A while ago a Slovakian girl came to my house as a lodger. I am fascinated by all the different cultures and languages I find around me, and I believed her to be the first Slovakian I had ever met. She said, well no, there’s a lot of us about. And sure enough, that week I noticed several SK car registrations, and met another Slovakian. I told my mum this rather dull anecdote, and she said “You know, my grandmother Fortgang, she came from a little place called Ludrova, near Bratislava. That is in Slovakia, isn’t it?” And, sure enough, when I checked it out, there is no doubt that I am one eighth Slovakian.
back row: Willi, Fritz, Moritz (aka Ernst), Lui ( aka Alois, Mum’s dad)
front row: Else, Adel, Rudi, Ignac, Olga
Mum said that the Fortgang brothers were devoted to their mother, and my granddad used to visit relatives in Ludrova every summer when mum was a child in Vienna in the 30s. He went back once after the war, but never talked about it. Well, the thing is, we’re going to Vienna in just over a week, and Mum keeps expressing a desire to visit Ludrova. It turns out that Ludrova is over 4 hours from Bratislava by train and bus, plus the short journey from Vienna to Bratislava, so I need more than just Mum’s childhood recollections before planning this trip.
Through the records on Familysearch.com I had already discovered that at least two of Adel’s sisters had moved to Vienna before 1900: Rosa, married to Jacob Quallbrunn, and Anna, married to Jacob Kalt, because these gentlemen had signed as witnesses on the Fortgang’s documents. Searching through Quallbrunn births I discovered that Rosa and Jacob had married in Ludrova, confirming that that was where the Brauners were living at the time. This wasn’t enough information. Frustratingly, on all documents, husbands and fathers had to give heir place of birth, but not wives and mothers.
Through the Brauner family we are related to Jews across the globe: Samuel and Cecilie’s descendants may be found in Israel, New Zealand, Argentina and Sweden, as well as the UK. But on the genealogy website, Geni.com, Ludrova was not mentioned as a place of birth. So, as a last resort, I consulted the Holocaust victims’ database at Yad Vashem.
Yad Vashem tells us that 8 Brauners living in and around Ludrova in 1942 were taken and murdered. This included cousins, aunts and uncles of my grandfather, among them Rosa Quallbrunn. So Mum now knows what her dad didn’t tell her after that post-war trip. She still wants to go there, the only question being whether she will feel up to the travelling.
It seems mysterious why so many stayed while others went to great pains to escape. But assembling all the necessary documents to leave greater Germany legally was by no means easy, and after September 1939, clearly impossible. One of Rosa Quallbrunn’s daughters had themselves smuggled over Hungary’s eastern border during the war, and thence made their way to Palestine with their family. It was Rosa’s Israeli great-grandson Itzik Goldberger who placed the extended family tree on Geni.com and established our connection with them. I had a very pleasant skype-chat with Itzik a while ago and we agreed to further investigate all things Brauner.
Just in case you’re confused about these relationships, here’s a little tree I made showing Mum’s ancestors:
the Ruth Ridley history project 
Hello Ruth, I am a second cousin of yours. My Grandmother Gisella Goldberger Brauner was a sister of Adel – your Grandmother. She was born in Ludrova. Please contact me by mail. I wrote to Steven on GENI several days ago after he contacted me.
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My grandparents Giselle and Adolf Goldberger Lived in Vienna until 1918.
My father was born in Ruzomberok (Rosenberg) near Ludrova.
My grandmother made the match between Helene – the daughter of Rosa Quallbrun and the nephew of her husband Adolf Goldberger.
I have addresses of many of the Brauner family members around the world. There is a brauner also in Australia.
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