Theresienstadt (Concentration camp)

This collection contains the personal papers of members of the Leiter and Berliner families of Hamburg and Berlin. Some members of these families immigrated to the United States in the late 1930s while others survived World War II in Amsterdam, as forced laborers in Berlin, or in Theresienstadt. Materials include vital documents, official papers, personal correspondence, poems, clippings, official announcements and orders, banking records, restitution materials, and a few photographs.

Documents refer to the Ostwald, Tendlau and Cohen families. One focus is on the life of Alice Witte née Cohn. Of special significance is a letter that Karl Siche wrote to Alice Witte. Together with Alice Witte's former husband Max Witte, Karl Siche was detained in a concentration camp. Here Max Witte passed away. There is also a remarkable letter from Hedwig Ostwald, which she wrote in Theresienstadt in 1944, prior to her deportation to Auschwitz where she died. Her husband Max Ostwald, a lawyer and the head of the Reichsvereinigung der Juden in Deutschland (district Westphalia) had already died in 1942 in Theresienstadt from disease.