The Siblings of Samuel Deutsch (Rosenblum, Greenfield)

This is the third in a series of “Brick Wall” posts. I have actually discovered a few leads in the past couple days on this branch of the family which provide a little more hope than previously.

Samuel Deutsch (1861-1938), his wife Helen Lichtman Deutsch (1881-1958), and six children (Jean, Edward, Maurice, Ted, Martin, and Berta) immigrated to America in 1913 from Nagayalmas, Hungary. The town, in the Transylvania region, is now part of Romania.

(Helen actually arrived a year earlier to earn money for the rest of the family to make the trip.) In 1914 a 7th child, Allen, was born. They all settled in Chicago, Illinois.

According to family records, Samuel’s parents were Abraham Deutsch and Sarah Weiss. I have no information on them except for their names.

Martin, Ted and Berta recorded a family history audiotape in the 1970s, and they knew their father had had several siblings, and they had cousins in America, but they hadn't seen them in years and their memories were hazy. They were able to come up with a handful of names, though their certainty was low. They also knew that Samuel had had a wife prior to Helen in Hungary, and six children who decided not to come to America. They didn't know any names.

A couple days ago my mother had a phone conversation with the daughter of Jean, and her memory was also now hazy, but Jean had been the eldest child, and her daughter recalled a few more names of Samuel's siblings (but not that of his first wife). Plugging the names in Ancestry.com has resulted in a few interesting leads

Likely siblings of Samuel:

David Deutsch – it is thought he was in America only briefly and returned to Hungary. However, a son of his, Herman, settled in Michigan, was a teacher, and he changed his name to Herman Dexter. It’s not believed he had any children. David may have had a few daughters who stayed in America, and their names may have been Hannah Goodman, Celia Palmer and Bertha Newman.

Sarah Deutsch – married a Rosenblum, and had six children. One son named Daniel, and five daughters.

A very likely family has been found in a Rootsweb forum post – a Sarah Deutsch and Adolph Rosenblum who lived in Chicago. Their children were Daniel, Pauline, Frances, Esther, Julia, and Lillian. In 1930 Julia Rosenblum had married David Mittelman. [The post is dated back in 2003, and the poster has not responded to a query I made a month ago.]

Regina Deutsch – married Nathan Greenfield

I found a Nathan and Regina Greenfield in the 1930 Chicago census, with children Gertie, Milton and Irving. Country of origin being Hungary.

Nephew of Samuel

Sigmund Deutsch

I found in Chicago a Joe and Eva Deutsch with sons Sigmund and Albert, living on the same street as Samuel and Helen in 1920.

There are enough names here I should be able to locate some cousins with a little help from the Chicago Vital Records which are supposed to come online at some point in the near future. Before then I might make a trip to the local library and browse through the Chicago city directories for 1923 and 1928, but I'm not sure if they will provide more information than the census already does. Unfortunately, after 1928, the next Chicago city directory at my local library is from 1973.