Ernst Levy Collection

The collection consists of official and private documents belonging to members of the Levy and Thilo families, including their correspondence and photographs. It provides insights into the lives of a German-Jewish and a German-British family before, during and after the Nazi era. Although containing materials from several individuals, the majority of the papers pertains to Ernst Moritz Levy and his wife Helen Levy-Thilo.

Related to the lives of the protagonists, this exceptionally rich collection covers a wide range of subjects, including among others: German immigrants in the North of England (Bradford) in the late 19th/early 20th century, Jewish soldiers in the German Army during World War One, trading business, Nazi persecution, emigration, refuge and internment in Britain, the evacuation of London from German bombing during World War Two, post-war restitution efforts and tracing of Holocaust victims.

Of special interest might be the preserved correspondence of Elise Weinberg, a maternal aunt of Helen Levy-Thilo, who was involved in the ‘Guatemala Transfer’ Scheme, a Gestapo deal to grant exit permits to a small group of affluent elderly Jews from Berlin for buying overprized shares of a certain consortium in Guatemala.