Landau family memorial in Halle

Landau family memorial in Halle

• Nov 27, 2023
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Here is the full Stolpersteine essay about the Salomon Mendel Landau family from the Zeit Gesichtern in Halle site. There are also stumbling stones, including for Kurt Paechter, at the Berlin apartment on Nassauische Straße, where a slightly different version of the essay appears.

Salomon Mendel, called “Sami”, Landau was born on October 25, 1864 in what was then Austrian Neu Sandez/Galicia (today Nowy Sacz/Poland). His wife Rosa Sadger was born on December 29, 1873 in Krakow. In Vienna she received music lessons at the Vienna Conservatory, and it was also here that she met her future husband, Sami Landau.

In Halle, the Landaus owned the “Eier-Spezial-Groß-Store” at Talamtstrasse 7, founded in 1892, which Sami had taken over from his brother. Their three children were also born in Halle: Grethe (born February 26, 1898) and Anneliese (born March 5, 1903). Gotthelf Kurt died at the age of 13 as a result of an accident. The Landaus were a liberal family in which music played a major role. Evening house concerts and frequent visits to the Leipzig Gewandhaus were the focus of interest. Daughter Anneliese received piano lessons from her mother, played the violin and studied musicology in Halle and Berlin. She worked as a music writer, organized a series of lectures on the radio and worked for a long time for the Jewish cultural association founded by Martin Buber, Leo Baeck and others.

In 1924, daughter Grete married the lawyer Kurt Julius Paechter, head of the legal department at Deutsche Bank, and moved to Berlin with him. The children Hans (*1925), Gert (*1928) and Lise Ruth (*1933) were also born there.

The arrest of Kurt Julius Paechter after the November pogrom in 1938 made the family realize the extent of the danger. It was possible to send the three Paechter children to England on a children's transport. The married couple Salomon and Rosa Landau left Halle and moved to Berlin to live with their daughter Grete. Anneliese Landau left Germany on April 19, 1939. In England she met her nephew and niece again, who were staying with English families. She reached New York on January 1, 1940. All efforts from there to get her family to leave the country were unsuccessful.

Weakened by forced labor, 43-year-old Grete Paechter fell ill and died on December 31, 1941 in Berlin from “blood poisoning (sepsis), peritonitis, heart failure.” On October 14, 1942, the Landau couple (presumably together with their son-in-law) were deported to Theresienstadt. The 78-year-old Salomon Landau died here on June 13, 1943. Rosa Landau died shortly before her 71st birthday on December 21, 1944.

Kurt Julius Paechter was (according to his sister-in-law Anneliese) deported from Theresienstadt to Bergen-Belsen. In April 1945, when Bergen-Belsen was liberated by British troops, he was one of the terminally ill prisoners for whom all help came too late. He died at the age of 52 on December 31, 1945.

The STOLPERSTEIN dedicated to him in front of his Berlin house, Nassauische Straße 61, has different dates, which probably arose due to a mix-up by the Berlin initiators.

Anneliese Landau became music director of the Jewish Center Association in California from 1944. She organized concerts, gave lectures, published and developed an educational program, which she later implemented at various adult schools. She died on August 3, 1991 in Los Angeles at the age of 88.