Renate S. was 18 years old when she sent this photo from New York to her father in Hanau. She lived in a children’s home in Wiesbaden-Schlangenbad for two years being protected from the NS authorities. © Rainer Weissbecker
Renate S. was 18 years old when she sent this photo from New York to her father in Hanau. She lived in a children’s home in Wiesbaden-Schlangenbad for two years being protected from the NS authorities. © Rainer Weissbecker

Based on an official order dating from summer 1943 children who were specially classified as “valid Jews” or as “mixed race first grade” and were under the care of “Jugendamt der Stadt Frankfurt” (Frankfurt Youth Welfare Department) were supposed to be institutionalized in the Euthanasia Asylum in Hadamar. When Theo Walter, the head of the municipal Youth Welfare Department received a copy of this order he did everything in his power, together with “Caritas” (the catholic welfare organisation), to protect such children from this measure. Inge G. was housed in an abbey in Lower Bavaria and Erna H. in a home in Palatinate on account of the help offered by the Monica Home, a Social Welfare Home for Catholic Women. Curt Leon Speier was housed in an orphanage in Baden-Württemberg. The Gestapo civil servant gave Curt’s aunt and a Youth Welfare Department employee an additional three days in order to get him out of the city.

Franz R. had a Jewish mother and a non-Jewish father. After his mother had been deported his father was also able to find a place for him in a home for the handicapped located in Hochdorf/Baden-Württemberg. The Hotel Viktoria Children’s Home in Schlangenbad (which served as an alternative accommodation for Frankfurt children homes) accepted Renate S., after her brother Karlheinz, who suffered from epilepsy, was sent by the municipal Health Department to Hadamar and was gassed there in August 1943. The children had previously been taken care of by relatives, but as this accommodation was no longer deemed safe after the brother had been sent away Renate was housed in an external children’s home. Mrs. Niklas’ three children, who were classified as “valid Jews”, were housed with farmers in Zwingenberg. They emigrated to Palestine after 1945 with the help of “Caritas” and the Youth Aliyah. Orphanages in Thuringia and Sachsen also housed such children. 40 children in children’s homes, care centers and relatives’ households were allowed to stay because the head of the municipal Youth Welfare Department refused to carry out the order..

See: Petra Bonavita: Mit falschem Pass 
und Zyankali, Stuttgart 2009, pages 157-159.

[german version]