Margot Schattner was born in 1917-18

Margot Schattner was born in 1917-18

• Aug 29, 2020
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I wrote yesterday that Ze'ev Sharon (Wolf Schattner) was born in 1913, which Walter found surprising and possibly in error, primarily based on his understanding of the age difference between our mother and her cousin. 

Helga was born in October 1924. Walter had believed that Ze'ev was only a few years older than Helga, and certainly not as many as 11 years older as my information suggested. So I told him I would go check my sources and try to update the information. 

I should say here that ihere is one person in our family, Ze'ev's grandson Ahikam Finkel in Israel, who would know this and other family facts. So far, I have not touched base with Ahikam about my new findings. I plan to contact him by email soon, as soon as I have written up more of my information.

But back to Ze'ev's birthday. I find that I do not have a solid source for the 1913 date. I searched online thinking I might find a death announcement that would have his birth information. So far this morning, I have not turned up anything. 

One thing I did do was to review the Yad Vashem testimonies that I have seen before for Ze'ev's mother Rosa and sister Margot, that document their deaths in Belgrade in April 1942. These testimonies were submitted in Israel in 1955 by Dr. Artur Hendel, a relative of the Schattner family in Belgrade.

I'll report more about these records in a separate post, but the information I want to highlight here is that Margot's age is given as 24 at the time of her death in April 1942. That would put her birth date in 1917 or early 1918. Yesterday we learned that her father died in May 1917. So she would have been a classic case of a war baby born after her father's death.

From this I conclude that Ze'ev had to have been the older sibling. So until we get more definitive information, we know that Ze'ev was born in 1916 or earlier. Since his parents were married in 1911 (I have the marriage record), it would not be surprising if their first child was born in 1913 or thereabouts. 

Maybe Ze'ev was so vigorous and heroic in Walter's eye that he seemed more youthful than he actually was.

Update: I just found Ahikam's family tree on Geni. He gives Ze'ev's birth date as March 11, 1917, which is precisely two days after his father's death in Pecs, Hungary. Margot's birth is given as 1913. So maybe Artur Hendel testimony is wrong concerning Margot's age, and thus she would be the older sibling.

Their father David Schattner has a nickname "Drago" in Ahikam's tree. I see that there is not a date of death given for Drago,, so the death record I found yesterday will definitely be news to him.