CENTRAL EUROPEAN LETTER
History has traveled the world. Died on December 25, 2020 in Lyon, Erich Schwam, a Jew of Austrian origin, bequeathed all of his inheritance to the commune of Chambon-sur-Lignon (Haute-Loire), where he survived, hidden with his whole family, during the Second World War. At first, this bequest surprised in Chambon, where the Schwam family had been forgotten among the thousands of Jews hidden by the local population. But gradually, with the help of testimonies and archives, the veil is lifted on the fate of this benefactor, whose donation ultimately approaches nearly three million euros, according to the latest estimates from the notary in charge of the succession.
In contact with Denise Vallat, the cultural assistant who is preparing for this summer an exhibition on the fate of Mr. Schwam, The world was able to trace the traces of the Schwam family in Vienna, Austria, where Erich was born in 1930. He is the only son of a Viennese doctor, named Oskar, and of a housewife, Malcie, born in Skole , a then Austro-Hungarian municipality which is today located in Ukraine. The two married in 1924.
In Erich’s early childhood years, the Schwam family seemed to live a prosperous and peaceful destiny, according to the photos found at Erich’s home in Lyon, which show them on vacation in the summer of 1935 in Payerbach, a place of holiday resort in the mountains 100 km south of the Austrian capital, popular with the Viennese bourgeoisie and aristocracy. They live in a suburb of the Austrian capital, on the 17the district, less than 500 meters from the medical office where Oskar Schwam practices homeopathy. Malcie is a housewife.
Confiscatory taxes
Even if anti-Semitism was already widespread in the former capital of the Habsburgs, Vienna then had one of the largest Jewish communities in Europe, with nearly 200,000 people, or 10% of the population. The annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany on March 12, 1938, will suddenly change their destiny. From the Anschluss, the population of Vienna was indeed particularly enthusiastic in the looting of Jewish property. “Unlike Germany, the first victims of the Nazis were the Jews in Austria, recalls Doron Rabinovici, specialist in the fate of Austrian Jews. What happened in Vienna was then copied to Prague, Berlin or Paris. “
Like all Jews, the Schwams are forced to declare their assets to the Nazi administration. Available in the Austrian national archives, their declarations completed on July 15, 1938 show an important heritage, which also probably explains the extent of the legacy. Malcie Schwam owns half of a building in the now trendy district of Neubau, and the couple together own another building in the upper-middle-class district of Döbling, consisting of “28 lots, three floors, built in 1914” and a “Garden of 300 m2 “. This building still exists today, perfectly identical to this description.
By adding insurance policies and personal property, the couple estimate their total assets at over 80,000 Reichsmark (RM), the equivalent of the current 344,000 euros according to the National Bank’s equivalence tables. German. Over the course of 1938, the mood became worse and worse for the Jews of Vienna, culminating in the Kristallnacht, from November 9 to 10, 1938, which actually lasted several nights in the Austrian capital. On November 8, 1938, Malcie Schwam was forced to sell the shares in her building to two brothers, according to statements she made after the war. The money from the sale, a little over 30,000 Reichsmark, will mainly be used to pay the confiscatory taxes put in place by the Nazis, the Judenvermögensabgabe (tax on the wealth of Jews) and the Reichsfluchtsteuer (Reich flight tax).
A family tossed from camp to camp
In the wake of the Kristallnacht, Oskar Schwam is sent to Dachau, where he will be imprisoned until the beginning of 1939. At this time, his wife declares a new address, in the 20e district of Vienna, where the Nazis gradually concentrated the Jews. “Certain witnesses of the time assure that Dachau was at that moment almost at rest from what was happening in Vienna, Mr. Rabinovici assures us. In this arrondissement, for example, 200 women were forced to dance naked in the cellars. Everything was done to push the Jews to flee. “ The Schwam family followed suit in early March 1939, leaving Vienna for Brussels. The Gestapo declares them “Deregistered for Shanghai”. Did they take advantage of the visas provided by the famous Chinese consul in Vienna, Ho Feng Shan, who saved thousands of Jews and was declared “Righteous Among the Nations” in 2001? The flight was in any case a good choice: Oskar and Malcie will lose several of their siblings in the death camps.
The rest of their flight is not available in Austrian sources, but in Chambon-sur-Lignon, Denise Vallat has gradually retraced their journey. Even if doubts still remain, one thing is certain: between Belgium and Le Chambon, where they arrived in early 1943 with Malcie’s mother, the Schwams were tossed around in several camps in the south of France. In the summer of 1941, Malcie thus declared to be at the Rivesaltes camp, in the Pyrénées-Orientales, while Oskar was at the Milles camp, in the Bouches-du-Rhône. In Vienna, in their absence, on April 2 of that year, the Gestapo withdraws the nationality of those it has renamed. “Israel” and “Sara” like all Jews. On August 11, their building in Döbling was confiscated and immediately sold to the widow of a Wehrmacht soldier. The sales contract mentions that this is “Declares Aryan on honor”.
If the sad fate of the Schwams is unfortunately common to several refugees from Chambon, they differentiated themselves after the war by deciding to stay several years in the Cévennes commune. In 1948, they began in particular the procedures to recover their property before the Viennese retrocession authorities, indicating that they were still domiciled. “At M. Héritier, La Bourghea”, a hamlet near Chambon where they were lodged after the war. “It’s quite unique, most of the Jews left at the end of 1945”, recalls Mme Vallat. “My mother told me about them”, assures Armand Debard, grandson of Firmin Héritier, who still owns this property and who remembers having crossed paths with Erich Schwam at least once years later: “He came with his wife to visit. “ In 1949, Oskar and Malcie indicated that they had returned to Austria and were staying with Malcie’s sister, but they did not completely deregister from Chambon until 1950.
Career in the French pharmaceutical industry
Erich Schwam was then 20 years old and had just graduated from the Cévennes College. Rather than follow his parents, who are buried in the Jewish cemetery in Vienna, he remains in France, where he applies for French nationality and makes a career in the pharmaceutical industry. “Very few Viennese Jews returned after the war, recalls the historian Doron Rabinovici, and those who did are above all those who hoped to recover their property “, like the Schwams. Before the Austrian authorities, the procedures are long and complex and it was not until 1962 that the Schwams were almost fully compensated, after the death of Oskar, in 1958. But how to explain that Malcie and Oskar returned leaving their only son in France ? “This is THE big question”, which torments Denise Vallat like all those who are passionate about this issue. “Did he have a girlfriend?” In any case, it is not the woman he married afterwards and who has no connection with Le Chambon ”, she jokes.
In Vienna, the only survivor of the family is the grandson of one of Erich’s first cousins. Contacted, he and his mother discover the fate of the Schwams and say they have only a vague memory of stories of family trips to Lyon. Another family of Viennese Jews, the Mautner, was also in hiding in Chambon, with a brother of Firmin Héritier. But Egon Mautner, born in 1944 in Chambon, ensures “Never to have heard of the Schwams”. Her older brother refuses to speak.
The key is perhaps to be found in a little sentence that was left by the mother of Armand Debard and daughter of Firmin Héritier, Alice Héritier, now deceased but who wrote a testimony on her experience for a conference organized at the Chambon in 1990. “ The Schwams wanted to stay in France but their efforts were unsuccessful. Mr. Schwam could not practice his profession in France, she writes. They sadly returned to Austria. “
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