Daniel Abraham

Hebrew name: Naftali
Secular name: Herz Wolf
Alternate spelling: Hersz

Mates (Mathis) Katz Aron Selig Katz Leo (Leiser) and Frida Katz

Herz Wolf Katz was born to Isaac Katz and Zlate (Slate) Schnee in either October or November 1855* in Sokal.

* Estimated date based on his death notice; he was 48 years 3 months old at the time of his death, on February 7, 1904.

Herz Wolf was a grain merchant, and - according to my mother - "led a comfortable life". His occupation was listed as "Getreidehändler" ("grain dealer") on his son Leiser's birth record in 1886. Herz Wolf and Sara Cheine's civil marriage (1891) used the more generic term "merchant" ("Kaufmann"). It's not clear whether this means he later expanded his business beyond just grain trading, or this was simply a clerical shortcut.

Herz Wolf married Sara Cheine Gruber (Grüber ?), born in Radziechow (or Rozdziałów?) in 1856 (+ or - 1 year).

Alternate names/spellings: Chanje, Cheijny, Hannah.

Marriage record, Herz Wolf Katz and Sara Cheine Gruber, 1891 (excerpt)

Herz Wolf and Sara Cheine' marriage is listed in the Sokal records for the year 1891, when they were both aged 35. Because they had already had several children by then, we can safely assume that this date is not the actual marriage date, but the date of their civil marriage, or maybe the official recording of their religious marriage.

Children

Twelve children, not three!

Until newly discovered birth records, Herz Wolf and Sara Cheine Katz were only known to have had three sons - Leo, Aron and Mates - with the possible controversial addition of a fourth son.

A few years ago, going through transcripts of Sokal birth records digitized in 2007 revealed the existence of three more sons. The explanation for these previously unknown children was simple: two of these had died as infants, while the third one had died at the age of twenty-two.

Newly digitized (2012) records now reveal the addition of no less than six previously unknown siblings! Three girls: Perel, Zlate and Chaje Zeldy, and three boys: Osias Maier, Nachman and Leibisch.

Additionally, the birth record for Leo has finally been found - recorded under the name Leiser ("Eliezer"). This newly found record changes the date of his birth by three years.

The addition of these six newly-discovered siblings completely changes the picture of the Sokal Katz family. Instead of being the story of the three Katz brothers who left Sokal for Germany around WW1, we now have twelve children, ten of which reached adulthood. Ignoring Israel Tewel who died of pulmonary tuberculosis at age twenty-two, we now have nine adult lives to document instead of only three.

These new siblings now provide a new argument for the possibility that the "unknown" Katz (Max Katz) who made his way to New York could indeed have been one of these newly discovered Katz boys.

These new additions also raise two questions: why was no one aware of the existence of these siblings, and what happened to them?

The second question is probably the easiest to answer: if these siblings remained in Sokal, which I assume was the case, they most likely were destroyed in the Shoah, probably in Belzec in 1943 with the rest of the Sokal community. Their names - Osias Meier, Nachman, Leibisch - however don't appear on the Yad Vashem list of victims, nor in the communitiy Yizkor book Sefer Sokal. These lists are most likely incomplete, so it's impossible t know for sure what their fate was.

As for the first question, assuming that these siblings did remain in "the old country", it is easy to imagine that they would have been at most just a vague, distant presence in the lives of the children raised in Germany (Toni, Yitzhack, Bill, Max.) Leo, Aron and Mates probably remained in contact with occasional letters, but for Toni, Yitzhack, Bill or Max, these uncles and aunts were probably complete strangers.

Toni remembered receiving letters from Sokal, and Max visited relatives in Sokal in 1938, so it is likely that these "relatives" were their uncles and aunts.

List of children of Herz Wolf and Sara Cheine Katz

Mates

Born: 19 October 1875

See Mates Katz's Family Page.

Moses Leib

Born: 20 May 1877
Died, 30 Sept 1877, age 4 months

Israel Tewel

Born: Jan 27 1879
Died August 31, 1901, of pulmonary tuberculosis, age 22.

Perel Jütte

Born 19 Dec 1880
Married Chaim Juda Leib Kolbuszower v. Gruber, merchant, born in Witków Nowy in 1876, son of Moses Kolbuszower and Hudes Gruber, on 6 September 1915.

Aron Selig

Born 29 April 1882
Father of Bill (H.W.), Michael and Saul

See Aron Katz's Family Page.

Hersch, 1884

Born 29 September 1884.
Died 26 may 1885 at the age of 8 months.

Leo (Leiser/Eliezer)

Born 22 February 1886,
father of Toni and Yitzhack.

See Leo Katz's Family Page.

Zlate

Born 14 August 1887,
Married Chajem TENNENBAUM from Wilcza Wola/Bojanów/Nisko on 30 August 1909.

Osias Mayer

Born 6 April 1889

Nachman

Born 20 April 1890.
Nachman Katz, merchant, married Rifke ROSENBLAT on 27 August 1919.
Died 18 November 1928 at the age of 38* of pulmonary tuberculosis. (Death record has age: 40).

Leibisch

Born 14 April 1891
Merchant, married Hene Freide SELIG in 1921.

Chaje Zeldy

Born 29 November 1895

Death of Herz Wolf

Herz Wolf Katz died of pneumonia on February 7, 1904, at the age of 48.

Death of Sara Cheine

During WW1, Sara fled the advancing Russian (or Ukrainian?) army and managed to escape to Czechoslovakia with her daughter-in-law Frida. "Later, (her son) Leo left to bury his mother." (source?). It's not clear what "later" means, and the official record of her death has not been found. She was still alive for the marriage of her son Leibisch in April 1921, meaning her death can be placed sometime between 1921 and the mid 1930's.