A short letter from 1942 and its historical significance

It is just a short letter, carefully written on the lined page of a DIN A5 writing pad. Addressed to: "Mr Gustav Schmidt, Hamburg 23, Schellingstraße 9IV". An 8 pfennig stamp with a portrait of Adolf Hitler is stuck next to the address. The postmark reads: "Hamburg-Rahlstedt, 12.6.42. Post office 12." No sender is noted.

The handwritten lines contain the intimate confession of a mother to her son - Gustav. He is the father of Wolfgang and Helmut Schmidt. The letter shows the importance of the new addition to the Helmut Schmidt Archive (HSA) in Langenhorn for further research.

The estate of Wolfgang Schmidt, which the Federal Chancellor Helmut Schmidt Foundation took over for safekeeping from his granddaughters on 23 October 2020, comprises around 2,600 sheets. The correspondence of Wolfgang Schmidt and his wife Gesa from the period 1935 to 1986 forms the largest part of the collection. The biographical documents compiled by Gustav Schmidt, the brothers' father, are also significant. The deposit also includes six etchings by the Hamburg painter Hugo Schmidt.

The importance of the estate for research into the family's history is further emphasised here by Frida Feind's letter to Gustav Schmidt from 1942. A comprehensive critical examination of the sources is not possible at this point.

The letter has the following wording:

"Rahlstedt. 10.6.[19]42
Dear Gustav and Wicka!
As you would like to know who your father was, he called himself Ludwig, he did not give his surname, I must send you an answer. It is difficult for me to write this to you.
I met your father from the shop on my way home. He invited me to the theatre and then we went to dinner. There we drank some wine and that's how it happened. I only saw him again once. He wrote two lines saying he had to go away. Never heard from him again. Now you know everything dear Gustav[.]
Best regards from your mother Frida Feind, née Wenzel."

75-year-old Friederike Christine Eduardine Wenzel (née Feind) testifies to her 54-year-old son Gustav Schmidt (née Wenzel) that he was born out of wedlock in 1888.

The mother's statement, if it stood alone, would be a remarkable historical document of its time, because when Gustav was born out of wedlock in 1888, it was still considered a disgrace for both mother and child. The mother's opening words - "Since you would like to know who your father was" - suggest that she is answering a recent question from her son. She also addresses her daughter-in-law Ludovika Schmidt (née Koch), but does not include her in the following text. After reading the letter, the question arises as to why Gustav only asked for information about his biological father in 1942. After all, he had already been adopted by the Schmidt couple in 1888 and had made it to the position of headmaster without the outwardly visible stigma of an illegitimate birth.

The answer only becomes recognisable in the historical context of the transcript. Only then does it become clear that the letter was not intended to clarify something, but to conceal something.

in 1942, Helmut and Wolfgang, Gustav's sons, wanted to get married. Marriages between "Aryan" and "non-Aryan" people were forbidden in National Socialist Germany after 1935. Proof of descent had to be provided with a so-called Aryan certificate. In most cases, it was sufficient to present an ancestor's passport. In the case of Jewish people, the inhuman Nazi racial ideology differentiated between full, half and quarter Jews, which is why ancestors up to the grandparents' generation had to be officially proven.

Helmut Schmidt's genealogical passport, which has been preserved in Wolfgang's estate, was filled out by his father Gustav. For this purpose, he had obtained notarised extracts from the registry office and church registers from his maternal ancestors, which are also preserved in the estate.

The information on the father mentioned by the mother as "er nan[n]te sich Ludwig" should have been found under "Position 4, father of 2" (Gustav). The space is empty. Position 5, mother of 2" is meticulously filled in. Would it not have been logical to obtain the information about the father from the mother when filling out the genealogical passport in 1935?

Not at all. There must have been a gap in the ancestor passports of the grandparents' generation for many German citizens. The registry office system of the German Reich had only been in existence since 1876; for the time before that, one had to rely on church records and these were kept inconsistently. This meant that Gustav Schmidt could be sure that the blank space under "Position 4, father of 2" would not be given any special attention in 1935. In the case of a marriage, however, such a blank space could lead to serious enquiries. He therefore asked the mother for information in 1942. Statements after 1945 prove that mother and son knew very well who the biological father was. Behind "er nan[n]te sich Ludwig" was Ludwig Gumpel, a Jewish private banker. Although he did not acknowledge his son in 1888, he did pay alimony, as Helmut Schmidt later revealed. His son Gustav even had contact with him.

With the words "he called himself Ludwig, he didn't say his surname" and the sentence "We drank a little wine and that's how it happened", the mother is not trying to make a confession about a frivolous night. In consultation with her son, she wants to conceal his father's Jewish origins. The admission of her "shame" actually serves as a shield for her grandsons Wolfgang and Helmut, who want to marry in 1942 and need "proof of Aryan origin".

The short letter, which Wolfgang Schmidt carefully preserved in his estate, is therefore a key document in the Schmidts' family history.

By acquiring and cataloguing new additions, the Bundeskanzler-Helmut-Schmidt-Stiftung is not only usefully supplementing the estates of Helmut and Loki Schmidt, it is also expanding the scope of research in many respects.