I’m trying to answer some questions about my late grandmother's biological parents.
My grandmother died in 2012. She was sent from Germany to the US as a 6-year-old refugee in 1952, and she spent much of her adult life trying to track down her birth family. I have a box of her letters and printed emails from that search, and that's the source for nearly all of the information that will be in this post.
My grandmother was born Roswitha Walczyk in Stuttgart, Germany on November 21st, 1946. Her mother, Janina/Janka Walczyk, was a Polish woman from Chechły. (the source labeled her childhood/family home as Chechły/Borki, which I think refers to it being in the woods near Chechły, but I don't speak Polish.)
During the war, Germany made its way to Chechły and Janina was sent to work in Austria. I've been struggling to figure out—where did she work? What was this place? She sent a letter to her family in 1943 with this return address:
Janina Walczyk
Brünaü Baüer
Lenzing 4 Saalfelden
Salzburg Ostmark
I don't believe Janina was part of any specific group targeted by the Nazis, and she described the place as a farm, not strictly a camp or a place for political prisoners, but I don't know what the truth was. It surprises me a bit that she was able to send or receive mail, wherever she was. Janina's niece wrote
"She mention (sic) that she worked very hard. Milk 24 cows every day. The time was horrible for young girls, they mishandle them . . . She was always saying something like this (I don't know if my translation is O.K.) 'I never roam or loiter with any man' but was different if they forced young woman and she wanted save her own life 'was no choice'"
———
This is an excerpt from a less focused post I made to /r/Geneology.
EDIT: I can’t say how much I appreciate the offers of help and resources.
I do want to add—because I think this post left just enough ambiguity to give a few people the wrong impression—Janina survived the war.
She lived in a UNRA camp in Germany after the war ended and, leaving an infant daughter behind, she ultimately fled to Ontario, Canada.
The US Holocaust Museum has a search engine where you can look for victims and survivors of the holocaust.
The address is Lenzing 4, Saalfelden, Austria, easy to find on a map. Brunau Bauer (the peasant of Brunau) was the name of the estate. (The signs above the u are not points but a stroke to distinguish u from n) Today the estate is owned by a Mr Joseph Haitzmann. I found a source that indicates that the estate was owned by a Mr. Haitzmann in 1906, so it might have been in the possession of the family all the time. If you want to get in touch with him: I can tell you from my experience some turn away (now they come to ask for compensation) others have even photos of their workers. Mostly it will be, my grandfather told me that there were foreigners here during the war but it’s all forgotten now. If there is nothing to find in the Arolsen Archive you may contact the municipality of Saalfelden if they still have their registry of foreigners.
So I have worked with Arolsen Archives for last couple of weeks. You may try your luck there.
You may request a search via the Arolsen Archives (formerly known as International Tracing Service)
It is completely free. The Online archive also has a lot of documents searchable https://collections.arolsen-archives.org/search/ (the whole archive is only searchable on site)
A preliminarey name tag search for "Janina Walczyk" gave me a person born 12/01/1923 (roughly age apropriate) who is listed under a documents collection of "Displaced persons - Austria"
https://collections.arolsen-archives.org/archive/69586930/?p=1&s=Janina%20Walczyk&doc_id=69586930
Good luck :)
edit: I am sorry, I haven't read the rest of the comments, someone else already suggested the AA.
She sent a letter to her family in 1943 with this return address:
Janina Walczyk Brünaü Baüer Lenzing 4 Saalfelden Salzburg Ostmark
I don't believe Janina was part of any specific group targeted by the Nazis, and she described the place as a farm, not strictly a camp or a place for political prisoners, but I don't know what the truth was.
Seems like she was recruited as a Ostarbeiter, who replaced German workers when they had to go fighting on the front. On Austrian farms they were very common during WW2. In general these places were not the worst to survive the war as treatment depended on the local farmer and less on authorities. Often they even stayed at the farm after the war.
The address still exists although "Brünäu Bäuer" is certainly wrong. Probably it's Brunau Bauer? You could try contacting them. Maybe they still know some stories.
Edit: Seems like the correct name of the farm is probably "Brun(n)auer" and not Brunau though. When I saw the address I was first wondering as in Austria farms usually have family names and not place names (Brun(n)au is a place name but Brun(n)auer a family name).