I’ve been absent from this blog for almost a year but I am now back in the blogging saddle! I hope. It is amazing how times flies! Life can get hectic and sometimes choices have to be made. I am slowly learning that I cannot do “everything”. For the past year, other life projects took priority over this blog. Now, though, I have time and energy again to devote to my research and this blog.
Swiss Archives
I have a large number of draft posts, ones that I started but never finished. I also have an even larger number of blog post ideas. In trying to find a jumping off point for re-entering the blog stream, I thought I would choose a small topic.
While splashing happily in the Swiss Archives last year, I had started a series of posts about Josef Jakobs and the gold counterfeiting scheme he had started with Werner Goldstein whilst in Zurich. There was a secondary series of posts about Jewess Yvonne Sommerfeld, which I plan to pick up again at some point.
The Swiss Archives also contained some files on Dorothea Schachtel, a German Jewess from Berlin, who had used one of the fraudulent Finnish passports from Ziebell, to escape Nazi Germany. Unfortunately, the Swiss authorities got wind of the fradulent passports and detained her. Dorothea told the Swiss that she had hoped to travel to Cuba, but had read in the newspaper that Ely Goldsmith, Ziebell’s contact in Cuba had been arrested in mid-1939. I knew from Josef’s statements to MI5 that Ziebell did have a contact in Cuba, but I had never learned his name! And here it was, presented on a gold platter.
Cuban Visas
Ely Goldsmith – Cuban contact of Jürgen Ziebell. This would be a small post, an addendum to the series of posts on the black market passport scheme run by Ziebell. Little did I know. As I delved into the story of Ely Goldsmith, I realized I had a tiger by the tail. This man has left one of the largest footprints in the historical record that I have ever come across. There were dozens of newspaper articles about him. There were numerous court transcripts and judgements. He was small in stature, but he left a big impression. Ely was well-known by the State Department, Treasury Department and Immigration and Naturalization departments. He was a household name with court justices.
His “small” blog post has turned into a “mega” blog post. It has also unveiled an entirely new aspect of German-Jewish emigration to the United States. Whether or not he actually helped any of Ziebell’s clients escape Nazi Germany is another matter. I am always fascinated to uncover the stories of these individuals. I wonder at their motives, at their stories.
Stay tuned as I introduce you to Herman Ely Goldsmith, one of the most fascinating characters I have met during this journey.
In the Meantime…
In the meantime, I came across two stories about spies dressing as nuns before parachuting into war torn countries. The one story is presented as fiction, the other is presented as fact. Naturally, I had to dive into both stories to determine the veracity (or not) of the second story. Sadly, the fictional story comes across as somewhat more believable than the “factual” story. Stay tuned.
Finally…
I have received a number of messages from blog readers over the last few months, so we’ll start with those in the next post… and then chase down the nun spies… or spying nuns…
Header image by SorcerySoap HocusPocus from Pixabay