Haunting holocaust images from beyond the grave: Chilling family photographs and treasured possessions left behind by Jewish family sent to Nazi concentration camp discovered hidden in attic 70 years later
- Treasured possessions belonging to Jewish Holocaust victims discovered
- Family photos, jewellery boxes and documents hidden in Slovakian attic
- It is believed the stash belonged to Samuel Gottschall, born in 1878
- The prayer leader was deported to a concentration camp with his family
- Heartbreaking find made by handyman fixing neighbour's leaky roof
- They had been stashed in the hope the family would one day return
- Mr Gottschall may have had a surviving son who moved to Australia
Haunting family photographs and treasured possessions belonging to Jewish victims of the Holocaust have been discovered in an attic more than 70 years after they were sent to concentration camps.
Jewellery boxes and pictures believed to belong Samuel Gottschall and his loved ones, who were murdered by Nazis during the Second World War, were hidden away in a dim and damp attic in Slovakia.
The stash was discovered between the roof beams of a home in the city of Presov in Slovakia by handyman, Imrich Girasek, who was fixing his neighbour's leaking roof.
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Haunting: This photograph found in the stash of personal belongings is believed to show Samuel Gottschall (right) and his family. They were all sent to concentration camps
Hidden treasures: Cutlery, photographs and documents were found in the house in Presov, Slovakia
Poignant: These family photos were taken before the deportation of the city's Jews began
Letters, newspaper clippings, a Jewish songbook, jewellery and cutlery had also been stowed away in 1942 - the year the deportation of the city's Jews started. Many families had left behind such personal collections in the hope that they would return to collect them.
But they never did.
Handyman: Imrich Girasek was fixing a neighbour's leaking roof when he came across the haul
Girasek, a 46-year-old former soldier and married father-of-five, said: 'The old roof needed to be checked so I went there because the owners are my friends.
'They have owned the house since the 1960s.
'The owners of the house weren't interested in the things, but I couldn't bring myself to simply throw them away.'
The items were found next to suitcases from the period, but the handyman thinks they had been looted.
'I believe the things were initially stored in the suitcases and then hidden in the attic, but that somebody searching for valuables must have taken them out and left them lying about,' Mr Girasek added.
'The jewellery boxes were all empty. Somebody must have stolen the jewellery years ago.'
He carefully leafed through the documents and photographs – among them wedding pictures and family portraits – but was not able to identify the people in the pictures.
'Most likely all of them were deported to a transportation camp,' he added.
'All the found documents date back to before 1942, and the first transport of Jews from Presov happened in 1942.'
Mr Girasek gave the items to the city's Museum of Jewish Culture with the hope the family could be identified and relatives located.
'It would make me happy to know that the things had been passed on to people close to the family who used to own them,' he added.
Mystery: The photographs found in the Presov home are believed to belong to Mr Gottschall's family, but the museum researching their origins cannot be 100 per cent certain
Discovered: This document, believed to feature college graduates, includes a photograph of a man with the surname Gottschall
Family portrait: These smartly dressed subjects are thought to be connected to the Gottschall family
Gita Eckhausová, head of Presov's Jewish Religious Community, said: 'We have gone through the material and compared the photographs with historic photos from our archives.
'It would appear that the items belonged to the family of Jewish Neolog cantor (prayer leader) Samuel Gottschall.
'According to our research, the people pictured in the photographs are Gottschall and his family, but we can't be 100 percent certain.'
Mr Gottschall, born in 1878, was deported to a concentration camp in 1942 along with his entire family.
Lubica Tatranska, the museum's employee responsible for the restoration of historic items, said: 'Everything is dirty and dusty. The Jews used to hide their personal and valuable things before they were deported.
'Most of them thought they were going to labour camps and would eventually return.'
Artifacts: The items are now at the Museum of Jewish Culture, once an Orthodox synagogue
Unassuming: The stash was found in the attic of this house, built next to the Neolog synagogue
Holy place: The items were found in a house next to the Neolog synagogue (pictured), which is now a shop
Unidentified: Staff at the museum believe the photographs belong to Samuel Gottschall, but individuals cannot named
Lubica Tatranska, the museum's employee responsible for the restoration of historic items, said some of the documents and photos are damaged and have no value
Slovakia had been an ally of Nazi Germany and the country supplied it with workers.
However, when it fell short of the promised numbers, it agreed to replace the shortfall with 10,000 to 20,000 deported Slovak Jews.
Before the war, some 136,000 Jews lived in Slovakia, but now there are only about 4,000.
In Presov, the third-largest city in Slovakia, some 6,000 Jews were deported to concentration camps between 1942 and 1945.
Only 800 people returned to the city after the war and many of them later emigrated, often to the US, Australia, Israel and the UK.
The documents found in the attic are written in German, Hungarian, Yiddish and Hebrew, and several bear the surname Gottschall, including newspaper clippings and a songbook and musical scores signed by Samuel Gottschall.
The items were located in the house built next to the Neolog synagogue in Presov's historic city centre.
Further research in the Australian Dictionary of Biography has indicated that Mr Gottschall may have had son who survived the horrors of the war - Benjamin Bela Vojtech - who became a rabbi.
He married Margareta Glässner in 1938 in the Czech town of Louny.
Discovery: This was another of the documents found between the roof beams
Musical: Museum employee Lubica Tatranska carefully inspects this Jewish songbook, which was stowed away in 1942
During the Second World War, Mr Vojtech secretly carried out religious services before he and his wife were transported to Auschwitz in German-occupied Poland.
Mr Vojtech's wife died in Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, but he survived and was liberated in May 1945.
After the war, he served as a communal rabbi to the surviving Jews in Prague.
He remarried in 1946 and left Czechoslovakia for Australia three years later with his, then pregnant, wife and one child, to escape the hardship under the communist regime.
Mr Vojtech died of cancer in 1978 in Sydney, but this is where the trail ends.
The items will be cleaned, counted and become part of the museum's collection in the coming weeks.
Any relatives who get in touch with the museum can claim the items discovered by Mr Girasek.
Manuscript: This document helped the museum staff identify its owner. It was signed by Samuel Gottschall
Newspapers: Clippings from Hungarian papers were among the items hidden in the home
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