Sondermann Stella – Gedenkbuch

Sondermann, Stella

Geburtsdatum:: 10.04.1928
Geburtsort:: Düsseldorf

Beruf:: Schülerin

Wohnorte:: Collenbachstraße 16, Mozartstraße 19

Todesdatum:: nach 1941
Todesort:: Ghetto Minsk

Am 10. April 1928 kam Stella Sondermann als zweites Kind des Ehepaars Hugo und Henriette Sondermann, geborene Löwenstein, in Düsseldorf zur Welt. Sie hatte noch einen älteren Bruder, Kurt, der am 6. Mai 1924 geboren worden war.

Stellas Vater Hugo Sondermann stammte aus dem Ort Horn, wo er am 25. Oktober 1887 als Sohn der Eheleute Aron Moses und Jenny Sondermann, geborene Cohn, zur Welt gekommen war. In Düsseldorf arbeitete er als Handelsvertreter für Textilwaren und Gardinen.
Ihre Mutter war am 21. August 1889 in Assinghausen im Hochsauerlandkreis geboren worden.

Die Familie Sondermann wohnte in Düsseldorf in einer Wohnung in der zweiten Etage des Hauses Collenbachstraße 16. Stella und ihr Bruder Kurt besuchten die Private Jüdische Volksschule in Düsseldorf. Bilder, die Stella dort im Kunstunterricht bei dem Künstler und Lehrer Julo Levin malte, sind erhalten geblieben. Stellas damaliger Mitschüler Günter (heute Gary) Wolff erinnert sich, dass Stella ein besonders schönes Mädchen war, und er damals ein bisschen verliebt in sie war.

Am 10. Oktober 1941 musste die Familie in die Mozartstraße 19 umziehen. Am 10. November 1941 wurde Stella Sondermann mit den Eltern und ihrem Bruder Kurt in das Ghetto von Minsk deportiert und dort ermordet.

Autorin: Hildegard Jakobs, Mahn- und Gedenkstätte Düsseldorf

Quellenangaben
Stolperstein

Dieses Bild malte Stella Sondermann in der Jüdischen Schule in Düsseldorf (SMD)

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Introduction

Presented by the City of Düsseldorf, this digital memorial book commemorates the Jews who were murdered during the Nazi. The City’s Memorial and Education Centre has been researching victims’ life stories since its foundation in 1987, collecting biographical data, documents, letters and photographs. Using databases whose origins can be traced back to the 1990s, together with the collated information to be found in the archival collection, almost 3,000 individuals have been identified who were persecuted and murdered because they were Jews, or “non-Aryan” Christians.

Biographical research into the above necessitated searches – of both national and international archives – for a variety of documents such as register office certificates, registration indexes, address books and exit papers. Perpetrator resources, too, were searched, for example Gestapo files, files relating to communal matters, and tax and administrative district files. Numerous interviews with survivors and members of victims‘ families provided insights into family life, routine and otherwise, as well as of the personality of the deceased.

The cohort of those who were murdered is heterogeneous. Old and young, men and women, the young and the elderly, people from modest backgrounds or those who had built a secure living for themselves; people who, after 1933, had fled to the European continent but who were then “reeled in” by the German occupation; people whose death or murder came about in a variety of circumstances. Some died of starvation, disease or forced labour in the ghettos and concentration camps to which they had been deported, others were murdered in extermination camps. And there were also those who, out of despair, committed suicide or were murdered before the outbreak of war whilst still at home, for example during the 1938 November Pogrom and in other violent events.

The relationship to Judaism of many of those who died was very individual. The breadth and depth of the spectrum was such that they ranged from the deeply pious and orthodox to those of a more liberal or conservative persuasion and, at the other end of the scale, to atheists. All were persecuted as “Jews” by reason of their ancestry, whether they were baptised Christians, having previously been Jews, or had become Jews only in the course of Nazi “investigations”, despite never having had a Jewish identity. Nazi ideology decreed that the decisive factor was not individual identity but “ancestry”, “blood relationship” and “racial hygiene”. Despite all their differences, what all these people had in common was that they came from Düsseldorf, had been born there or had lived there for many years.

Scientific research can access genealogical connections by availing itself of the online compilation of names, dates and biographies; but in addition, by creating connections with their own personal research, survivors and their descendants the world over can also search for their murdered families.

The work on an online memorial book is never done. The intention is to add more dates and names. Of course the Düsseldorf Memorial and Education Centre is grateful for any leads, additions and corrections which contribute to the overall picture.

Düsseldorf, May 2022

Hildegard Jakobs
Academic Project Leader
and Deputy Director

Dr. Bastian Fleermann
Director