Gershon-Lehrer.be

Genealogy Services

Please contact me if you’re in the need of Genealogy related services (research, preparations, trips, etc).

You may contact me for any country
(such as Belgium, The Netherlands, Germany, Poland, Israel, etc).

Contact me and let’s discuss fees and further details about your request.

Month: May 2012

  • An introduction to the alien/immigrants files at the FelixArchief (Antwerp Archives)

    Microfilms at the FelixArchief

    Many of the Jews citizens living in Antwerp around the turn of the 20th century were immigrants. In addition, while it is impossible to arrive at precise statistics, of the 65-75,000 Jews living in Belgium on the eve of World War II, at least 85 percent had arrived in the country after 1918. It is for that reason that I want to focus in this article on the alien files which probably are the most interesting for people who have had Jewish relatives in Antwerp. I hope to write in the future about other collections held by the Antwerp Archives.

    How and by whom were the files assembled?
    All new immigrants (except for the immigrants who are in certain privileged categories) who wanted to stay in Belgium, did have to contact the municipality of the place where they resided in.

    The city council was in charge of some tasks imposed on them by the Belgian government such as:

  • Justin Gerstner – 5 November 1921, Ebelsbach (Germany) – October 31, 1944, Wolsum (Netherlands)

    Justin Gerstner – 5 November 1921, Ebelsbach (Germany) – October 31, 1944, Wolsum (Netherlands)

    The following post was already published on my old website. I am now republishing it with some corrections.

    Justin Gerstner (Source: www.tsjerkwert.nl)

    Justin was born on 5 November 1921 as the son of Salomon Gerstner and Frieda Sundermann in the village of Ebelsbach which is in the German state of Bavaria (according to the NIOD he was born on 5 February 1921). The town of Ebelsbach is about 20 km northwest of Bamberg and about 86 km north of Nuremberg. The Gerstners are originally from Lisberg and its area in Bavaria.

    According to a letter (of 12 maart 2004) from the NIOD to Ms. Kappner from Haszfurt (Germany), Justin fled in 1934 from Nazi-Germany. He initially lived with his uncle Joseph Gerstner in Enschede. Justin appeared on the Enschede list of the “Zentralstelle für judisch Auswanderung” (the Zentralstelle für judisch Auswanderung was the Amsterdam office of the Nazi Sicherheitspolizei and the SD, which supervised the deportation of Jews from the Netherlands. Ferdinand Hugo aus der Fünten was in charge of this office, which was situated in the Euterpestraat).

    Justin worked as an office clerk in Enschede and, according to the above mentioned list of the Zentralstelle, he lived on

    (more…)