Leonora Grünne was an actor, as was her husband Friedrich. From working on stage in Vienna, they were acquainted with a Berlin actress, Margarete Gahrmann. During the Second World War the Jewish couple lived in Berlin, where Fritz Grünne was employed at the Jewish Cultural Association’s theater. They had to go underground in January 1943 and Margarete Gahrmann hid them for a time in her apartment in the Schöneberg district. Gahrmann’s Jewish partner, the dancer Ellen Rathé, also hid there.
After only a short time, Fritz Grünne was arrested on the street and taken to Alexanderplatz prison. Under threat of deportation, he saw no other way out but to hang himself in his cell, on February 1, 1943. He was buried in Weißensee Jewish Cemetery.
His widow was also arrested several months later. According to Margarete Gahrmann, she was denounced by Stella Kübler. Kübler betrayed numerous Jews to the Gestapo—in the hope of saving her parents’ and her own life. Leonora Grünne was deported to Auschwitz on December 7, 1943, and murdered there.