Widminnen (Poland), 1875 – 1943, Sobibór (Poland)
Eugen Engel was born in 1875 in Widminnen in East Prussia, which today is Wydminy, Poland. His parents were a local Jewish land owner and merchant named Samuel Engel, and his wife, Berta née Salinger. In 1892, the family moved to Berlin, where Eugen Engel followed in his father’s business of selling fabrics for women’s clothing. In 1907, he married Lea Jacoby, and in 1910, their daughter Eva was born. Engel was an amateur, largely self-taught composer, but an amateur of the highest level, whose works enjoyed occasional public performances. He was a close acquaintance with Engelbert Humperdinck and corresponded with the conductors Bruno Walter and Leo Blech, along with the pianist Edwin Fischer. It is generally assumed that in 1914 he began work on the opera Grete Minde, based on Theodor Fontane’s novella. Once Hitler became German Chancellor in 1933, there was no hope of an opera by a Jewish composer being performed. He attempted unsuccessfully to find a foreign venue for performance. Eva subsequently immigrated to Amsterdam in 1935, and her father followed shortly following the outbreak of war in 1939. After the Netherlands fell to the Nazis in 1940, Eva immigrated to America in 1941. Unfortunately, Engel’s attempts to follow her failed, despite being on a list for immigration. In March 1943, he was deported to Westerbork camp. He was then transferred to the Sobibór death camp in Poland on March 20, and murdered three days later. He was 67 years old.
