From the Alfred – Alf Schwarzbaum collection: Reports on Jewish refugees in postwar Germany and Switzerland, and correspondence with Robert Weiler, 1945

From the Alfred – Alf Schwarzbaum collection: Reports on Jewish refugees in postwar Germany and Switzerland, and correspondence with Robert Weiler, 1945. 7 pages, typewritten, in German Inventory: 1. Report from Sankt Margarethen, Switzerland, with information about Jews in camps in Germany, and lists of Jews sent to Auschwitz. 1 page, typewritten, in German 2. Report dated 24 May 1945 about Jewish refugees in the French zone of occupation. The information is based on testimonies of refugees who had come to Switzerland and Jews in Konstanz, Germany. 1 page, typewritten, in German 3. Two letters sent to Schwarzbaum by Robert Weiler, the president of the Jewish community in Kreuzlingen, Switzerland, regarding these reports, 24 and 27 May 1945. 2 pages, typewritten, in German 4. Schwarzbaum's reply to Weiler, Lausanne, 1 June 1945, with a list of seven Jews currently in Konstanz. 2 pages, typewritten, in German About Alfred Schwarzbaum: Alfred (Alf) Schwarzbaum was a Jewish merchant from Bedzin, Poland, who fled to Switzerland after the occupation. In Switzerland, he set up a relief enterprise, and supported hundreds of Jews. Alfred (Alf) Schwarzbaum was born in 1896 in Sosnowiec, Poland. He later moved to Bedzin, became a businessman and started a family. In late September 1939, following the German occupation of Poland, he sent his daughter to England. In November 1939, he was jailed for several weeks in Myslowice and was interrogated by the Gestapo. After his release, he turned down an offer from Mosheh Merin, head of the Sosnowiec Jewish council, to be his deputy. Using his connections and his fortune, he was able to obtain visas for Switzerland. In April 1940, he left Poland and settled in Lausanne. Schwarzbaum soon started sending out food, clothing, money and papers to Poland. He managed to navigate between the often uncoordinated Jewish and Zionist organizations based in Switzerland, to transfer financial help to Jews in Poland. He sent hundreds of parcels to German occupied localities, via Lisbon, Sweden and Turkey. He visited refugee camps in Switzerland, and corresponded with persons living under the Nazi rule. He also produced passports, which led him into trouble with the Swiss police, who feared for violation of the country's neutrality policy. In 1945, he immigrated to Mandate Palestine. In Israel, he supported funds and provided stipends for students in need, in several Israeli institutes for higher education. He died in 1990.