Charlotte Koppel
1859-1934
Born: Germany
<p><font face="tahoma,arial,helvetica,sans-serif" size="3">My grandmother, Charlotte, was born in Germany and when she was about 30 my grandfather made a trip to Germany to bring her back to New York City to marry her. I assume the marriage was pre-arranged but I have no way of knowing or checking it out. Anyhow, it must have worked for they had 5 children (one of which died in childhood). I was only about seven years old when Charlotte died so the story I'm going to tell was told to me by my mother. It seems that during World War I both my father, Leo, and my uncle Albert were in the U.S. Army. Albert was gassed in France and died at an early age. While both her sons were in the Army, Charlotte, still loyal to the mother country, slept with a picture of the German Kaiser over her bed. I'm only guessing but I'll bet that when Sigmund and her sons pointed out the inconsistency of her display of loyalty, she would just ignore them. An editorial comment from me: if Charlotte, a Jewish woman, had remained in Germany, her loyalty would not have kept her out of the gas chamber.</font></p>