Visit by Julia Maria Hochfeld Baker at the Hannoverscher Bahnhof Commemorative Site

In 1942, the Hochfeld couple were forced to move from their apartment in St. Georg to a so-called “Jews' house” at Kleine Schäferkamp 32. In July 1942, they were taken to the school at Schanzenstraße 105, which served as a collection point for the deportations on July 15 and 19, 1942.  On July 15, 1942, the Hamburg Gestapo deported over 926 Jews from Hamburg to the Theresienstadt ghetto via the Hannoverscher Bahnhof. In a total of eleven transports, over 1700 Jewish women, children and men from Hamburg and northern Germany were deported to the Theresienstadt ghetto. Alfred and Julie Hochfeld were deported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp in mid-May 1944 and murdered there.

Julia Maria Hochfeld Baker's father, Hans-Joachim Hochfeld (born 1911), was no longer admitted to the exam in 1936 due to his Jewish background. He was forced to abandon his law studies. He managed to emigrate to Brazil in 1938 with the help of Aracy de Carvalho. As an employee of the Brazilian consulate, Aracy de Carvalho issued numerous visas to Jewish people against the regulations and thus helped them to emigrate.

During the visit, Julia Maria Hochfeld Baker and Israel Hochfeld Baker Monteiro viewed the exhibition in the information pavilion and the current photo installation “...without any hope of return”. Deportation assembly points in Hamburgs. They spoke with members of the project team about the development of the future documentation centre. It will be dedicated to the history of the National Socialist deportations from northern Germany and their continuing relevance for the present day.

Afterwards, they visited the name plaques at the Sternschanze primary school, which commemorate the deportations of July 15 and 19, 1942. Julia Maria Hochfeld Baker was present at their opening in summer 2022.