The Children
HOWEVER: The first, second and also third child were little girls.
According to Lotte’s remark to her husband, at present school principal in Hamburg:
I will give birth to girls until you will rejoice over them…
Lotte with her firstborn little daughter, Eva
Four Generations (from left to right):
Grandma Preuss – 46 years old;
On her lap: Esther – half a year old and
Lotte – 21 years old; on her lap: one and a half year old Eva
Great-grandmother Mathilde Halberstadt (mother of Grandma Preuss) – 66 years of age.
The first three little daughters and the longed-for son on the children’s bench (from left to right: Esther, Miriam, Buli, Eva)
Father and little son Julius, called Buli, 1924
The midwife:
Children are like pancakes:
The first one is slightly burnt (Eva had black hair)
The second one is not fully baked (Esther was very pale)
The third one is too thin (Miriam was very tender: “A chick in danger of being blown away”)
The fourth one is too fat (Buli’s birth weight was 4 kg, “with boot size 42″)
Only the fifth pancake came out perfect: Judith was a beautiful baby…
Lotte with the first five “pancakes” (first row from left to right: Miriam and Esther; second row from left to right: Judith on Lotte’s lap, Buli, Eva.)
Then another boy was born, followed once more by three little girls– like in the beginning. Hence the number of children amounted to: seven plus two or – three times three:
The three big ones,
The ‘centerpiece’
And the three little ones.
The youngest – number nine, Sara Stella, was born on 24 December 1928 and mother Lotte advertised in the “Israelit”: Looking for a competent maid with affection for children to take on a job in a bustling kosher rabbi’s household with nine children…
Advertisement in the “Israelit”, 31 January 1929
Two weeks thereafter President Hindenburg took on the godparenthood for the rabbi’s baby.
Mother Lotte: “Don’t laugh at me, but I would like to have another baby, to hold such a sweet-smelling creature in my arms”. But her nine children protested: “You are not the youngest anymore – in twelve years you’ll be 50.”
Drawing by 5- year-old Noemi, All nine Carlebach children, 1932
The Eternal Issue of Finding a Suitable Nanny
(Stage-managed by the 9 Carlebach children):
The disguised housewife is sitting and awaiting the applicants willing to take on a job in a bustling kosher rabbi’s household with nine children to introduce themselves.
Housewife: …Within six weeks the sixth maid already… Listen, there’s a knock at the door! Maybe she’s even the seventh. May God grant us that she is gentle and kind… come in!
How can I help you?
Girl: I would like to be of service./em>
Hausfrau: You want to be of service?
Girl: You probably mean because of my beautiful dress. On Sundays I only wear Satin and gloves with 99 buttons and my boyfriend takes me out to dance.
Hausfrau: Oh, you also have a boyfriend?
Girl: Not only one, but three…
Jo and Lotte with the children and two nannies, Emma and Erna:
First row from left to right: Jo with Noemi, Erna, Lotte and Emma;
Second row from left to right: Eva, Peter, Judith, Esther;
Third row from left to right: Ruth, Buli, approximately 1927/28
Only here JoLo (code name for Joseph and Lotte Carlebach in censored letters) could spend some rare quiet time together
