This article is based upon a talk given at the IAJGS Conference in Philadelphia, August 2–6, 2009—Ed.

For the past five years, I have been researching the fate of Jewish refugees in Belgium, France, Italy, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom using records in public and private archives in a variety of repositories. I visited more than 80 archival facilities, sometimes staying for several weeks in one place. I focused first on materials for the period 1940–42/43 pertaining to Austrian and German Jewish refugees in the non-occupied Southern Zone of France. From there, I followed whatever paper traces I could find for these individuals.

In order to document persons after they left their country of origin, a researcher must be familiar with the various governmental organizations and the laws and decrees issued in each country researched. Sometimes the archival records of a welfare organization hold the only evidence of the fate of an individual in a specific location; public records may still be held by one or another administration entity. Some have been destroyed.

Despite various difficulties finding it, a huge amount of data about Holocaust victims is still available, and I almost always have recovered evidence of a trail for the 400 individuals I have researched. My research began with one child (see Case Study below) which led me ultimately to create databases containing the names of more than 100,000 Jewish refugees.

Refugees in France

To understand the types of records available for research today, genealogists must know both the history and the French governmental administration during the wartime period. The election of Adolf Hitler as Chancellor of the German Third Reich on January 30, 1933, did not immediately lead to the exile of German Jews. The Reichstag fire of February 27, 1933, and the arrest of more than 4,000 opponents of the regime triggered the flight abroad of the first wave of refugees, among whom were many Jews.¹ Paris was not the only destination, of course. Approximately 25,000 to 30,000 Germans took refuge in France at the end of 1933, and during that period, Sanary, in the Departement of Var, became the world capital of German literature. A second wave of immigration dates from the introduction of anti-Semitic measures in Germany; first, the boycott of Jewish shops and then the application of the Nuremberg laws in 1935.

A committee for the aid to victims of German anti-Semitism was created in France on June 22, 1933, by Baron Robert de Rothschild and Albert Lévy and was administrated by Raymond-Raoul Lambert. The committee opened four shelters in Paris in order to deal with the victims who arrived that year. Many in France spoke in defense of the victims, but this did not prevent the introduction of restrictive legislation for all refugees in 1934, including an obligatory visa and an identity card subject to certain conditions.² Refugees arrived from the Saarland in 1935 after a plebiscite there reincorporated the Saar into the Reich. Notable among these refugees were Germans who had taken sanctuary in the Saarland in 1933 and had to move again in 1935.

On September 17, 1936, Leon Blum, head of the French government, signed a convention of recognition of the status of German refugees. The Popular Front had no impact on the previous measures. World War II broke out on September 3, 1939, and led the Daladier government (successor to Blum) to reinforce surveillance of political elements considered subversive and to the internment of all individuals, whether aliens or not, considered a threat to national defense or public safety. The Conseil des Ministres (French cabinet) of 1938, relating to the “situation and policing of foreigners” had already addressed the case of unwanted aliens, “the elimination of whom is essential…on the grounds of their actions that are a danger to national security.” With a view to their internment, “special gathering centers” were created.

A huge wave of German Jewish emigration erupted after the Anschluss³ and later Kristallnacht⁴ and refugees arrived in Belgium and France (in other western European countries also) attempting to escape the Nazi regime. According to historian and political analyst Patrick Weil, a total 120,000 Germans and Austrians were admitted to France between 1933 and 1940, of whom 90 percent were Jews.⁵ Official evaluations reflect a discrepancy; they claim that in 1939, between 45,000 and 70,000 German and Austrian refugees were living in French territory.

French Administrative Districts (Departments)

Each department has a state archive called Archives départementales in which are held police files and prefecture archive holdings related to persecution (forced residence, camps, arrest, police research, and so forth). Also in these archives is a census of foreigners, military files of the men who joined the Foreign Legion in 1939 to avoid internment, and a variety of other useful sources of information.

A recently enacted French archival law (2008) has shortened the period of restricted accessibility for most public records to 50 years (with the exception of judicial and medical files), and even postwar documents are now freely available—as long as one knows where to search and what to expect. Comparing a French map of 1940 to a contemporary map allows a researcher to see where the various concentration camp files are held today.

In each department that had one or more internment camps, such as Pyrennees, Rivesaltes, and others, relevant files are available in the departmental archives. Most are not indexed and often not even sorted. Almost none are digitized.

What to Expect and Where—Nationally

• CARAN in Paris and Fontainebleau National Archives <www.archivesnationales.culture.gouv.fr/>
• ANOM ( exCAOM) Aix en Provence Overseas archives (Remember that France had colonies at that time.)
• Foreign affairs records in Paris and Nantes (consular records, visas, and similar documents) <www. diplomatie.gouv.fr/archives>
• Military records for Foreign Legion records and Gendarmerie <www.servicehistorique.sga.defense. gouv. fr>

What to Expect and Where—Departments

• Since 1922, France has had 90 departments, each of which has a state (departmental) archive, as well as city and private archives.
• Paris has a special status and records are held in the archives of the Prefecture de Police and in the archives of the city (and department) <www. archivesdefrance.culture.gouv.fr/annuaire-services/de­part­­ement/paris>.

What to Expect and Where—Cities

In small towns and villages, archives are held in the hotel de ville or mairie (city hall). In larger locations, archives may be elsewhere.

Holocaust Records Held in Public Archives
(archives départementales)

• Camp file records
• Police files of arrests
• Foreigner files
• List of transfers
• Work permits
• GTE files

      Commissariat Général aux questions juives (Aryanization,research and arrest files) mainly are held in National Archives at the CARAN.

Holocaust Records Held in Private Archives

The archives of the Memorial de la Shoah in Paris, also known as the Centre de documentation juive contemporaine (CDJC), , consist of more than 30 million records, many bearing the original signatures of the heads of the Third Reich or persons responsible for the deportation of Jews from France.

German Sources

Militärbefehlshaber in Frankreich (MBF). The German military administration in France was divided into two sections, the command staff and the administrative staff. The archives of the command staff deal with the collaboration between the occupation authorities and the Pétain government, the persecution of Jews, and the general policy of retaliation. In the archives of the administrative department, one finds documents about the influence of the occupation authorities on the French economy (intervention, robbery and especially, economic Aryanization). The German Embassy in Paris was actively involved in anti-Jewish measures as reflected in the many letters and telegrams sent several times daily between Berlin and the Paris embassy.

Gestapo in Occupied France. The archival fond consists of letters, telegrams, and reports on the internment, deportation, and other measures against Jews, such as the wearing of the yellow star, denaturalization, and retaliatory measures in general. Other documents pertain to pressure on Italian politics in the Italian-occupied zone.⁶ This fond was increased by material on the Gestapo in France, and kept in the German Federal Archives (Bundesarchiv Koblenz). It gives a picture of the structure and activities of the Gestapo in France, especially the anti-Jewish service led by Theodor Dannecker, then Heinz Rothke.

Nuremberg Trials Archives. This archive contains part of the documentation gathered for the military international trial, as well as other trials by the United States military tribunal. The collection is subdivided into the following groups:

• NO (Nazi Organization). Documents from all Nazi organizations are gathered in this grouping, especially those related to the role of the SS and the WVHA (Central Bureau of Economy and Administration SS).
• NOKW (Nazi “Oberkommando der Wehrmacht”) Documents relating to the activity of the German army
• NG (Nazi Government). A group of documents that illustrate the activities of organizations of the state
• NI (Nazi Industry). A group of documents about industry and financial institutions in the Third Reich

Records Held by CDJC

The Centre de documentation juive contemporaine holds the following:

• Records of the General Commissariat for Jewish Questions (CGQJ). CDJC has more than 20,000 documents from the CGQJ and the trial of its leaders.
• The archives of Professor George Alexis Montandon. Montandon was a Swiss-born anthropologist and expert on racial issues with the Commissioner General for Jewish Questions.
• Institute for the Study of Jewish Questions. The CDJC holds most of the papers of this organization created in 1941 at the instigation of Theodor Dannecker. Included is the correspondence of the secretary general and descriptions of the Institute’s activities.
• Other important records held by the CDJC include those from the Directorate of the Armistice, the Prefecture of Police, and such Jewish organizations as the Children Rescue Organization (OSE), the French Jewish Scouts (EIF), the Federation of Jewish Societies of France (FSJF), the Representative Council of Jewish Institutions of France (CRIF), the Society for the Protection of Jewish Children (OPEJ), the Central Commission for Children (CEC), and others.

An abridged version of the archives’ catalog, minus data related to the privacy of individuals mentioned, is available online at <www.memorialdelashoah.org/ b_content/getContentFromNumLinkAction.do?item Id=713&type=1>.

The catalogue of the CDJC includes documents regarding the history of World War II, anti-Semitism, Jewish communities in the 19th and 20th centuries, and the Holocaust. The CDJC online archives include more than 1,000,000 original documents, 84,000 photographs, 3,000 original posters and postcards, 30,000 books and 2,000 periodicals from its print library and the video library of several thousand testimonies, documentaries, and films.

The databases in the catalogue of the Victims of Anti-Jewish Persecution in France include the names of Jews deported from France as listed on the Wall of Names at the entrance to the Memorial. Also included are the names of those who died in the internment camps in France, the internees, and those shot (where traces were found). The databases are constantly changing, increased by the testimonies of families, and are regularly updated.

Another database that may be searched has the names and biographical data on members of the Jewish resistance in France identified by the Alumni Association of the Jewish Resistance in France (ARJF-OJC). Resources from various Jewish organizations such as FTP-MOI (Francs Tireurs Partisans), FFI (French Forces of the Interior), and FFL (Forces Françaises Libres) will be added as well. The database of the Righteous of France, recorded by Yad Vashem (Israel), contains the names of French Gentiles who saved Jews in France or elsewhere in Europe as well as the names of French Righteous who lived outside of France.

Case Study: Karin Suzanne Kornweitz

The fate of a young Austrian girl who was a refugee in France between 1940 and 1943 illustrates how archival resources may be employed to investigate fading traces of an individual’s life. I began my research on Karin Suzanne Kornweitz and her mother, Frieda, during the summer of 2004 in southern Germany where one of the child’s relatives gave me copies of her alien police file from Brussels. Included was a document stamped by the Consulate General of Belgium in Vienna dated 1938 and a photograph showing a child with blonde curls, chubby cheeks, and mischievous eyes posing for the photographer.

Also in the file was a document from the War Victims Administration in Brussels stating that Karin’s last known address was 24 La Croisette, Barcelonnette, France.

My first step was what I believed to be Karin’s last. In mid-July 2004, I visited Barcelonnette in southern France in the middle of the Ubaye Mountain Valley. No one in the city hall acknowledged ever having heard of Jewish refugees, nor of Austrians. But in the attic of a building where I finally was permitted entry after a long discussion with a clerk, under a pile of unsorted and, of course, unclassified, dusty papers, was a notebook written in fading blue ink with the inscription “distribution du lait” (milk book).

After a few pages, the name Kornweitz and Linder (Karin’s mother’s maiden name) appeared. Karin was marked J3, which meant that she was a child over the age of 13 and could get more milk (even though she was only seven years old at the time). The fact that Karin’s mother also was on the list was odd and could only mean that she was pregnant.

That same summer, I visited four different cities where Karin had been; later in the year, I went to another three. After that, I began with the departmental archives. I visited five archives and finally went to the welfare organizations that also had a record of Karin. In New York City, I found Karin cited in the YIVO archives among several records of the General Union of Israelite of France (UGIF). In Vienna, I collected archival documents about Karin’s parents, and at the Israelitische Kultus Gemeinde (IKG), the Jewish Community of Vienna, her birth record.

In Milan, I found Karin in the State archives and in the Jewish center of documentation (CEDEC), evidence of her in Cuneo’s Museum of Resistance, and her name in Borgo San Dalmazzo’s camp. From Milan, Karen was sent to Nice and then to Drancy before being deported to Auschwitz by convoy 73 on December 7, 1943.

Karin’s file was waiting for me in the archives of the OSE. I found relatives of hers—survivors. I found a biography written by an uncle who was a kapo (overseer) in Auschwitz and investigated by the French military court in 1945 for possible trial. He had fled to the United States where he refashioned his memory. He transformed his time of collaboration with the Nazis in France, Italy, and Auschwitz to become a hero in various testimonies he gave. He forgot to mention that he was investigated for murders by the French military court, considered a participant, and kept only his victim identity. I found survivors of his command. The biography, written in 1995, was largely fabrication—sprinkled with a bit of truth. I had found the original military archives; the witnesses for the court cases were dead.

I contacted the son of the uncle saying that I had documents showing his father’s collaboration with the Nazis. Not surprisingly, the son did not want to see them. After we published the website, another of Karin’s cousins contacted me, eager to know what his father and uncle had done to survive.⁷ The International Tracing Service (ITS) has no record of Karin except for a copy of the French deportation list on which she appears. The absence of ITS records most likely means that Karin either was murdered at Auschwitz or arrived there already dead.

I found the final set of documents about Karin only a few months ago, four years after I started the search in a part of the OSE archives held at the CDJC in Paris. Karin never attended school, so I did not find her in the city school records. Karin is not a file in my hard drive; she is a little blonde girl who disappeared at the time of the destruction of Europe’s Jews. We are not related in the way genealogy relates people; we are related because I am among those who remember her, without ever having previously known her.

Karin’s Story

Karin Suzanne Kornweitz was born on October 26, 1936, in Vienna to a Jewish family. Her father, Nathan Otto, a bookseller, was 26 years old at the time; her mother, Frieda, was 24. Karin’s records in Barcelonnette shows she died in December 1943 in Auschwitz with her mother. The convoy arrived on December 7, 1943. Her father died in Mauthausen after a death march; he is recorded in the Mauthausen death book. Julius Kornweitz, her uncle, a resister and leader of a communist network, was murdered in Mauthausen—shot in the head upon his arrival. Karen’s grandparents, Ojzer and Marem Kornweitz, survived, hidden in a small apartment in Brussels. They continued to look for their sons and granddaughter until they died in the 1950s. Bertold Linder, the kapo, and his brother, Wilhelm, survived.

To read more about Karin and her family go to <www.jewishtraces.org>, follow the individual chap­ter, and choose the Kornweitz family.

Notes

1. The Reichstag was the German parliament. The fire was set by an unemployed Dutch bricklayer whom the Nazis had manipulated. The day after the fire, Hitler asked for extended powers and received them from President Hindenburg in an act called the Reichstag Fire Decree. The decree suspended most civil liberties in Germany and was used by the Nazis to ban publications not considered “friendly” to the Nazi cause. Hitler, after having obtained his emergency powers, announced that the fire was the start of a Communist plot to take over Germany. This sent the Germans into a panic and isolated the Communists further among the civilians. In addition, thousands of Communists were imprisoned in the days following the fire, on the charge that the Party was preparing to stage a putsch (takeover of the government). With Communist electoral participation suppressed (the Communists previously had received 17 percent of the vote), the Nazis were able to increase their share of the vote in the March 5, 1933, Reichstag elections from 33 percent to 44 percent. This gave the Nazis and their allies, the German National People’s Party (which won 8 percent of the vote) a 52 percent majority in the Reichstag.
2. Restrictions of all sorts were applied to avoid delivering these documents. Proof of income and ability to work had to be supplied along with other required data.
3. The German word Anschluß or Anschluss, meaning annexation, stands in history for the politico-military annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany into the Reich.
4. The Nazis reviewed the pogrom at a meeting held on November 12 to assess the economic impact of events they call Kristallnacht in reference to the thousands of windows that were smashed during the night of November 9–10, 1938.
5. Researcher at the CNRS in France, teacher in various universities; his bibliography may be found at .
6. The armistice of June 24, 1940, was signed by France and Fascist Italy (just after the armistice of June 22, 1940, signed by France and Nazi Germany). It ended the war declared on France on June 10, 1940, by Mussolini. Four departments had been partially occupied: Alpes-Maritimes, Basses-Alpes (Alpes-de-Haute-Provence since 1970), Hautes-Alpes, and Savoie.
7. <www.jewishtraces.org>

Manuela Wyler is the executive director of Dorot association d’histoire, a French non-profit research and publication organization based in Lyon. She is chief editor of jewishtraces.org and retirada.fr and has worked for the museum in Izieu, France. She is a consultant for the Memorial de la Shoah archives division in Paris.