Stumbling Stones Zschopauer Straße 74

These memorial stones (so called Stolpersteine of stumbling blocks) commemorate:

* Zita Sonder, born 1900, deported 1942, murdered 1943 in Auschwitz.
* Ludwig Motulski, born 1928, deported 1942, murdered 1942 in Belzec.

Cäcilie Zita Stern married to Leo Sonder, and they had a son, Justin Sonder. The Sonders were a German Jewish family who were considered to be assimilated into German culture. In 1942, when Justin was 16, his parents were deported – first to Theresienstadt, and then to Auschwitz. Justin was forced to work in the arms industry before being deported to Auschwitz, where he briefly saw his father again and learned that his mother, Zita Sonder, had been murdered in the gas chambers. Both Justin and Leo survived Auschwitz, but Leo died in 1949 in Chemnitz as a result of being there. Justin Sonder also returned to Chemnitz. At the age of 90, he traveled to Dethold to testify against an Auschwitz SS guard.

Zita Sonder’s last permanent address in Chemnitz is given as Lindenstrasse 1 in one place, as Apollostrasse 18 in another (the Chemnitz deportation list seen in Yad Vashem’s database). This stolpersteine location, Zschopauer Strasse 74, may have been a Judenhaus.

It is not clear why a stolperstein for Ludwig Motulski is here. He lived with his parents in Zschopau, not far from Chemnitz. Apparently after Reichspogromnacht, the Motulski family was forced to give up business and home, and they moved to what was probably a Judenhaus at this address in Chemnitz. The German Federal Archives states that his permanent address was Zschopau. According to the German Federal Archives, he and his parents were deported on 10 May 1942 from Weimar-Leipzig to the Belzyce Ghetto and murdered there.

Other stolpersteine were installed for Ludwig and his parents at Lange Straße 19 in Zschopau.

"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 with the victim’s 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."

For more information and pictures, please visit Stolpersteine Chemnitz (in German).

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Source

• Text: Fedor de Vries & Anne Palmer
• Photos: Treem
• Yad Vashem Central Database of Shoah Victims’ Names
• holocaust.cz
• Interview with Justin Sonder, January 2011
• Wikipedia: Justin Sonder
• Zschopau: Stumbling Stones
• Stolpersteine.eu