Martha was Fritz’s wife and Werner’s mother. In Berlin she lived a half-life as a worker and subtenant at Normannenstraße 2 before the Gestapo took her property and the Berlin deportation list placed her in a transport classed for Auschwitz.
Also in Where the record stops · Auschwitz transport record
An Auschwitz transport record names her. This archive does not resolve her fate beyond that file.Where the record stopsFamily
Martha Pohly was born in Göttingen on 15 November 1889. She married Fritz Reichenbach and lived over the clothing shop at Breite Straße 7. Their son Werner was born in Wernigerode in 1914.
After Fritz was murdered at Buchenwald, Martha was in Berlin. Her Vermögenserklärung lists her as a Jewish worker and subtenant at Normannenstraße 2, paying 45 RM in rent, and names Erna Müller as her last employer.
On 1 February 1943 the Gestapo in Berlin ordered her entire property confiscated for the Reich. The file number O 5205–47/30129 belongs to Berlin wave 47: the 33rd Osttransport of 3 March 1943, classed for Auschwitz.
Read the Gestapo order beside the scanMonths after the transport, Commerzbank Wernigerode sent her savings of 36,884.91 RM and 527.67 RM in interest, 37,412.58 RM in all, to the Oberfinanzkasse. Household paperwork continued into 1944. That is the Reich collecting her property; it is not evidence that Martha was still alive in Berlin.
The Wernigerode Stolperstein at Breite Straße 7, laid on 14 April 2009, reads “tot 1944 bei Bombenangriff.” Local writeups repeat that stone against the Bundesarchiv Gedenkbuch date of 3 March 1943 and Auschwitz. The Berlin Stolpersteine biography for Normannenstraße 2 says that Martha died in Auschwitz in 1943. The primary documents in this archive are OFP 30792, including the Gestapo order of 1 February 1943, and the Berlin deportation list for the 33rd Osttransport of 3 March 1943. Arolsen DocID 127212607 lists Martha at running number 963 with the prisoner-number field blank; no Auschwitz intake record has been found.
Family and household
People connected to this life
- Fritz Reichenbach · husband
- Werner Reichenbach · son
Sources
Sources
- Peter Lehmann, Harz-Forschungen XXXVI (2023)
- Brandenburgisches Landeshauptarchiv, Rep. 36A (II) 30792
- Arolsen Archives DocID 127212607
- Bundesarchiv Gedenkbuch en1138520
- Berlin Stolpersteine biography for Normannenstraße 2
- Wernigerode Stolperstein laid 14 April 2009 and local memorial writeups
- Family restitution file
What remains uncertain
The file places Martha in the transport series classed for Auschwitz on 3 March 1943; it does not document her last hour or registration on arrival. No prisoner card, death-book entry, number-book entry or arrival record has been found, and the deportation list leaves Häftlingsnummer blank. Postwar T/D 743.670 is a tracing case, not camp intake. The 2009 Wernigerode stone is a local inscription now contradicted by that file.