Gregor Kochricht 1905 - 1945

Born 3.3.1905 in Odessa / Odesa
Died 12.2.1945 in Mauthausen

Biography

Gregor (Grégoire, Grischa, Grigory) Kochricht, Born 3 March 1905 in Odessa, now Ukraine, but Russian Tsarist empire at that time. 1905 was a year of bloody pogroms and Grischa's father Jacob Kochricht died that year. He had two brothers aged 10 and 11 in 1905.

Kochrichts were jewellers for several generations, with jewel production in Odessa and import of clocks and watches from Germany. The firm had a retail shop in the elegant "Passage" in Odessa and travelling salesmen. The widow, Sophie Kochricht (gazed in Auschwitz in 1943) took care of her children and managed the business until she escaped from the Bolsheviks. She settled with teenaged Grischa in Pforzheim, where she had good relations with her former suppliers.

The older boys were already independent but Grischa finished his education and studied engineering in Germany. He found employment for some time in Italy, and left around 1937 for Paris where his mother and brothers were settled.

He had married a charming christian Slovakian lady, Marie Jakova. The couple lived in Paris, where his mother and two brothers were settled, when war started in September 1939. They moved to Lyon in non-occupied France but Grischa Kochricht, foreigner, had to report to the authorities. He was enrolled in September 1943 to work for the Todt organization and stationed at the "Camp of Foreign workers" located at Miramas near Marseille.

Conditions there allowed visits from his wife and she advised him to escape and hide with fake identity papers, documents she could provide for him. He refused, explaining that the Germans would punish his work companions in reprisal.

Unfortunately, others were more selfish and escaped from Miramas camp. As usual, the German authorities designed 10 men for deportation in reprisal and Grischa Kochricht was arrested on 22 February 1944, sent from Miramas to Marseille, then to Drancy and deported with convoy 70 on 27 March 1944 to Auschwitz.

He lived until evacuation of the camp end January 1945, survived the "long march" to Mauthausen but died there on 12 February 1945.

Häftlingsnummer in Auschwitz unknown

Häftlingsnummer in Mauthausen 123460

 

This information is given by Tamara Kochricht, niece of Grischa. Born in 1926, she remembers well her uncle when he lived in Paris.

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