Hans Ignaz Halberstadt (10 June 1885 – 22 September 1966) was a German-born American Olympic épée and saber fencer.

Early and personal life

Halberstadt was born and raised in Offenbach am Main, Germany, and was Jewish."Hans Halberstadt at the 1928 Olympics,"
West Coast Fencing Archive.Bernard Postal, Jesse Silver, Roy Silver
''Encyclopedia of Jews in Sports.''
/ref> He was trained at the Offenbach am Main Fechtclub."Hans Halberstadt and the Thomson Twins,"
West Coast Fencing Archive.

Fencing career

Halberstadt was German National Champion in epee in 1922 and 1930. He was also German team sabre champion with Fechtclub Offenbach in 1924 and 1925. He competed for Germany in the individual and team

épée The ( or , ), sometimes spelled epee in English, is the largest and heaviest of the three weapons used in the sport of fencing. The modern derives from the 19th-century , a weapon which itself derives from the French small sword. This contain ...

and team

sabre A sabre ( French: �sabʁ or saber in American English) is a type of backsword with a curved blade associated with the light cavalry of the early modern and Napoleonic periods. Originally associated with Central European cavalry such as th ...

(coming in fourth) events at the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam at the age of 42. After the

Nazis Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in N ...

came to power, after

Kristallnacht () or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom(s) (german: Novemberpogrome, ), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's (SA) paramilitary and (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation fro ...

his family's business was seized by the Nazis and Halberstadt was interred in

Bergen-Belsen concentration camp Bergen-Belsen , or Belsen, was a Nazi concentration camp in what is today Lower Saxony in northern Germany, southwest of the town of Bergen near Celle. Originally established as a prisoner of war camp, in 1943, parts of it became a concentra ...

by the Nazis because he was Jewish. He then fled Germany at the age of 56 with what he could carry, first to

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

, and then

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

in 1940. Halberstadt then became 1940 US Sabre Champion, both in individual saber and team saber. In San Francisco he taught fencing in the 1940s at the San Francisco Olympic Club and then at his own club which he opened, and ran a fencing supply company. Among his students in San Francisco were

Helene Mayer Helene Julie Mayer (20 December 1910 – 10 October 1953) was a German-born fencer who won the gold medal at the 1928 Olympics in Amsterdam, and the silver medal at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin. She competed for Nazi Germany in Berlin, despite ...

and Tommy Angell. His name lives on through a San Francisco fencing club founded by his students after his 1966 death. Halberstadt was inducted into the U.S. Fencing Hall of Fame, in its Class of 2013.">"Two Fencers With Penn Ties Headed to Hall of Fame,"
University of Pennsylvania.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Halberstadt, Hans 1885 births 1966 deaths German male fencers Olympic fencers for Germany Fencers at the 1928 Summer Olympics Sportspeople from Offenbach am Main Jewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United States German people of Jewish descent Jewish épée fencers Jewish sabre fencers Jewish American sportspeople Jewish German sportspeople Fencers from San Francisco Bergen-Belsen concentration camp survivors