gives me pleasure to be able to get this or that for Irene that she often can’t get and then they are surprised that, while I have been here such a relatively short time, they have been let down by their old suppliers and are glad to accept my help.
Worries come back again and again ever since I have been here, and I still haven’t found peace. The matter of the flat, in particular, plagues me – in the end, if I do have to move out, I will after all land up at Irene’s. Of course, that hasn’t been decided yet – I would only have to move out if someone applies to the magistrate for my flat and I must be prepared. The whole thing horrifies me and it depresses me very much. I tell myself that I can’t ask anything for myself other than the fate that has long befallen so many others. What is bitter in all this is that the Kultusgemeinde24 – and it alone is the administrative body which decides for the Jews – doesn’t allocate a separate room to women who are alone, but simply puts them in with some stranger. So imagine, dreadful things are happening. Often the landlords and tenants can’t stand each other. It’s terrible how it is sometimes – few people show consideration and a willingness to meet each other half way. And when I consider that such a fate may now befall me, I would lose courage if I didn’t think all the time about you. If I weigh up living with Irene, in a practical sense it is the best, but it would be at the cost of my independence.
Beloved, forgive the typing errors because of the dusk. I am ashamed that today I have only written about myself and my worries – that happens when letters don’t arrive! I embrace you now very lovingly, kiss you many times in the usual way, and am
Your Mitzi
Karlín, Saturday evening, 2/8/1941
My beloved Ernstili,
Today I was hoping for news from you again; I thought there would be some but nothing came. Well, I hope perhaps on Monday. I am alone and am just very full of yearning for you.
Eman wrote today that the ‘friends’ send many greetings. Things are going well for them. He also wrote that both men are apparently so good and I really don’t know what to think. He seems to mean Otto Reichl who is apparently giving his wife an allowance.25 He lives only four hours away from her and it appears that he is constantly sending her money as he seems to be doing very well at his job. In a material sense it would simply be a small instalment of what he has to pay her but also a penance for the deliberate pain he gave, which was undeserved. His conscience is probably troubling him, because he was basically a good person, but he was goaded by his mother and was under her influence to an abnormal degree. God grant that he doesn’t make the child unhappy again, because he is not a normal person and I can’t say it doesn’t matter to me, even if I can’t do anything about it. But if, God forbid, my fears were to be realized, that would certainly be a misfortune. Evidence indicates that there is something psychologically wrong with him, which is how at the time he ruined the child mentally. All that appears to me now like a bad dream and I can still hardly speak about it, the memories of what we lived through are so horrific and tormenting.
As I take it that you will only get pleasure from reading newspapers in German, I recommend to you the weekly ‘Das Reich’.26 You will be able to get it there just like here, so please buy it some time. Have you still got work?
Sunday, 3/8, evening
I have been out since 10 o’clock this morning. I was visiting my friend Olga Löwenstein in Vinohrady.27 She was given notice to leave her nice flat last May, had to move out within three weeks and of course, according to the regulations, she had to become a sub-tenant.28 That is particularly bitter for a single person because one usually cannot get a room of one’s own but must share with some other person that the Kultusgemeinde has assigned. You are offered three flats (that is, three rooms) and from those you must choose one. No further offer is made. The flat is identified three days before the move and then, if you don’t want it, well, then you can live on the street. So one has to get a grip if one doesn’t want to be without a roof. Poor thing, she had to take a room which can’t be heated and in which the landlady has dumped a large part of her own furniture which can’t be used. She isn’t allowed to use the kitchen or the bathroom. There is no room or any other possibility of storing coal. And then along came someone else to share the room who brought with her enough furniture for two rooms, who argues every day with the landlady and there is a constant danger that the two women will fly at each other. Horrible scenes like that are now unfortunately the order of the day among our co-religionists and the Kultusgemeinde is fully engaged with settling quarrels. Unfortunately most of the Prague families who have to let out part of their flats are very unreasonable and unkind and see others as intruders. Of course there are exceptions here and there, people who are humane. So now you have an idea of the daily game in our town, but also in Brno, etc.
I went with my friend to the old Žižkov Cemetery, the Jewish one.29 There one can sit down and it looks like a park. There are even sand-pits for small children to play in and this place of relaxation is much visited.
Midday at the Lípas’ and in the afternoon with Mutti at Frau Neumann for our bridge party. Richard N[eumann] has married a widow with a seven-year-old girl, but his wife looks young and nice. He was designated as a Class 1 worker and although he has been an excellent gardener for a year he is now working in a brick factory. He digs clay and also works a machine. His fellow workers are apparently very nice to him and as a heavy labourer he gets double food ration cards. Of course, when he gets home in the evening he has a hearty appetite. He leaves home at 5.30 in the morning, but he gets a good wage, about 50 crowns a day, I think.
I wanted to ask you again, my good one, whether butter and fats are also rationed or if they are freely available. If you can, eat plenty of bread and butter because that would be good for you – it is especially good and healthy to eat butter. Here the sick, or those who have a doctor’s certificate to show they need it, get an extra allowance.
And now, farewell. I hug and kiss you 10,000 times and am, in great longing,
Your Mitzi.
Karlín, 20/8/1941, 10 in the evening
My beloved
I really feel a bit ashamed because I sent your letter off today without a signature and ask you to forgive me.30 This two-hour period for shopping makes one very tense, but there’s nothing one can do about it. I will send the bathing caps off if they are to be had, I will let you know soon whether they are.
And now I want to answer your letter – the one of 9/8 – properly. Since the picture gave you such pleasure I will send you another soon, my golden treasure. I can offer you this harmless pleasure, it is sad enough that I can do so little else for you.
Of course I can understand that you are impatient with bridge parties and other social chit-chat with strangers. I feel just the same. The very fact that you were usually reserved and taciturn towards most people makes me all the happier at your openness towards me and I know that between the two of us a wonderful dialogue will develop. Our heads are in fact full of each other, we are two crazy lovers, it’s almost scandalous, Ernstili, but what can we do about it? It makes me laugh again from sheer happiness. But you know, my treasure, you must nevertheless force yourself to mix with people, just don’t become a recluse.
I am really very well now, I have a lot of work and a lot of running around to do. Everything is now fully prepared at the storage depot. If I have to move out of the flat, I have decided not to go to the Lípas under any circumstances because I would lose my independence there, I would rather content myself with somewhere else. Now I have about six weeks before the decision is made, but will in any case take precautions and be ready to move. But the main thing is that I know where I will put the furniture and all the rest, and from tomorrow that will be settled.
So now I am going to bed. Good night, my love! Now I am snuggling down under the covers and imagine to myself that you are with me, then I embrace you most lovingly in my mind, send you the most beautiful kisses and am
Your Mitzimarie
Karlín, 23/8/1941, 8.30 p.m.
My dearest
Once again the post is not quite regular – today your letter of the 12th arrived. It makes me a bit nervous, I don’t know how it is that I immediately start worrying about all sorts of possible and impossible things.
On the other hand, the contents of your letter cheer me up enormously. When I read your description of the return from the vineyard and the fruit you brought back, I involuntarily thought of the biblical story of the first humans, but Eve was not there.
I am very pleased that the situation with H[ella] is bearable. So do what you want, whether you want to tell Hella something [about us] or not, just follow your instinct.
I am already looking forward to the picture. I already know that you will be much thinner than before. With that heat it couldn’t be any other way. If possible, please send me a picture of the children. I would like to see the pair of them.
I will send the three caps to Herr Gustav Jurgscheit,31 probably next Tuesday, and also if possible a box of oblaten32 for you. Please tell Herr J. that they are for you. There is no need to send the money, it is only very little, there’s no hurry. In any case, I don’t like mentioning sums of money in letters because I don’t want to give the wrong idea, so consider this trifling amount as a little gift. These things are very cheap and it is just a tiny favour. One is allowed to send things from here to the Altreich33 and also to send and receive money, but there are a great many formalities if one wants to send money outside this area, then one has to be very careful not to make a mistake on a form. I ask you again not to stint on your food, allow yourself everything you need for a decent life.
As regards the flat, I have been told that I will not have to move out so I can keep hoping that things will remain as they are, except if the day comes when suddenly everyone here has to move out in a short time34 – that happens and then there is nothing one can do about it. If only I knew where I would be able to put everything quickly in such an event.
Beloved, farewell, stay healthy. I hug you tenderly and kiss you with all my heart and am
Your Mitzi.
PS Eman wrote about the ‘friends’, they are fine. If I understand Eman correctly, Grete is in contact with Dr Reichl. I wouldn’t be happy about that, but I can’t prevent it and wouldn’t want to.
My beloved
I haven’t had any news from you for a week now, and I am uneasy again but I am convinced this is not your fault, one has to expect such interruptions in wartime and be all the more grateful for every happy moment. When I remember the interruptions in the World War, when I often waited weeks for news, then one has to be glad that it is still a lot better now, so far.
How are things with Hella? Is there harmony between you or are you both still irritable and tense?
I haven’t much time now because I want to get this letter to the post so that you don’t worry, but as no post is coming from you I am going to answer more completely the letters of June/July.
Once you asked whether I go to the café. Well now, Ernstili, what do you think? Go to the café? No, I don’t do that, nor do Mutti, Irene or Gustel; none of us goes to the café because we wouldn’t enjoy being at Aschermann’s.35 We have enough work to do in the house and, with the shopping in the afternoon, time just flies. One has to hurry to get everything done in the two hours for the following day. There’s no time for walks. And where would one go?36 At the most a visit from us to you and from you to us, as we say. But that is very nice, there is always someone one knows there, one has a little chat and then one hurries home because I am always home before eight o’clock.
A while ago you offered to send me anything I needed. Even if I haven’t got any coupons I don’t need anything now. I am provided for, my beloved. No doubt you’ll be getting coupons too, who knows? You still seem to have all sorts of things, there are still enough clothes etc. here, but it is controlled by ration cards. The rationing system works brilliantly here, its organization is quite exemplary.
Now I must stop, I have a guilty conscience again about the Herr Censor – he must forgive me just once more. I hug and kiss you lovingly many times, keep healthy and cheerful and content.
With deepest love from your Mitzimarie.
Karlín, 2/9/1941
My dearest
From your letter of 15/6 [sic] it does indeed really seem as if you have been gone from us for a very, very long time, beloved. Sometimes I think you are living on Mars. And I am glad, and grateful to fate, for this feeling. I do know, thank God, that things are all right for you. But for us too. The papers I named were often of interest to me because they kept me informed of events in far-away lands.37 I was always greatly interested in the stories of [people’s] journeys etc., but I couldn’t discuss things with you in any other way because I never do anything at all which could give the slightest impression that I am interested in some other matter.
I note what you write about your papers. From them it is clear you are a citizen of the Protectorate, that is sufficient. The passport would not be valid here any more, you would get another if you were here but there it is sufficient.
Recently Frau Vacek asked me to rinse her back in the bath. I did so, I took the brush and gave her a good hard scrub because she had already annoyed me several times. Then she squealed and I said to her ‘You know, I must practise on you before my Ernstili comes, then I will wash him from head to toe, that’s my speciality.’ She said ‘He’s got something to look forward to, poor thing.’ ‘You don’t imagine’, I said, ‘that I will scrub him like I scrubbed your back!’ There was a lot of laughter, she means to get her revenge, the Madam.
And now! A kiss and another one and another, and then farewell.
Lovingly, Mitzimarie.
My sweet merry little boy
This salutation is the answer to your letter of 17/6, to complete it. In that letter you called me ‘Mother’. My love, do you still remember your mother’s love, when you were a child? I am sure your mother loved each of her children with a mother’s love. Do you know how my heart lights up when I picture how I played with and cuddled my children, how often they used to argue about who was going to sit next to me. And do you know whom I could compare you with, who your gentle words remind me of? My Edithel. I can imagine so beautifully how, like with my Edithel, I would stroke and cuddle you. My Edithel was such a little one for honeyed words. And she and I, we were so close to each other. She would often come and take a cushion, place her little head on my knee and then off she went. She really is a very sweet person. My God, how my heart pains me when I think about it …. But no, when I have you, you will be Edithel too.
Photo 7 Marie with her husband Emil, before 1936.
The photo is delightful, even if the thinness cannot be disguised, and I can see that the head is quite untroubled by problems, looking completely healthy and that makes me happy. I will set about feeding up the rest of you again.
Of course, Ernst, I will love you with all your weaknesses, although I would point out that I don’t know these yet, only what you have told me. Emmerl also had his weaknesses, but I liked them too, I mean I got used to them. Often in his absentmindedness he would take the office key with him and when I wanted to open up I had to get the locksmith. Or, in the evening, I would hunt for ages for my nightie and then my eye would fall on Emmerl and he was wearing it. Imagine, he was sleeping so peacefully and contentedly, that is how absentminded he could be. Anyway, that was in the early years – I had been given real English nighties in my dowry, which was very modern in those days, and the poor thing mixed it up with his nightshirt. But anyway, that could only happen to Emmerl! There were lots of things like that and I soon got used to it.
And now I must stop. I give you a very, very loving hug and kiss from your
Mitzimarie
Vienna, 4/9/1941
My dearest
My friend, Frau Anna Riemer, is forwarding you this letter from Vienna.38 She is completely trustworthy and you are quite safe writing to her. I am just waiting for confirmation through her that you are getting my post regularly, then I will be able to give you further instructions about your letters. Anna will certainly deal with everything as you wish. She certainly will not read the letters. I will ask her on her word of honour not to do so. She really is a decent, fine person. But all the same, I know that you will be inhibited, I can understand that. I am the same but I have such wonderful old letters from you that I have to content myself with them in the meantime.
This letter is going to A. in a sealed envelope. She can then send it on. I am well, everything is in order. I have only one worry which only you can cure: that is the great longing for you. Oh God, I’ve got it badly!
Yesterday I sent you two long letters direct. Today I was able to write another. I hope I will get news from you that my letters have arrived.
I hug you most tenderly, send you a number of sweet kisses and am
Your Mitzimarie.
Karlín, 6/9/1941
My beloved
At the same time as this letter you will receive one from Anna; oh, it is so hard to write these. If I only knew whether you are receiving the letters which I am sending you directly, so that I could write accordingly. Treasure, I cannot thank you enough for your loving consideration and solicitude. Now every day I read your last letters in place of those which can’t reach me and they fill my whole existence.
I am asking Anna or Alois to let me know whether all my letters arrived. Now I will carry on answering unanswered parts of your old letters. Your picture is just smiling so beautifully at me, as if you were sitting next to me and looking over my shoulder as I write.
As regards clothes coupons, I can tell you that for us there aren’t any. Thank you for your kind offer, but for now I still have enough because one saves, and because we dress very simply when we go out and don’t visit places of entertainment of any sort, we need far fewer fine stockings and all the lingerie which was dear to our feminine hearts. Anyway, I am already looking forward to the revenge I will take when I clear out my collection of stockings because I have never darned as much as now – understandable, isn’t it?
My sweet, you can imagine how I suffer when you describe your walks and I can’t be with you. Yes my love, we would sit down now and again – would the kisses remain restrained? I wouldn’t want that! How I am already looking forward to you pointing out this and that. That is just what I have been missing so much since our separation, that generous sharing of your knowledge. I am as thirsty for this as for your kisses. Or do you think that it will be a while before we talk seriously? Sometimes it seems like it to me. It is unbelievable how, when I think of you, I can only ever have a one-sided conversation. Oh, you old sinner (and yet so young), how did you manage to change me like this?
Beloved, it has turned 12 o’clock midnight while I’ve been talking with you, so good night!!!
I am imagining you are with me, I am going to fall asleep in your arms. Be healthy and happy and write a lot to me as soon as you can. With great longing I kiss your eyes, cheeks, mouth and am
Your Mitzimarie.
Karlín, 8/9/1941
My beloved birthday child
Now your birthday is over and I will describe to you how this morning I lived it with you in my vivid imagination. I woke up at 4 a.m., I wanted to be the first to wake up today, of course we were together in our bedroom, you were still sleeping deeply and peacefully. I wondered: shall I, shan’t I? Without waiting, still half asleep, I rolled over towards you to congratulate you and as I started to say ‘Sweet birthday child, congratulations’, two strong arms grasped me, the elbows were a bit pointed, and in a torrent of kisses my stammerings were lost. It was bewitching, wonderful, and then we fell asleep again, until we celebrated the birthday in the morning according to plan. In reality I prayed for you then very fervently, as I always do. All day long I thought only of you, but I was filled with great sadness, arising, in truth, from my longing for you. It was all I could do not to howl out loud.
And now, back to reality. I may soon send you the address of Miss Grete Rudolph. She is a good person, the twin sister of Edith’s mother-in-law. As soon as I send you her address I will write to her too. Yesterday there was a letter from Paul,39 saying that the ‘friends’ are well and that he is in correspondence with them, that everything is as Eman writes.
I showed your picture to the family and it was much admired. I can never hide how joyful and happy I look when people talk about you and the others might think it a bit ridiculous that we are burning with such young love. I don’t, of course, say anything about either you or me, that we are so in love, but they just see it. It set my mother off to tell the old story that the Buxbaums (she meant you) stay young for ever, the grandfather became a father again at 70. You know my mother, when she starts on her stories about Luck,40 she’s very amusing, everybody laughed a lot, but I felt very proud of the good opinion they had of you and just nodded appreciatively. Were your ears burning?
Beloved, today I am writing more briefly, farewell. [no signature]
Karlín, 11/9/1941
My dear Ernst
My treasure, would it not be possible to get Alois to send you a Viennese newspaper41 regularly, an official one, it could even be the Jewish one? It is really important that you hear something from your former homeland. I can’t send you any newspapers from here but I think it is allowed from Vienna. I will have to hand in my typewriter to be mended, I think.42 I will find it very hard to say goodbye to it because of my correspondence with you, I hope I may be able to borrow one from some business or other. Have you still got yours?
You haven’t teased me about my prediction for a long time, which is why I tell you today that I am starting on it again, so that you can tease me about it again! So listen, five months from my last birthday43 I intend to hold you in my arms, I don’t wish to wait any longer, then we will celebrate one year of being engaged.
There are good reasons for me not wanting to live with the Lípas. Irene, with all her kindness, behaves towards me in a way which doesn’t suit me, which makes it better that we should not be together so much. I became convinced that it is better if I remain myself and am not under Irene’s influence. She knows it and it often vexes her, but there is nothing one can wish for or change in that. That’s why it will be better, if I do have to move out, that I simply live with strangers rather than with the Lípas. To be constantly ordered about and corrected, laughed at or ridiculed, if she feels like it, and when I don’t do things as she wants, letting me feel my dependence, getting punished like a small child – no, Ernstili, I won’t ever surrender myself to that. I also believe I understand more than Irene, even if she is better off financially than I am – that doesn’t matter to me at all. It is all happening because everyone is very tense. It will soon be three years that I have been rootless. They have often had worries about me and less joy than before, that is obvious. But now everyone has enough trouble and torment and therefore has only half the understanding for others, or none at all. Everything is taken amiss, as happens when things are not going well for people. Then it is best if one is not so much together, so that one doesn’t get on each other’s nerves. As you know, I have been through a lot and my way of thinking has changed, others just have to bite the bullet. There’s nothing to be done since they didn’t choose a different path. But you mustn’t think that we are any less good sisters, that wouldn’t be true, but we will never understand each other completely because we are quite different and because I won’t ever again let myself be influenced by Irene’s opinions but will stay as I am.
And if fortune allows us to have each other one day, then we will creep away and hide, at least for a time, and talk over and recount everything, heal our wounded hearts of all the pain left by these times, each healing the other. May God be merciful and grant us at last this fortune.
For now a very, very loving farewell. With a hug which will drive you senseless, and a number of sweet kisses, I say goodbye. Utterly yours,
Mitzimarie
My dearly beloved
I am writing so often to you now because I am afraid I will soon not have a typewriter. I have been worried about this for days now. Today I was at Karel’s44 and I asked him to help me out with one and he half agreed to do so. Yes, one has endless worries. My family can’t understand why I don’t want to write by hand, but we can understand it, can’t we? How many sheets of paper would I need? I can’t ask that of Herr Censor and I wouldn’t like to have to give up my conversation with you.
The picture of Erika is delightful, a real little teenager, natural and sweet.
I am very surprised that there is so much you can’t get and hope you have some things stored away. The coming decision on the question of the flat, the final settling of the matter, is making me very tense, as you can imagine, but what can one do? At a time like the present all that is just immaterial and if the individual is also affected, so what? I have various plans, and even if I did have to move out, I would always take into my calculations what I would do if you suddenly came. I have just made provision for an alternative which would at least be half satisfactory – I hope so anyway – but let God take care of a little too, my treasure!
I remember the storms at the seaside very well. It is interesting how they really stirred me. This spectacle of nature has a curious effect on people from countries with no coasts, at least it was so with me. When I was at the seaside I loved getting up early and walking along the beach on my own to watch the sunrise and the return of the fishermen with their catch. Looking at the sea when it was calm always had a most powerful effect on me. I could have sat for hours studying it, musing and thinking. But the storm stirred me above all because I thought of how many people might again be losing their lives at that moment.
You are right to take up your studies again, that is a good distraction. I myself always enjoyed learning and broadening my knowledge very much, so you can imagine how happy I am if you also look for diversion in studying. Unfortunately I can’t do anything for my mind now, time and circumstance don’t permit it.
Would it not be possible for you to have a warmer room? On no account should you, heaven forbid, get ill.
My sweet, I too have no patience for anything, wherever I am I long to be at home so that I can be alone with you, writing to you and reading one of your letters. It is always the same and will be so until we are together.
It is late again. I am going to go to sleep and dream most beautifully of you. I kiss you lovingly, good night, be healthy and happy.
Your Mitzimarie.
Karlín, 15/9/1941
My dearly beloved sinful one
Today I ate at the Lípas’, which was fine. One has to realize that they lost all their provisions yet everything is still very respectable there. Irene now cooks for herself as her maid can’t do it. One has to be glad if one can get a maid who is decent, because the majority won’t go to Jews. There are also plenty of Jewish domestics but they have all been snapped up.
Afterwards we went to Frau Louise Neumann. [Her son] Richard has got married to a widow with an eight-year-old child, a nice little woman. They live with Frau N. but she is expecting to lose her flat any minute. Richard had an accident while doing heavy labour because a J[ewish] colleague dropped a 150 kg heavy metal plate on his foot, breaking some of his toes. He says that if it weren’t for the pain he’d be glad to be able to be at home for a bit. Frau N. has other worries too: today she handed in her inventory.45 Her son Karl and his wife are in Split, which they like, but they don’t know whether they can stay there.46 They have abandoned everything to make this journey.
And then it is evening and I am sitting here with you. On my left is your picture, which is smiling at me. It is the most beautiful present for me, as if I were talking to you.
Do you know that in a few days it will be New Year?47 I think you don’t bother about the festivals any more, but I don’t want to miss this opportunity to tell you my dearest wishes: my love, you know what I want for you and for me: our happy reunion very soon, in health and peace. Like you, I hope that all the great suffering may make people gentle, that everyone may once more be able to behave well towards each other, that for us too there may be a quiet little place in the sun. During the festival I will spend some time in the synagogue and will pray fervently even though I know already that I will get very worked up. It is very strange, as soon as I enter a place of worship, I listen for a while to the service, then I see at once before my eyes, in all vividness, the synagogue of my home town with all its ceremony. All the long years I went there pass before my eyes, all my memories are so powerful, going right back to my youth, and then when I see the beautiful building in ruins and ashes,48 I am seized by a pain I can’t put a name to. I feel so alone and miserable, so without any support, so broken. That is why I only rarely go to a service. One Friday evening recently I went past the building in the Geistgasse49 where even today the service is like an opera. I went there with Irene, there wasn’t a seat left in the great building. When I heard the good music, deep and solemn, I was overcome and it felt as if a great worm was burrowing and gnawing in my breast and the tears streamed down my cheeks. I was upset, too, to see the distress in faces I knew, everyone is so serious and anxious.
During the days of the festival we will wear our own badge.50 I won’t mind it at all, but some people are very unhappy about it. I have nothing to hide, I am not breaking any rules, so I can happily wear it. I will not do anything forbidden, either with or without the badge. In a few days one will have got used to it.
My letter today is a report, not a love letter, but the report is necessary this time. So farewell, be healthy and happy.
Your Mitzimarie
Karlín, 18/9/1941
My dearly beloved boy
It is a load off my mind that my letters are reaching you and also that the parcel and the pictures reached the people they were addressed to and gave such pleasure. I was a bit anxious that I might have changed a lot and that my picture might disappoint.
I’m so glad that the bäckerei51 tasted good and gave so much pleasure and that they arrived undamaged. If I had known whether I was allowed to or not, I would have sent more, and now I ask you to let me have, if possible, another address to which I could send you a further parcel. That would be a great pleasure for me.
I thank you many times for the photo of Bubi. What a joy to have two such happy healthy youngsters.
I received a verbal assurance that I can stay in the flat, but I don’t feel it is completely reliable. In any case, at the end of the month I will call in at the Kultusgemeinde, which has taken over the handling of my notice, and wait to hear more.
Tomorrow I will move the paper things. I will do that together with the removal man because everything is well prepared. Then everything in the warehouse will be neatly organized. I won’t move the rest yet, I’ll wait until after 1 October. Now that I know where everything will go I am more at ease.
But of course I will often give you a scrub, I’m good at that, don’t be afraid. Then I will wrap you well in your bathrobe, rub you down and into bed. Then I’ll accept a tip, but not too measly a one. Hmm, what do you think? Will the gentleman be ‘magnanimous’? Hopefully he’ll behave like a nobleman.
I am wondering a great deal about how it came about that I love you so passionately and have such a burning desire to give so much love. In my whole life I was rarely asked whether I wanted to give as much as to receive. It is quite different with you. You are an absolute master, you know how to reach my weakest points and that is why you will get further. I feel as if there was some unopened reservoir there which you discovered and which belongs only to you. You have enticed another secret out of me, you bad one, but enough for now!
I kiss your beloved eyes, your cheeks, your forehead and then five times your mouth, hug you warmly and lovingly and am
Your Mitzimarie.
P.S. Treasure, it is lovely of you to want to send me nuts. I haven’t had raisins for a long time, there aren’t any here. In any case, I thank you with all my heart for thinking of it.
Karlín, 19/9/1941
My dearly beloved
Now I am going to try to answer the old letters in order. So, number 100. As I now know that my letters are arriving I am much calmer and am therefore very grateful to Anna and Marie52 for their kindness. You can hardly imagine how happy your pleasure at the modest little gifts made me. I am very glad that you immediately noticed my new hairstyle that I thought up and requested especially for you. People here like it too, they say it suits me well. The dress in the photo is in a deep red material, a good colour for me. You bad one, I deliberately ignored your remark about getting a podium and there you go and mention it again, just wait! If you make fun of me any more because I am small, then I will think of a way to tease you. After all, I can stand on tip-toe.
We have received delightful greetings from our ‘friends’, heart-warming. You can imagine what a joy that was. Apparently they are all getting on wonderfully. Yes, America is a land of boundless possibilities, but only for young people. Older ones have no place there, on the whole they are less well appreciated, according to what one hears and reads. The couple have apparently set up a delightful home and the others too are busy and content. They have a lot of good friends and have settled in wonderfully in that distant country.
Now I’m coming to a serious bit. It is about your views on respect and my thoughts about Emmerl. Oh Ernstili, don’t you see from everything that I already belong entirely to you? You have always known me, you know that I was a serious person with a great sense of duty and high ideals about morals, etc. Do you think, my beloved, that if I hadn’t freed myself from many things I would be able to love you so very, very deeply? You yourself showed me the way, I want to tell you that now I am more or less a part of you. Don’t you see how we are woven together? There is such an understanding between us in our way of thinking that no more assurance is needed. I admit freely that I feel a lasting respectful reverence for Emmerl, and for you a passionate love, which knows no bounds or limits, and I long ago cast away all caution and misgivings. And you alone taught me this.
It is now 11.30 at night. In the room next door the married couple are sleeping sweetly but I had to laugh out loud about you, you old-young rascal, just wait. What would Gretel and Edithel say? They know that I always said yes to real, true life. It was with Edithel in particular, and only her – neither mother, nor sister, nor any other woman or female friend – that I spoke about my feelings and my marriage. When Edithel became a wife she came to me in her sweet way and asked me all sorts of things. She was trying to work out the right way to make her Franz happy. I immediately recognized how the child was thinking.
I did out of love what I had never been able to do in my life, in order to help her not to make mistakes, I told her about many things from my own life that I thought were important for her. There is no one else, and never has been, to whom I ever spoke in this way. Already when I was at school my friends and fellow pupils knew that I never joined in their conversations and they stopped talking when I came near saying ‘The child is coming, you must be quiet.’ And that is how it remained with our marriage too, there was an understanding between us that we would not talk with anyone about our marriage, neither with my mother nor my sister; neither I nor Emmerl wanted that. He was extremely touchy about that and would have been deeply offended and I felt just the same. And to discuss it with other women? I would never have dreamt of it. Why should it interest other women? I don’t really know how it was that no other woman ever told me her story, but I didn’t want it and never encouraged it, but also nobody asked it of me.
Today is New Year’s Eve, do you know that? The service was cancelled.53 We had got a little used to wearing the badge. The first day, the 19th, I had to leave the house at 7.30 a.m. and I admit I had a ringing in my ears and felt dizzy when I took my first steps in the street. I was filled with an indescribable feeling of humiliation. But only for a few moments. Then I lifted my head high and looked everyone I met full in the eye. Thank goodness the public is on the whole humane and nice.54 They are yellow Stars of David, the size of a hand, with the word ‘JUDE’ [Jew] written in black in the centre. I don’t know yet whether there will be a service at all tomorrow morning. I don’t think I will go but I will eat at Irene’s anyway.
I have already moved part of the goods into storage. It was pretty tiring but I managed to do it on my own. Today I was told again that I am not allowed to give up my flat. I must get hold of the official at the Kultusgemeinde and get him to inform the court that the notice is invalid and then the business will be over for now. Do you know what they call Pařížská?55 The Milky Way! Because that is where most of the Jews with stars live, and there are plenty more such jokes now.56 Today, following the old custom, I was at the cemetery. I always look for the grave of Franz’s first mother there.57 She would be exactly as old as me. I didn’t know her but that is where I always make my prayers. Franz is Edith’s husband.
Before I run out of space I want to tell you, my love, that I am so utterly and completely happy with you. I am no longer capable of answering your sweet letters adequately, I lack the words but in my mind I turn the words into actions, I take you in my arms and say to you that I love you dearly and passionately and that I long immeasurably for you. God protect you, keep well and cheerful and happy.
And now, good night, my sweet boy. I am falling asleep beside you. 1000 loving kisses,
All yours, Mitzimarie
Karlín, 22/9/1941
My most dearly beloved
Today I have at last, as you wished, told the friends [through Eman] as you wanted. In my heart I am not too happy about the friends, I can’t say that to anyone here but it upsets me that I haven’t seen a single line from them in 1½ years. I know, of course, that there will be reasons for their silence, perhaps it is also not to endanger us, but still, I’m just not happy about it.
Do you know what I am reading at the moment? Joseph Roth’s ‘Radetzky March’.
Anna Riemer wrote me such a nice, kind letter today. She will deal with everything as wished, assures me of her utmost discretion, so if necessary please do use her to make your arrangements, my love. I don’t need to, touch wood. It’s only because of you that I smile, my sweet treasure, who else could I ascribe it to? Oh, the thought of you is so wonderful and so beautiful. When I sometimes imagine our future life together this is what happens to me: first, I feel a trickle of cold down my back, like a shiver, then I become burning hot and then I am swept up in a delirium of happiness unlike anything I have ever known. Then I rummage about for scraps of the songs I knew when I was young and a sort of song comes out, all of a jumble, yes it wasn’t the Lorelei who made me do that but Ernstimann!
Am I to ignore our love’s past? What a question, how could I? No, my love, these will be my most beautiful memories, together with my gratitude that you called me back to life, yes truly it was you alone. If it hadn’t happened I don’t know whether I would not have done away with my life. You won’t be surprised when you hear all that I went through for a few years.
We spent the festival days as weekdays. I only had 10 minutes in the synagogue, yes, it has never been like that before. We wouldn’t have been able to feel any sense of devotion so it was pointless. Do you know what nickname they have given to the Jewish Town Hall? ‘U Flecků’.58
Now the weather is fine again, warm during the day but quite cool in the early morning and in the evening, quite autumnal. Autumn in the country around Prague is very beautiful, it is just a pity we aren’t able to enjoy it.59 I did a lot of running around today and now I am off again. One gets very angry when one goes to the Jewish office, where I was just now about the business with the flat.60 One has to wait for hours with a number and then watch as a lot of people who haven’t registered go in first. Then, when it’s finally one’s turn, one is told by the official on some pretext to come back another day when it suits him better.
And now, I embrace you, kiss you warmly in my own way (which you know) and say goodbye. Keep well and cheerful.
Your Mitzimarie
Karlín, 25/9/1941
My most dearly beloved Ernstili
As if I had guessed that I would get a letter today from Anna-Sarah, I decided not to go out because I had some more to do in the flat. Although it was a beautiful day the yellow mark spoils going out for me and I stayed at home. Lo and behold, Anna’s letter 108 arrived in the afternoon. I am still waiting for 107, which hasn’t arrived yet. Anna is very good, she sends me her originals and even sends them by airmail. In the meantime I hope all my letters arrived, that you get news from me regularly. I will carry on reading and answering old letters from you – if you can’t write to me what else can one do?
You told me about a visit to a little wood. Oh my treasure, do you know how I long for the smell of a wood, for the smell of fresh air, but I could bear everything easily if you were with me! When we can go walking in our woods again I’ll give you a little kiss now and then, but otherwise one must behave properly in the woods, that is only decent. I am just saying that to myself because I know you wouldn’t do anything else, hmm hmm!
I have already written to you about the problem of the flat [but] it seems you didn’t understand me, so I will explain it to you in detail now. Thus: if anybody is given notice – and that can only be by the Zentralstelle61 in Střešovice, so not the landlord – he must go to the Kultusgemeinde with the notice and get himself registered. That means his name is recorded and he will then be told to come back in about 14 days, i.e. about 8 days before he has to leave. He then gets about three addresses from the Kultusgemeinde from which he must choose one. Of course, there are a lot of people who have acquaintances. If they think they will be able to live with an acquaintance they go to the KG and ask ‘Could I take a room in such and such a place?’ Jews are now allowed to rent in only 3 districts, Prague 2, 5 or Vinohrady, but they can never have their own flat, only a subtenancy. In Vinohrady, not in the main street, only in the side streets. So for me it would be normal not to get a room to myself because it is calculated that one person gets 4 square metres. If I had to rely on the Gemeinde they would put me up with some stranger, which is pretty bad. It can happen to anyone, even those who have had a room of their own for a long time and they just have to take in another one or two people. It happens frequently that two couples have to live in a large room and they say it is still better than barracks. In the long run one needs to have sympathy and feeling for one’s fellow human beings.
You have to understand that notice to leave one’s own flat is given all the time and that people may then not take another flat of their own. All, without exception, can only become subtenants. But it is the Kultusgemeinde which allocates the subtenancy, as it is the authority considered to be in constant contact with the Zentralstelle, and as there is a great shortage of rooms it is rather difficult to find accommodation for all the people. That is why they are constantly measuring up space and the families who still have their own flats within the three permitted areas – only Jews, of course – are forced by the Kultusgemeinde to give up as much as possible. No matter how many rooms they have, they have to surrender it all and are allowed to keep for themselves only their few square metres for sleeping and living. They are still better off in that they do have the bathroom, kitchen, dining room etc., and they have to offer the tenants the use of these rooms. Now, you can hardly imagine how much irritation that causes. There are several offices and a whole lot of officials at the KG who have nothing to do but to settle people’s arguments and squabbles. It’s dreadful, what’s going on, but one also finds the opposite: individual families who are still civilized, who get on with each other and are considerate.
I have written all that to give you a general idea. As for my case, the Lípas have six people in their two largest rooms, not counting Mutti. They have one room for themselves, their former bedroom, Mutti has the former office. Up to now Mutti has not had to share. I am registered there and that is why Mutti hasn’t yet got anyone with her, and also because she is old and very unwell (the doctor certified this). But there is a possibility that she might suddenly get someone. Now, as you know, the landlady’s notice is not valid, so I can stay here, but it is quite a new house, something could happen and we could all have to leave and then fate would have caught up with me.
Tante Lidi still has a room free. If it came to it and I was ordered to share a place to sleep with another person, I would allow myself the luxury and rent a room at Tante L’s. I would have, in any case, to sleep where I was registered. That would be one possibility or I could do something with some other of my acquaintances if I am not afraid of spending a bit of money (that would be if my treasure came).
The second possibility would be the Lípas. They have been saying up to now that I can come any time to them but you are right, my love, I would be ‘looked after’ as far as food and everything else goes, but my freedom would be gone. Irene is far more kind and loving, a truly good sister and yet as long as I can I want to be independent. If I have to move out some time I will only go to them if it is in their interest, not mine, out of consideration for Mutti, so that she doesn’t have to share with a stranger. And if I have to be with someone else I will always arrange things so that I have a room somewhere else, that is what I hope.
So, my love, don’t worry, I know how to make sure there will be a little nest for us. Trust me, let me take care of it. I will make sure everything works out.
And now, where am I sitting? And then? Then most loving kisses, your Mitzimarie
My beloved
I feel a need to explain yesterday’s letter about the question of the flat and my relations with Irene, so that you can judge things properly. If it didn’t suit me at the Lípas’ it would be very difficult to get anything else, because I would be in the bad books of the Kultusgemeinde. They would be annoyed with me in view of the present situation and would punish me by giving me some very unpleasant accommodation, if anything at all, or even threaten me with mass accommodation. They would say one can’t be so choosy today.
I mentioned Tante Lidi because her area is unrestricted, the Kultusgemeinde isn’t allowed to send people there. I couldn’t be registered there, but my aunt could happily let me use her flat during the day and I could sleep where I have rented, it would just cost me a bit more. You will be shaking your head and thinking ‘Why doesn’t she want to go to her sister’s, when they were always so close?’ Quite right, we still are. I have been here for three years already and during that time the Lípas have been very kind to me. They still are but the times have made them very tense and people around them feel it. Nobody, including their nearest and dearest, ever felt and understood our lot as refugees,62 until it happened to the people of Prague. Then they began to moan, but they still don’t understand what we have already lived through. On the one hand, Irene would like to give me as much as she can, but on the other, she wants to keep me completely under her wing, to tell me off if she feels like it, to force her opinions on me, and her style of living. In short, she is so domineering and thinks that what she does is so well done that there can be no discussion and that everyone else could learn from her. But I won’t take that. The giving doesn’t matter, it is quite unimportant, I can be content with little if necessary, but I must always be handled nicely and kindly, not be scolded by others or have my supposed faults laughed at in public in order to be witty so that others can be entertained at my expense. I find that tactless. I could easily take my revenge, but I don’t because I am who I am.
Irene can very well sense my awkwardness towards her in various matters, she senses the complete harmony between you and me which she has never been able to have herself because she is too restless and too house-proud and never has time to devote herself to her husband. She suspects and knows that I am a woman who belongs 100% to her man; for example, she can’t understand why I have so much to write to you or you to me. Recently she said to me, when she saw your letter in my pocket, ‘Gusti hasn’t written to me as much in our whole marriage as Ernst writes to you in one go.’ She was making fun of me in a superior way, as if it was the most stupid thing. And why? Because they didn’t do it. I could easily have answered her back but I love her too much to hurt her or offend her. The result is that inwardly I move further and further away from her. So, because she hasn’t got enough to discuss with her husband, others shouldn’t have either. And what she dislikes even more than our discussions is our constant effort, due to our enforced separation, to live our marriage through our letters.
Let me explain better: it had already been decided a good while ago that I would eventually live there in Mutti’s room. We talked about what I would need to bring, such as a bed, wardrobe, etc., and I said I would like to bring my long mirror, at which Irene said it wouldn’t suit the room. That’s not true, it belongs with the things I mentioned. I replied that I wouldn’t leave it behind. She: ‘Since when have you been so vain? You just can’t take orders from others.’ This last made me resolve under no circumstances to go there. And to repeat, if she gets a stranger there she will have to let them bring three times as much, let them cook with her, etc. I have immaculate, new, beautiful things that I am bringing. A stranger might bring the most horrible rubbish and she wouldn’t be able to grumble. And they have six strangers, to whom they permitted, in the most humane way, more than would happen anywhere else.
Farewell, I will write to you again tomorrow. Now I am sitting down in my favourite place and then a kiss and another and then? That’s all! Tenderly,
Your Mitzimarie
My dearest
All your many suggestions give me occasion to talk about things that I would have loved to discuss with you long ago if, out of consideration for Herr Censor, I weren’t anxious about the letters being too long. You claim that my letters are more beautifully written and better composed than yours, but that’s not true. Haven’t you noticed how in a few words you can usually deal with a matter, whereas I need so many?
I can’t send my letters any more from the Karlín post office as all mail has to be sent from the post office in Ostrovní [Insel] Street.63 You know that we have to hand in all mail destined for abroad and registered letters open and unstamped at the counter. Here in Karlín it was only three minutes away but now I have to travel for ten minutes on the [tram] number 5.
How did you spend the new year? Do they celebrate the festival there at all, I mean in your family? Next Wednesday is the Day of Atonement but it is hardly being celebrated here.64 They are working at the Kultusgemeinde and everywhere because that is more important.
Christmas was almost always a beautiful, happy time for me; oh, if only we could see each other by then, what would I give to be able to!
Good night. I love you and am completely your
Mitzimarie
1Lydia Vogel (*1875), sister of Marie’s mother. She was murdered in Treblinka in October 1942.
2Ernst fought in the First World War.
3Marie’s birthday was on 12 June.
4By this time Jews were allowed to shop only between 3.00 and 5.00 p.m.
5Hulda Wurm (*1884) was Mutti’s sister. She was sent to Treblinka on the same train as her husband Artur (*1874) and sister Lydia.
6Marie, as most of the older Jews who used to live in the Sudetenland, was not fully proficient in Czech.
7Jelení příkop (in Czech) behind the St Vitus Cathedral, and the Prague Loreta.
8Jewish cemeteries (especially the New Jewish Cemetery in Olšany, Prague-Žižkov) were some of the few public places accessible to the Jews after the introduction of anti-Jewish restrictions, when they were no longer able to visit public parks. Marie describes the limited public space available to the Jews.
9Emigration is the accepted and official euphemism for deportation. Marie’s references to the parcels she (and others) sent to the deportees in Poland evidence the solidarity in the Jewish community even at the time when Prague Jews had limited access to food.
10The Bader family home in Karlsbad.
11Ernst’s son-in-law had a small shop with photographic equipment.
12Erika Cougno (Mädi) and Heinz Cougno (Bubi) were Ernst’s grandchildren.
13The German-Soviet war broke out on 22 June 1941.
14Bochov.
15Marie is as yet unaware that there are severe food shortages in Thessaloniki.
16Jüdisches Nachrichtenblatt, Ausgabe Wien.
17Her daughter Edith. Edith had a law degree from the Charles University in Prague. She worked as a secretary in a bank.
18Edith emigrated as part of the domestics’ programme, one of the few ways for young women to reach Britain before the war.
19The Vaceks lived with Marie in one apartment. It seems they were not Jewish.
20Marie is wondering whether the German occupiers in Thessaloniki have imposed the same shopping restrictions on Jews as they have in Prague.
21Other sources confirm an increasing number of weddings in the Jewish community with the intensifying persecution. This could be a social response to new hardships.
22Marie is referring to having sent parcels to some Viennese friends who have been deported to Poland.
23Historically, Czech anti-semitism was often directed against Jews as perceived Germanizers. These sentiments further increased during the occupation, when the Jews, who continued to speak German, were highly resented.
24The Germans tasked the Kultusgemeinde (the Community Office) with the implementation of all directives issued by the Nazi authorities, which led to frequent tensions between the Jews and the community leadership.
25Grete’s divorced husband, Otto Reichl, also fled to England where he enlisted in the Czech army.
26‘Das Reich’ (literally ‘The Reich’ or ‘Empire’) was a weekly newspaper founded by Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels in 1940. It mainly circulated inside Germany, but was also available to subscribers in other European countries. Reading it might give Ernst some information about laws affecting Jews in the Reich, which he should take as a warning.
27A district in Prague.
28Marie several times describes the limited options open to Jews in Prague when assigned accommodation by the Kultusgemeinde.
29See also the letter of 22 June 1941.
30The unsigned letter of 20 August is missing.
31In her memoir From Thessaloniki to Auschwitz and back, Ernst’s grand-daughter Erika writes that two rooms in the Cougno family house were requisitioned for a Gestapo officer and his orderly. Apparently Jurgscheit was one such officer.
32Wafers.
33The Altreich was the name given to pre-1938 Germany (before the annexation of Austria, Bohemia-Moravia, parts of Poland, etc.).
34Marie anticipates the possibility that there would be new restrictions on Jewish residences in individual Prague districts or even deportations.
35A former Jewish-owned café in Prague at Dlouhá ulice which continued to serve Jews when others were no longer allowed.
36An indirect reference to the edict prohibiting Jews from entering any of Prague’s public parks and gardens.
37Marie is possibly hinting that she is following the situation in Greece.
38Anna Riemer was a sister of Olga Löwenstein, Marie’s very close friend in Prague.
39Paul Buxbaum, see Chapter 1, footnote 26.
40Luka, near Karlsbad.
41See footnote 16.
42Marie is disguising the fact that she has to declare to the authorities whether she has a typewriter. She does this on 13 September and on 1 November she has to hand it in (see Introduction).
4312 June.
44Karel Struzi.
45In the course of the autumn all Jews were required to hand in to the authorities an inventory of all their possessions.
46Split, in what is now Croatia, was occupied by Italy since April 1941.
47Rosh Hashana was on 22 and 23 September.
48The synagogue in Karlsbad was burnt down on Kristallnacht in November 1938.
49Dušní ulice. The synagogue is known today as the Spanish Synagogue. It had an organ and choir and was known for encouraging congregational singing.
50On 1 September 1941 it was announced that Jews in the German Reich, including the Protectorate, in future had to wear the yellow Star of David in public. Distribution of the stars commenced on 17 September and wearing them was compulsory from the 19th onwards.
51Pastries.
52Marie, like Anna Riemer, is a friend in Vienna.
53This could be as a result of the tensions after the introduction of the compulsory Star of David.
54Other sources confirm the positive response in the Czech population. The Czechoslovak BBC Service from London broadcast a speech in support of the Jews.
55Pařížská třída (= Paris Avenue), the main and very elegant thoroughfare through the Old City of Prague. Irene and Gustav’s flat faced this street across a small park.
56The German intelligence agency in the Protectorate (the Sicherheitsdienst) recorded the circulation of similar jokes in Prague.
57In a letter to her daughters, Grete and Edith, dated 6 June 1939, Marie describes how she chanced upon Ada Sternschuss’s grave. ‘Yesterday was Papa’s jahrzeit, I lit a candle for him on your behalf at the cemetery. I wanted to look for Onkel Vogel’s grave and as I was looking my gaze fell on a grave: Ada Sternschuss. She was Franz’s mother. So I prayed there and took a few flowers which I will send to Edith.’
58U Fleků is one of the Prague’s oldest pubs and breweries, dating back about 500 years. Giving its name to the Jewish Town Hall was an ironic play on the German word ‘Fleck’, meaning a mark or stain, which was also the word people used to denote the yellow Star of David: ‘der gelbe Fleck’.
59According to a new regulation, introduced in September 1941, Jews were not allowed to leave their residential area without permission.
60See footnote 24 (letter sent on 25 July 1941).
61Full name: Zentralstelle für jüdische Auswanderung (= Central Office for Jewish Emigration; in August 1942 the name changed to Zentralamt für die Regelung der Judenfrage in Böhmen und Mähren = Central Office for the Solution of the Jewish Question in Bohemia and Moravia). This was a Nazi organization, which held the central authority in Jewish affairs in the Protectorate (another similar office existed in Vienna and in Berlin). Established in July 1939 by Adolf Eichmann and Walter Stahlecker, it was initially created with the aim to centralize and speed up the process of Jewish emigration, whilst at the same time to confiscate most of the Jewish émigrés’ property. Later the Zentralstelle directed the deportations of the Jews.
62People who were expelled or who fled from Sudetenland.
63This decree was issued on 24 September 1941.
64Marie alludes to the tense situation after the arrival of Heydrich in Prague.