Mind you, my family at the time was Catholic so not quite sure why the research was undertaken. I've been told that it was done on all public servants at the time and I do know that one of my great uncles served in the SS. I've also been told that the Nazi Party was beginning to harass and persecute Catholics, particularly politically active Catholic priests so perhaps my family's Catholicism landed them on the research list (see articles on this subject on Wikipedia here and here). Another possibility that was revealed to me for the first time in 2011 by my now late Mother Ingrid Hartz was that her Grandfather Alois Hartz (Gustav Aloysius Richard Hartz) helped several Jewish families escape the country. If this became known or even suspected, that may have instigated the research. More on that story here.
One of the final pages of the document listed information for the death of my GGGG Grandmother, Johanne Dorothea Albertine Auguste von Watzdorf (1792-1897) who was married to my GGGG Grandfather, Heinrich Christian Hartz (1784 – 1865).
It was finding Johanne von Watzdorf that sparked this whole project that has turned out to be much bigger than I ever imageined. Below are images of all the documents I received, click on the images to enlarge...
