And thought that you have a brick wall, this is from Sunday L.A. Times. You should read it and learn how luck can play in your search. George > > > > -------------------- > Finding Lea > -------------------- > > Beckoned by the Dark Eyes in a Photo, a Los Angeles > Judge Tries to Solve the Mystery of the Woman's > Fate, and of the Child in Her Arms > > By KATHERINE MADER > > November 18 2001 > > As a little girl I was prohibited from wearing black > boots: They reminded Dad of the Nazis and gave him > nightmares about Lea. He never spoke of his older > sister, and I learned not to ask him about the aunt > I would never meet, to accept the mystery that we > had "family who disappeared in the war." > > With every passing year, my curiosity grew. Dad died > in 1980 without saying much about Lea. I often > visited or spoke with his last living sister, Jenny, > who returned to Vienna after surviving the > Theresienstadt concentration camp. Aunt Jenny was > always thrilled to hear from me--but reluctant to > speak of Lea. The only evidence Lea had ever existed > was a photo of a young woman Jenny identified as her > eldest sister, posed with an infant. For years I > stared at the picture on my living room wall, > haunted by the same dark eyes that I shared with my > father. Who was the infant? What was the baby's > name? What happened to them? > > Over the years Aunt Jenny dribbled out a few more > details: Lea was married and had three teenage sons. > Her husband's family name was Marfeldt. My father > escaped from Vienna to Switzerland in 1939 with his > brother, Ello. Ello married a Swiss. His only child, > Anita, is my lone first cousin. Although she lives > in Switzerland, we are as close as the siblings > neither of us had. We shared the pain of learning we > had lost three cousins, the boys who vanished with > our aunt. Jenny died in 1996 without adding to our > slender list of facts about Lea. > > It seems impossible in our information age that all > record of a family could disappear. I searched the > Internet and other electronic databases. I leafed > through Red Cross documents, lists from Holocaust > libraries and synagogues, concentration camp > records, Jewish newspapers. I found no Marfeldts. I > learned this was not unusual. Where the Nazis failed > to incinerate an entire family, they often succeeded > in wiping out many of its branches. I was > determined, however. I wanted to record for future > generations that these people had lived, that they > mattered to our family. I hired a Jerusalem private > investigator to search Israeli records. He fared no > better than I. > > Last December, I visited Anita in Switzerland. She > had uncovered a small clue. My Uncle Ello, who died > in 1961, had left voluminous personal papers. In > them was a postcard from Lea, with a 1942 postmark > from Tarnow, Poland. We had always assumed she lived > in Vienna! Lea wrote that she appreciated a package > she received from relatives and needed warm shoes > for her son Fritz, with whom she hoped to remain. > > So we had a cousin named Fritz and he lived in > Tarnow during the war. His last name was not > Marfeldt but Marfeld. Further digging in Ello's > papers yielded more postcards from 1943. Fritz wrote > that he had heard nothing from his parents and > brothers in six months and thought of them > constantly. > > I spent the 2000 winter holidays in Egypt and Jordan > with my husband and children. At the last minute we > decided to spend the final two days in Israel. While > my family toured the Negev, I visited the library at > Yad Vashem, a Holocaust memorial site in Jerusalem. > My last shot, I thought. I found a database called > Pages of Testimony with the names of millions of > Holocaust victims. Everyone with knowledge of > Holocaust deaths is urged to contribute, each > swearing their testimony is correct. Eventually this > database will be accessible via the Internet. > > I typed in "Marfeld." A name appeared on the screen: > Lea Marfeld. A miracle! Her page said she was from > Tarnow and died in a concentration camp. There were > pages for Fritz, dead at age 20, for Martin, dead at > 18, and Simon, dead at 12. All lived in Tarnow. All > died in concentration camps. I was more stunned to > learn that each of my relatives had been entered > into the Pages of Testimony on May 24, 1999, by a > Jacov Zedon. I had never heard of this man. What > prompted him to enter the Marfelds? And why so long > after their deaths? > > Zedon's telephone number was on each page. I used > the library phone to call. A woman answered. I do > not speak Hebrew. In the fractured German of my > youth, I explained what I wanted. After a long > silence she said, "I am so sorry. But my husband, > Jacov, died last week. I never heard him speak of > the Marfeld family. I had no idea that he entered > their names at Yad Vashem." All she could offer was > the phone number of Jacov's cousin. > > I took it, sure that Jacov Zedon had taken Lea's > story to his grave. A man appeared at my elbow. "I > overheard you on the phone," he said. "My German is > as bad as yours." This was Tommy Lamm, a > professional researcher searching for Nazi war > criminals on behalf of the Simon Wiesenthal Center > in Los Angeles. He urged me to keep digging. "Just > when you think that you've reached the end of the > road, another road invariably opens up," he said. > > Tommy spoke Hebrew. He offered to call Jacov's > cousin. The cousin said he had never heard of the > Marfelds. Jacov grew up in Tarnow, he added, and he > referred us to a doctor who kept track of former > Tarnow residents in Israel. The doctor could give us > only a phone number for Lucia Melloch, who had lived > in Tarnow and had immigrated recently. Tommy made > the call because Lucia spoke Polish and Yiddish, and > I speak neither. "I am in the library of Yad Vashem > with an American woman searching for relatives from > Tarnow," he began in Yiddish. "Have you heard of the > Marfeld family?" His face lit up. I listened in > amazement as he translated her reply: "Was the > mother Lea, and the children Fritz, Martin and > Simon?" > > "Yes, yes!" > > "My father owned a house in Tarnow during the war," > she said. "We rented rooms to the Marfeld family." > Since Lucia also spoke broken German, I got on the > phone. Lucia was the same age as Fritz, 20, and they > became good friends when the Marfelds moved into her > father's house. Lucia said Lea's husband, whose > first name she did not recall, taught Hebrew in the > high school. Lea was a tall, kindly woman. Her sons > were smart and well mannered. When war came, the > boys had to leave school and try to survive when > there was almost no food or clothing. In 1942, all > but Fritz were taken by the Nazis. He was taken in > 1943, shortly after writing a final card to Uncle > Ello. > > Lucia believed that they all went to nearby Belzec, > the most deadly Nazi extermination camp. If Belzec > is not as well known as Auschwitz, I learned from a > book at Yad Vashem, it is because of approximately a > million Jews sent there, precisely two emerged > alive. > > I also learned that German troops occupied Tarnow on > Sept. 8, 1939. Jews were seized for forced labor, > robbed, beaten. The Germans torched most of Tarnow's > synagogues. In the ensuing months Jews lost their > jobs and were stripped of money and property. On > June 11, 1942, hundreds were murdered in the streets > and 3,500 went to Belzec. By June 18 another 10,000 > Jews had vanished into Belzec. Many more were > slaughtered in the cemetery or in huge pits outside > Tarnow. A Jewish ghetto was established on June 19, > and in November another train with 2,500 went to > Belzec. > > Lucia last saw Fritz in 1943. His last postcard is > postmarked March 9, 1943. According to the > Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, killing continued in > Tarnow until the end of 1943, when the city was > declared judenrein ("cleansed of Jews"). I have no > doubt that Lea, her husband and three sons were > murdered, if not in Tarnow then surely in Belzec. > > Belzec is an almost forgotten place, millions of > unburied human bone fragments shrouded by an > overgrown forest. I am saddened and disgusted to > imagine the Marfelds' last thoughts, their unmourned > bones scattered in such a place. Small wonder that > my father and aunt wished to spare their children > such horror. > > I asked Lucia, now 77, if she knew why Jacov had > posted the names at Yad Vashem. "Jacov and I went to > school together in Tarnow, and were great friends," > she replied. "When I came to Israel, I wanted to > make sure that the Marfelds and what happened to > them were memorialized. Jacov lived closer to Yad > Vashem, so I asked him to go there and enter the > names." So Jacov's widow never knew the > Marfelds--because her husband hadn't known them. He > had merely done Lucia a favor. But why bother? "I > always imagined that one day Lea's family would find > her through Yad Vashem," Lucia said. > > Two strangers half a world away tried to venerate a > family that had been dead for more than half a > century--and fate conspired to place these > all-but-forgotten names before one of only two > people in the world who cared about the Marfelds. > The names went into the database in 1999. I came to > Yad Vashem a year later. Had I visited before they > were entered, I would have missed them, and probably > stopped looking. Had I visited another day, would I > have found a multilingual researcher to translate? A > year later, would Jacov's widow still be alive? > Would Lucia? > > I used to fantasize that my relatives had escaped > and were safe in Australia, or perhaps South > America. Now I know that they are with the 6 million > Jews who died during the Holocaust. I find peace in > this awful truth and in knowing that they were never > forgotten. And I know that one day my daughter > Julia, sweet and kind and towering over her tall > father, will look through dark eyes like Lea's at > her own children, and tell them of her tall great > aunt and of Fritz, Martin and Simon, her first > cousins once but forever removed. > > * > > Katherine Mader is a Los Angeles Superior Court > judge who lives in Los Angeles with her husband and > three children. She is co-author, with Marvin J. > Wolf, of several nonfiction books, including > "Perfect Crimes" (Ballantine Books, 1995). > > For information about reprinting this article, go to http://www.lats.com/rights/register.htm __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Find the one for you at Yahoo! Personals http://personals.yahoo.com