| Born: | 09-10-1910 |
| Faculty: | Medical School | Medical University Vienna |
| Category: | Expelled student |
Janka HOLCZER (m. KOLLMANN) born on September 10th, 1910 in Nyiregyháza, Hungary/Austro-Hungarian Empire (entitled residency ("heimatberechtigt") for Tornalá/Czechoslovakia [Slovakia], citizenship 1938: Czechoslovakia), daughter of Ludwig Holczer (administrator), lived in Vienna's 9th district, Porzellangasse 54/11, was enrolled finally in the fall term of 1937/38 at the Medical School in the 4th year of her studies (fall term 1937/38 was validated on February 1st, 1938).
She was forced to discontinue her studies and leave the University of Vienna for racist reasons under National Socialism after the "Anschluss".
She married Dr. Georg Kollmann (1912 in Vienna-1992 in Israel) and they were able to escape together to Helsinki, where their son Frans Olof Kollmann was also born in Helsinki in 1941.
However, on November 6th, 1942, they were among those eight Jewish refugees who were expelled from Finland by the Finnish Security Police (Valtiollinen poliisi) on the freighter SS Hohenhörn to Tallinn, Estonia, where they were handed over to the Gestapo and taken to Berlin. From Berlin, all three were deported on Transport No. 29 on February 19th, 1943 to the concentration camp Auschwitz [Oświęcim] in German occupied Poland where Janka Kollmann and her son Frans Olaf were murdered immediately after arrival on February 20th, 1943. Her parents, her sister Margit and her husband were also murdered in Auschwitz.
Her husband, Dr. Georg Kollmann, survived and was liberated in 1945. He then worked in a U.S. military hospital in Austria until 1950 and then emigrated to Israel where he lived and worked as a doctor. He died there on October 3rd, 1992.
Since June 2018, the first three Finnish Stolpersteine commemorate Janka, Georg and Frans Olaf Kollmann in Helsinki.
Lit.: Archive of the University of Vienna/enrollment forms ("Nationale") MED 1937-1938; POSCH/INGRISCH/DRESSEL 2008, 407; Mikko Härmeinen at www.geni.com; Stolpersteine in Helsinki, victims database at Yad Vashem for Frans Olof Kollmann, Georg Kollmann and Janka Kollmann.
Herbert Posch
