In Memory of Henry Einstein
This is a personal Holocaust account:
When my husband, Lieutenant Mitchell R. Miller. and I were stationed in Munich, Germany with the U.S. Army (arriving in September 1970 and leaving in May 1972), Mitch was assigned as an officer in the 18th Military Intelligence Battalion, 66th Military Intelligence Group.
One Department of the Army civilian at the 18th was Henry Einstein, a Jewish only child who we knew had as a teen been sent out of Nazi Germany in time (to relatives in New York). He returned to Germany as a young solder with the U.S. Army and worked as a clerk at the Nuremberg trials.
Mitch and I knew that Henry’s mother still lived in Germany, and that was why he remained there. Yet as newcomers to the world of Holocaust survivors, we didn’t think to ask about his father.
(Mitch’s Department of the Army civilian boss was Lucian Kempner, whose father Robert Kempner had been a prosecutor at the Nuremberg International Military Tribunal on war crimes after World War II. Lucian (Lutz) had been arrested and held early in Dachau and had then gotten out before the war, working undercover for the Allies in Italy. He was on the Dachau committee that later got the trees planted by the prisoners — now grown to adult height — removed from the camp and replaced with saplings because of the misleading impression the now-beautiful trees gave.)
Then one day we planned a trip to the nearby concentration camp of Dachau. The other Jewish officer in the 18th asked Henry why he wasn’t going to come with us. Henry’s answer: “My father was killed in Auschwitz.”
We had learned that Henry’s mother had survived the Holocaust by claiming French citizenship. And we never thought to ask Henry what happened after that citizenship claim to enable her to survive. (Update note: According to information learned in July 2023, she escaped to neutral Switzerland via France.)
In addition, Henry “lost 12 other relatives at the hands of the Nazis.”
I once asked Henry if he were related to Albert Einstein. His reply: “All the Einsteins in the Ulm-Stuttgart-Nuremberg triangle were related.”
The Holocaust account doesn’t end here. Because Henry’s mother didn’t want to leave Germany and start all over with a new language and culture, Henry stayed in Germany to be near her. And he had a non-Jewish girlfriend whom he could not bring home to his mother.
He never married — and he never had any children. Thus his ancestral line was lost as if he and his mother had been murdered along with his father.
Henry was a good friend to Mitch and me — and I decided to dedicate this www.ThinEdgeOfTheWedge.com project to him because he represents all those who, while at first glance may appear not to have been impacted by the Holocaust, did indeed have their lives irrevocably altered by the Nazis’ crimes against humanity.
Phyllis Zimbler Miller
February 16, 2021
UPDATE May 2023: Henry Einstein’s papers were donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in April 1989.
“Consists of depositions, interrogations, and evidence of the Office of the United States Chief of Counsel for War Crimes, Nuremberg Military Tribunals. The documents relate to alleged war criminals, information on atrocities and crimes, and the persecution of Jews, Poles, and other nationals by the Nazi regime. Also includes various legal opinions and decisions relating to several restitution and indemnification cases after the war.”
Here is the link to the donated papers.
Here is additional information on the Henry Einstein Collection 1907-1955.
UPDATE July 2023: Henry has been found!
Due to the power of the internet, someone researching a paternal aunt of Henry’s found me and sent me information on Henry (1920-1988):
This person informed me that Stolpersteine have been installed for Henry (Heinz) and his parents Arnold (Adolf) and Pauline (Dreyfuss) Einstein in Heilbronn. Their Stolpersteine are also listed on this Wikipedia page.
Here are the Einstein Stolpersteine with information on the family.