Note: In this lengthy post, I compile the substantial amount of evidence I’ve collected related to my father’s first cousin Heinz Löwenstein’s exploits during WWII. This post would not have been possible without the substantial contributions of Mr. Brian Cooper from England who ferreted out most of the primary source documents and books citing Heinz. I’m eternally grateful.
Related Posts:
POST 16: MY GREAT-AUNT HEDWIG LÖWENSTEIN, NÉE BRUCK
POST 137: MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN HEINZ LÖWENSTEIN: DISCOVERING HIS WHEREABOUTS DURING WORLD WAR II
POST 161: FATE OR COINCIDENCE? THE FLEA MARKET FIND OF FEDOR LÖWENSTEIN PHOTOGRAPHS
POST 162: FEDOR LÖWENSTEIN’S CORRESPONDENCE WITH MARCELLE RIVIER, HIS ONETIME GIRLFRIEND
My last three posts (Post 160, Post 161, & Post 162) have largely dealt with Fedor Löwenstein (1901-1946), one of my father’s first cousins, a renowned painter. He moved to Paris in 1923, attracted by the artistic influence of the capital. He was part of an artistic movement that dominated there, designated as the École de Paris, the School of Paris. This does not refer to any school that really existed, but rather to a movement which brought together artists who contributed to making Paris the focus of artistic creation between the two world wars. It was in this rich artistic context that Löwenstein painted and drew. His early works were marked by the influence of cubism, whose main representatives worked in Paris, although his subsequent productions evolved towards abstraction.
In Post 160, I provided an update on my now ten-year old claim against the French Ministry of Culture’s (Premier Ministre) Commission pour la restitution des biens et l’indemnisation des victims de spoliations antisemites (CIVS), Commission for the restitution of property and compensation for victims of anti-Semitic spoliation. In brief, my claim involves a request for compensation and repatriation of 25 works of art produced by Fedor Löwenstein confiscated by the Nazis in December 1940 at the Port of Bordeaux. The works were destined for New York for an exhibition at the Nierendorf Gallery but only three paintings are believed to have survived the Nazis’ destruction of his so-called “decadent art.”
In Posts 161 and 162, respectively, I discussed photos and letters that have been discovered and/or have survived among the personal effects of two of Fedor’s girlfriends, the Corposano Studio dancer Doris Halphen and the renowned artist Marcelle Rivier (1906-1986).
In this post, I shift my attention to Fedor Löwenstein’s younger brother Heinz Löwenstein (1905-1979) (Figure 1), specifically his whereabouts during WWII. His capers and adventures during the war are bookworthy. I’ve previously explored this topic relying on detailed information unearthed by an English gentleman named Brian Cooper from Maidstone, Kent, England. (Figure 2) Brian specializes in studying and researching British WWII prisoners of war and coincidentally stumbled upon a mention of Heinz Löwenstein and an alias he used, “Henry Goff,” while investigating his uncle incarcerated in a German stalag during the war. Since writing Post 137 and Post 137, Postscript, with Brian’s help and guidance, I’ve discovered an astonishing amount of new information which I discuss below.
Unlike Fedor Löwenstein, who died prematurely of Hodgkin lymphoma in 1946 in Nice, France before I was born, as a child I met both of Fedor’s younger siblings, Jeanne “Hansi” Goff, née Löwenstein (1902-1986) and Heinz Löwenstein. Both Hansi and Heinz were my father’s closest cousins. Hansi was an austere person who seemingly disliked children; by contrast, her brother Heinz was exceedingly affable and charismatic. Throughout her life, Hansi retained her married name “Goff,” a name I will return to below as I relate the story of her brother’s wartime escapades.
As a brief aside, from the report that the CIVS’ forensic genealogist prepared in connection with my claim against the French Ministry of Culture, I learned that Hansi’s husband’s name was “Georges Goff.” To the best of my knowledge, Georges and Hansi never had any children, or at least none that survived to adulthood. To date, I have been unable to learn whether they divorced or whether Georges died prematurely; regardless, Hansi never remarried.
As many readers whose relatives survived WWII can probably attest to, my own relatives were rather reticent to talk about their experiences during the war. My father occasionally alluded to Heinz Löwenstein’s wartime exploits but in such vague terms that as a child I never understood what those escapades entailed. My childhood fantasies filled in the blanks in ways that now seem phantasmagoric. I never anticipated I would learn the truth but thanks to Brian, I’m now able to fill in more of Heinz’s story.
Let me start by reviewing what I presented earlier, then move to the more recent discoveries so the entire story is told somewhat linearly.
Brian Cooper first contacted me in February 2023 after coming across my Post 16 where I discussed my great aunt, Hedwig Löwenstein, née Bruck (1870-1949), and her three children, including Heinz. (Figure 3) In his own research on British prisoners of war, he’d come across the name Heinz Lowenstein (without an umlaugh over the “o”). Initially uncertain whether the Heinz he’d come across and my ancestor were the same person, two threads in my post convinced him they were one and the same. First, as mentioned, Heinz Lowenstein used the alias “Henry Goff,” Goff being his married sister’s surname. Second, he learned that my father’s cousin Heinz Löwenstein had the same date of birth, the 8th of March 1905, as the prisoner of war records indicate for the Heinz Lowenstein he’s been researching.
I immediately asked Brian why he was interested in Heinz Löwenstein. Though very familiar with this branch of my extended family, I assumed there was an ancestral connection of which I was unaware. Amazingly, it turns out Brian’s uncle, Harold William Jackson from the 2nd Battalion Northamptonshire Regiment, captured in 1940 in France, was interned in one of the same Stalags as Heinz had been held, namely, Stalag VIIIB/Stalag 344 in Lamsdorf, Silesia [today: Łambinowice, Poland]. More on this below but suffice it to say that unlike Heinz who was at multiple Stalags and work labor camps throughout his captivity, Brian’s uncle was apparently only imprisoned in Stalag VIIIB until January 1945 when the Nazis began marching the still able-bodied prisoners-of-war west as the Red Army was approaching. By contrast with my father’s cousin Heinz Löwenstein, Brian’s uncle’s fate is unknown. Whether Heinz and Brian’s uncle knew or ever ran into one another is similarly unknown.
Until Brian Cooper provided documentary evidence, I had no idea where Heinz spent the war nor how he survived. The primary source of information on Heinz Löwenstein’s whereabouts and movements during the war can be found in the UK National Archives. Specifically, records created or inherited by the War Office’s Armed Forces Services containing “German Record cards of British and Commonwealth Prisoners of War and some Civilian Internees, Second World War,” found in Catalogue WO (for War Office) 416 are pertinent. Three entries related to Heinz Löwenstein, or his alias “Henry Goff,” can be found in this dossier. The National Archive website provides a summary of these German Record cards, but Brian obtained complete copies of the originals, which form the basis for the detailed synopsis he compiled of Heinz’s wartime activities.
The most informative German Record card in terms of tracking Heinz Löwenstein’s movements during the war is record number WO 416/412/223 (Figure 4a-d), alternately referred to as his Personalkarte, his personnel card. This card includes his picture, his father’s first name, his mother’s maiden name, his religion, and his date and place of birth, all previously known to me, confirming this was my father’s first cousin. Unknown to me was his service number (i.e., 8576), his service (i.e., Palestinian Army), the regiment or squadron he was a member of (i.e., Corps of Signals), his profession (i.e., electrician), the place he was captured (i.e., Greece), the date of his capture (29th April 1941), his POW number (i.e., 8576), and the camp name and number where he was initially interned (i.e., Stalag XVIIIA which was located in Wolfsberg, Austria).
Prior to being contacted by Brian, I’d already learned that Heinz married a divorcee named Rose Nothmann, née Bloch in Danzig, Germany [today: Gdańsk, Poland] on the 22nd of October 1931; interestingly, she was eleven years his senior. An illegible notation in the upper righthand corner of the marriage certificate indicates they got divorced, an event I assumed had taken place in Danzig. However, from Heinz’s Personalkarte where he named his wife Rose Löwenstein living in Palestine as his next of kin, I now realize the divorce likely took place after Heinz returned from the war.
Another thing I concluded from Heinz’s Personalkarte is that he and his wife moved to Palestine from Danzig where he enlisted in the English Army, probably in around 1935. Two POW lists published, respectively, in September 1944 (Figure 5) and April 1945 (Figure 6) indicate the regiment/unit/squadron Heinz was a member of, “3 L. of C. Sigs.” This refers to the “3 Line of Communication Signals [Royal Corps of Signals, often simply known as Royal Signals].” For readers, like me, unfamiliar with the work of this squadron, this unit is responsible for providing full telecommunications infrastructure for the Army wherever they operate. Signal units are among the first deployed, providing battlefield communications and information systems essential to all operations.
As mentioned above, Heinz’s Personalkarte shows he was captured on the 29th of April 1941 in Greece. Before discussing where he is likely to have been captured, let me provide readers with a general overview of the Battle of Greece. This battle, also known as the “German invasion of Greece” or “Operation Marita,” was the attack of Greece by Italy and Germany during World War II. It began on the 28th of October 1940 with the Italian invasion of Greece from the west via Albania, then a vassal state of Italy. Greece, with the help of British air and material support, repelled the initial Italian attack and counterattack in March 1941.
Realizing that the bulk of Greek troops were massed along the Greek border with Albania and that Italy was in trouble, German troops invaded from Bulgaria to Greece’s north on the 6th of April 1941, opening a second front. The Greek Army was quickly outnumbered even with the reinforcement of small numbers of British, Australian, and New Zealand forces. The Greek forces were outflanked by the Germans at the Albanian border, forcing their surrender. British, Australian, and New Zealand forces were overwhelmed and forced to retreat southwards down the Greek peninsula, with the goal of evacuation. For several days, Allied troops were able to delay the German advance, allowing ships to be positioned to evacuate the units defending Greece. Still, by the 27th of April the German Army captured Athens, and reached Greece’s southern shores by the 30th of April. The conquest of Greece was completed a month later with the capture of the island of Crete. An intriguing footnote is that Hitler later blamed the unsuccessful German invasion of the Soviet Union on Mussolini’s failed conquest of Greece.
Knowing that Heinz was taken prisoner on the 29th of April, Brian reasons that he was seized in or near Kalamata on the Peloponnesian peninsula. Based on testimony from others, we know that POWs were quickly moved to a prison compound at Corinth, then shortly thereafter to Salonika. On their way to Salonika, the prisoners stopped briefly in Athens before continuing northwards. However, when they reached the tunnel below the Brallos Pass, north of the town of Gravia, the prisoners had to dismount because the tunnel had been rendered unusable by explosives during the recent retreat by Allied soldiers. Thus began what is referred to as “The March,” the destination of which was the town of Lamia 40 miles north. This involved a long slog uphill, followed by a precipitous downhill walk in unpleasantly hot weather.
A Facebook account about the “Battle of Kalamata 1941” estimates that by September 1941, 12,000 POWs had passed through the “Salonika Transit Camp Frontstalag 183,” on their way to the central Europe Stalags They included many nationalities—Scots, English, Australians, New Zealanders, Serbs, Indians, Palestinian Jews, Cypriots, Arabs, and Greeks. Many of the POWs died, and a few daring ones escaped.
From Heinz’s Personalkarte we know he was initially imprisoned in Stalag XVIIIA in Wolfsberg, Austria after being transported by cattle truck from the Salonika Transit Camp. A different German Record card for Heinz Lowenstein, WO 416/228/460, records his transfer from Stalag XVIIIA in Wolfsberg, Austria to Stalag VIIIB in Lamsdorf on the 28th of July 1941. (Figures 7-8) The earliest date on Heinz’s Personalkarte, German Record card WO 416/412/223, is the 8th of July 1941, which corresponds to the date he was inoculated against typhoid, perhaps upon his arrival at Stalag XVIIIA in Wolfsberg. (see Figure 4b)
Beginning in September 1941 and continuing through June 1943, Heinz was temporarily transferred from Stalag VIIIB, where he appeared “permanently” based, to seven different work labor camps in the towns of: Görlitz, Germany [today: Zgorzelec, Poland]; Wawrowitz, district Troppau [today: Vávrovice, Opava District, Czech Republic]; Oppahof-Stettin, Kreis Troppau [today: Štítina, Opava District, Czech Republic]; Stramberg, Kreis Neutitschein (Neu Titschein) [today: Štramberk, Nový Jičín District, Czech Republic]; Krappitz, Germany [today: Krapkowice, Poland]; Tarnowitz, Germany [today: Tarnowskie Góry, Poland]; and Oppeln, Germany [today: Opole, Poland]. Two of these places were in the Sudetenland, the part of then-Czechoslovakia annexed by Germany under the terms of the 1938 Munich Agreement.
Another interesting detail recorded on Heinz’s Personalkarte are the solitary confinements he was made to endure for neglecting or disturbing work operations and for two escapes. Remarkably, Heinz’s escape from work labor camp designated as “E479” in Tarnowitz is recorded in a book by Cyril Rofe entitled “Against the Wind.” Cyril himself escaped from a work camp that was subordinate to Stalag VIIIB on his third attempt, eventually making his way to Moscow before being repatriated via Murmansk. I refer readers to Post 137 for the verbatim description from Cyril Rofe’s book of Heinz’s escape, a compelling read.
Following Heinz’s release from the brig in August 1943 after his third escape, possibly in September 1943 or slightly later, Heinz made a successful fourth escape from Stalag VIIIB/Stalag 344 or one of its subordinate work labor camps. The evidence for this comes from War Office record WO 224/95 (see Post 137, Figures 21a-d) which places him at Camp Siklós in Hungary in November 1943.
Record WO 224/95 is a Visit Report by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) written on the 16th of November detailing prison conditions at the Camp Siklós Hungarian detention center inspected on the 8th of November 1943. While referred to as Camp Siklós the holding facility had in fact been moved from Siklós to Szigetvár on the 12th of August 1943 due to the poor conditions prevailing at Siklós; Siklós is approximately 39 miles southeast of Szigetvár. Attached to this report is a list of 20 army personnel, presumably all POW escapees, including “Henry Lowenstein.” Based on the Visit Report from the ICRC it is unclear when and where Heinz was arrested in Hungary following his escape from Stalag VIIIB/Stalag 344 (Lamsdorf) but no later than the 8th of November, probably earlier, he was in Hungarian custody. Szigetvár, incidentally, was the castle estate of Count Mihaly Andrassy, and incarceration conditions there were excellent.
The ICRC visit to Camp Siklós (Szigetvár) was conducted in its capacity as a Protecting Power which was formalized in the Geneva Convention of 1929. Protecting powers were allowed to inspect prisoners of war camps, interview prisoners in private, communicate freely with prisoners, and supply books for the prison library.
Let me provide some historical context regarding Hungary’s situation vis a vis Nazi occupation at the time that Heinz was detained there.
In March 1944, Hungary was invaded and occupied by Nazi Germany. Before the Nazi invasion, Hungary had not formally declared war against the United Kingdom, so any British POW escapees, if caught by the Hungarian authorities, would expect no more than internment by Hungary as a neutral power. There was no concern that British POWs would be returned to German control. Based on the existing War Office records, as mentioned, Heinz escaped from Stalag VIIIB in Lamsdorf and somehow made his way to Hungary before the Nazi occupation.
- Now we get to the murkiest part of Heinz’s story. From one moment to the next, he went from being known as “Henry Lowenstein” to being “Henry Goff.” (To remind readers, the surname “Goff” was Heinz’s sister’s married name.) As a Hungarian internee, Heinz was known as “Henry Lowenstein,” but at some point, after he was recaptured by the Germans following their invasion of Hungary on the 19th of March 1944, he became known as “Henry Goff.” Exactly when this happened is unclear. The Hungarians knew Henry’s real identity and presumably would have shared this information with the Germans following their takeover of the internment camp at Szigetvár. We know from War Office record WO 416/141/191 (see Post 137, Figure 22) that “Henry Lowenstein” becomes “Henry Goff,” born on the 8th of March 1905 in Manchester, England. Presumably after he becomes Henry Goff, he is also assigned a new POW number, No. 156116. From Heinz’s point of view, the change of surname and birth place was presumably an insurance policy because of his Jewish faith. Together with his new POW number, he presumably thought that his chances of survival improved, although how much danger he was in is uncertain.
WO 416/141/191 record tells us Heinz was returned to the Stalags in Austria after he was recaptured in Hungary. All I knew for certain is that by the 28th of July 1944, Henry Goff was transferred from Stalag XVIIA in Kaisersteinbruch, Austria to Stalag XVIIB in Gneixendorf, Austria. (Figure 9).
Prior to obtaining the recently acquired information, the above formed the basis for what I discussed in Post 137 and Post 137, Postscript. Since these earlier posts, I’ve obtained: excerpts from two books Brian found discussing Heinz; two “Liberation Questionnaires” alluding to Henry Lowenstein and Henry Goff; dossiers from the ICRC related to both Lowenstein and Goff; reference to Henry Lowenstein in a so-called “Mentioned in Despatches,” which would have been a condition of obtaining certain war decorations; a group photo taken in a German Stalag showing Heinz; and more. These documents provide a better picture of Heinz’s movements during the war and a more nuanced understanding of how his actions fit into broader events going on at the time. Let me systematically review these new findings.
Brian Cooper brought to my attention a book entitled “The Double Dutchman: A story of wartime escape and intrigue” by Francis S. Jones. Heinz is prominently featured in this book. Let me review some of the details.
The story is primarily about a New Zealand soldier, captured like Heinz Löwenstein during the Battle of Greece in April 1941, by the name of Roy Natusch. He was interned in Stalag XVIIIA in Wolfsberg, and like Heinz escaped from a work camp with two other internees, Lance-Bombardier David “Dai” Tom Davies and Joe Walker. The work camp from which they fled was located not far from the Hungarian border in a place called Gaas, Austria. (Figure 10) The author does not specify the exact date of their get away, but I place it in the Fall or Winter of 1943. Following their nighttime escape, the three internees tried to get as far into Hungary as possible; they were trying to avoid being recaptured by the German-influenced Hungarian border squads who would have handed them back to the Germans.
Let me reiterate what I previously mentioned. Following the beginning of WWII, the British and Americans declared war on Hungary, an ostensible ally of Germany and Hitler. However, the declaration of war was not reciprocated by the Hungarian government, and as mentioned above, any escaped Allied prisoners who made their way to Hungary were merely incarcerated but not sent back to the Germans. Clearly, this is what happened to Heinz Löwenstein.
While Roy Natusch was only a Corporal, with the agreement of his two companions, he passed himself off as a Captain knowing that if the three were captured by the Hungarians an officer would be better treated. Eventually, the three escapees were in fact arrested by Hungarian police or military, and temporarily interned in Komárom, Hungary, near the then-Czechoslovakian border. Had they avoided capture and internment by the Hungarians, Roy and his traveling companions had always intended to do a dog-leg through Hungary into then-Yugoslavia (i.e., head east into Hungary, then turn southwards towards Yugoslavia), linking up with Tito’s Partisans and being repatriated with the Allies in Italy. This was not to be their fate, at least not immediately.
As an officer, or at least claiming to be one, Roy quickly came to the attention of the only other escaped Allied officer in Hungary, a real officer, the South African Lieutenant Colonel Charles Telfer Howie hiding in Budapest (i.e., Komárom and Budapest are only about 60 miles apart). Along with a Private by the name of Tom Sanders, Howie had escaped from Stalag VIIIA in Lamsdorf [today: Łambinowice, Poland].
While at Komárom, Roy Natusch was visited by a Colonel Utassy from the Hungarian War Office along with a Foreign Service Officer, presumably to be vetted for possible involvement in a plot to change the course of the war. He eventually made his way to Budapest where he met other members of the Hungarian resistance and was introduced to Lt. Colonel Howie. While Howie could have left Hungary and rejoined the Allies, he consciously decided to remain there. Clandestinely, he was working with the various opposition factions in Hungary to switch them from the Axis to the Allied side. This was a particularly precarious undertaking since Budapest and more generally Hungary had Nazi spies everywhere. Moreover, it was an open secret that as soon as the Soviets got anywhere near Hungary, a day which was quickly approaching, the German troops would invade the country and quickly seize Budapest.
At the time Natusch met with Lt. Colonel Howie, Germany had not yet invaded Hungary, however. Howie dispatched Natusch to the detention camp in Szigetvár at Count Andrassy’s castle estate with specific orders that the detained British POWs there not attempt to escape to Yugoslavia, or they would be court-marshalled after the war. Sargeant Major Norman McLean was ostensibly in charge of the soldiers. As noted above, Heinz Löwenstein was among the twenty or so British soldiers confined there and was considered the “intellectual of the camp”; here is where Roy Natusch first encountered Heinz. With Heinz’s nod of approval, the British soldiers put off their escape attempt, a fateful decision, as it turned out. By the time Natusch and Howie made their request, Heinz, the point of contact because of his fluency in multiple languages, had already contacted a local Hungarian who would have facilitated their escape by accompanying them to the Partisans in Yugoslavia. The distance from Szigetvár to the Yugoslav border was less than 15 miles, although the march to reach Partisan lines once inside Yugoslavia was long and dangerous because the Wehrmacht troops were active in the northern part of the country.
The British representatives who were supposed to negotiate with the Hungarian opposition were to be dropped by parachute on the plains near Szigetvár, and the British soldiers were expected to gather the inexperienced parachutists and bring them to Budapest. Howie had assured the British soldiers that in the event of a sudden German invasion, he would notify them by phone and/or send one of his men to warn them so they could quickly flee to Yugoslavia to join the Partisans.
As it turned out, Germany’s sudden invasion of Hungary took place on the 19th of March 1944, and came from three directions, Yugoslavia, Romania, and Germany. As expected, the Wehrmacht immediately headed for Budapest and the internment camp at Szigetvár where they recaptured all the British soldiers, including Natusch and Löwenstein. The warning the soldiers had been awaiting from Lt. Colonel Howie never arrived because the phone lines were immediately cut throughout the country upon Germany’s invasion, and the man Howie sent to warn the soldiers instead decamped for Romania.
Because of Natusch’s knowledge of “The Mission” (i.e., the Allies plan to try and peel off Hungary from the Axis alliance) and the players involved, he was a wanted man. Under torture, Natusch could have divulged the names of no fewer than eleven co-conspirators. For this reason it was imperative he escape the clutches of the Gestapo. Fortunately, he managed to escape at Szigetvár despite being guarded by seven Wehrmacht soldiers. Following his getaway and subsequent travails, he eventually made his way back to Budapest in the company of another British escapee, and reestablished contact with Lt. Colonel Howie who was in hiding. In Budapest, through contacts he had there, he connected with some Dutch soldiers, including a Lieutenant Eddie van Hootegem. The latter would wind up giving him his identity card, so for a period this was his alias. However, when he and two other Dutch officers (Lieutenant Frank Brackel & Lieutenant Joob Sengor) were arrested in Budapest and taken to Buda prison, together they crafted an elaborate explanation for why the purported Dutch soldier “Eddie” was unable to speak Dutch.
Suspicious of his explanation, the Germans transferred Roy Natusch, now Eddie van Hootegem, along with a contingent of almost a hundred Hungarians, Poles, French, and Jews, and non-descripts, by train from Buda prison. The Wehrmacht intended to take Roy/Eddie to an Oflag, a prisoner of war camp for officers established by the Germans during WWII, in Neubrandenburg, about 120 miles north of Berlin. This presented a major problem for Roy since they would ultimately have discovered he was Natusch, not van Hootegem.
On their way to Neubrandenburg (Figure 11), however, the prisoners were unloaded in Stalag XVIIA [Kaisersteinbruch, Austria]. Roy once again had the good fortune to run into Heinz Löwenstein there, who had by now assumed his own alias, the previously mentioned “Henry Goff.” As a side note, Francis Jones, author of “The Double Dutchman,” incorrectly claims Heinz’s alias was “Henry Lewis.” Regardless, Roy had learned from his time in Szigetvár that Heinz was a master forger, so he asked him to prepare a set of papers so that he could pass as an Italian.
Below is how Francis Jones describes the episode and the results:
“Henry Lowenstein appeared a few hours later and got past the guards without difficulty. ‘Here you are, sir,’ he said. ‘It’s finished. He glanced around nervously. ‘Best hide it. I’m not sure about these guards.’ Natusch put the slim package he’d been given into his breast pocket. The Palestinian was as jumpy as a cat. ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t do anything for your friends [EDITOR’S NOTE: THE AFOREMENTIONED BRACKEL & SENGOR]’ he went on, ‘but there was only enough material for you.’ Pride of craftsmanship calmed some of Henry’s agitation. ‘You’ll find a passport there, properly stamped,’ he announced, ‘a travel warrant, also stamped, and a couple of letters. You’re Mario Brioni, sir. That’s if you want to be Italian. I’d better go now, sir. Good luck.’ He shook hands with Natusch, gave Frank and Joob a half-bow, and left.
The New Zealander passed the little folder to his two friends without a word and stayed on the alert whilst they examined him it. The verdict came quickly. ‘It’s perfect,’ Frank said slowly. His eyes were wide with admiration. ‘This is first-class work.’ Joob Sengor, taking longer over his examination, agreed, and with that, Natusch was really satisfied. Joob was a protégé of the great Bentinck [EDITOR’S NOTE: A DUTCH FORGER], and a connoisseur of forgery. He put the documents back into his pocket and breathed thanks once again to the ever-helpful Henry Lowenstein.”
What the Germans had failed to do in Budapest, namely check his photo and fingerprint files in Berlin, they would certainly have done in the Oflag in Neubrandenburg; obviously, they would quickly have learned his real identity and turned him over to the Gestapo for interrogation. This meant that Natusch couldn’t risk facing new interrogators and had planned to jump off the train en route to the Oflag and change his identity from Eddie van Hootegem to Mario Brioni, who happened to be a fictitious Italian traveling legitimately. Incidentally, Roy had opted for an Italian surname because he spoke passable Italian and thought he could fool most Germans.
Roy’s intention after he jumped from the train was to travel in the opposite direction along the same line from Stettin [today: Szczecin, Poland] towards Hegyeshalom, near the Austrian-Hungarian border. Stettin lay 30 miles east of Neubrandenburg, which made the revised journey feasible. Roy was concerned that if his luck failed some attentive German might check and discover there was no such person as Mario Brioni. If this happened, he knew that he could no longer be Eddie van Hootegem, a Dutchman who didn’t speak Dutch, and certainly not be himself. Henry Lowenstein again came to his rescue and offered him his own identity since he now went by Henry Goff. Roy jumped at the offer, so Lowenstein gave him his identity tag. This was the last interaction between Heinz and Roy documented by Francis Jones.
As fate would have it, when Roy jumped off the train at the stop before Breslau [today: Wrocław, Poland], he was seriously hurt. Knowing he would be recaptured because of his injuries he ditched the identifications for both Mario Brioni and Henry Lowenstein. He was arrested at the train station near Breslau by one of the three guards escorting him to the Dutch Oflag in Neubrandenburg. On the 2nd of August 1944 two guards from there came to collect Roy. Because his Hungarian civil papers were in order, upon his arrival in the Oflag he continued to pass himself off as Eddie van Hootegem. However, eventually he gave up the ghost and admitted to his interrogators that he was Roy Natusch, an escapee from Stalag XVIIIA in Wolfsberg. Fortunately, the Germans didn’t immediately make the connection that he was wanted by the Gestapo; consequently, they sent him back to Stalag XVIIIA where he’d originally escaped from years before. Knowing he was still in danger, he quickly had himself assigned to a work party in a place called Radkersburg near the Yugoslavian border. With help from the Hungarian resistance, he escaped across the border and after a dangerous journey through German lines reached the Partisans. From there he was eventually repatriated in Italy.
I’ve gone into so much detail about Roy Natusch because his story sheds a lot of light on Heinz Löwenstein/Henry Goff.
Another book published in 2016 citing Heinz was co-authored by David “Dai” Tom Davies, the Lance-Bombadier with whom Roy Natusch originally escaped from Stalag XVIIIA, and Ioan Wyn Evans. In the book, entitled “All for Freedom – A true story of escape from the Nazis,” he writes of Heinz during his time in Szigetvár:
[Page 101] “There was an exceptionally interesting character in our midst. A French Jew named Henry Lowenstein. Extremely able, he spoke many languages, but his greatest accomplishment was his ability to forge documents. He could make copies of official documents that would look every bit as authentic as the originals.”
[Page 103} “We needed to utilise Henry Lowensten’s forging skilled to make passports. We went to a photography shop in Szigetvar where two Jewish women very kindly took our pictures, free of charge. Lowenstein then made passports for us. We were given those so that we had ‘official documents’ if we were stopped by the authorities at any time.”
The reference to passports would presumably have been some type of Hungarian identity card rather than what we commonly call a passport. The German occupation of Hungary obviously forestalled their use as all the British escapees in Szigetvár were retaken on the 19th of March 1944. Upon their recapture, Davies and the other internees were sent to Dulag 172 in Zemun, Yugoslavia [German: Zemlin/Semlin] near Belgrade [today: Zemun, Serbia]. (Figure 12)
The location of Dulag 172 is described here: https://www.holokaust.arhiv-beograda.org/concentration-camp-at-sajmiste/?lang=en
Davies describes the horrid conditions at Zemun:
“We were taken to a place called Zemun. This was a Nazi concentration camp on the outskirts of Belgrade. Without a shadow of a doubt, it was the most awful place I had ever seen. Yes, I’d been held in pretty miserable places before. But they were nothing like this. Everywhere else paled into insignificance compared to Zemun.
It was difficult to comprehend what happened there and what would happen. It is absolutely impossible to describe Zemun to anyone who hasn’t been there, felt it, and smelled it. For me, this was simply hell on earth. The Nazi’s name for Zemun was Semlin, and it was located on the site of the old Belgrade Exhibition Grounds. There were several large buildings there known as pavilions. The Nazis had first taken people there to be incarcerated in 1941. At that time it was a Judenlager, a camp where the Jewish people were imprisoned. Thousands of Jews had been taken there, men, women and children. They weren’t guilty of any crimes, of course. They had simply been taken there because they were Jews, and Hitler hated them. And the horrible truth was that once the Jews arrived at Zenum, there was little chance they would leave alive.
The Nazis had these gas vans, also known as death vans. Cruelly, they would pile about 80 to 100 Jews at a time, including elderly people and young children, into the back of the large vans, and they would expose them to a poisonous gas which would kill them. Can you imagine such a thing? Apparently, 6,300 Jews were killed at Zemun between Marh and May 1942. That was just cold-blooded, inhuman cruelty.
After they had killed almost every single Jew to enter Zemun, the Nazis changed the camp status. From the middle of 1942 onwards it became an Anhaltelager, a camp where political prisoners were held. These were mostly Partisans from Yugoslavia, who now supported the Allies in the war. In truth, these people weren’t politically active. They were just ordinary Serbians from different parts of Yugoslavia. Many of them had just helped Partisan soldiers by offering them food or giving them shelter overnight, whilst several of them were just families and old people who happened to live in villages where there was support for the Partisans. They weren’t guilty of any real crimes.
By the time that we reached Zemun in March 1944 there were people of all ages and backgrounds there, many of them women and children. There were some Jewish people, but not many.
In the block where we were held, there wasn’t even a roof over our heads. To all interests and purposes, we were outdoors, exposed to the elements. In terms of hygiene and sanitation it was awful. I can’t remember seeing a single toilet there. It was absolutely disgusting. The stench was unlike anything I’d come across before – a potent mixture of the worst odours of life mixed with the unmistakable, lingering aroma of death.
As you can imagine, there was little food, and what we were given was incredibly bad. I remember a very weak cabbage soup, which looked like dirty water and tasted even worse. There was the odd scrap of stale bread, and tiny amounts of water. But there was nothing that was remotely nourishing. Nothing. People were starving there. Every single day there were several deaths. People were just dying on their feet.
There were scenes of unfathomable cruelty. I remember one day seeing a woman with a baby queuing for some food and holding a small bowl. When she got to the front, she was given a few drops of that horrible cabbage soup. Starving, she turned to the officer, and asked if she could have some more. But, instead of giving the young mother an extra spoonful, the officer knocked the bowl out of her hand and laughed in her face. Those of us waiting behind the woman were incensed by what we saw, and it was only the presence of heavily armed guards that prevented a riot. The sad truth was, though, that no one could really challenge these guards. Such bravery would have been folly: we would probably have been shot dead there and then. The only way we could help the young mother was by offering her some of the contents of our own meagre bowls. The poor woman didn’t get much, but it was better than nothing, and it was some kind of moral support.
It was little wonder that many lost their heads in such an atmosphere. Some poor desperate souls would run at the large wire fences and try to clamber over. Such attempts were futile, however. As they struggled to gain footholds on the fence, they were unceremoniously shot in the back. Very often the guards would leave their bodies there to decay, a reminder and warning to others who harboured similar thoughts of escape. The message was clear and stark. There was no way out.
We were kept in the block with no roof for several days, before a dozen or so of us were moved to another area of the camp. It was still unpleasant.”
While Zemun is today located in Serbia, according to Dai Davies the camp guards were Croatians. During an air raid that took place on the 16-17 April 1944, Davies escaped with three other internees. Like Ray Natusch, all were eventually repatriated to Italy via southern Yugoslavia.
Let me return briefly to the puzzling question of when Heinz Löwenstein possibly adopted the name Henry Goff. Brian Cooper believes this took place after Heinz arrived in Dulag 172. As the war went on, Brian knows from other cases that the German paperwork system broke down presenting Heinz with an opportunity to take on an alias. One must also remember that Heinz was a master forger, and there’s no reason to believe he wouldn’t have created a set of papers for himself bearing the Henry Goff name.
We know from the Visit Report the ICRC made to Szigetvár that Heinz was known to Hungarian authorities as Henry Lowenstein. We also know that the Germans headed straight to Szigetvár on the 19th of March 1944 after they invaded Hungary. No doubt, the Germans would have been told by the Hungarians the names of the POWs being detained there, so Heinz was no doubt still known as Lowenstein then. I also know from a prisoner card I obtained from the ICRC (see discussion below) that on the 24th of March 1944 he was transferred from Szigetvár under the name of Henry Lowenstein.
Aware of the potential dangers of being returned to German “care,” he probably decided to become Henry Goff if the opportunity arose. He would have let his fellow detainees know his alias. I assume he would have gotten rid of his German POW dog tag with his actual name and POW number from Lamsdorf to make it harder to trace him in the German war records. However, Francis Jones tells us on pages 151-52 that Lowenstein gave his Heinz Löwenstein dog tag to Ray Natusch when they briefly met again in Stalag XVIIA in Kaisersteinbruch, Austria after their escape and recapture. Perhaps Heinz was able to retain and hide his original dog tag? It seems Heinz only got his new POW number upon his arrival at Stalag XVIIIA (Wolfsberg) from Dulag 172 when he was telling the Germans that he was Henry Goff and before he was transferred to Stalag XVIIA.
Support for the notion that Henry Lowenstein became Henry Goff at Dulag 172 comes from a “Liberation Questionnaire” completed after the war by a Robert Vivian Sunley, one of the British POWs at Szigetvár. He writes:
“After removal from Hungary we were taken to Dulag 172 Belgrade and imprisoned. Following an American Bombing Raid I attempted an escape in the company of Pte Heinrich Lowenstein, a Palestinian of the Signal Corps then under the name of Henry Goff. We were spotted by the guard and fired upon, narrowly escaping death, and returned to closed imprisonment.”
Corporal Joseph Crolla was interned with Heinz in Szigetvár. Following the war, he also completed a “Liberation Questionnaire,” which corroborates some of the detailed information provided above. I quote:
“I went back and collected the other three who we had left to watch our kit. We all filed into the wagon (which was full of salt) except Hall who climbed in through the window after he had put a new seal on the door of the wagon. We were ten (10) days inside the wagon which was pretty tough owing to water difficulties, but between Hall and I in turns we got out of the wagon and found water. On the 4th of December 1942 we arrived at our destination a place called Hegyeshalom (on the Hungarian border) so we got out of the wagon and started walking further into Hungary. We must have walked twenty to thirty miles until we came to a barn where we bedded down for the night. The next morning we were rudely awakened by the farmer who was quite annoyed and scared to find five men sleeping in his hay but we bluffed him for a while by saying we were German soldiers who had wandered over the border while on maneuvers and were trying to find our way back again to Austria but had got lost. He invited us into his house for some breakfast, and at the same time sent his wife for the police (Gendarmes) who after we had a wash and something to eat arrived and took us away to a place called KOMOROM where we got treated not too badly, on Xmas day we were taken to Siklos Vaar, Siklos where we stayed until a Graf Andrassy, Szigetvar Hungary took us to his estate and gave us our freedom. We lived with this Graf until the Germans occupied Hungary on the 19th of March 1944, during this time there arrived two officers (at different times) first to come was a Colonel Howie (South African captured at Tobruck) and secondly a Captain Natusch (British, captured at Tunis). [EDITOR’S NOTE: ACCORDING TO FRANCIS JONES, ROY NATUSCH WAS CAPTURED IN KALAMATA, GREECE IN APRIL 1941 (p. 165)] Colonel Howie gave an order that anyone attempting to escape would find themselves on a Court Martial when returning to England. He also promised us that he would at least give us twenty (24) four hours warning if the Germans invaded Hungary so we could get away to Yugoslavia to join the Partisans as he had arranged everything for us, but without any warning the Germans walked into Hungary at 5:30 in the morning and recaptured all of us except Colonel Howie who was in Budapest at the time. Captain Natusch escaped that night although he had an escort of 7 Germans with Tommy guns, the Germans didn’t waste much time with the rest of us for before we knew what was happening we were on our way to a Dulag at Semmlin just across the River Sava from Belgrade, we had not a chance to get away as were heavily guarded until Easter Sunday (April 27 1944) when the Americans bombed our camp killing about 1500 prisoners of war (Italians and Serbs) during the raid that night five of us managed to get away (George Ratcliffe, Chestshires, John McAteer A.& S.H., John Martin Australian, Harry Grant Australian, and myself) but after two days of walking through bog country we walked into an Anti-Aircraft post and were recaptured, the Germans took us back to our camp the next day after a bit of trouble as the Croat people wanted to hang us as they thought we were American airmen, so after a bit of stone throwing and spitting we managed to get clear of the area, which was bombed to the ground. When we got back to the camp about midday there was another air raid on so for punishment, we were not allowed to go into the trenches but had to stand up out in the open with guards in the trenches round about us with orders to shoot to kill if any of us tried to make a break, they also took our boots and trousers from us. That same night McAteer and I got away again but were caught the very next morning by a German patrol and taken back to camp which was a blazing inferno, and the huts which were not on fire we soon put a match to them. A few days later all of us (about 12 British and 8 or ten American airmen) were put into a wagon (after removing our boots and trousers) and taken to Stalag 17A. Kaisersteinbruch Austria where we all got a severe interrogation then locked up together in a shed away from the other British P.O.W’s During our stay at the Stalag we met Brigadier Davies and a Colonel or Captain Verral with ten or eleven other officers (British and American) one of them had his legs broken and was refused medical aid. These officers told us they were going to Berlin for interrogation.”
Knowing the ICRC had visited Camp Siklós (Szigetvár) in its capacity as a Protecting Power, Brian suggested I ask them about any documentary materials they might have in their archives on Heinz Löwenstein/Henry Goff. Because of the large number of archival searches they are asked to do, one can only submit applications by email twice a year on specific dates. I applied in September 2023, and the ICRC responded in December with information on BOTH Heinz and Henry. I attach the summaries sent by the ICRC (Figures 13-14) and will highlight a few new things I learned.
The ICRC staffer handling my application told me that in her 20 years of working there, she’d never come across a case like the one involving my father’s first cousin, and the Houdini act he orchestrated in adopting an alias and thus having two dossiers on file with the ICRC. Because the ICRC contact took a personal interest in my request, she even discovered materials that had been misfiled citing Heinz.
The documents include a letter dated the 19th of June 1941 (Figure 15), written by the Greek Red Cross to the ICRC in Geneva which lists British militiamen who are POWs in Greece and who are interned in Goudi (Athens) concentration camp. The list includes “H. Loewenstein,” says he’s in good health, and gives the name of his wife living in Jerusalem, Palestine as the person to be notified of his status.
One prisoner card shows the precise date that Henry Lowenstein, as his name was then written, was interned in Camp Siklós, the 24th of October 1943. (Figure 16) A different prisoner card dated the 8th of December 1943 seems to suggest he was transferred to the castle estate of Count Andrassy in Szigetvár on the 16th of November 1943. (Figure 17) An attached document of British POWs on the estate of Count Andrassy at that time lists 16 individuals, including Henry Loewenstein, with an extra “e.” (Figure 18)
Yet another prisoner card shows Henry was transferred from Szigetvár on the 24th of March 1944, five days after the Germans invaded Hungary. (Figure 19) A list of POWs from that exact date includes 24 names (Figure 20), including “Captain” Roy Natusch, who we know escaped during the transfer. We also know from Dai Davies’ book that the British POWs were transferred from Szigetvár to Dulag 172 outside Belgrade, Yugoslavia; the distance between these places is approximately 225 miles.
The ICRC accompanied by a representative from the Hungarian Red Cross visited Szigetvár on the 24th of January 1944, and submitted a report written in French on the conditions there, which were described as excellent. Some interesting details can be gleaned from this report. There were no Hungarian guards, only two soldiers who were administrative liaisons to Camp Siklós. Prisoners were free to wander close by, but they needed special authorization to roam more widely. The POWs were paid 5 Pengös a day with 2 Pengös a day deducted for food. Roy Natusch is mentioned in this report, stating that he had excellent lodgings in the Count’s manor. The report paints a unique picture of how POWs were humanely treated by Count Andrassy.
The ICRC sent a prisoner card (Figure 21) for Henry Goff dated the 29th of June 1944 indicating his transfer from Stalag XVIIA (Kaisersteinbruch, Austria) to Stalag XVIIB (Gneixendorf, Austria). Trivially, this tells us that Henry’s last encounter with Roy Natusch, which took place upon Roy’s transfer from Budapest to Neubrandenburg with a layover in Stalag XVIIA, had to have occurred before the end of June 1944.
Brian Cooper is a real wizard at unearthing and sleuthing out military documents and first-hand accounts from various archives, books, etc. One day he sent me a picture (Figure 22) he came across on Facebook, of all places, captioned as follows: “The Israeli Jewish soldiers of the UK Pioneers Corps in a photo taken in Lamsdorf (unknown date between 1941 and 1944).” He suggested I check each of the faces to see if Heinz might be among them. Astonishingly he is! He is the individual seated in the front row on the far left. Even though he was only between 36 and 39 years of age at the time, clearly internment made him look much older.
If this picture was indeed from Lamsdorf, I can narrow the period when it was taken to between the 28th of July 1941, when Heinz was transferred from Stalag XVIIIA (Wolfsberg, Austria) to Stalag VIIIB (Lamsdorf) and his final escape from Lamsdorf in Fall or Winter of 1943. Following his recapture in Szigetvár, Hungary, and his return to Austria in 1944 via Dulag 172 (Zemun, Yugoslavia) to Stalag XVIIA (Kaisersteinbruck, Austria) and Stalag XVIIB (Gneixendorf, Austria), he was never returned to Lamsdorf, so the picture was not taken in 1944.
Another item of interest Brian found for Henry Lowenstein was a reference to him in a so-called “mentioned in despatches,” under the dossier WO 373/103/370. (Figure 23)
| Reference: | WO 373/103/370 | ||||||||||||||
| Description: |
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The man who likely recommended this award for Heinz was Sergeant Major Norman McLean, ostensibly the senior military POW at Szigetvár prior to “Captain” Roy Natusch’s arrival. From McLean’s account, we can confirm that Heinz Löwenstein escaped from captivity four times, not including his short-lived escape from Dulag 172. Given his skill as a forger, Brian and I both wonder why he was allowed to escape Lamsdorf? One would think the camp leadership would have valued him more for his skills forging documents than risking his life on the lam, particularly as a Jew.
With this observation, I conclude this very lengthy and involved post. I’m not optimistic I’ll learn much more about Heinz Löwenstein’s daring exploits during the war. However, there’s always a chance of uncovering additional accounts from some of Heinz’s fellow internees. Another possibility I’m looking into is trying to determine whether the universal legatee in Israel involved in my claim with the French Ministry of Culture, who is one of the heirs to Fedor Löwenstein’s estate via Heinz, may have inherited a diary, documents, or photos from him. Hope springs eternal.
REFERENCES
Davies, D.T.A. & Ioan Wyn Evans. All for Freedom: A True Story of Escape from the Nazis. Gomer Press, 2016.
Jones, Francis S. The Double Dutchman: A story of wartime escape and intrigue. The Dunmore Press Limited, Palmerston North, New Zealand, 1977.
Rofe, Cyril. Against the Wind. 1st ed., Hodder & Stoughton, 1956.
