Polish passport of H. Straszunska
Passport issued by the Rzeczpospolita Polska to Harvey Sohnen’s grandmather, Henia Straszunska (born 1884) for her to travel with her daughters Sora (9 years old) and Etel (6 years old) to America. It had 22 pages but only the front and back cover and pages that have printing and/or writing on both sides are scanned. It includes a photograph of Henia and Etel. Henia signed in Yiddish (Hene Shtrashunske). The stamps in Henia’s passport shows that during her journey from Oshmyany to New York, she stopped in Warsaw for more than two months, presumably to obtain all the necessary papers for emigration and travel, and then stopped in Danzig/Gdansk, after leaving Poland at Tczew. They stayed in Danzig for more than two weeks before boarding the Wilson Lines SS Smolensk initially to Hull, UK. They travelled from Hull to Liverpool, most likely by train. They then travelled to New York on the Cunard Lines ship Carmania. A passenger list exists for the transatlantic trip on the Carmania. Harvey’s grandmother, Hannah, or Henya Straschunska became Strauss as soon as she arrived in the United States. She travelled with her four children.
Following the 1921 emigration of Henia and the children, Benjamin no long had any close family left in Europe, but Henia still had eight siblings there. One sister had moved to Kungur, Russia before World War One. A younger brother later joined her. Another brother escaped the Nazis and fled to Israel around the beginning of World War Two. Henia’s other three sisters and two brothers were murdered in the Shoah.
- Emigration
- Heritage
- Identity
- Memory
- Migration
Harvey: "I was astonished to see the passports, because it’s the relics of my family's immigration to the United States. It's just stunning to see something like that. Passport for my grandmother in 1921, from different countries. I believe it was very difficult for my grandmother to get her passport. Because my grandfather left Oshmani in 1913. And it's very typical for immigrants that the man goes first to try to get a job set up and make things ready for the family to follow. But it was 8 years from when my grandfather left until my grandmother left, and that's a very long time. I believe that it must have been very difficult. Part of that reason was World War I. After World War I it was difficult for people to emigrate. But my grandmother finally arrived in 1921 to USA with 4 children, including my mother. There were 5 family members, that was a passport for 2 of them. Also transatlantic travel was very dangerous. But after World War I, there were other problems. And so it was a very difficult thing. Apparently, the difficulties were on the Polish side. Americans didn't have a problem. Although they were ultimately restrictions in immigration. It was very hard to get out of Poland”.
