Virtual Reconstruction of a Destroyed Community during the Holocaust- The Sephardic Community of Vienna, Austria (in French)
17
JULY
2012
Lecture read by Joëlle Allouche-Benayoun.
A microfilm held by the Family History Library is entitled Turkische Israelitengemeinde [Turkish Jewish Community] contains birth and marriage records of the Turkish (Sephardic) Vienna community for the years 1845-1938. These registers have been completely indexed and uploaded to the Internet. They include some 15,000 individuals: the newborns, their parents, the midwives, the mohalim [circumcisers] and sometime a witness, and in the marriage register: the grooms, the brides, their fathers and often their grandfathers.
We will first study the history of this community with an emphasis on its foundation in the mid -18th century, its statutes given in 1778 by the Austrian authorities, its synagogue and its terrible end that began on March 12, 1938 with the Anschluss [the annexation of Austria to the 3rd Reich] and the following Kristallnacht Pogrom and its tragic end Nazi concentration camps.
We will then analyze the database components: the origins of these Sephardic Jews, the surnames, the given names and their changes during a century, their marriage links. This virtual reconstruction will be completed with the help of the community burial website, data gathered from some 150 grave photos taken in Vienna Jewish Zentralfriedhof cemetery and the Holocaust victims' website.
| Speaker | Location |
|---|---|
|
Mathilde TAGGER |
Ella Fitzgerald A |