The Schongut family

The Schongut family

I think this picture was taken in Aknaszlatina, Ukraine. We used to go there in the summer, there was a salt-bath there. The picture was taken when our family was together. The two little girls in the front are my sisters Anna Kaufmann, the eldest, and Margit Kaufmann, the second eldest, between them is me on my mother's lap, while the little girl in the background [behind the table] is my cousin Klari Schongut, the third from the left is Uncle Sandor, one of my uncles, next to him is Aunt Vilma, Emil Schongut's wife, while on the right is Oti, our German maid. I don't remember the others.

Grandfather Schongut had five children: Sandor, Emil, my mother, Erno, and the youngest, Imre. Sandor had a broker agency in Maramarossziget where he was one of the contact men, i.e. he established business connections between people. He was extremely honest and fair. His wife was Gitta, and they had two children, Klari and Laci. Klari was the same age as my elder sister, who was four years older than me. They called her big Klari and me little Klari. She married Dr. Sandor Grossman in Szatmar. Laci was two years older than me. He graduated from a medical school in Paris, and remained there. He became a doctor in Montpellier. His wife, Erzsebet Gross, was a painter.

Dr. Emil Schongut was a lawyer in Budapest, and his wife, Vilma Heller, died of appendicitis when their younger daughter was nine months old. Uncle Emil was shot into the Danube in 1944. They had two daughters, Jutka and Agi. Jutka died young, she had some problems with her cardiac valve. Agi, Gross after marriage, still lives in Budapest, but I haven't heard from her in very long, although she used to phone me.

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