Karl Neumann was born in Jastrow/ Western Prussia on August 19, 1860 as the son of Markus Neumann and his wife Sara, née Frank.

After his marriage to Klara Löwenthal from Bad Kissingen in October 1893, he lived in the Franconian spa town. No later than in 1902, he possessed a building for his residence and his business in Ludwigstrasse. Their two children Julius and Else were born in 1894 and 1895. On April 30, 1903, Karl Neumnn had been granted the citizens’ rights of Bad Kissingen. He was a merchant and ran a distinguished fashion house for men’s clothes in the spa town. Karl’s wife Klara died already in April 1915.

The Neumann family soon became a target of Nazi terror: Karl’s son Julius who ran his father’s business in the meantime was taken into “Schutzhaft” (protective custody) for two months in March 1933 because of alleged “Marxist and communist machinations”. Their business was also hit by the boycott actions and an attack in 1935. Like in some other Jewish shops, in the night before August 20, 1935, an acidic fluid was sprayed through the keyholes of the shop doors “that spread a very unpleasant odour” and carpets in the shops involved were damaged (See: State Archive Würzburg, Landratsamt Bad Kissingen: 1153 Politische Halbmonats- und Monatsberichte der Gendarmeriestationen an das Bezirksamt 1935). In or around Pogrom Night on November 9, 1938, two SA men are said to have appeared at the Neumanns’ with drawn pistols, according to oral reports. Karl and his son Julius are reported to have been forced under threats to sign a contract for the sale of their imposing estate in Ludwigstrasse 9 (former 3). Nowadays, the proceedings can’t be proved any longer. What is a fact is that on February 1, 1939, one of these SA men opened his delicatessen shop in the Neumanns’ building and was the owner of the estate from that time on. Under further repressions, the Neumanns had to dissolve their business in a clearance sale (See: Thomas Künzl, Bad Kissinger Stolpersteinbiografie).

After the situation got more and more dangerous, at the latest from the beginning of 1938, Karl Neumann and his son endeavored to get an emigration permit for New Zealand, where Karl’s daughter Else and her husband meanwhile lived. But they were not successful with their efforts which came to nothing when the war started. On February 1, 1940, the widower and his son had to move to Maxstrasse 23a, into the house of the Hermann Holländer family – one of the so-called “Jews’ Houses”. The former fashion dealers were now forced to do menial labour such as street sweeping or cleaning the sewer. According to oral tradition, Karl Neumann, now a man of 80 years, was to do cleaning tasks again and again. 

Karl Neumann was checked out from Bad Kissingen on May 1, 1942 and is regarded as being displaced into an Old People’s Home in Würzburg. From there, at the age of 82, he was deported on September 23, 1942 on Transport II/26 to Theresienstadt via Nuremberg where he died. The only hint as to his date of death is a note in the Bad Kissingen Citizens’ Registration Files. On December 18, 1942 his death is registered at the District Court of Bad Kissingen. (See: Thomas Künzl, Stolpersteinbiografie).