personal data


Reins Johanna

Surname
Reins
Birth Name
Adler
First Name
Johanna (Hanna)
Date of Birth
06-02-1914
Place of birth
Bad Kissingen
Other family members

Parents: Hirsch and Therese Adler née Rosenthal
Siblings: Karl (Kalman)Lotte m. LammSuse Adler
Children: Tirza marr. Cohen

Address

Theresienstraße 10 (today's count)

Profession
Emigration/Deportation

1939 emigrated to England
1945 emigrated to Palestine

Date of death
Place of death

biography


Johanna Reins, née Adler was born in Bad Kissingen in June 1914 as the second child of the merchant for manufactured goods Hirsch Adler and his wife Therese, née Rosenthal. She had an older brother (Karl *1910) and two sisters (Lotte *1913, Suse *1920). After Anton-Kliegl-Elementary School, she attended the “Institut der Englischen Fräulein” (Mary-Ward-School) in Hartmannstrasse just like her sisters. There, they found many friends among their non-Jewish classmates. As numerous activities were not allowed to orthodox Jews on Sabbath, their friends helped them in school on Saturday by taking notes for them and carried their school bags. Johanna and her siblings spent a nice and carefree childhood in the spa town. The Adler couple raised their children in the Jewish tradition, but they should also feel as loyal German citizens. 

The harder the Adlers were hit by the massive growth of anti-Semitism in Bad Kissingen at the beginning of the 1930s. Because of the boycott against businesses on April 1, 1933 everything changed immediately from one day to the next. They saw themselves faced with a lot of anti-Semitic agitation and restrictions. The boycott of their shop impaired the family most. Living and surviving became more and more difficult.

Johanna Adler left Bad Kissingen as early as 1935 and moved to Berlin. In 1939, her parents got forged documents for her, on the basis of which she got a working permit for England. 

On arrival, she found a job in a factory that produced ties and, in addition, worked as a housemaid with a Jewish doctor in Golders Green, a suburb of London. That way, she survived the war and the Nazi Era in safety, but lonely and depressed. The more so when she got to know that her younger sister Suse and her parents became victims of Nazi terror and were murdered. In London, she got acquainted with her husband Eliyahu Reins, a Dutch soldier. They married in 1945 and went to Palestine where they first lived in Sde Ilan, then in Moschaw Kfar Pines. In Israel, their two children Tirza and Yehuda were born.

In 1999, Johanna Adler-Reins and her daughter Tirza visited Johanna’s town-of-birth Bad Kissingen for the last time. She enjoyed the friendly welcome of Mayor Christian Zoll and could meet some of her former classmates from the “Institut der Englischen Fräulein”. In spite of these positive experiences, the dark shadows of the past were always present for her during her visit.


References


leicht gekürzt übernommen aus: H.-J. Beck, Kissingen war unsere Heimat, Stand April 2017, S. 957ff) 
(Informationen basieren auf: Tirza Cohen (Jerusalem), The Story of the Adler Family of Bad Kissingen, unveröffentlichtes Manuskript vom August 2010; Übersetzung Hans-Jürgen Beck (Tirza Cohen ist die Tochter Johanna Reins)



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