Dr. phil. Margit Gutmann

Margit Gutmann was born in Erding on December 19, 1903, the only daughter of Arthur and Julie Gutmann. She grew up in a respectable middle-class Jewish home. Her father was a lawyer and deputy Director of the Munich Regional Court. Margit Gutmann first attended the Höhere Mädchenschule (Higher Girls’ School) on St.-Anna-Platz and then, between 1917 and 1923, what is now the Luisengymnasium high school, where she stood out with her excellent performance. After her Abitur (school leaving and university entrance examination), she went to the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität in Munich, first studying Law for one semester before changing to Classical Philology, German Language and History. She passed her state examinations to qualify as a teacher in 1927 and 1928, and in 1928 gained her doctorate. She subsequently taught at the Mädchenlyzeum (girls’ grammar school) in Frankenthal in the Palatinate, where she was one of the most popular teachers.
In 1932, Margit Gutmann returned to Munich where she lived with her parents and worked as a private tutor for Latin, Greek, German and History. In October 1936, she moved to Berlin and taught at the Goldschmidt-School, a Jewish private school in Berlin-Grunewald. After the school was closed down in 1939, Margit Gutmann stayed in Berlin and until July 1942 was a teacher at the school of the Reich Association of Jews. In the Summer of 1942 she went into hiding. She made the fatal error of nevertheless submitting a declaration of her assets, which led to the Gestapo (secret state police) finding her. In September 7, 1943, Margit Gutmann was deported to the collection camp in Grosse Hamburger Strasse, and then three days later to Auschwitz concentration camp. All traces of her disappear there. It is still not known to this day exactly when Margit Gutmann was murdered.
Her parents did not survive the Nazi period either. Arthur and Julie Gutmann were deported to the Theresienstadt ghetto on July 10, 1942 and murdered there in 1943.
(Text: Barbara Hutzelmann; editor: C. Fritsche; translation: C. Hales)