Stumbling Stones in Chemnitz
Jakob, Erika, Ryfka and Charlotte Frisch
Jakob Frisch
Born: 31 March 1898
Died: 04.06.1941
Godmother: Kerstin Hermann-Nitz
Erika Frisch
Born: 23.06.1925
Died: after 10 May 1942
Godmother: Hanife Sulejmani
Ryfka Frisch, née Kirschen
Born: 01.07.1898
Died: 19.07.1940
Godmother: Kerstin Hermann-Nitz
Charlotte Frisch
Born: 27.07.1927
Died: after 10 May 1942
Godfather: Andreas Georgi
Installation location:
Car park between Wiesenstraße 10 and Clara-Zetkin-Straße 10Stumbling stone laying on:
5 December 2019
Life path
The Frisch family was one of the Jewish families in Chemnitz that were completely wiped out by the National Socialists during the Shoah. Commercial clerk Jakob Frisch had lived in Saxony since 1921. In March 1923, Jakob Frisch married Ryfka Kirschen, who was the same age, in Vienna. Until then, she had lived with her parents in the Danube metropolis. Before the marriage, Jakob Frisch was registered in the suburb of Schönau. He moved with his wife to Wiesenstraße 52 in Chemnitz, where their two daughters Erika and Charlotte were born in the following years.
During this time, the family lost their Polish citizenship and became stateless. This may explain why Ryfka Frisch was expelled from Germany in 1933 for a passport offence. In 1934, however, the district administration cancelled this order against the housewife. Jakob Frisch worked as a traveller until the end of the 1930s. During this time, Ryfka Frisch fell seriously ill and was initially admitted to the local mental hospital. From there, she was transferred to the Hochweitzschen state sanatorium in December 1936. Her husband took this as an opportunity to divorce her in May 1938. At that time, the daughters were sent to the Leipzig Jewish Children's Home, probably at the instigation of the Jewish community, where they continued to attend school.
On 1 August 1939, the Chief of Police informed Frisch that, as a stateless person, he had to leave the "Reich territory" within two months. The following month, the Second World War broke out and the order was suspended. In January 1940, Jakob Frisch was arrested and taken to Sachsenhausen. The daughters became half-orphans and orphans in quick succession. First, their mother was murdered on 19 July 1940 in the T4 institution in Pirna-Sonnenstein. The father remained in Sachsenhausen. As an invalid prisoner, he was killed in the same institution on 4 June 1941.
Their urns were buried in a common grave in the Jewish cemetery in Altendorf. Erika and Charlotte were deported from Leipzig on 10 May 1942 on a transport of central German Jews to the Belzyce ghetto near Lublin, where they were 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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