Childbed fever

I want to write this time about an issue which is connected strongly to our familys
history.
The worst enemy of our families in the Borchardt-family tree was, of course, the
Nazi final solution, but there was another enemy, also very dangerous, and it
belongs also to the past.
The medical term is puerperal infections, a general term for any bacterial
infection of the female reproductive tract following childbirth or miscarriage. From
the 1600s through the mid to late 1800s, the majority of childbed fever cases were
caused by the doctors themselves. Perhaps our women were luckier, because Jewish
doctors of course washed their hands, but hospitals for childbirth became common
in the 17th century in many European cities, and there were non-Jewish doctors and
nurses in these institutions, and they infected many of the women.
Perhaps the most famous case, but not on our tree: Goethe's sister, Cornelia, he did
not want to talk about it. Only in the 19th century the doctors realized that death
after birth is apparently associated with inflammation caused at birth, and therefore
began to pay more attention to hygiene, also and especially of midwives.
In these times, giving birth was not only painful, it was highly dangerous!
The first cases we know about (and there is no doubt at all, there were much more
than what we know), are from the fourth generation (gr-grandchildren of Baruch and
Edel): Gitel Borchardt (born von Glogau), who died in 1780 at age 21-24. We dont
know about children. Than Johanna (Edel) Helfft (born Borchardt), died in 1799 also
in the same age. Two wives of Zanvil Shmuel Lewin Eger (he has more names),
Emma (Esther) Judith Borchardt (born Hellborn), the gr-grandmother of Sascha
Morgenthaler. In the fifth generation we have Julie Burg born Riess, the wife of the
first Jewish major in the Prussian army, Meno Burg, and Aron Borchardts first wife,
Gabriel Munters grandmother. In the sixth generation Zanvils granddaughters
Riekchen Rosenstein (born Feibes) and Johanna Sutheim (born Feibes), Pauline
Salinger (born Borchardt), the sister of the Waldsteins, Simons first wife Seraphine
Borchardt (born Munter).
All these women were married and died in the age of 20-40, but we have no proof
that birthgiving was the reason of their death.
In the seventh generation we have the first cases, where we have evidence of
women who died after giving birth: Samuel Borchardt is the grandfather of the
Quaker author Margaret Hope Bacon, and the only living child of Jeanette Fendig.
After giving birth to a second child, this child and the mother died, and Abraham
Borchardt married Jeanettes younger sister Amalie. The descendants of Abraham
and his two wives are a huge branch on our tree.
Most of these women are the first wives of their husband, and if they had children,
they grew up with his second wife. These children dont have any connection to
their biological mother, and she is forgotten. Rosa Borchardt (born Primo) gave
birth, in her short life, to at least five children who survived, the youngest was

Johanna, the mother of our Chicago-Evanston-clan, born Sep 20 1885 in Schivelbein.

Rosa died six weeks after that. Emma Reissner (born Israel) gave birth to at least six
surviving children, and died three days after the birth of Manfred. She is the grgrandmother of Ruben and Tamar Frankenstein and the Weichselbaums and the
Benjamins, but their grandmother Paula was nine years old when Emma died. Aron
did not marry again and remained a widower for his last 15 1/2 years. We do not
know how he managed his household, but probably the burden fell on the shoulders
of the first daughter Helene, who was already 19 years old and married Nathan
Konschewski just 23 years later at the age of 42 years.
Aron's brother Max married again, when his wife Amalie Reiner (born Frank) died
six days after giving birth to Eugen Amalius. The cantor and elder of Stargard Jacob
Borchardt married Jenny, after the death of Rosa Borchardt (born Tonn), which left
him with three little children. Johanna Lessing born Strauss died 19 days after giving
birth to her second daughter, who then was named after her Johanna. The widower
Simon married the younger sister Clara. Hulda Reiner (born Kwilecki) died at the
day of her daughters birth, David married one and a half year after that.
I believe the fast marriage of the widower is not only a practical way for him, but it
is also for the children. It makes for them easier to cope with the grief and continue
their life and growing.
The list is very long, and it shows not only sad cases of early death, but also in
many cases feelings of guilt. We know of at least one case, the one of Lina
Joelsohn (born Borchardt), that the widower who didn't marry again - accused his
boy of the death of his wife, and in this case it is absurd in a special way: Lina died
not after the birth of the accused boy, but after the birth of his brother!
It is very long list, and continues with Marie Irene Silberstein (born Stern) and Estelle
Sander (born Borchardt) and Teresa Maguire (born Borchardt), and it would have no
ending, if the medical development wouldnt have stopped it, at least for our
families. Some of the last cases, known to me, are Charlotte Recha Wachsner (born
Apolant), died in April 1915 after giving birth to her daughter, the mother of the
writer Marianne Meyerhoff, and Herta Lewin born Manheimer, the sister of my
grandmother, who died in September 1920 after giving birth to my mothers cousin.
She was a gifted painter and the most beloved person by my grandmother. With all
the sadness that came afterwards with the Nazis, the death of her sister was the
one thing my grandmother could never cope with. Alice Edna Shelander (born
Hampton) died in July 1922 after giving birth to her fourth child, who died also.
Gertrud Rosenfeld (born Rewald) died in March 1916 after giving birth to Eva
Gustel. Gustel married 21 years later, when Germany wasnt like before and in
another continent, the youngest brother of her fathers second wife.
Today postnatal infections are treated by penicillin, invented in 1928, when my
mother was born, but came into use only at the end of World War II.
For our families the problem belongs to the past, but around the world, each year
die half a million women from complications during and after childbirth. The World
Health Organization (WHO) says, we could save 98 percent of these women. A
quarter of them die from bleeding after birth. Injection for forty cents would help

reduce the opening of the uterus. 99 percent of the victims are from developing
countries. Every sixteenth woman in sub-Saharan countries die after birth. In
Western Europe, one of four thousand. My mother almost died in 1958 after giving
birth, in Afula, but she survived. One of the rare cases in the last fifty years
happened in 1996, also here, in Israel. One month after the birth of my son was
born another son on our tree, also in Jerusalem, like my son, and the mother died
the same day.