The Haaß Family/Erna Kahn & Wilhelm Haaß

Erna Kahn was the youngest daughter of Josef and Hulda Kahn, born in 1897. In 1924, she married a non-Jew, Wilhelm Haaß, and converted to Christianity[1]. Four years later, Erna and Wilhelm had twins, Günter and Johanna. The family lived in Schulstrasse (site #40 on the Rosengarten map) where Wilhelm operated a ‘Schlosserei’ or machine shop.

The Haaß home & workshop in the early 1930s. Source: Haaß Family Archive

The Haaß Schlosserei/Machine Shop in Schulstrasse. Photo: Themar Fotoklub, 2008

Günter and Johanna were 11 years old when their mother died. The story after the death of their parents is unclear. Their names, like the names of other children of Christian/Jewish marriages, do not appear on any of the censuses of the Jewish community between 1935 and 1939. We know that Günter and Johanna continued to live in Themar until at least 1940 and attended the public school because the Nazi authorities kept close tabs on their whereabouts. At some point, however, Günter and Johanna moved to Gleichamberg, just south of Themar, to live with a sister of Wilhelm, Helene Haaß. Both twins survived the war; Oskar Stapf, the principal during their public school years, received a letter from them in 1947.

[1] Themar City Archives, Namen des Vereins: Israelitische Kultusgemeinde, 1 October 1935. Haaß is identified as “evangelisch getauft.”