Stumbling Stones Bahnhofstraße 75

These small, brass, memorial plaques (stolpersteine or stumbling stones) commemorate:

* Richard Goldstein, born 1874, escaped 1940 to Slovakia, paddle steamer Pencho, sunk in Aegean Sea, taken to Italy, interned Ferramonti, dead 10 January 1943.
* Else Goldstein née Leipziger, born 1887, fled 1940 to Slovakia, paddle steamer Pencho, sunk in Aegean Sea, taken to Italy, interned Ferramonti, 1944 Palestine.

Background

Richard Goldstein, an expediter, and Else Leipziger maried in 1911 and had one daughter, Rita. In 1935, Rita fled to Palestine, where she married Egon Oschinsky. Richard and Else visited them in 1937 but did not like it and returned to Cottbus. Life was not easy there, including the serious injuries Richard suffered after being thrown from a tram because he was Jewish. He and Else made arrangements to return to Palestine. In 1940 they fled first to Bratislawa, where they got on a steamer, the Pencho. The steamer had engine trouble, crashed, and sank in the Aegean. The Italians who rescued the Goldsteins put them into the Ferramonti di Tarsia internment camp, where Richard Goldstein died in January 1943. The next year, Else Goldstein managed to get to Palestine via Egypt.

"Stolpersteine" is an art project for Europe by Gunter Demnig to commemorate victims of National Socialism (Nazism). Stolpersteine (stumbling stones) are small, 10x10cm brass plaques placed in the pavement in front of the last voluntary residence of (mostly Jewish) victims who were murdered by the Nazis. Each plaque is engraved victim’s with the name, date of birth, and place (mostly a concentration camp) and date of death. By doing this, Gunter Demnig gives an individual memorial to each victim. One stone, one name, one person. He cites the Talmud: "A human being is forgotten only when his or her name is forgotten."

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Source

• Text: Anne Palmer
• Photos: wie-wolf
• Yad Vashem Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names
• Berlin.de: Sieben Neue Stolpersteine … Cottbus
• MyHeritage.com: Richard Goldstein
• Helmut Heckscher’s memoir, Uprooted and Replanted, note #10. (No page numbers seen.)
• Stolpersteine.eu