Gertrude Eitelberg

Gertrude Eitelberg was born in Vienna as the legitimate daughter of the well-known ear specialist Abraham Josef Eitelberg and Jetty, née Pordes. A Jewish doctor from Tarnopol in Galicia [today: Tarnopil in the Ukraine], Abraham Eitelberg received his doctorate in medicine from the University of Vienna in 1878 [today: Medical University of Vienna] and, together with his wife Jetty, who was also Jewish, had four children, Maximilian, Cornelius and twins Gertrude and Melanie.

Nothing has survived about Gertrude Eitelberg's childhood and youth. Together with her twin sister, she worked at the Creditanstalt-Bankverein (CA). Both she and her sister Melanie remain unmarried and live together in an apartment in Vienna's 1st district.

On March 12, 1938, Gertrude Eitelberg witnesses the demise of a free and independent Austria with the invasion of the German Wehrmacht. With the occupation of Austria, German legislation was adopted and with it the 'Nuremberg Race Laws', according to which Gertrude Eitelberg was considered a 'full Jew'. She and her sister were immediately dismissed from the Creditanstalt-Bankverein (CA) and their assets were confiscated.

On November 23, 1941, Gertrude Eitelberg was deported to the KZ Kauen