Eduarda Poisson (geb. Schwarz)

Eduarda Schwarz is born in Jaroslau [today: Jarosalv in Poland] as the legitimate daughter of the Jewish k.u.k. Captain Heinrich Franz Schwarz and Eugenia, née Kohn. She herself is baptized Roman Catholic. When she was six years old, her mother died and her father married Renate Lewin, a Jewish woman. In 1898, the family moved to Olmütz [today: Olomouc in the Czech Republic] and in 1902 to Vienna.

In 1927, she married the bank employee Adolf August Poisson, son of the Jewish director of the Creditanstalt-Bankverein August Josef Poisson, who had converted to Catholicism, and the Catholic Bertha, née Lippmann. Eduarda Poisson was granted Austrian citizenship upon their marriage.

Between 1934 and 1938, Adolf Poisson worked as a commercial employee in various companies.

On March 12, 1938, the Poissons witnessed the downfall of a free and independent Austria with the invasion of the German Wehrmacht. With the occupation of Austria, the 'Nuremberg Racial Laws' came into force overnight, according to which Eduarda was classified as a 'full Jew' and Adolf as a 'half Jew'.

On August 15, 1938, Eduarda and Adolf Poisson decided to flee and emigrated via Trieste to Rio de Janeiro, where a brother-in-law of Adolf Poisson lived. They moved to Sao Paulo in 1941.

Eduarda Poisson's stepmother Renate Schwarz, who stayed behind in Vienna, was deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp on July 10, 1942 and murdered there on November 3, 1942.

During his emigration, Adolf Poisson managed to keep his head above water with book exams and odd jobs. In Brazil, they experienced the liberation of Austria in May 1945.

However, the couple lacked the financial means to return to their homeland after the war. When Adolf Poisson died abroad on November 1, 1972, Eduarda Poisson decided to return home.

On April 23, 1973, Eduarda Poisson arrived in Vienna and settled in Klosterneuburg. She joins the ÖVP-Kameradschaft der politisch Verfolgten und Bekenner für Österreich. She died in Klosterneuburg at the age of 89.