An Escape from Nazi Vienna: Heinrich Schrefel and Queer Holocaust history

Among the 31,000 Austrian Jews who escaped the Nazis to Great Britain was one Heinrich Schrefel. His story was not unlike that of many other Viennese Jewish emigrants: he was descended from Polish-Jewish parents, born in Vienna, and lived in the largely Jewish second district of Leopoldstadt. Schrefel escaped Vienna following his persecution by the Gestapo. In Great Britain, he was detained in the Kitchener Camp in Kent, together with thousands of other German and Austrian Jewish male refugees. Like many emigrés, he eventually changed his name to the more English sounding Henry Stevens. But one thing sets Schrefel apart: his life offers a queer counterpoint to the majority of Holocaust and Austrian Jewish histories. Schrefel's run-in with the Gestapo in summer 1938 was because of his love for another man. Schrefel's story, reconstructed from his trial file, will, address books, and genealogical information, is bound to remain fragmentary. In the absence of a testimony of his own, much of what we offer here is guesswork. To queer historians, these are familiar challenges. We are particularly interested in exploring how this single case study can shine new light on Austrian Jewish and Holocaust history, and histories of Jewish emigration from Nazi Greater Germany to Britain.