Jewish merchants in Solingen-Ohligs

Stop 6: The Bassat Family

Düsseldorfer Str. 40 as of today. Photo: Daniela Tobias

Düsseldorfer Str. 40 – go to map – go to starting point

Manufacturers Heinrich Bassat and Nathan Kastor were exceptions among the Jewish entrepreneurs of Ohligs: While most of them were retailers, Bassat and Kastor were industrialists (Kastor could even be classed as an industrial magnate).

Enrique Bassat, photograph dating from ca. 1939. Source: City Archive of Solingen

Enrique Juan Bassat y Strumza – or Heinrich Bassat, as he would call himself in Germany later on – was born in Istanbul, capital of the Ottoman Empire, on 15 April 1891. He was the son of Lazaro Elyezer Bassat and his wife Regina. The Bassats were Sephardi Jews who had been expelled from Spain after the Reconquista. They found a new home in the Balkans and eventually in Turkey. During the first third of the 20th century, parts of the family returned to their former homeland Spain. The Bassats founded steel ware companies in a number of countries.

We don’t have any information on Enrique Bassat’s childhood and youth. In 1920, he and Rosa Asseo got married in Istanbul. Rosa had been born in Adrianople (Edirne) on 23 October 1897. In 1922, the couple moved to Hamburg where Bassat founded a steel ware company in October. In June 1925, he got registered in Ohligs and, in April 1926, started producing razor blades, razors, pocketknives and scissors at Fürkerfeldstraße 22. According to his business registration card, Enrique Bassat was a Turkish citizen residing in Paris. In 1926, his brother Alberto joined the company as personally liable partner whereupon the business was turned into an open trading company (“offene Handelsgesellschaft” in German).

A job listing by the Bassat company, looking for female workers, in the local newspaper “Ohligser Anzeiger” of 6 May 1929. Source: City Archive of Solingen via zeitpunkt.nrw

Bassat very soon specialised in the manufacture of razor blades mainly. The company Albert & Heinrich Bassat was a member of the “Rasierklingen-Industrie-Verband” (literally “Association of the Razor Blade Industry”), founded in 1930, and took part in its meetings. The company advertised in specialist journals such as “Messer und Schere” and “Die Klinge”. Its commercial activity was further helped when Enrique’s brother Moise-Eliesêr Bassat founded the “Transcontinentale Export- und Importgesellschaft GmbH” (literally “Transcontinental Export and Import Company Ltd.”) in September 1931.

Listing in Solingen’s address register of 1931. Source: City Archive of Solingen

In early 1930 at the latest, Enrique and Rosa Bassat moved to Düsseldorfer Straße 40. The house they lived in was owned by local merchant Georg Davids and his wife Jenny. The Bassats were frequently visited by relatives who came from all over the world and stayed with them in Ohligs for weeks or months at a time.

After the National Socialists had seized power in 1933 and the “Third Reich” implemented its strict policies on the control of foreign exchange, the Bassat company increasingly faced difficulties. Although the business did not have to be closed down at first, the “Transcontinentale GmbH” had been dissolved in as early as June 1933, with Moise Bassat being appointed as its liquidator. In 1937 then, business operations had to be discontinued completely.

In 1934, Enrique Bassat was hit by multiple strokes of fate. After contracting an infection, his wife Rosa died at the municipal hospital on 15 March 1934. Only a few months later, on 19 July 1934, Enrique’s brother Moise died in Düsseldorf. Both were laid to rest on the Jewish cemetery in Solingen.

Two years after that, Enrique Bassat and his new partner Emilie Münch, née Heinemann, emigrated to France. Since Emilie was not Jewish, the couple was not allowed to get married in Germany and went to Paris at first: Enrique still had a residence there, at Avenue de la République. On 26 June 1939, they reached Rio de Janeiro by ship and got married there on 1 September 1939. Later on, the couple moved to São Paulo.

After Enrique Bassat had emigrated, his company in Ohligs continued to exist at first. Employees Elfriede Funk and Erich Flemm were conferred joint procuration on 23 April 1936. Three years later, on 10 May 1939, the company was dissolved and Emanuel Heinemann, Emilie Münch’s brother and lawyer in Wuppertal, was appointed as liquidator. In December 1939, Erich Korten, a former employee of the Bassat company, registered a razor blade factory located at Fürkerfeldstraße, the former site of the Bassat company. A close operational and commercial linkage can be assumed.

Business registration card of the company Albert & Heinrich Bassat oH. There was another company that Enrique Bassat registered in 1952. Source: City Archive of Solingen

Stopping over in Barcelona and other cities, Enrique and Emilie Bassat returned to Ohligs in December 1951. Prior to that, Bassat had already arranged for his company to be re-entered in the commercial registry in August 1949. Operations at Fürkerfeldstraße 22 were commenced in October 1952, but the company no longer succeeded in the post-war years. Operations were therefore discontinued in December 1955 and the company was de-registered again in 1957.

Emilie Bassat died in Haan on 2 June 1958. Enrique Bassat emigrated to Israel in February 1960. He settled down in Givatajim, a small city located east of Tel Aviv, and died on 22 March 1976.