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 […]
Back in the Blogging Saddle Read More »
I interrupt this series on Yvonne Sommerfeld for just a moment… Digging through the Swiss Archives online…. I have been a bit like a child in a candy shop. Stunned and gobsmacked… staring around me with wide-eyed wonder and glee. I’ll have this one… and this one… oh, and this one too! Oh heck… I’ll
Josef Jakobs was many things – son, brother, father, grandfather, dentist, bootlegger, philanderer, black marketer, criminal and spy. Can we add “liar” to that list? Josef told his British interrogators many stories during his incarceration at Camp 020, MI5’s secret wartime interrogation centre. Fantastic stories of German cabaret singers, Finnish bootleggers, black market passports, gold
Yvonne Sommerfeld – The Mysterious French Jewess involved with German Spy Josef Jakobs Read More »
This blog is Part 4 of a 4-Part Series on German Jew Werner GoldsteinPart 1 is here, Part 2 is here, Part 3 is here. Werner Adolf Goldstein, chemist and gold counterfeiter was a mysterious man. While I have uncovered the barest outline of his life, there are still many frustrating unknowns. The core mystery
Does the Jakobs Family Album contain Photos of German Jew Werner Adolf Goldmann? Read More »
This blog is Part 3 of a 4-Part Series on German Jew Werner GoldsteinPart 1 is here, Part 2 is here, Part 4 [will be here when it is posted]. While Werner’s father, Willy, perished under the Nazis, Werner himself managed to escape Germany and fled to Italy. He made a good choice. While many
German Jew Werner Adolf Goldstein Sought Refuge from the Holocaust in Italy Read More »
This blog is Part 2 of a 4-Part Series on German Jew Werner GoldsteinPart 1 is here, Part 3 & Part 4 will be here when posted. I never thought I would find any information on Josef’s gold counterfeiting buddy. To me, the name “Goldstein” (Goldstone) seemed too utterly made-up to be real. But, it
The Jewish Chemist Turned Gold Counterfeiter – Werner Adolf Goldstein Read More »
This blog is Part 1 of a 4-Part Series on German Jew Werner GoldsteinPart 2 is here, Part 3 & Part 4 will be here when posted. I burst into tears the other day. Now, this is not an unusual occurrence when I am researching the lives and deaths of Jewish victims of the Holocaust.
German Spy Josef Jakobs’ Gold Counterfeiting Story Confirmed by Swiss Archives Documents Read More »
A few months back, I read M.J. Trow’s 2023 volume on the Bella in the Wych Elm mystery. The book was a disappointment. It suffered from a number of errors and inaccuracies. On top of that, the dearth of source citations meant that readers and researchers were left wondering what was fact and what was
Lavinia Stratford – A Candidate for Bella in the Wych Elm? Read More »
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last few months, you’ve likely heard of ChatGPT, the new AI bot that is taking the tech world (and the rest of the world) by storm. Ask it for a marketing plan for your Airbnb and it will spit something out within seconds… and something quite
Is the AI bot ChatGPT Useful for Historical Research? Read More »
A few years ago, I told the story of my great aunt’s common-law husband, Gustav Goldemann. While my great aunt was not a Jew, Gustav was a Jew. For many months, he managed to avoid deportation, perhaps because he was in a common-law relationship with my great aunt, Tante Hanni Knöffler. But eventually, his luck
The 1942 Deportation of German Jew Gustav Goldemann from Berlin to Latvia Read More »