“Wiedergutmachung”?
In 1948, Edith Michaelis’s sister submitted applications for “Wiedergutmachung” (restitutionReturn of confiscated property to its rightful owners or their heirs.) and compensation to the Wiedergutmachungsämter (RestitutionReturn of confiscated property to its rightful owners or their heirs. Offices). Born on 21 January 1890 in Berlin as Johanna Neustadt, and previously married to Ludwig Lewin, Michaelis was a dentist with a practice at Olivaer Platz, very close to her sister’s apartment at Kurfürstendamm 185. Persecuted by the National Socialist authorities as Jewish, she was prohibited from continuing her profession from 1937 onwards. She therefore decided to flee to Denmark with her daughter in the same year.
Johanna Christensen was the only surviving heir of her sister Edith Michaelis. At the time of the applications, however, she had no information about the whereabouts of her sister and brother‑in‑law and did not know whether they were still alive.
Index card of the Central Location Index concerning Max and Edith Michaelis, September 1947. Request for information submitted by Johanna Christensen, sister of Edith Michaelis. Arolsen Archives, CLI M.18 – Documentation of the Central Location Index of the Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) in New York, DocID: 131659256
Despite all enquiries I have never heard from them again and must now assume that they were killed.
Johanna Christensen in the restitutionReturn of confiscated property to its rightful owners or their heirs. proceedings, June 1948. Landesarchiv Berlin, B Rep. 025‑01 no. 2266/51 with 2267/51, fol. 2
Based on the information provided by Johanna Christensen, who despite her enquiries had found no sign of life from her sister and brother‑in‑law, the Charlottenburg District Court declared Max and Edith Michaelis dead on 15 January 1948. The court recorded 1 January 1944 as the date of death.
Johanna Christensen died in 1953. In 1955, her daughter resumed the restitutionReturn of confiscated property to its rightful owners or their heirs. proceedings. They were not concluded until nine years later.
The “Haushaltsvorstand” (head of household)
In the restitutionReturn of confiscated property to its rightful owners or their heirs. proceedings, it was established, among other things, that the objects stolen by the Vermögensverwertungsstelle (Asset Realisation Office) had been the property of Edith Michaelis.
His [Max Michaelis] new home, at Kurstendamm [sic] 185, was completely furnished with the furniture belonging to Mrs. Michaelis which she had inherited from her first husband, Mr. Ludwig Lewin.
AffidavitLegally binding statement regarding a matter of fact. More by Curt Albu, a friend of the Michaelises’, September 1949. Landesarchiv Berlin, B Rep. 025‑08 no. 2975/55, fol. 7
My grandfather and the father of the late Mrs Edith Michaelis were brothers. I therefore knew Mrs Michaelis from early childhood. As I grew up, I continued to visit regularly in the home of Mrs Michaelis’s first husband, Ludwig Lewin, and later also in the Michaelis household. I was therefore well acquainted with the furnishings of the Lewin apartment […] and I can […] confirm that Mrs Edith Michaelis brought these furnishings into her second marriage.
AffidavitLegally binding statement regarding a matter of fact. More by Ida Liebmann, June 1960. LAB B Rep. 025‑08 no. 2975/55, fol. 45
Although the furnishings of the apartment at Kurfürstendamm 185 belonged to Edith Michaelis, the file at the Vermögensverwertungsstelle was kept under the name of her husband, Max Michaelis, because the National Socialist authorities defined him as the head of household. “Haushaltsvorstand” (head of household) was the term used for the person – usually the husband – under whose name the National Socialist financial administration recorded a household. The names of other household members, especially wives, as well as children and other relatives, were often included in the files, though no separate files were created for them. This special status of men was not unique to the National Socialist period – before and long after, administrative files were kept in this way.
The evidence showing that the stolen objects were the property of Edith Michaelis demonstrates that the National Socialist authorities were primarily concerned with liquidating these items as quickly as possible. A precise determination of ownership played no role.
Identifying buyers
In the restitutionReturn of confiscated property to its rightful owners or their heirs. proceedings, attempts were made to identify the buyers who had appeared in the private salesIn the context of the “Verwertung” (liquidation) of assets looted during the Nazi era: sale of seized or confiscated items directly to buyers outside of a public auction. More at the time and to involve them in the proceedings. This succeeded in only one case.
Letters sent to the buyers Gottfried Kornfeld and Sophie Überreiter, for example, were returned to the Wiedergutmachungsämter marked as undeliverable. This ended the authorities’ attempts to trace these individuals.
A response was received from the antiquarian bookseller Gustav Schmidt, who had acquired the large Michaelis library through the expert Max Niederlechner. He rejected a restitutionReturn of confiscated property to its rightful owners or their heirs. claim, arguing that the purchase had taken place a long time ago and that he could no longer determine which books had been involved. He also stated that his stock had been “durch Kriegseinwirkung mit mehreren tausend anderen Büchern vollständig vernichtet worden” (completely destroyed by wartime events together with several thousand other books). The authorities accepted this explanation, and no further correspondence took place, with the result that the heirs ultimately did not recover any of the books.
Kornfeld und Überreiter
Through research conducted by the provenanceIn the context of art history: origin of art and cultural assets. More researchers in the OFP(Senior Finance President) Until 1937, Landesfinanzämter (regional finance offices). OFPs were the highest regional authorities responsible for the Reich’s financial administration. From the end of 1941, they were tasked with planning and carrying out the theft of property from deported Jews. More project, more could be learned about the buyers Kornfeld and Überreiter. Court files found in the Landesarchiv Berlin show that several proceedings were brought against Sophie Überreiter after the war, in which she was also convicted. She had profited extensively from the National Socialist system of injustice, for example by acquiring several properties from Jewish owners who had been forced to sell. According to statements in restitutionReturn of confiscated property to its rightful owners or their heirs. proceedings against her, these forced sales were accompanied by threats. In these transactions, Überreiter acted together with the merchant Leo Spiegel, with whom she stated she was in a relationship. Research in the digitally available Berlin address directories shows that Leo Spiegel lived at Flensburger Straße 20. The same address appears in the private saleIn the context of the “Verwertung” (liquidation) of assets looted during the Nazi era: sale of seized or confiscated items directly to buyers outside of a public auction. More of 2 July 1942 from the Michaelis household to a Gottfried Kornfeld. No entry for a Gottfried Kornfeld at Flensburger Straße 20 can be found in the Berlin address directories. It therefore seems likely that the buyer may have been Leo Spiegel acting under another name. Another indication may be the payment made on 8 July 1942 to the Oberfinanzkasse (Chief Finance Treasury), recorded as being made by “Kornfeld Pariser Str. 55” for both private salesIn the context of the “Verwertung” (liquidation) of assets looted during the Nazi era: sale of seized or confiscated items directly to buyers outside of a public auction. More. Sophie Überreiter was registered as living at Pariser Straße 55 by 1943 at the latest, as confirmed by the Berlin address directory.
After the war, Leo Spiegel and Sophie Überreiter lived in Bavaria, in Prien am Chiemsee, where the Wiedergutmachungsämter were able to locate them. The Berlin Regional Court ruled that properties they had acquired during the National Socialist period had to be returned, which was carried out. Sophie Überreiter was temporarily imprisoned – correspondence from this period bears the address of a penal institution. Later, the trail of Spiegel and Überreiter disappears.
It could not be determined where the artworks, books, and other objects from the Michaelis household acquired by Sophie Überreiter – and presumably also by Leo Spiegel – are located today. They are likely still in private ownership.