Friday, March 29

Letter from Holocaust survivor found in flea market vendor decades later


Thrift stores, antique fairs and flea markets in New York City are prime places to find valuable hidden family heirlooms. When Chelsey Brown, an avid saver, was shown a letter written more than 75 years ago at the end of the Holocaust by a survivor, she knew where she belonged.

“The minute I transcribed it, I knew I had to go back to the right family,” Brown said. He found the note in late 2021.

The letter was written by Ilse Loewenberg, a woman who jumped from a moving train to the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1943. She was part of an underground Nazi resistance group called the Gemeinschaft für Frieden und Aufbau, or the Association for Peace and Development.

According to her sister’s later documentation, Loewenberg walked a three-day journey back to Berlin after escaping.

In 1944, she was recaptured and placed in solitary confinement in Berlin until she was freed by Russian troops in July 1945.

Loewenberg lost her mother, father, two sisters, and husband in the Holocaust.

After being released, she wrote a letter to her living sister, Carla, who had emigrated to England before the war. Carla was the only sister and member of the Loewenberg family to survive the tragedy.

“Thanks to the kindness of our liberators, I can give them a sign of my life after so many years,” Loewenberg wrote in German. “Daddy, Mommy, Grete, Lottchen and Hermann – no one is alive anymore. My pain is indescribably great. My husband, whom I married 3.5 years ago, was also taken from me!… When there is a mail connection regular, I’ll tell you everything in detail.”

Also Read  Kanye West pulls out of festival, report says – Press Enterprise

That’s the letter Brown bought from a flea market vendor.

Brown discovered the details of the family tree through MyHeritage.com, a global family history platform that preserves historical records.

He discovered that both Loewenberg and Carla immigrated to the United States and settled in Forest Hills, New York, in 1948. Neither Loewenberg nor Carla had children, but they did have extended families through their husbands.

Brown found Jill Butler, the daughter of Loewenberg’s brother-in-law’s brother. Butler and Loewenberg, who used to live nearby, were close before Loewenberg died in 2001.

When Brown sent the letter to Butler, Butler and his family were moved.

“My entire family is truly in awe of everything he has done for us,” Butler said in a letter to Brown. “We all love our great-aunt Ilse and are delighted beyond words to read her thoughts in her own handwriting after she emerged from the depths of European hell.”

He added: “May God bless your noble work and may you receive many blessings in return for all you do for families like mine.”

Brown, whose family also lost members in the Holocaust, now feels a deep connection to Loewenberg and says her story has inspired her.

“She is a bit of an inspiration for everyone to be better in life. After the war, Ilse actually sent supplies to the family who helped hide her in Berlin,” he said. “She really is an example of doing good in a world or being kind in a world that isn’t.”

Also Read  Russia announces ceasefire to allow for evacuations: LIVE UPDATES

Brown, who has made hundreds of heirloom returns, has said the stories have taught him a lot about life and relationships and that he wishes more people could reconnect with heirlooms.

“It breaks my heart, because I’m sure there are a lot of things that could help reunite them with their rightful families,” Brown said. “We shouldn’t be selling these items. It should be illegal. They should go back to their families.”

He added: “The reason people connected to my relic keep coming back to social media is because it shows that there is magic in the lives of average people,” Brown said. “Each of us has our own unique ancestry and history, and I think that’s what our world and our generation needs right now.”




abcnews.go.com

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *