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Letter
Montreal Holocaust Museum · small copy hosted here (www.cjhn.ca blocks its images elsewhere)
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Letter

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Held by
Montreal Holocaust Museum via Canadian Jewish Heritage Network (incl. Alex Dworkin Canadian Jewish Archives)
Dates
May 03, 1941 (indexed as 1941)
Level
item
Scope & content
1 page, single sided with the date in the upper right corner, and an address in the upper left corner. Narrative: In the 1920’s Serge and Sophie Philipson (nee Orbach) left Berlin for Paris due to rising antisemitism. On July 15, 1930 their daughter Rachel was born. Serge, Sophie and Rachel were Polish citizen, they never got either the German or the French citizenship. In Paris, Serge worked for Les Modes Modernes, the hat factory of his brother-in-law, Henri. When an opportunity to expand the business in Ireland arose, Serge moved to Galway. The new factory opened in July 1938. In August 1939, Sophie, Rachel, and 4 other family members (Rachel’s cousin Stéphane, his maternal grandmother Néné, Serge’s sister Esther and Serge’s sister-in-law Choura) left for Cabourg, in Normandy. After the winter 1939-1940 it became difficult to communicate with Ireland but Rachel and Sophie could still send and receive letter from Serge. At the end of winter 1940, the group moved to Néris and in July 1940, after the occupation of France by Germany, they settled in the zone libre in the village of Cauterets, on the border with Spain. They were reunited with Robert, Serge’s brother. In August 1942, 4 family members (Sophie’s sister Ella and her husband Ernest, their daughter Ruth, Serge’s siblings Robert and Esther) were arrested by local police and deported. They were not seen again. At the beginning of 1943, Sophie, her mother Augusta and Rachel moved to Maubourguet. In April 1943, they moved to Cannes in Hotel Victoria with Henri, Stéphane and Néné. Henri, Sophie and Augusta went into hiding together while cousins Stéphane and Rachel were taken care of by Néné and returned to Maubourguet. In January 1944, Henri, Sophie and Augusta were denounced and arrested. They were transferred to Marseille before being sent by train to Drancy transit camp from where they were deported. It is believed they were killed in a Polish killing centre. In 1944, Rachel moved from one place to another – under a non-Jewish identity - and continued to correspond with her father. In June 1945, she reunited with her father Ireland. They had not seen each other for 6 years. In 1951, Rachel got married. In 1954, she immigrated to Montreal.
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DocumentImmigrationJewish CommunityLetterLetterheadSignatureTypewrittenWarTagged automatically by a vision model; may contain mistakes.
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Extent
Letter : Paper : Ink : Beige ; Ht: 26,5 cm x W: 20,5 cm
Genre / form
textual record
Format
Document
Text in the image
3rd May'41Mrs.Goldie Steuer,3408 Nashville Ave.,New Orleans, LaU.S.A.My dear Goldie,Yours sincerely,P.S. Please give my regards to your parents and all the others.I have just received your letter of the 17th March for which I thank you.Before sending you the cable I knew that you were doing everything possible to help the parents but I got a letter from a friend of Schaja and this made me very nervous so that was the reason I sent the cable. Of course it is impossible for me to get in touch with Schaja himself. You say your heart is with all these unfortunate people and that you would do anything you possibly could for them, I believe this and indeed I appreciate it.I have just received a telegram from Sophie wishing me all the best but I got a letter from Lisbon from a friend of mine telling me that life in France is actually very hard. May I ask again that you do me a favour and send, if possible, to my wife at: " Sophie Philipson, Cauterets, H.P. France, Poste Restante" some chocolate, Coffee and Cocoa. Maybe it would be possible to send these through the Red Cross - I want them especially for Rachel. Would you also please write them a letter and ask them if they have sufficient money to enable them live as I think that for my own wife and child I might get permission to send some money.From here I have nothing special to tell you. Business is going well. It is very pe aceful here and so far we have been very lucky in this country, I hope it will continue.Hoping to hear from you soon and wishing you all the best,I remain,Read automatically; may contain mistakes.
Language
English
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2026-10-19T03:21:16Z · source datestamp n/a · andornot

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