Letters and postcards sent to Cecilia Pels in Copenhagen from various locations in Europe with expressions of thanks on receiving food parcels, 1941-1943

Letters and postcards sent to Cecilia Pels in Copenhagen from various locations in Europe with expressions of thanks on receiving food parcels, 1941-1943 Cecilia Cohen married Ludwig Pels in Hamburg; the Pels family were wine merchants and were very involved in community life in their town; Ludwig was head of the Chevra Kadisha (burial society) and Cecilia was involved in collecting donations for the needy; their daughter, Marta Pels, traveled to Copenhagen to marry Lipman Eliezer Kurtzweil, born in Hamburg and working as a teacher in Copenhagen; As a result of Kristallnacht, November 1938; the family lost a large part of their assets, when the situation of the Jews deteriorated even further, the couple decided to escape to Denmark and join their daughter's family, 1940; they lived in an old age home in Copenhagen together with additional famlies who had come from Hamburg; Cecilia joined the women's Syklubben (sewing club), they worked preparing various handicrafts and would organize a large annual bazaar, sending the money collected to the Vaad HaYeshivot (Yeshiva Committee) of Eretz Israel; Cecilia began to send parcels to her relatives who remained in Hamburg; the great need for this brought about the widening of the circle of people receiving parcels to beyond the immediate family and additional families began turning to Copenhagen with requests for help; the women in the old age home on 3 Dyrkob Street began to organize for sending a large number of parcels; the money from the handicrafts is saved for the parcels; it is necessary to recruit more persons willing to have the parcels sent in their name since the law limits sending the parcels only to direct family members, they persuade Jews and non-Jews to provide their names and addresses for the purpose of sending the parcels; when the Jews are deported, the parcels follow them and are delivered to the Theresienstadt Ghetto, Westerbork, the Lodz Ghetto, the Warsaw Ghetto, Amsterdam and various locations in France; the return letters of thanks sent to Copenhagen are a testament to the activity of women with no support from any organization and contrary to the opinion of the heads of the Jewish community in Copenhagen who feared that sending the parcels would bring on the wrath of the authorities in Denmark and Germany.