Simon Hirschland Bank

The Simon Hirschland Bank was founded in 1841 in Essen, Germany, by Simon Hirschland (1807-1885), who started his business as a merchant, and over the years began to lend money.

[1] The banking business began in 1841; Simon Hirschland also traded in wool, meat, pelts, nails, copper, lead and cattle, from 1 Weber Street.

[2] In 1938, the Simon Hirschland bank was forcibly sold ("Aryanized") and the family members who were involved in the bank fled to and settled in the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States.

[5] The bank building still exists as a department store on Lindenalle, near the renamed Hirschlandplatz, in Essen.

One of the artworks looted from Kurt Hirschland by the Nazis, a drawing by Vincent Van Gogh called La Mousmé (July-August 1888) was restituted to the family by Amsterdam’s Stedelijk Museum in 1956.