Passport & Wehrpass
All being issued to a Jewish man!
Much has been written and said about the infamous German passports specially issued for Jews, marked with a large J at the top-left corner of the first page that came out following a Swiss request from October 5th. The issuing of such passports lasted until the second half of 1941, October, when the German authorities stopped issuing Jews with passports as a means of encouraging and enforcing immigration. Towards the end of that year the decision to annihilate Europe’s Jews was taken.
Besides adding the large J at the top of each title page to a passport that was issued to a Jew, the addition of the name Israel was added to a male and Sara to a female. This began to appear around January of 1939. All these means were done in order to enable other countries to recognize when a Jews was trying to enter the country or apply for a visa at a consulate.
The passport here is rather interesting, not only because it is a strong reminder of past events but it comes with an additional document that SHOULD NOT have been issued in the first place! A German Wehrpass, the document issued when enlisting into the army and kept by civilians until full drafting into service, then the soldiers would receive the “active service” version of the booklet called a SOLDBUCH. The Wehrpass would be kept in the units records and returned when changing units or leaving the service completely, with it being returned back to its holder (this is a simple explanation about the use and issue of such booklets).
German J stamped passport No. 21/39 was issued on February 9th 1939 at Kitzingen to Leo Rosenblatt aged 47. His profession seems to have been in the cattle business, but by the time he received his passport, well, most likely it was confiscated from him, also indicating inside he has no job. The Germans made sure that as the years went by, their Jewish neighbors would be penniless and practically in poverty as the war came, and if you managed to leave the country with the right exit and entry/transit visas, well, you maybe had 10 Reich marks to your name. Literally.
Leo here had an entry visa for British Palestine issued to him on February 11th, and seems it was not meant to be used for immigration, but his status was changed from traveler to immigrant once in the Mandate, on March 22nd, this we can see on page 9 of the document.
The interesting item in this set, in my opinion, is the 1937 German issued Wehrpass. I should explain why.
Following the infamous Nuremberg Laws, among the rules and regulations imposed on non-Aryans, and one that had severe consequences on the Jews in the country, was that they could not serve in the armed forces in any security organization, and had there been any officers in the army by then, they were kicked out. So, a Jewish individual would not dare try to enlist or even be allowed to pass the entrance of a recruiting office yet alone be allowed to get enlisted and be issued any document that would indicate he was! This is the reason that when I saw this item in the first time, I was utterly shocked, could not believe that it was issued in the first place! Clearly it states inside that the region of its holder was of the “Israelitisch” faith. What possed the officer at the drafting office to issue it at all is a puzzle and most likely we will never know. Leo was not drafted, surely because he was Jewish but because it states on page 3.
German Wehrpass no. “Furth i. Bay (N) 92/4ii/3” was issued on April 22nd 1937 and by then both of his parents were deceased, passing away the same year 4 years earlier. The other annotation inside the document is the discharge from services, due to age, as mentioned on page 36 indicating that he is classified under “Landwehr II”, meaning, reserve, or due to age is discharged from active service.
I have added images of the 2 important and interesting documents.
Thank you for reading “Our Passports”
