Kristallnacht, November 9-10, 1938.  

The Blau residence, Hamburg, Germany

 My aunt tante Rivkah Jenny Marmorstein relates what she and her family lived through:
 

On the evening of Kristallnacht, the Nazi Sturmabteilung - SA Paramilitary appeared at their home and demanded the men of the family. My aunt, who was a young girl of 18 at the time, watched in fright as they strode through her home as though it was their own, looking for great-grandfather Dr. Yirmiyahu Armin Blau. Luckily, he wasn’t home at the time, however, they took her brother Walter Benjamin Blau,  and said they were going to come back for him later. Her older brother was my Zaidy Moshe Yehudah Blau. For the time being he was safe, studying in the Mirrer Yeshiva in Mir, Poland.

Members of the SA and the Kraftfahr-Korps [motor corps] march Jewish men through the streets after their arrest during Kristallnacht. Erlangen, Germany. November 10, 1938. —US Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of Stadtarchiv und Stadtmuseum Erlangen 

 Walter, or Binyomin Zeev, was a 20 year old healthy male when he was taken away and placed in a concentration camp. They asked his mother to bring his clothing to the police station since ‘he was needed for work’. 

In the meantime, great-grandmother Ella Leah Blau somehow managed to get the message to her husband that he should go and hide as the Sturmabteilung wanted to arrest him. They did come back for him again, but Armin quite naturally stayed in hiding for a long time (presumably with non-Jewish friends) until he felt the danger had passed.
 

Great-grandmother Ella Leah worked non-stop to get her son Walter released. After several months of working in a concentration camp, the Germans agreed to release him on the condition that he never return to Germany again.
 

To secure his release, my great-grandparents arranged for him to live with relatives in Holland, Hugo and Herta Lesser who lived in Amsterdam.  The plan was to prepare him for living on a Kibutz with the intention that he would move to Eretz Yisrael and join a Kibutz.
 

Walter was finally safe in Holland, but not for long. Before he had a chance to immigrate to Eretz Yisrael, the Nazis invaded on May 14, 1940, and as they rounded up the Jews for concentration camps, Walter was taken again and brought to the Mauthausen extermination camp. Nazi records indicate they performed medical experiments on him. He was killed July 3rd, 1941.



Walter Benjamin Blau Hamburg, 2 January 1918 – Mauthausen, 3 July 1941
https://www.joodsmonument.nl Nationaal Archief, Rijkvsvreemdelingendienst inv. nr. 873 

Ella Leah could not accept her son’s death, and always held out hope that he may have survived the war.
 After Kristallnacht, my great-grandparents knew their end was near if they stayed in Germany, and their only hope of survival would be to leave. But how? All the doors were closed, Jews were considered persona non grata, with almost no country willing to let them in.

 They applied for visas to the British Mandate of Palestine, the United  States, and England. They wrote many letters to friends and acquaintances to secure guarantees for entry visas. Their ultimate desire was to settle in Eretz Yisrael.

Three months before the start of World War II they received entry visas for England under a special emergency application which stated that great-grandfather Armin’s teaching skills were needed in London.

The first one to get a visa was Tante Rivka. She was afraid to travel alone to a new country as she generally never traveled alone. But she knew it was either life or death, and she knew she was leaving to save her life. She traveled on the Cunard Shipping Line from her hometown Hamburg to Southampton, England. She was met there by her first cousins, children of Cily and Achim Kopel. Soon both of her parents arrived in London.


 

Great Grandfather Aaron Ha'Levi Muskal

Our Grandfather אהרון הלוי - Aaron Muskal was born on June 18 1902 (July 28 1902?) To his parents Nota Arye (Leib) and Esther Malka (Simon).  They named him Aaron after his maternal grandfather, Aaron Simon.
He was born and raised in a small village called Dios Holon in Hungary (now Romania).  He was the eleventh child born to Nota Arye and Esther Malka.
The Muskal's were the only Jewish family living in Dios Holon.
After giving birth to him, his mother Ester Malka became very ill , to the extant that she was unable to nurse her newborn Aaron, and they had to hire a wet nurse for him. His mother remained ill for for quite some time. At some point,  Worried about his wife’s condition, Aaron’s father Nota Arye decided to travel to the Lisker Rebbe to requuest a Brocho for his wife.
 When he told the Rebbe about his wife’s illness, the Rebbe answered him:
"דו וועסט האבן נאך א קדיש'ל"   [meaning, you’ll have yet another son, who will say Kaddish - קדיש for you after 120 years].
Sure enough, some time later Esther Malka gave birth to her twelfth child, Hershel – Harry Muskal.  

Aaron Muskal sitting on right, most likely with classmates.
This is the earliest known photo of Aaron we have.

Aaron’s father Nota Arye left Hungary for America in May 1914, with plans to bring the rest of his family there too in the near future. But Hashem had other plans. Three months later WWI broke out and it was impossible to bring the rest of his family to America, nor could he travel back to them.

Aaron Muskal sitting on right, most probably with classmates. This is the earliest picture we have of Aaron.

With his older brothers drafted into the army to fight the war, and his father Nota Arye out of the country, Aaron and his younger brother Harry where the only men left who could work to support the family.

As part of war, bombs were falling and windows were being shattered. Thus, there was a great need for window repair-men. With this opportunity for employment, Aaron soon went to work as an apprentice for a glazier, and was able help support his mother and siblings. He started working at a very young age. We know that by the time he became בר מצוה   13 years old, he was already working. Years later Aaron told his children how on the day of his  בר מצוה,  he went to shul, put on his tefilin and davend, and then went straight to work.

Aaron continued working as a glazier during the war and after to support the family. In 1922, the Muskal family was finally able to come to the USA. The story of the families time from birth, during the war and their travels to the America have been written by our cousin Nora Banner in the booklet called "One Branch of The Muszkal Family".

Welcome! The goal of this blog is to share the life stories of our ancestors with the greater family. If you  are related to us, please message me or post in the comments. I would love to hear from you!