Erwin Elias Kahn was born on September 12, 1900 in Munich, the first child of the Jewish merchant Albert Kahn and his wife Lotte. He had three younger siblings. Erwin Kahn became a merchant and insurance agent. On May 15, 1928 he married Euphrosina Vessar, who was from a non-Jewish family, in Bucharest. Back in Munich the young, childless couple often changed residence. In November 1932 they moved into an apartment on the third-floor of the building at Hans-Sachs-Straße 18.
Only a few weeks after the Nazi seizure of power, on March 11, 1933, the SA arrested Erwin Kahn and took him to the Ettstraße police prison. He was then transported to Dachau concentration camp on March 22, 1933, the very day the camp opened. From there Erwin Kahn wrote to his wife and parents: “I assure you again that I don’t know why I’ve been arrested. I’ve never been the member of a political party.” As part of the scare campaign to intimidate political opponents, the camp SS carried out the first massacre on Communist prisoners with Jewish roots on April 12, 1933. When the SS men called out three prisoners by their surnames, Erwin Kahn also came forward. Along with Rudolf Benario, Ernst Goldmann, and Arthur Kahn, he was also shot. Unlike the others however, he survived. Although seriously wounded by two shots to the head, the police lieutenant present, Emil Schuler, prevented the SS men from giving him a “coup de grace”. Erwin Kahn was operated on at the Chirugische Klinik, Nußbaumstraße 20. While there, on April 15, 1933, he told his wife about the circumstances of the shootings. As the following day broke, on April 16, 1933, at around 4:30 a.m., Erwin Kahn died. The autopsy carried out by the forensic department of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität showed that he had been killed through blunt traumata of the larynx. He was most likely strangled to death by the guards. His grave is located at the Old Jewish Cemetery in Munich. (text: Björn Mensing, editor: C. Fritsche, translation: Paul Bowman)
