United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Julius Sommer was born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany on July 1st, 1876 to Loeser and Bertha Wohl Sommer. At age 14, he began to work a a Metallgesellschaft. He was a vice-president of the company before being forced to leave his job in the 1930s. Sommer and his wife, Paula (Wormser) had two sons, Richard and Alfred, both of whom had immigrated overseas (to the United States and London, respectively). After Kristallnacht, Sommer was able to leave Germany, immigrating to the United States in February 1939. He died on February 3, 1962. Alfred Sommer was born in 1909 in Frankfurt am Main, Germany to Julius and Paula Wormser Sommer. He earned his doctorate in chemistry at the University of Berlin in 1934. He immigrated to England, and, on July 16, 1938, married Rosemary Hulm, who was not Jewish. As Alfred was an enemy alien and not a British citizen, Rosemary lost her British citizenship upon their marriage. Though acquaintances were sent to Australia as enemy aliens, the couple remained in England since Alfred was employed doing scientific work for the war effort. They immigrated to the United States in 1953 and lived in Princeton, NJ, where Sommer worked at RCA Labs as a research chemist on photoemissive materials. The couple had three daughters. Alfred Sommer passed away on December 8, 2003.
box 1
Consists of pre-war, wartime, and post-war correspondence sent to and from Julius Sommer of Frankfurt, Germany, as well as Sommer's own wartime reflections of his own experiences. Includes letters written to his son Richard in the United States and son Alfred in London, his reflections on the British consular officer, Smallbones, who assisted Jews in Frankfurt in the wake of Kristallnacht, including Sommer, who immigrated to the United States in February 1939. Also includes correspondence between Alfred and Rosemary Sommer in London to Alfred's parents in the United States, 1938-1941, including information about life in London during the early years of the war, particularly witnessing German Jewish refugees arriving in England.
Sommer family papers