A girl in Hamburg

[roguegrafix]

Hello All, 

This is the family history/ fable

After reading it I would like to ask:
1. Do you think this is believable?

2. In Hamburg, where would you flee to?

3. I've seen many documentaries where Aussies and Kiwis stay in Berlin. So why do you think she must flee?

I might add that she was a governess to an Australian Jew. Would that matter?
From my Great Uncle:

Lucy told my mother about her rushed exit from Germany. Mum told me.
Lucy said she could tell she was being followed along the streets of
Hamburg by two men. She was almost certainly living with the
Kronheimers, and there was a big department store nearby which had a
sort of back entrance to the railway station. She decided to get out, so
packed a minimal amount of stuff in a bag too small to attract
attention, and headed off down the street. She had cunningly arranged
her walk just before train departure time, so wandered nonchalantly into
the store and wandered about, then nicked out into the station and
jumped on the train just as it was leaving, with her pursuers lost
somewhere in the store.

I have read that there were no passports or departure controls till a
few years later, I think about  1917, so her little trick wouldn't have
worked in later times.

I know she spent  several periods in England till about 1928 or30,
living in several places, but I reckon she would have fled to Henry and
Helen at the orphanage in Hull. She and Henry were very close.

That's hearsay and supposition, but I'd say almost certain. She rejoined
the Kronheimers after the war.

[charlie2]

When is this supposed to have happened?
 

[GreyC]

Neither the main-station in Hamburg nor in Altona nor the ones in Wandsbek or Harburg had a department-store so close by that it had a back door entrance to a department store (apart from the fact that neither of the latter cities mentioned where part of Hamburg before 1937). Passports had to be carried by foreigners in Germany at all times from 21st June 1916 and it had to be shown when crossing the border.

There was someone by the name of Max Kronheimer, a tobacco merchant in Hamburg during the first WW. His private address was not far from the Dammtor-Bahnof, yet this, too, was not close to any department-store, nor was the next in line, Bahnhof Sternschanze.

GreyC

Edited 10 hours ago by GreyC

[knittinganddeath]

1 hour ago, roguegrafix said:

So why do you think she must flee?

Did she really HAVE to flee, though?

(Why) did she believe that those men were government agents? How long had they followed her for? Maybe they were "just" trying to rob her, or were civilians who thought she was a spy and were trying to gather more details before reporting her to authorities? Were they even watching her in the first place, or was she paranoid given the increased xenophobia in Germany at that time?

[KizmeRD]

Much depends on the actual date when this alleged tale of fleeing Germany took place. Initially at the outbreak of the war enemy nationals comprising of women, children and men over military age or unfit to serve were allowed to go home. But after press reports of inhuman treatment of German nationals held in England, British civilians began to be rounded and interned in camps (military age men first), the main one being at Ruhleben.

Some of Max Kronheimer’s family certainly had Australian connections, so I think your lady may have worked in his household. As previously identified he was a wealthy tobacco merchant and resided in Admiralität Str. 71. A more or less direct route from there to the main station in Hamburg would likely have taken her up Mönckeberger Str. (which is where many of the large department stores are located, some relatively close to the station). As for routes out the country, heading north into Denmark would have been one option, the other would have been to head eastwards into Holland.

M.

[GreyC]

1 hour ago, KizmeRD said:

resided in Admiralität Str. 71

No he did not, I am afraid. That´s the address of his office. He lived at the Rothebaumchaussee, not far from the Dammtor-Bahnhof as mentioned above.

GreyC

[roguegrafix]

Hi All, 

Many thanks to the replies received. I think the story might have been embellished with its telling.

This is supposed to have happened at the start / outbreak of the war.

Cheers