(Continued from previous post)
Bassie Tillinger - Bassie, or Bertha as she was known in the US, was born on August 28, 1893 in Stanislwow. It appears that from Ernestyna thru her brother Jozef the records regarding their parents are consistent. Aron is listed as the legitimate father and Hanna is listed as Henzie Wax with her parents as Wolf Wax and Ruchel.
As Bertha is my great grandmother her branch is the one I know best, but will try to keep it short. At some point before 1920 she moved to Vienna and met my great grandfather Markus Rothstein from Tarnopol, a dry goods salesman, who had been in Vienna since sometime after 1910. They married on January 25, 1920 in Vienna.
Together they had two children; Paula born on November 30, 1920 and Harry born on May 19, 1924. Between both children being born Markus' parents and siblings emigrated to New York with the four of them staying behind.
On March 12, 1938 Nazi Germany annexed Austria and two months later, on May 31, Markus was on a train to Dachau. On Spetember 23, 1938 he was transferred to Buchenwald. It was during these four months that Bertha sent her two children to her brother in law Irving in New York as unaccompanied minors. An interesting side note; during their travel from Vienna to Genoa to New Yok, Paula and Harry were allowed off of the boat to look around the city for some time. Well as the story goes they missed the boat and ended up having to stay in Genoa for two weeks.
On January 1, 1939 Markus was released from Buchenwald as part of a prisoner exchange. From what I understand this was arranged by U.S. Senator Robert Wagner and Markus' brother Irving. Markus and Bertha subsequently left Vienna on February 16, 1939, arriving on the 26th.
On July 29, 1943, Harry enlisted in the Army with the Counterintelligence Corps as a translator. One story that has been passed down to me from his time there is as follows. One time he was interrogating an Austrian prisoner whom he knew from growing up in Vienna. The prisoner it seems did not recognize him. Harry went on to say that the US Army knew everything about them, who their family was, and even where his mother went grocery shopping.
After the war he worked as a jeweler and after marrying his wife and having their first two children they moved to Pittsburgh in 1954.
Jozef Tillinger - Jozef was born on October 21, 1897 in Stanislwow. As previously mentioned from Ernestyna's birth record through Jozef all parental and maternal grandparent information is standardized.
Like with his siblings Solomon Isaak and Bertha I have not yet determined when he moved to Vienna.
His marriage record to Rosa Garfunkel in 1936 lists other dates before that time indicating some kind of event happend, however I don't know what at this time.
In 1937 they had their first child while still in Vienna and two years later they arrived in the US with the help of his oldest brother Julius and sister Bertha. Two years after that their second child was born.
Up Next - Dawid Tillinger and his family