Departed, without providing an address - this postal sticker was affixed to numerous mail items before the Reich Post returned them to their senders outside Germany. In reality, most of the addressees were not "departed," but had been displaced or murdered because they were Jewish. "Departed" thus became a metaphor for the disappearance of Jews from Germany, until the sticker was banned by the Gestapo in January 1943, as its meaning had become widely known. Not only the contents of mail items but also their external characteristics bear witness to individual fates and historical events. As documents of everyday culture, they provide new clarity and expand knowledge about people and contexts. The question of the contemporary historical significance of postal items arises.