Ida Einstein, née Schlossberger

Ida Schlossberger was born on June 1, 1890, the fifth of seven children of Ernestine and Simon Schlossberger in Unterdeufstetten, in today's Baden-Württemberg.¹ Only four of her siblings survived infancy.² The family moved to Crailsheim, the exact date of the move cannot be determined.³

On June 16, 1912, Ida married the cattle dealer Isak Einstein of Kriegshaber and together they moved to Ulmer Straße 185.⁴ Through her marriage to Isak she became part of the large Kriegshaber Einstein family. The Einstein family was well known in Swabia because of the cattle trade founded by Isak's father Simon.⁵ Ida's sister Mina was also a member of the extended Einstein family, having married Isak's brother Hermann in 1911. Ida and Mina each gave birth to a daughter in 1916: Ida to Beate and Mina to Brunhilde.⁶ Ida's daughter Beate experienced no anti-Semitic exclusion during her school years from 1922 to 1933.⁷

The April boycott of Jewish businesses in 1933, carried out after the National Socialists came to power, did not affect Einstein's livestock business. But in the years that followed, sales declined more and more.⁸ Ida and Isak Einstein’s family was directly affected by the consequences of the Reich Pogrom Night of November 9-10, 1938. Their daughter Beate was fired without prior notice, and two of Isak's brothers were arrested.⁹ In addition, the Einsteins were forced to give up the cattle business and sell some plots of land at a very low price.¹⁰ After these developments, the Einsteins hoped for an opportunity to leave the country as soon as possible. Beate, like her cousin Brunhilde, was able to emigrate to Great Britain in 1939.¹¹ The Einstein brothers tried to emigrate together, but immigration requirements, such as conversion to Catholicism in South America, prevented this plan for the practicing Jewish families. Ida's brother-in-law Moriz and his wife Lydia therefore decided to send their children to Great Britain on a so-called Kindertransport.¹² For those remaining in Nazi Germany, the situation became increasingly threatening. The emigration ban of October 1941 finally eliminated the chance of escape.¹³

Many Augsburg Jews were compelled to do forced labor, including Ida, who had been ordered to work in the Augsburg balloon factory starting in April 1942.¹⁴ Deportations from Augsburg began in November 1941. The first to be deported were two of Isak's brothers who were transported to Piaski in April 1942.¹⁵ Ida's mother Ernestine and her brother Siegfried were deported as well.¹⁶ The members of the Einstein family who had remained in Kriegshaber until then were expelled from their homes within the following months and forced to move into so-called Judenhäuser (Jewish houses).¹⁷ Ida's and Isak's last place of residence is the Judenhaus at Ulmer Straße 207, which is registered in the corresponding police record in the Augsburg City Archives as their last place of residence.¹⁸

On March 8 or 9, 1943, Ida and Isak, as well as Isak's two brothers and their wives who had remained in Kriegshaber, were deported to Auschwitz and were killed there.¹⁹

This is an excerpt from the biography written by Rebecca Listle, student of the upper school class of 2013/2015 at the Paul-Klee-Gymnasium Gersthofen, for the W-Seminar in History entitled "Victims of the persecution of Jews during the Nazi period in Augsburg and surrounding area".