Stumbling Stones in Chemnitz
Julius Strauss
Julius Strauss
Born: 13 January 1896
Died: after 19.08.1942
Installation location:
Heimgarten 100Stumbling stone laying on:
14 June 2023
Photos of the laying of the Stumbling Stones
Life path
The businessman Julius Strauß lived in Chemnitz from the summer of 1920. He was born in Kitzingen (Lower Franconia) and grew up in Nuremberg. His parents were Josef Strauß and Friederike Heumann. He had five siblings. Julius Strauß was one of the Jewish soldiers who fought in the World War.
In August 1920, he moved to Chemnitz, where from then on he worked for the sheet metal wholesaler Martin Lebrecht, which had a branch in the city from 1914. It was based in the rear building of the house at Wilhelmstraße 13.
Strauß himself found a flat at Zschopauer Straße 1a. His career took off when the company owners Ernst and Paul Lebrecht granted him sole power of attorney in December 1922.
On 27 January 1923, Julius Strauß married Wella Elise Görner, a police inspector's daughter of the same age, in Chemnitz, who had converted to Judaism at the time of the wedding. He returned to Nuremberg in March 1923 for professional reasons. His wife followed him in September 1923 and their sons Ernst-Günther Joseph and Peter Werner were born in 1925 and 1928.
In 1929, the couple returned to Chemnitz and found a suitable flat in the newly built house at Heimgarten 69 in the suburb of Gablenz. Strauß continued to work as a salesman. His wife died on 26 December 1930 and was laid to rest in the Jewish cemetery in the Altendorf district. The widower then moved into the house at Heimgarten 100 with his underage sons.
Ernst-Günther and Peter were enrolled at the Dittesschule (Reichenhainer Straße 33) and attended both Christian and Jewish religious instruction.
7 September 1935 changed the lives of the merchant and his sons. On that day, Julius Strauß was arrested in Chemnitz and transferred to Sachsenburg concentration camp a week later. A surviving judgement states: "The protective custody prisoner Strauß wants to use his Jewish manners to try to avoid work by feigning illness". The camp commandant therefore refused to release the prisoner promptly on 31 January 1936.
Strauß was nevertheless released for a short time before he was arrested again on 10 November 1938 during the November pogroms and taken to Buchenwald concentration camp the following day. He was released on 1 December 1938. This was on the condition that he leave Germany as soon as possible. He emigrated to France in August 1939. The sons continued to live with their grandparents at Melanchthonstraße 61.
Julius Strauß thought he was safe, but the outbreak of war soon changed his situation. He was arrested and taken to the Drancy transit camp. From there, he was deported to the Auschwitz extermination camp on 19 August 1942 and murdered.
Stumbling stones in Chemnitz
It is a project against forgetting: stumbling stones have been laid in Chemnitz every year since 2007.
Embedded in the pavement, the memorial stones commemorate the tragic fates of fellow citizens who were persecuted, deported, murdered or driven to their deaths during the National Socialist regime.
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