Stumbling Stones in Chemnitz
Fritz Bernstein
Fritz Bernstein
Born: 31 January 1916
Died: 04.08.1942
Sponsor: Georgius Agricola Grammar School
Installation location:
Parkstraße 48 a-hStumbling stone laying on:
5 December 2019
Life path
Fritz Bernstein was born in Chemnitz on 31 January 1916. His parents were Hans Bernstein and Selma Heine, who had married in Chemnitz in July 1905. There were two siblings, Käthe and Karl Ludwig. Fritz Bernstein's father had made a name for himself in the city when he had the architects Kornfeld and Benirschke build a modern factory building for his mechanical woollen goods factory on the site at Zwickauer Straße 173/175 in 1927. At the turn of 1919/20, Hans Bernstein acquired the villa at Parkstraße 48, where the family would live from then on. Fritz was one of the many sons of Chemnitz Jews who successfully attended the Realgymnasium, today's Agricola-Gymnasium.
His father had already appointed him and his siblings as limited partners in the company in May 1922. However, in the midst of the global economic crisis, the woollen mill went bankrupt. This also meant that the family had to give up their villa in autumn 1934. The liquidation of the company was not completed until April 1937. The family had emigrated to Holland early on, where Fritz learnt the trade of a carpenter. He moved to London in 1935. There he earned his living as a bicycle salesman.
Fred Bernstein, as he now called himself, was spared internment as an enemy alien after the outbreak of war. On 22 December 1939, he married Jean Ward in Hampstead. On 24 January 1940, he was accepted into the 97th Pioneer Corps, which mainly carried out construction and supply work for the British Army. His unit was stationed in the Cardiff area.
On 12 December 1941, he sent a message to his sister Käthe in Cuba, in which he regretted that he was only able to see his wife and his son Jack, who had been born a few weeks earlier, very rarely. A few months later, Fritz Bernstein fell seriously ill. He died in a military hospital on 4 August 1942. His grave is located in the parish of Llandrillo (Wales).
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.
more