Sossie WAGEN, née Neumann, was born in the Russian Empire’s town of Krzyzerogatha on April 14, 1897 [so far we have been unable to find either its location or its current name].
Witthold David WAGEN was born in the Austro-Hungarian city Lemberg, Galicia (which was later Lwów in Poland and is now Lviv in Ukraine) on March 16, 1893.

They were both Jewish and were married in the Jewish Community of Vienna before they moved to Salzburg in 1918 and got local citizenship rights here. Until 1938 the WAGENs operated a commercial trade agency at 7 Ernest Thun-Straße.

Twenty-six Jewish men, including David WAGEN, were arrested in Salzburg over the course of the »Reichskristallnacht« Pogrom (the so-called »Night of Broken Glass«) on November 9-10, 1938.
They were held in the police jail on the Rudolfsplatz before being deported to »protective custody« in the Dachau concentration camp. Over the following weeks they were released from the concentration camp on condition that they sign over their property and leave the country.1

The WAGENs, seem to have been unable to get the visas and affidavits needed to get into another country and they stayed in Salzburg until they were arrested and deported to Vienna on March 6, 1940.

Sossie and Witthold WAGEN’s last residence was at 10/4/23 Kurrentgasse in Vienna’s 1st District.
On July 17, 1942 they were listed as numbers 321 and 322 on Transport 32, Train Da 69 – the train that took them to Auschwitz where they were murdered. Witthold WAGEN’s Vienna registration card simply notes »emigrated with wife«.

Witthold’s brother Aron and his wife Charlotte had lived in Vienna for a long time before they too were murdered in Auschwitz.

1 The Salzburg Jews who were arrested in Salzburg by the Gestapo in the pogrom night of November 9-10, deported to the Dachau concentration camp and then released after being forced to sign various papers included: Dr. Hans Aninger, Heinrich Berkowitz, Manfred Bonyhadi, Dr. Paul Freund, Isidor Fuchs, Arthur Fürst, Dr. Hermann Glaser, Otto Grindlinger, the brothers Hugo and Karl Klein, Leo Köhler, Artur Kohn, the brothers Ernst, Ludwig and Otto Löwy, Rabbi Dr. David Margules, Isidor Mendelowitz, Julius Neuwirth, Robert Ornstein, Alfred Pirak, Rudolf Singer, Ladislaus Spiegel, Witthold WAGEN, Camillo Weil, Dr. Richard Weinberger and Leo Werner.
We also know that some Salzburger Jews were arrested at that time in other locations, like Max Sonn who was arrested in Linz and Martin Schönhorn who was arrested in Vienna – they too were deported to concentration camps and released after being forced to sign various papers.

Author: Gert Kerschbaumer
Translation: Stan Nadel

Stumbling Stone
Laid 27.08.2008 at Salzburg, Ernest-Thun-Straße 7

<p>HIER WOHNTE<br />
WITTHOLD WAGEN<br />
JG. 1893<br />
DEPORTIERT 1942<br />
AUSCHWITZ<br />
ERMORDET</p>
Registration form of Sossie & Witthold Wagen (formerly Posthorn) Registration form of Sossie & Witthold Wagen (formerly Posthorn) – backside

All stumbling stones at Ernest-Thun-Straße 7