Jaroslaw's and the JAROSLAWs - History of a Family and a Corporation

25 March 2012

In November 1996, thanks to Simon S. in Berlin, I learned about an entirely "new" branch of my family -- the SCHREIBER family descended from the sister of my great great grandmother Sara FALK geb. NAUMBURG (ca.1787-1851), Hinde SCHREIBER geb. NAUMBURG (ca.1784-ca.1818) and R. Benjamin SCHREIBER (1779-1839), rabbi in Schrimm and Grätz.   That tree included their son Meier SCHREIBER, married to Ernestine (Ester) MITTWOCH, who had a daughter Friederike (Frieda) who married David JAROSLAW and had the children Hedwig and Benno.

That is where things stood for over a decade.

In 2010, from a partial list of gravestones of the Lohestrasse (ul. Slezna) Jewish cemetery in Breslau, I learned that Friederike died on 18 August 1875, at the age of just 32.

And, that is where things stood until last week.

My last blog entry described learning that my grandmother Gertrud FALK geb. RAPHAELSOHN (1886-ca.1943) had been put into forced labor for the firm Scherb & Schwer KG.   That led me to try to learn about the company that had taken advantage of my grandmother (and so many others) during the last year or two of her life, before she was deported to Auschwitz and murdered.

A website on the components used to make the Enigma machine ("Hellschreiber") included information on Scherb & Schwer as one of the component manufacturers.  The firm Scherb & Schwer was the "Arjan" successor company to the formerly Jewish-owned company Jaroslaw's Erste Glimmer-Waren Fabrik.

The history of Jaroslaw's can be traced, in a limited way, through Berliner Adressbücher entries:
1882          - no entry
1883-1891 - Inhaber C. Jaroslaw  [seems to be Clara Jaroslaw, geb. Fürst]
1892-1897 - Inhaber D. Jaroslaw 
1898-1903 - Inhaber D. Jaroslaw & Dr. B. Jaroslaw
1904          - Inhaber  [not given]                 (entries for David and Dr. Benno)
1905-1909 - Inhaber  [not given]                 (entries for Ww. Clara and Dr. Benno)
1910          - Inhaber Jaroslaw'sche Erben (entry for Ww. Clara; and a Bernhard)
1911-1912 - Inhaber  [not given]                 (entries for Ww. Clara and Dr. Benno)
1913-1925 - Inhaber Jaroslaw'sche Erben (entry for Dr. Benno)
1926          - Inhaber Jaroslaw'sche Erben (entry for Ww. Else geb. Lobrina)
1927-1930 - Inhaber [not given]                 (entry for Ww. Else geb. Lobrina)
1931-1940 - Inhaber [not given]                 (no Jaroslaw family entries)
1941          - no entry  [see, Scherb & Schwer KG]

After Friederike died (1875), David JAROSLAW got remarried to Clara FÜRST.   It is not clear who formed Jaroslaw's since the earliest directory entries list Clara as the proprietor.  An entry in "Handelsblatt der Chemiker-Zeitung" by Georg Krause (Vol. 6) (Coethen 1882) mentions the company as being in Berlin, but with "Inhaber" Clara Jaroslaw, geb. Fürst being in Breslau.  The family seems to have moved to Berlin around 1883.  (The family was living in Breslau from at least 1870 when David JAROSLAW is listed:  Gold- u. Silberarb., Schwedn. Straße 45 I. -- they are not listed in the 1868 directory.)

The confirmation that the JAROSLAW family of Jaroslaw's was the same as the family of David JAROSLAW and Friederke SCHREIBER came from the "Vita" section at the end of Benno JAROSLAW's published dissertation, "Bestimmung der Löslichkeit von Jod in einigen organischen Flüssigkeiten" (1895) [Determination of the Solubility of Iodine in Organic Liquids]:

"Natus sum Benno Jaroslaw anno MDCCCLXXIII die VII. m. Mai Vratislaviae patre Davido, matre Frederica e gente Schreiber.  Quae cum praematura morte nobis erepta esset, pater Claram e gente Fuerst in matrimonium duxit, quam vivam magnopere veneror. Fidei addictus sum iudaicae. ..."

Another connecting and confirming clue, was the 1905 passenger list from a trip that Dr. Benno JAROSLAW took to the US.  He traveled from Dover, England to New York, NY on the S.S. Hamburg on 19 May 1905.  He is listed as a 32-year-old (b.ca.1873) single man, a "manufacturer" living in Friedenau near Berlin.

This ties in nicely with the information in the National Probate Calendar (Index of Wills and Administrations), 1861-1941, with information on the death of David JAROSLAW:

"JAROSLAW David of "Friedenau" 60 Frege-strasse Berlin Germany died 19 November 1903 Administiration (with Will) (Limited) London 8 October to Leopold Van der Velde merchant the attorney of Clara Jaroslaw widow Effects  £1765 11s. 2d."

The Berliner Adressbücher entries further suggest that Benno was married to Else LUBRINA and that Benno died in 1925 or early 1926.

Based on British patent office records, the "Jaroslaw'sche Erben" seem to have included not just David's widow Clara and son Dr. Benno JAROSLAW, but also two other women.  This bibliographic data from one British patent, for example:

• Title:  "Method of Manufacturing Plastic Masses from Albuminous Substances, Like Casein" Patent No.: GB272947
  Assignees:  Schröder, Richard, Schröder, (née Jaroslaw), Meta, Jaroslaw, (née Labrinus), Else, and Levis, (née Jaroslaw), Sophie, (trading as Jaroslaw's Erste Glimmerwaren-Fabrik in Berlin). June 17, 1926

includes Meta SCHRÖDER geb. JAROSLAW and Sophie LEVIS geb. JAROSLAW.  Since Benno was single in 1905 (when he sailed to the US), and Meta and Sophie were married adults by 1926, I assume they were half-sisters of Benno; presumably, the daughters of David JAROSLAW and his second wife Clara geb. FÜRST.

So, far I have not uncovered what became of Benno's sisters and I do not know if he and Else had children.  There was a Sophie LEVIS (b.ca.1879) who sailed to England in 1934 on the S.S. Barrabool; her last permanent residence was given as Palestine.  But for now, the information on the JAROSLAW family that owned the company that later came to "employ" my grandmother, essentially ends with the expropriation of their business.