Location
Swinemünder Str. 74
District
Gesundbrunnen
Stone was laid
June 2005
Born
14 February 1892 in Wirsitz (Posen) / Wyrzysk
Deportation
on 06 March 1943
to
Auschwitz
Murdered
in Auschwitz
-
Stolperstein für Chaim Selma Wurzel © Koordinierungsstelle Stolpersteine Berlin
Selma Meyer was born on 14 February 1892 in Wirsitz (now Wyrzysk, Poland) in what was then the Prussian province of Posen. She moved to Berlin, where she married Chaim Heinrich Wurzel, a milliner born in Tarnów in 1891. They lived in a 2-room apartment at Swinemünder Straße 74, in the district of Wedding (Gesundbrunnen area). Chaim Wurzel was the proprietor of a business selling ladies’ wear and hats, which was based in the same building. The couple’s only child died aged only one.
On 13 September 1939, Chaim Wurzel was imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Selma Wurzel tried in vain to have her husband released by obtaining emigration papers for him through an aid organization. She wrote to her sister-in-law Chaja Knepel, who had emigrated to London in May 1939, that he would only be released if 200 dollars were made available for his emigration in a neutral foreign country. They were not able to deposit the money. Chaim Wurzel was murdered on 15 July 1940 in Sachsenhausen. He supposedly died of severe cellulitis. According to relatives, Selma Wurzel was not sent his ashes until winter 1940/41.
On 1 February 1943, the Gestapo ordered the confiscation of her assets. From the ‘declaration of assets’ she completed on 5 March 1943, we know that she last worked in the Carl Halfar factory at Prinzen Allee 74 making uniform caps for the German army and Berlin public transport operators. On 6 March 1943, she was deported to Auschwitz on the “35th transport to the east”. Selma Wurzel was murdered in Auschwitz; her date of death is not known.
On 13 September 1939, Chaim Wurzel was imprisoned in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Selma Wurzel tried in vain to have her husband released by obtaining emigration papers for him through an aid organization. She wrote to her sister-in-law Chaja Knepel, who had emigrated to London in May 1939, that he would only be released if 200 dollars were made available for his emigration in a neutral foreign country. They were not able to deposit the money. Chaim Wurzel was murdered on 15 July 1940 in Sachsenhausen. He supposedly died of severe cellulitis. According to relatives, Selma Wurzel was not sent his ashes until winter 1940/41.
On 1 February 1943, the Gestapo ordered the confiscation of her assets. From the ‘declaration of assets’ she completed on 5 March 1943, we know that she last worked in the Carl Halfar factory at Prinzen Allee 74 making uniform caps for the German army and Berlin public transport operators. On 6 March 1943, she was deported to Auschwitz on the “35th transport to the east”. Selma Wurzel was murdered in Auschwitz; her date of death is not known.