Marga Spiegel

Marga Spiegel (21 June 1912 – 11 March 2014) was a German woman who went into hiding with her daughter in 1943 during the Holocaust of World War II. Her husband also hid during the war, but separately from the family since it was harder to conceal a Jewish man of military age. He was also well known in the farming community as a cattle and horse trader. Even though they had some close calls, Spiegel and her family survived for several years with the help of several farmers and their families.

Spiegel's family was persecuted by the Nazis beginning in 1933 when Adolf Hitler became chancellor, and the Nazi Party changed Germany's form of government to a dictatorship. Nazis enacted laws to classify undesirable people as "enemies of the state" or outcasts. The Rothschilds were subject to arrests and harassment. Siegmund Rothschild was sent to a concentration camp early in the Holocaust and died there in 1938, one year after the death of his wife. Marga Spiegel's husband, Siegmund Spiegel, lost 37 members of his family during this period.

After being forced to leave their home and business in Ahlen, the Spiegels lived in an apartment for Jews with six other families. Then, Germans assigned Siegmund to a forced labor work unit, and he lived with his family in a run-down, former Army barracks back in Ahlen. They decided to hide after the Spiegels were ordered to meet with the Gestapo on 27 February 1943.

Spiegel wrote a book about their story. It was published in 1969 and was later released as a movie in 2009 titled Saviors in the Night. Between 2010 and 2014, she received the Federal Cross of Merit, Honorary Award of the Cinema for Peace Foundation, and the Order of Merit of North Rhine-Westphalia.

Early life Margarette (Marga) Rothschild was born in Oberaula, Hesse, Germany, on 21 June 1912. Her parents operated a retail store and a shop that made blueprint dye. She had a younger sister, Inge Johanna.

The year 1933 brought monumental changes in Marga's life. She graduated from high school the same year that Adolf Hitler, a dictator, became the chancellor, and the Nazi Party came into power and initiated antisemitic laws. Siegmund Rothschild was able to pull a few strings to get Marga into a school in Marburg that did not allow Jews. His leverage was that he had fought during World War I. She studied mathematics and physics for a year or so, but she left the school after classmates harassed her for being a Jew.

Holocaust era (1933–1945) Nazi Party from 1933 to 1938 Adolf Hitler restructured the government of Germany beginning on 30 January 1933 when he was appointed chancellor of Germany. Hitler and other Nazis changed the form of government to a dictatorship from its former republic. Legislation was enacted that classified people by whether or not they were beneficial or harmful to the country. If they were undesirable, such as if they were Jewish, they were classified as "enemies of the state" or "outcasts". Following Hitler's lead, the mayor of their town persecuted Jews, like Siegmund Rothschild and his family. They were subject to arrest on "flimsy" charges, taunted, and attacked. Siegmund Rothschild was convicted of usury and fraud and sentenced to prison. Marga was apprehended several times. Siegmund was a successful horse After the war, they had a son. Johanna was deported from Düsseldorf. Yet, the Central Database of Shoah Victims' Names at Yad Vashem record for Leo states that he died at Auschwitz concentration camp. No date of death was provided. Johanna was also said to have died there.

The Spiegels began to hear rumors that German Jews were sent east to Poland by the Nazi government. They heard that after Jews dug their own graves, they were shot by Germans at the prepared sites. Most of their Jewish neighbors had been deported from Dortmund as the Speiegels tried to plan their next steps. He put on Pentrop's uniform from World War I, wore his own Iron Cross medal, and Siegmund pretended that he was visiting on a holiday.

Heinrich Aschoff A farmer, Heinrich Aschoff, took in Spiegel and her daughter Karin. Heinrich and his wife had eight children, one of who was a soldier. The Aschoff told their two oldest daughters that Spiegel and her daughter were Jews. Anni, one of the older girls, was a member of the Bund Deutscher Mädel (BDM), the female Hitler Youth organization, also known as the League of German Girls. After the war, Sickmann received the title Righteous Among the Nations on 20 July 1969 for sheltering and providing goods for Spiegel and Karin. The Sickmann's granddaughter, Leoni Sickmann, attended the school in Werne that was named after Marga Spiegel and was at the ceremony that Spiegel attended when the school was opened.

Heinrich Silkenbömer After about nine months in hiding, the Silkenbömer family at Lüdinghausen took in Siegmund. Heinrich and his wife had two sons who were away fighting in the war. Siegmund stayed in the bedroom of one of the sons. He was treated well, and Marga was able to visit him occasionally at their farm. He lived there until the end of the war.

After the war The Spiegels were liberated when the American Army invaded the area on 30 April 1945. Spiegel was interested in leaving Germany after the war, but her husband insisted that they stay there.

Jewish Cemetery in Ahlen, Tomb of Marga and Siegmund Spiegel. Photograph: NordNordWest, Lizenz: Creative Commons by-sa-3.0 de Spiegel died from natural causes on 11 March 2014 in Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. She was 101 years old. She was buried at the Jewish cemetery in Ahlen.

Published works Marga Spiegel: Rescuers in the night. How a Jewish family survived in a Münsterland hideout. 7th edition. Lit Verlag, 2009, ISBN 978-3-8258-3595-8 (The 1st edition was published in 1969. Reprint as a series of articles in 1961/1962 in the magazine "Der Sämann" (organ of the Catholic rural people's movement).) Marga Spiegel: Farmers as saviors. How a Jewish family survived. With a foreword by Veronica Ferres. 2nd Edition. Lit Verlag, 2009, ISBN 978-3-8258-0942-3

Legacy A school in Werne, where she lived with the Aschoffs, was named after Spiegel. She received the Federal Cross of Merit in 2010. In 2013, she received the Honorary Award of the Cinema for Peace Foundation. In 2014, Spiegel was awarded the Order of Merit of North Rhine-Westphalia in Düsseldorf.