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Renate Aris (* 1935)

• she was born in 1935 in Dresden

• her father was Jewish but her mother wasn’t

• she and her brother were classified as Jews by the Nazis and therefore were not allowed to go to school

• from 1941 until 1945, her father, brother and her were forced to wear the Yellow Star

• from 1941 until 1945, her father was a forced worker

• on 13th of February 1945, her father received the order to prepare for deportation with his children on the 15th and 16th February

• survived the bombing of Dresden on 13th and 14th of February 1945 because she and her family lived in a suburb

• on 15th and 16th February, she fled with her brother and mother to a friend’s house, where they hid for the rest of the war

• after the end of the war, the family moved back into their old apartment

• in October 1945, she went to school for the first time

• after four years at the Volksschule Dresden Weißer Hirsch, she changed to the Fletschergymnasium

• celebrated her bat mitzvah together with her brother’s bar mitzvah, which were the first and last one’s until 1990

• left school to start an apprenticeship as tailor since she wanted to become a costume designer

• got her master craftsman’s diploma as tailor

• started to work in the costume department of the Theater Junge Generation in Dresden in 1958

• became head of the department from 1958 – 1961

• moved to Wittenberg and worked as head of the costume department at the Elbe-Elster-Theater from 1961 – 1968

• after being injured in a car accident, she could no longer work as a costume designer and moved on to television, where she was responsible for several studios until 1990 when she became a pensioner

• now she goes into schools to talk to children about her persecution, National Socialism, Judaism and Antisemitism

We spoke to Renate Aris, who was born on the 25th of August, 1935 in Dresden, about her and her family’s experiences with racial persecution as Jews during the time of National Socialism in Germany.

Her father, Helmut Aris, was born in 1908 into a Jewish industrialist family. His father owned a company that produced Maiolica etc. In 1933, he married Susanne Reinfeld who had grown up in Paris in a German family. They had their first son, Heinz-Joachim Aris, in 1934 and the following year their daughter Renate. Helmut Aris’ father died from natural causes in 1940. Helmut Aris’ mother however was sent on the first transport to Riga and shot upon arrival. Out of Helmut Aris’ extended family, only two people survived the Holocaust.

Since Helmut and their two children were classified as “Jews” by the Nazi-regime, the family suffered under the antisemitic policies that were implemented since 1933. Helmut and Susanne tried to keep the worst from their children by speaking French whenever discussing deportations, harassments and other forms of systemic abuse, so that their children would not understand them. But some things, they simply could not cover up, like the prohibition to go to school or the obligation to wear the Yellow Star from 1941 until 1945. And while the children knew nothing about the deportations, they could not help but notice how members of their Jewish community kept disappearing. What Renate Aris remembers best about her life under National Socialism is the isolation. Because she and her brother were not allowed to go to school, they hardly knew any other children. And even in their free time, most families did not want to endanger themselves by letting their children to play with two Jewish children.

The remaining Jews of Dresden were forced to live in so called “Judenhäusern”, which were houses where only Jewish people lived. Since Susanne Aris was not Jewish, an exception was made for her family. They were allowed to stay with her mother in Briesnitz, a suburb of Dresden. However, they were still required to put a big Yellow Star on their front door. Living separately from all other Jewish people meant first and foremost isolation for the Aris family. The relations to their other neighbours were relatively friendly but reserved. Every time the air raid alert was sounded, the family was the first to go to their basement because they did not want to pass all their neighbours when wearing their Yellow Stars. The night that Dresden was bombed in 1945 was the only night, the Aris family spent in the air raid shelter together with their neighbours.

In the meantime, Helmut Aris was forced to work in different companies around Dresden. The working conditions were severe as the forced workers suffered from hunger and cold. The only exception was the demolition company Metschke, where Helmut Aris was treated quite well. The guards thought him to be one of the French forced workers since he was fluent in French and therefore close to the French forced workers. But on the 13th of February 1945, Helmut Aris was summoned by the Gestapo where he received the order to prepare for his own and his children’s deportation which was to take place on the 15th and 16th of February 1945. Renate Aris estimates that by this time, out of the roughly five thousand Jews of Dresden, only about a hundred still lived in the city. The Gestapo had plans to deport the remaining Jews of Dresden in order to declare the city “Judenfrei” – free from Jews. These plans were crossed by allied bombers who arrived in the night from the 13th to 14th of February, reduced the city centre to rubble and caused a fire storm. One of the houses that was hit by a bomb was a “Judenhaus” which killed about half of the remaining Jews of Dresden.

The Aris family survived the bombings unharmed thanks to the suburban location of their residence. In the chaotic aftermath of the bombing, Susanne Aris took her two children, ripped off the Yellow Stars from their clothing and told them, that their surnames were now “Müller”. Then they walked through the burning city, trying to get to Prague, where the Red Army was closing in. But fires, rubble and corpses were blocking the streets and hindering the escape of Susanne, Hans-Joachim and Renate “Müller” Aris. They eventually made it to the district “Weißer Hirsch” on the other side of Dresden, where they sought refuge at a friend’s house. His name was Gerhard Winkler and he and his wife Hildegard had a big house where they sheltered many people who had either lost their homes in the bombing or who had fled from the former eastern territories of Germany where the Red Army was approaching. Since the Aris family wanted to avoid any questions, they hid in a back room behind the kitchen – the door hidden behind a rack full of apples – only to come out when all the other guests were asleep or had left the house. They spent their lives in silence, isolation and constant fear of being discovered and murdered.

The deportation, that was set for the 15th and 16th of February, was cancelled because the bombing had also destroyed the train stations and railways. The Jews who had survived the bombing all managed to use the chaos to their advantage and go into hiding, just like the Aris family. Still, the Nazi authorities did not give up und tried to find them. They went from house to house, checking people’s identities and looking for anything and anyone suspicious. They also came to the Winklers’ house while Susanne, Hans-Joachim and Renate Aris were hiding in the backroom behind the kitchen. Renate Aris still remembers sitting there in mortal fear, trying not to breathe to loudly, in fear of being discovered and murdered. Thanks to their hiding spot and their host’s ability to distract the Gestapo officers, the Aris family remained undiscovered.

For three months the Aris family hid in the back room at the Winklers’ house. Susanne Aris only left it once to check on her husband and her mother. It was only in the night from the 7th to 8th of May, when the Red Army was about to take Dresden, that Susanne, Hans-Joachim and Renate Aris finally left their hiding spot and returned to the grandmother’s apartment in Briesnitz where they reunited with Helmut Aris. Soon after, they moved back into the Winkler’s house, leaving the apartment in Briesnitz to Gerhard Winkler’s parents, who had lost their home in the bombing. One time, a Soviet officer sought them out to ask, whether they needed anything. Helmut Aris, being ever so humble, refused, claiming that they had a roof over their heads and a somewhat reasonable amount of food, which was more than most had at the time.

With the fall of the Nazi regime, it finally became possible again to practice Judaism. Susanne Aris converted to Judaism, so that they could be “a completely Jewish family”, as Renate Aris puts it, and the Aris family became very active in the reestablishment of the Jewish community in Dresden. It was a small community, consisting mostly of the forty surviving Jews as well as a few elderly Holocaust survivors. Therefore, the community was deeply shaped by its members experiences with persecution, forced work and concentration camps, but also by their joy and gratefulness for the re-emerging Jewish life in Dresden. When Renate Aris celebrated her bat mitzvah in 1948, one of her key memories is that of the Holocaust-survivors weeping throughout the ceremony because they had never thought to witness a bat mitzvah in Dresden again.

But not all was well again. As a socialist country, the GDR did not endorse or encourage religion of any kind, which included Jewish practices. There was also a general fear that Stalinist policies and practices would be adopted in the GDR which were prospects that no one wanted to face. This is why many Jewish citizens of the GDR seized the opportunity to emigrate to Israel in the early 50s, including the community leaders in Dresden. Helmut Aris strongly opposed this development. He was from Dresden, this was his home and no one was going to drive him away. Often, he told his children “We have always been persecuted but we have always survived.” Since Helmut Aris had already been involved in the community as a young man, it was only natural to him that he and his family would actively participate in the re-established Jewish community. Still, the small Jewish community grew smaller still, with members emigrating and no new people joining.

There was of course the question of where the Jewish community could meet and practice their religion. The big synagogue had been destroyed in the November pogroms of 1938 and never been rebuild. The choice fell therefore on a regular residential building that was located close to the city centre and had not been destroyed in the bombing. Then, in 1950, a new, small synagogue got consecrated. It was a big event where even the world-famous boys’ choir “Kreuzchor” sang and finally, the Jewish community of Dresden was provided with a house of prayer again. It was not until 2001 that a new synagogue was built on the premises of the old synagogue that had been destroyed by the Nazis.

One important freedom that the end of the Nazi regime brought to the Aris family, and Renate Aris in particular, was the possibility to go to the theatre again. This is where Renate Aris discovered her passion for the theatre-business. With her mother’s support, she left school and started an apprenticeship as tailor, so that she could become a costume designer. Her brother, in the meantime, studied economics and followed in his father’s footsteps as businessman. It took a few detours, but finally, in 1958, she became head of the costume department at the Dresden theatre “Theater Junge Generation” and later at the Elbe-Elster-Theater in Wittenberg. After a car accident in 1968, Renate Aris was so severely injured that she was no longer able to work as a costume designer. Instead, she moved on to television and was responsible for several studios throughout the GDR. Because she had been a victim of persecution by the Nazis, she was allowed to retire five years early, in 1990. Ever since, she goes into schools in order to educate the children about her persecution, National Socialism and antisemitism.