Sophia Neuhaus, Rosa Simon, nee´ Neuhaus
Sophia Neuhaus
Sophie Neuhaus lived at Obermarktstrasse 9, the house owned by Isodor and Rosa Simon, Sophie being her sister. She was Jewish, was the daughter of Abraham and Mina Neuhaus, born 4th October,1882, and came from Werl-Scheidingen in the district of Soest. She never married.
There are few documents available that describe her time in Minden. It has not been possible to discover when she moved to Minden whether or not, this was her first appartment there. She definitely lived at this address as from 27th December, 1936, and like her sister, worked for her brother-in-law, Isodor Simon, in his Upholstery/Painter business.
On the 11th December,1941, Sophie Neuhaus was arrested and taken to Bielefeld from where she was deported to the Riga Ghetto the following day. There, every trace of her was lost but she did not survive the camp, and her probably date of death was 16th May, 1943..
Rosa Simon, nee´ Neuhaus
Rosa Simon was born in Werl-Scheidingen, in the district of Soest on 19th April, 1877. She was Jewish. Her parents were the merchant, Abraham Neuhaus and Minna Neuhaus nee´Spiegel. She was the sister of Sophie Neuhaus. She trained and qualified as a clerk in her younger years and worked as such. On 17th May, 1919, she married the Jewish Upholsterer and Decorator, Isodor Simon, born 25th February, 1878 in Minden, in Bielefeld.
It has been established that her husband had business on one level of the side wing of Bäckerstrasse 3, dealing in beds and cotton wares. Rosa Simon worked as a saleswoman and bookkeeper and also dealt with the firm’s correspondence. In 1935 the couple bought the house at Obermarktstrasse 9, where they lived and carried on their business. They were both active in the Jewish community and Rosa was the vice-chairwoman of the Isrealite Wom
en’s Union.
When the National Socialists came to power the anti Jewish measures and actions affected the Simon business and also the family. Customers stayed away and their turnover sank drastically. In the Pogrom night of 9th to the 10th November, 1938, homes and businesses were looted and demolished. Isodor Simon was, like many Minden Jewish males, taken to the Concentration Camp, Buchenwald, from where he was released because of his age and because he had been awarded the Iron Cross in World War 1.
The pair were now forced to give up their business, which became Aryan. The contents of the shop and it’s stores were forcibly taken away by Trustees and sold to rival businesses. The house and plot of land was bought by the master decorator Reinhold Ströber who operated an Upholstery and Decorating firm there. The couple didn’t receive the proceeds as they were paid to the Dresdner Bank, Minden, into a frozen account. This money was used to pay the so called Jewish Capital Tax and the Reich’s Escape Tax. The couple had to leave the four roomed apartment that they had, in their own house, and were forced to live in a smaller apartment in Ritterstrasse later moving to the so called ‘Jewish House’at Königstrasse 37. It was there that Rosa and Isodor Simon, together with other Minden Jews were, on 28th July, 1942, arrested and sent to Bielefeld, from where they were deported to the Concentration Camp, Theresienstadt. Rosa Simon died there on 5th June, 1944, but the circumstances surrounding her death are not known.
Isodor Simon survived the Nazi Regime. After the intervention of the International Red Cross at the beginning of 1945 he was sent to Switzerland with a large group of Jews from Theresienstadt, in 1946, emigrating to the USA. Because of the Bundesrepublic’s Refund Law his house in Obermarktstrasse 9 was returned to him.
He sold it in 1951 for 8,000.-DM to the new owner, who had bought it in 1938 at the time of the forced selling to aryans.