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latest: Ella Behrens [*1892]
The banker and merchant Joseph Salomon - not to be confused with Joseph Salomon from Winsen/Luhe, whose sons Simon Salomon and Moritz Salomon lived in Lüneburg from the 1840s - was born in Lüneburg around 1755. He was the first child from the second marriage of Lüneburg "Schutzjude" ("protected Jew") Salomon Salomon. His mother was Hendel, née Traub from Hamburg, who gave birth to at least nine more children in the following years.
As a young man, Joseph left Lüneburg, presumably to work as a helper for a "Schutzjude" in another town. After the death of his father in 1782, he returned to Lüneburg and achieved the status of a "Schutzjude" himself from 1790.
This term denoted a status granted by German sovereigns to Jewish merchants from about the 14th to the 19th century, in order to profit from their revenues and control the settlement of Jewish families. In return for the payment of high protection fees and adherence to strict restrictions of mobility, the “Schutzjuden” received a certain degree of external protection and privilege over other Jews. In the Kingdom of Hanover, the status of “Schutzjude” existed until the 1840s.
It was only after attaining this status that Joseph Salomon was able to start a family himself. In the 1790s, he married Röschen Gans, who came from Celle, a member of the large and influential Gans family. The couple had four daughters: Hanna, Marianne, Lena and Friedericka. They all grew up in Lüneburg, but later moved to other towns.
As a merchant in Lüneburg, Joseph Salomon had a license for money transactions and mobile trade. The address books list him from 1816 to 1831 as a "Commissionair", i.e. a kind of stock exchange trader, first in Grapengießerstraße, then Auf dem Meere, and finally from 1829 Am Markt.
Joseph Salomon probably died in Lüneburg in 1831 or 1832 and was buried in the town"s Jewish cemetery. His widow Röschen moved to Hamburg, probably to stay with one of her daughters, and later died there. Joseph Salomon"s death marked the end of an era: He had been the last member of the Salomon family that had lived in Lüneburg for more than 120 years, starting with Moses Salomon around 1707.
Sources and info:
Hamburg register of deaths, 1883, for daughter Johanna Stern nee Salomon (ancestry.com)
Name variants: Josef