Unearthing Victims and Survivors

Coming to Terms with the Bettauer Family in the Holocaust

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.23777/sn.0223/ctt_nwes01

Keywords:

Paula Bettauer, Helmut Bettauer, Reginald Parker, Hugo Bettauer, Hermine Löwensteinová, Vienna, Holocaust, family history, antisemitism

Abstract

Much is known about the Viennese Jewish author Hugo Bettauer (1872–1925), author of Die Stadt ohne Juden (1922), a journalist, an advocate of open conversations about sexuality in the First Austrian Republic, and the first victim of the National Socialists in Austria. However, less is known, by both historians and his descendants, about his family members leading up to and during the Holocaust. This article traces the research conducted by its author, Nathaniel Parker Weston, Hugo Bettauer’s great-grandson, to discover the fate of members of Bettauer’s family. Particular attention is placed on unearthing the stories of Hugo Bettauer’s son from his first marriage, Helmut Bettauer (1899–1942), and his sister, Hermine Löwensteinová (née Bettauer (1870–1942), both of whom were murdered in death camps. The article also reflects on Hugo Bettauer’s son from his second marriage, Reginald Parker (1904–1967), the grandfather of the article’s author, recounting his actions to apparently obscure the Jewish background of their family history.

Author Biography

  • Nathaniel Parker Weston, Seattle Central College

    Nathaniel Parker Weston earned a PhD in European and Southeast Asian History from the University of Washington with a dissertation on the impact of German racial science and nationalism in the colonial Philippines. A revised version of the dissertation, entitled Specters of Germany: Colonial Rivalry and Scholarship in the Philippine Reform Movement & Revolution, was published in 2021 by the Ateneo de Manila University Press in the Philippines. In addition to various studies of German colonial scholar- ship, he has published several articles on different facets of the Holocaust. He is cur- rently working on a study of anti-Jewish stereotypes in German popular anthropologies of Pacific Islanders. He is a history instructor at Seattle Central College.

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Published

2023-11-23

Issue

Vol. 10 No. 2 (2023): S:I.M.O.N. – SHOAH: INTERVENTION. METHODS. DOCUMENTATION.

Section

COMING TO TERMS

License

Copyright (c) 2023 Nathaniel Weston

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How to Cite

“Unearthing Victims and Survivors: Coming to Terms With the Bettauer Family in the Holocaust ”. 2023. S: I.M.O.N. Shoah: Intervention. Methods. Documentation. 10 (2): 151-65. https://doi.org/10.23777/sn.0223/ctt_nwes01.