Joachim Auerbach

Born:	05-18-1893
Faculty:	Law School
Category:	Deprivation of academic degree

Joachim AUERBACH (born on May 18^th, 1893 in Lemberg, Galicia/Austro-Hungarian Empire [Lwiw/Ukraine]), had graduated at the Law School at the University of Vienna on June 21^st, 1918 with the academic degree "Dr. iur.".
In times of Nazism he was deprived of his academic degree on July 17^th, 1942 with the racist argument, that he as a Jew was not considered dignified an academic degree of a German university ("eines akademischen Grades einer deutschen Hochschule unwuerdig").
Joachim Auerbach, son of Dr. Josef Isaak Auerbach (lawyer, 1863-1942) and Josefine Auerbach, née Herzmann (1863-1930), had studied law in Vienna and received the degree of Dr. iur. from the Law Faculty of the University of Vienna on June 21st, 1918. He worked as a lawyer in Vienna from 1922 on and, together with his father Dr. Josef Auerbach, ran a law firm in Vienna's 3rd district, Landstrasser Hauptstrasse 14. On April 14^th, 1935, he had married the American Julia, née Werbofsky, widowed Gantert (1900-?) in Vienna. She was born on December 5^th, 1900 in Spring Vally, New York, lost American citizenship on her first marriage on October 5^th, 1921 to Hermann Gantert (1876-1934), a German. Two weeks after her marriage to Joachim Auerbach, she traveled back to the United States and applied to regain her U.S. citizenship, which became important for emigration to the U.S. three years later. Their son, Harry Raoul Auerbach, was born in Vienna on October 7^th, 1936, and the family lived in Vienna's 3^rd district, Neulinggasse 12/15. After the so-called "Anschluss" of Austria to the German Reich in March 1938 Dr. Joachim Auerbach and his family had to flee from Austria and they first managed to travel to Paris/France, where they obtained a U.S. visa on June 22^nd, 1938. So they were able to depart from Le Havre/France on September 15^th, 1938 with the SS President Harding to emigrate to the USA, where they arrived in New York City, NY on September 24^th, 1938 and initially lived with his cousin Josephine Greenbaum, in Sterling Place, Brooklyn, NY. Joachim Auerbach immediately applied for U.S. citizenship, which he received after the five-year period expired on December 28^th, 1943, and he was also registered for the U.S. Army in 1942 (but not drafted). The family resided at 219, W. 81 street in Manhattan, New York City, NY, and he was able to re-establish a law practice at 25 Broadway, Manhattan, New Yok City, NY (1960). Due to his successful escape to the USA, he and his wife were deprived of their German citizenship by the Third Reich as early as August 4^th, 1941 - announced in the German Reich and Prussian State Gazette No. 181 of August 6^th, 1941. As a result, Joachim Auerbach was deprived of his doctoral degree by the University of Vienna on July 17^th, 1942, for racist reasons, since he was considered "as a Jew unworthy of an academic degree from a German university" under National Socialism. It was not until 13 years after the revocation and a decade after the end of National Socialism that the doctoral degree was regranted to him on May 15^th, 1955, and the revocation declared "null and void from the beginning". Dr. Joachim Auerbach died in August 1975 in New York/USA and is buried at Beth Olom Cemetery in Ridgewood, Queens County, New York/USA.

Lit.: Archives of the University of Vienna, enrollment forms ("Nationale") IUS, graduation registry ("Promotionsprotokoll") IUS 1915-1919 No. 587, rectorate GZ 118 ex 1942/43 (ONr. 70), GZ 561 ex 1944/45 (ONr. 15, 243); list of deprivation of citizenship promulgated in Deutscher Reichsanzeiger No. 181 of August 6^th, 1941; www.genteam.at, www.ancestry.de, POSCH 2009, 388; SAUER/REITER-ZATLOUKAL 2010, 79.

Herbert Posch