Stolperstein dedicated to Sigfried Laufer

The Stolperstein for Sigfried Laufer is set into the pavement at Bratislavská 250/69 in Brno, marking the last home he chose for himself before the Nazis deported him to his death. It belongs to the Europe-wide network of Stolpersteine – small brass memorial plaques embedded in the pavement, each one placed outside the last freely chosen residence of an individual Holocaust victim.

Who was Sigfried Laufer?

Sigfried Laufer was born on 6 February 1876 in Vlasatice, Moravia. As an adult he settled in Brno, living at the address where his memorial stone stands today. In 1941 he was deported to the Mauthausen concentration camp in Austria, where he was murdered on 13 October of that year.

Why is the stone placed at Bratislavská 250/69?

The Stolperstein concept, created by German artist Gunter Demnig, follows one strict rule: a stone is never placed at a symbolic site or a grave, but exactly where the victim actually lived before deportation stripped them of any choice. Bratislavská 250/69 was Sigfried Laufer's own last address in Brno, a home he chose for himself. Because of this, visitors literally stand at the threshold of his former front door rather than in front of an abstract monument somewhere else in the city.

What happened to his family?

Sigfried Laufer's fate was shared by much of his family. His second wife, Helene Laufer, was also deported and did not survive the war, and the same fate befell their son Erwin. Brno holds separate Stolpersteine dedicated to both Helene and Erwin, so a visitor can trace the family's history by following the stones through the same streets. Not everyone in the family met the same end: Sigfried's children Herta and Karl managed to escape to the United States and survived the war far from Europe.

What exactly is a Stolperstein?

A Stolperstein – literally a "stumbling stone" – is a small cobblestone-sized block topped with a brass plate engraved with a victim's name, date of birth, and fate: deportation, the camp or place involved, and the date and place of death. Gunter Demnig began the project in Germany, and it has since grown into the largest decentralized memorial to Nazi victims in the world, with thousands of stones across European cities, including numerous locations throughout Brno and other Czech towns. Stones are laid singly, in family groups, or in clusters, always in the pavement, forcing passers-by to bend down to read the name.

Frequently asked questions

Where exactly is this memorial stone located? In the pavement at Bratislavská 250/69 in Brno, at the address where Sigfried Laufer lived before his deportation.

Who was Sigfried Laufer? A Brno resident born in 1876 in Vlasatice, who was deported to the Mauthausen concentration camp in 1941 and murdered there on 13 October of that year.

Did any of his family survive the war? Yes – his children Herta and Karl escaped to the United States and survived. However, his wife Helene and son Erwin were deported and did not survive.

What is a Stolperstein, and why is it set into the pavement rather than displayed elsewhere? It is a brass memorial plaque embedded in the cobblestones, marking the exact site of a Holocaust victim's last home rather than a cemetery or another symbolic location – the place where they actually lived before that right was taken from them.