Círculo Israelita de Bolivia Archives

POST 62, POSTSCRIPT 2: THE FAR-REACHING SEARCH FOR MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN, HEINZ LUDWIG BERLINER: ANOTHER DEADEND

Note: While continuing my longstanding search for Heinz Ludiwg Berliner, one of my father’s first cousins who is reported to have wound up in Bolivia, I learned that he was merely one of about 20,000 Jews who escaped there from Nazi Europe. I discuss Bolivia’s motivation for allowing so many European Jews into the country when the doors to them in most other countries had been closed.

POST 62, POSTSCRIPT: THE FAR-REACHING SEARCH FOR MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN, HEINZ LUDWIG BERLINER—FURTHER PROOF OF HEINZ’S EXISTENCE

POST 122: HERTA BRAUER, THE FAMILY CONNECTION TO THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC’S NOTORIOUS DICTATOR, RAFAEL TRUJILLO

POST 129: THE UNSUCCESSFUL QUEST TO TRACK DOWN DR. ERICH BRUCK IN ARGENTINA

The Circulo Israelita de Bolivia ( Jews of Bolivia (haruth.com ) is the highest synagogue on earth, located at an altitude of more than 12,000 feet in La Paz, Bolivia. The synagogue serves the 500 to 700 Jews in a country where the citizens are predominantly Catholic. It retains copies of various documents and newspaper clippings related to the immigration of Jewish people to Bolivia and the creation of the Jewish communities in La Paz, Cochabamba, and Santa Cruz. I first contacted the Circulo Israelita de Bolivia in 2019 after learning that my father’s first cousin, Heinz Ludwig Berliner, survived the Holocaust by somehow making his way there. (Figure 1) I had hoped they might have evidence of Heinz’s presence in the country, but regrettably not.

Figure 1. Page from MyHeritage ancestral database entitled “German Minority Census, 1939,” showing a Heinz Ludwig Berliner born in Ratibor on the 24th of September 1916, living in Berlin-Charlottenburg at the time, who emigrated to Bolivia

After my last contact with the synagogue in January 2020, shortly before the Covid pandemic burst upon the global scene, I set aside my pursuit to track down my father’s first cousin. Thus, it came as a big surprise when the Circulo reached out to me recently with new information. I’d clearly planted a seed during our earlier exchanges. Synagogue staff explained that an anthropologist named Dr. Sandra Gruner-Domić is currently in Bolivia doing research on the history of Jews there, and the topic of Heinz Berliner came up.

It turns out, Dr. Gruner-Domić had found a so-called “Censo De Extranjeros,” a foreigner census form (Figure 2), for a gentleman named Erich Blumenthal Berliner. This document is a mandatory declaration that Bolivia’s Minister of Immigration required be filled out by all foreign immigrants. Obviously, given the identical surname to my ancestor Heinz Berliner caused synagogue staff and Dr. Gruner-Domić to wonder whether there might be any connection between these two Berliners. After briefly getting my hopes up, I quickly realized they are not related in any way I can easily discern.

Figure 2. A “Censo to Extranjeros,” a foreigner census form, for a gentleman named Erich Blumenthal Berliner who arrived in Bolivia the 2nd of October 1939; this census form was sent to me by Dr. Sandra Gruner-Domić, a Fulbright Scholar studying Jewish migration to Bolivia between 1937 and 1941

Still, as I had done and discussed in Post 129 for my unrelated but similarly surnamed individual named Dr. Henrik Brück, interred in “El Cementerio Judio” in Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña in Chaco Province, Argentina, I searched in ancestry for any evidence of Erich Berliner’s life in Germany. Intriguingly, I found his marriage certificate showing he married a woman a widow or divorcee named Edith Charlotte Rotenstein née Totschek in Berlin in 1934 (Figures 3a-c); this matches the maiden name of Erich Berliner’s wife on his foreigner census form. So, just as I had tracked Dr. Henrik Brück to his place of birth in Alba Iulia, Romania from Argentina, I was similarly able to backtrack from Bolivia Erich Berliner to his place and date of marriage in Berlin. Relevantly, however, neither is related to me.

Figure 3a. Cover page of Erich Berliner’s marriage certificate showing he married the widow or divorcee Edith Charlotte Rotenstein née Totschek on the 14th of November 1934 in Berlin

Figure 3b. Page 1 of Erich Berliner’s 1934 marriage certificate

Figure 3c. Page 2 of Erich Berliner’s 1934 marriage certificate

I exchanged a few emails with Dr. Gruner-Domić incidentally sharing Erich Berliner’s Berlin marriage certificate ruefully remarking this Berliner is unrelated to Heinz. Sandra then sent me a page from the database of individuals buried in the Jewish cemetery in Cochabamba with the names of two other Berliners, Frida and Lothar Berliner, with their specific birth and death dates. (Figure 4) This also allowed me to check their names in ancestry. I was very precisely able to find a birth certificate for an Adolf Lothar Berliner who was born in Berlin on the 11^th of October 1883 matching the date of birth from the Cochabamba database. (Figures 5a-b) I also found Lothar’s marriage certificate showing he got married on the 11^th of July 1921 in Berlin to a woman named Frieda Anna Pauline Dammann born the 24^th of November 1887. (Figures 6a-c) While her forename matches the Berliner buried in Cochabamba and I believe her to be Lothar’s wife, her date of birth is different. What to make of this is unclear.

Figure 4. Partial database of names of people interred in the cemetery in Cochabamba, Bolivia with the birth and death dates of two Berliners, Frida and Lothar Berliner

Figure 5a. Cover page of Adolf Lothar Berliner’s birth certificate showing he was born on the 11th of August 1883 in Berlin, matching information from the Cochabamba, Bolivia cemetery database

Figure 5b. Adolf Lothar Berliner’s 1883 birth certificate

Figure 6a. Cover page of Adolf Lothar Berliner’s marriage certificate showing he married Frieda Anna Pauline Dammann on the 11th of July 1921 in Berlin

Figure 6b. Page 1 of Adolf Lothar Berliner’s 1921 marriage certificate

Figure 6c. Page 2 of Adolf Lothar Berliner’s 1921 marriage certificate

In trying to find a photo of Sandra to include in this post (Figure 7), I learned much more about how Jews found refuge in Bolivia during the Nazi era. I’ll briefly review the historical context for this based on a Webinar Sandra delivered at the JDC Archives in May 2022: “Sandra Gruner-Domić Lectures on Bolivia, a Forgotten Refuge During the Holocaust: Jewish Immigration 1937-1941 | JDC Archives” This is a topic of potentially much greater interest to readers than my search for Heinz Berliner, although it fits well into trying to better understand how he wound up in Bolivia.

Dr. Gruner-Domić is a migration scholar and is on a Fulbright Scholarship to Bolivia for the 2022-2023 academic year. Recently, she has been examining the immigration of Jewish refugees in Bolivia during the Holocaust, including the role played by a Moritz Hochschild, a Jewish entrepreneur, and the second-wealthiest man in Bolivia at the time.

The immigration of Jewish refugees to Bolivia is a lesser-known chapter of the Holocaust. Amazingly, approximately 20,000 Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi Europe arrived in Bolivia between 1937 and 1941, at a time when other Latin American countries had closed their doors. Bolivia was among the 32 nations who attended the Évian Conference in July 1938 at Évian-les-Bains, France, to address the problem of German and Austrian Jewish refugees wishing to flee persecution by Nazi Germany. The conference was deemed a failure because aside from the Dominican Republic, delegations from the participating nations failed to come to any agreement about accepting the Jewish refugees fleeing the Third Reich. At the Évian Conference Bolivia also refused to accept any Jewish refugees.

However, a month after the conference Bolivia notified the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees of their willingness to begin accepting Jewish refugees. So, along with Shanghai and the Dominican Republic, Bolivia was the last country in the world in the lead up to WWII still issuing visas to Jews trying to flee Nazi persecution. Regular readers will recall that in Post 122, I talked about how another one of my relatives, Herta Brauer, escaped to the Dominican Republic.

As just mentioned, Bolivia issued 20,000 visas to Jewish refugees between 1937 and 1941. Let’s briefly examine Bolivia’s motivation for deciding to do so.

Between 1932 and 1935, Bolivia and Paraguay fought the Chaco War over control of the northern part of the Gran Chaco region, known in Spanish as Chaco Boreal, which was thought to be rich in oil. (Figure 8) The Chaco War was the bloodiest interstate military conflict fought in South America during the 20^th century and was fought between two of the continent’s poorest countries, both of whom had lost territory to neighbors during 19^th century wars. Bolivia lost its Pacific coast to Chile during the 1879 War of the Pacific, while Paraguay lost almost half of its territory to Brazil and Argentina in the Paraguayan War of 1864 to 1870. As a result both countries wound up landlocked. Although the 600,000 km2 of the Gran Chaco region was sparsely populated, control of the Paraguay River running through it was especially important to Bolivia because it would have provided access to the Atlantic Ocean.

Figure 8. Topographic map of South America showing where the Gran Chaco region is situated (Image Natural Earth, kk – nationsonline.org)

In any case, because of the war, Bolivia lost almost 60,000 people, or roughly 2 percent of its population; in addition, Paraguay captured around 10,000 Bolivian civilians, many of whom decided to stay in Paraguay after the war. Clearly, Bolivia was hemorrhaging people. Following the war, Bolivia was trying to counter its population loss as well as stem further losses by people seeking better economic opportunities in surrounding countries.

After the Chaco War, Bolivia was at an important historical crossroad amidst a nationalist resurgence. Immigration was one step in the country’s transformation, the goals of which were to modernize and repopulate the country, as well as colonize the eastern region of the country with the aim of expanding agricultural development there. Beginning in January 1937, President José David Toro Ruilova once again allowed the free entry of foreigners into the country that had been suspended during the Chaco War. Shortly thereafter Jews began to arrive in Bolivia.

The year 1937 was a turning point for Jews in Europe, with a massive exodus beginning in 1938, and the years 1938 and 1939 being characterized as the “Panic Migration Years.” The involvement of Moritz (Mauricio) Hochschild, a Jew who’d emigrated to Bolivia during the 1920’s, played a part in allowing Jews from Nazi Europe to enter the country. As Bolivia’s second wealthiest man and a leading mining industry businessman, he became an economic advisor to President Toro; the two of them found commonality and their personal relationship played a role in convincing Bolivia to allow Jewish migration. According to Dr. Gruner-Domić, the refugees arriving from Europe were viewed primarily as Europeans and secondly as Jews.

The first concrete measure taken by the Bolivian government was an agreement it signed in January 1937 with the Polish government to allow the resettlement of 250 Jewish families; an agreement was also signed with then-Czechoslovakia. In a few instances, even Jews who’d been incarcerated in concentration camps were released if they’d been lucky enough to obtain a Bolivian visa.

Prior to the mass migration of Jews into Bolivia, which peaked in 1939, there were only about 200 Jews in the entire country. It’s reported that on the 22^nd of February 1939 alone, more than 800 Jews arrived. The arrival of this many Jews at once strained the country’s infrastructure, so a decision was made to limit the number of refugees to 250 a month, though it’s unclear this limit was ever implemented.

The path by which most European Jews who’d secured a Bolivian visa came was via boat leaving from Hamburg, Germany or Milano, Italy, traveling through the Panama Canal, landing in Arica, Chile (Figure 9), then taking the train to La Paz; others came via train from Argentina or Brazil. Most Jews who found refuge in Bolivia in the late 1930’s and 1940’s did not stay, so today’s Jewish population is estimated at between 500 and 700. Following the war, those who had families elsewhere left. Judging from the relatively small number of Jews in Bolivia today, I reckon that Heinz Berliner was among those who decamped to a yet unknown country.

Figure 9. Map of Bolivia in relationship to Arica, Chile along the Pacific coast showing where most Jewish refugees arriving from Europe landed and took the train to La Paz

POST 129: THE UNSUCCESSFUL QUEST TO TRACK DOWN DR. ERICH BRUCK IN ARGENTINA

Note: In this post I talk about the failed search for my first cousin twice removed Dr. Erich Bruck whom I have tantalizing evidence wound up in the Argentinian part of Tierra del Fuego. I discuss the proof I obtained in confirming that a similarly named Dr. Enrik Bruck who is buried in Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña, a town more than 2,300 miles away from Tierra del Fuego, is not my distant cousin.

POST 62, POSTSCRIPT: THE FAR-REACHING SEARCH FOR MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN, HEINZ LUDWIG BERLINER—FURTHER PROOF OF HEINZ’S EXISTENCE

POST 113: CHIUNE SUGIHARA, JAPANESE IMPERIAL CONSUL IN LITHUANIA DURING WWII, “RIGHTEOUS AMONG THE NATIONS”

Dr. Erich Bruck is my first cousin twice removed born in Ratibor, Germany [today: Racibórz, Poland], same town as my father Dr. Otto Bruck, on the 31^st of August 1865. I have evidence of his birth from the Family History Library’s Microfilm Roll 1184449 for Jewish births in Ratibor. (Figure 1) He was one of 14 or 15 children born to my great-granduncle- and -grandaunt, Oskar Bruck (1831-1892) and Mathilde Bruck née Preiss. At the tail end of Post 113, I included a table with the available vital statistics on these children. Astonishingly, to date, I’ve been unable to find a single living descendant for any of these offspring.

Figure 1. Birth register listing from the Family History Library’s Microfilm Number 1184449 for Erich Bruck showing his parents were Oscar Bruck and Mathilde née Preiss and that he was born on the 31st of August 1865

Unlike some of his siblings who perished in the Holocaust, Erich is believed to have survived. As briefly mentioned in Post 113, a tantalizing clue as to Erich’s fate was found in the “Pinkus Family Collection 1500s-1994, 1725-1994” archived at the Leo Baeck Institute. On the Oskar Bruck-Mathilde Preiss family page, names and some vital data on 12 of their 14 or 15 “kinder,” children, can be found, including information on Dr. Erich Bruck. (Figure 2) It confirms he was born on the 31^st of August 1865 in Ratibor, was a doctor in Argentina, and emigrated to “Feuerlandinseln,” Tierra del Fuego Islands in the 19^th century. Beyond the fact this is an unusual place for an individual to have emigrated to, this is the closest I’ve been to finding a Jewish ancestor in Antarctica, still more than 2,300 miles away, the only continent where my family’s diaspora has not yet taken me.

Figure 2. Page from the “Pinkus Family Collection 1500s-1994, 1725-1994” archived at the Leo Baeck Institute on the Oskar Bruck-Mathilde Preiss family with vital data on 12 of their 14 or 15 children, including Erich Bruck; this is the source for the information that Erich Bruck was a doctor and emigrated to Tierra del Fuego, Argentina

Some brief geography. Tierra del Fuego, Spanish for “Land of the Fire,” is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The archipelago consists of the main island, Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, with an area of 18,572 sq. mi. (48,100 km2), and a group of many islands, including Cape Horn and Diego Ramírez Islands. Tierra del Fuego is divided between Chile and Argentina, with the latter controlling the eastern half of the main island and the former the western half plus the islands south of Beagle Channel and the southernmost islands. Ushuaia is the capital of Tierra del Fuego, with a population of nearly 80,000 and claims the title of the world’s southernmost city. The family page from the Pinkus Family Collection makes it clear that Dr. Erich Bruck was a physician in Argentina, not in Chile.

My quest to discover what may have happened to Dr. Erich Bruck has been ongoing for several years interrupted by investigations into other ancestors. Obviously aware of an Argentinian connection, in 2021 I contacted the “Asociación de Genealogía Judía de Argentina (AGJA),” the Jewish Genealogical Society of Argentina, asking whether they or another genealogical association or group could provide any information about my distant cousin. I received a prompt response from a Ms. Estela Rappaportt (Figure 3) referring me to a Facebook group located in the Ushuaia community of Tierra del Fuego. I contacted them but never received a reply.

Figure 3. Ms. Estela Rappaportt from the “Asociación de Genealogía Judía de Argentina (AGJA),” the Jewish Genealogical Society of Argentina

More intriguingly, Estela mentioned there is a tomb in the province of Chaco in Argentina, in the city of Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña, of an Enrik Bruck, who died there on 31^st of May 1931. Given that Erich Bruck was born in 1865, the age of this individual at death at least seemed like a plausible match. Moreover, I thought his forename might well have been changed to Enrik in Spanish. Ignoring the fact that Tierra del Fuego and Sáenz Peña in Chaco Province are more than 2,300 miles apart (Figure 4), I became obsessed with the notion that my distant relative is interred there. How Erich Bruck might have wound up in Sáenz Peña after living in Tierra del Fuego was an afterthought.

Figure 4. Generalized map showing the distance between Tierra del Fuego and Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña where Dr. Enrik Bruck is buried is more than 2,300 miles

Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña in Chaco Province is under 700 miles from Buenos Aires (Figure 5), and has a population of 83,000 people, mostly descendants of settlers from Spain, Italy, Russia, Poland, then-Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, and Ukraine, as well as Jewish families from elsewhere in Argentina. Sáenz Peña was founded in 1912 and has developed as a commercial and industrial center serving the surrounding agricultural region of the Gran Chaco plains. In 1945, the Jewish population numbered around 200 families, though today fewer than ten Jewish families remain.

Figure 5. Generalized map showing the distance between Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña and Buenos Aires is less than 700 miles

With Jews having lived in and around Sáenz Peña, it stands to reason there would be a Jewish cemetery. And, in fact, I learned about Saenz Peña’s “El Cementerio Judio,” a Jewish cemetery dating from 1920 with 120 graves, formerly called “Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña Cementerio.” The information about this Jewish cemetery was derived from the International Jewish Cemetery Project, which is a volunteer, cooperative effort of the International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies and JewishGen, Inc.’s “JewishGen Online Worldwide Burial Registry” or “JOWBR” which seeks to identify Jewish burial sites and interments throughout the world.

I tried contacting the Sáenz Peña’s Ayuntamiento, the city’s town hall, but never received a response. I tried working through a friend at the Jewish Genealogical Society of Los Angeles and her Rabbi to establish a local contact but this too failed. I even tried having South American relatives call the Jewish cemetery’s caretaker, all to no avail. Because information on the International Jewish Cemetery Project regarding gaining entry to the cemetery implied the process was rather informal (Figure 6), I set the issue aside for future consideration. Nonetheless, I remained stubbornly convinced that my ancestor was interred in the Jewish cemetery in Saenz Peña and had eventually intended to go on a letter-writing campaign to confirm this.

Figure 6. Information about the Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña’s “El Cementerio Judío” from the International Jewish Cemetery Project

Let me briefly digress. Like most avid genealogists, I have a “bin” of unresolved genealogical questions, quests if you will. In Post 62 and Post 62, Postscript, I discussed my father’s first cousin, Heinz Ludwig Berliner, who, like Erich Bruck and my father, was born in Ratibor; “Berliner,” incidentally, was my paternal grandmother’s maiden name. Hearsay from Heinz’s branch of the family suggests he committed suicide in 1948, place unknown.

Heinz’s last known location is in Bolivia. A brief reference in MyHeritage stated he wound up there. In 2019, I contacted the Jewish synagogue in La Paz, the Circulo Israelita de Bolivia, hoping they might have immigration or other records on Heinz, which they do not. At the time, I mistakenly concluded the theater where Heinz had performed under his stage name “Enry Berloc,” the “Teatro Municipal,” was in Buenos Aires rather than in La Paz (Figure 7); as a result the Circulo referred me to the AMIA in Argentina, the central institution of the country’s Jewish community. AMIA, in turn, directed me to the “Asociación de Genealogía Judía de Argentina (AGJA),” which is how I encountered Ms. Rappaportt.

Figure 7. Playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” I originally thought was located in Buenos Aires for a performance my distant cousin Heinz Ludwig Berliner starred in, using his stage name “Enry Berloc”; it turns out the Teatro Municipal is located in La Paz, Bolivia

My contact with the Circulo Israelita de Bolivia was not for naught, however, as I will explain in another postscript to Post 62.

Getting back on track. A recent email from the Circulo Israelita de Bolivia reminded me I had never connected with Saenz Peña’s El Cementerio Judio, so I decided to again contact Ms. Rappaportt from AGJA asking her who I should write to in Saenz Peña about Enrik Bruck. Estela sent me the name and email of the President of the Kehilá or village of Sáenz Peña, but then almost immediately sent me a photo of Enrik Bruck’s headstone. (Figure 8) To say I was flabbergasted would be an understatement given that I’d been looking for such information for years.

Figure 8. Photo of Enrik Bruck’s headstone from the “Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña Cementerio” sent to me by Ms. Estela Rappaport

While I never asked Estela where she obtained the photo, I eventually located it on my own on the JOWBR website. I have literally looked at hundreds of burial registry records on JOWBR’s website (Figures 9a-b), and this is the first time I’ve ever seen one with a picture of the individual’s gravestone, so I consider myself fortunate to have obtained this image without going down more rabbit trails.

Figure 9a. Page from the “JewishGen Online Worldwide Burial Registry” or “JOWBR” with information on the “Presidencia Roque Sáenz Peña Cementerio”

Figure 9b. Page from the “JewishGen Online Worldwide Burial Registry” or “JOWBR” with the photo of Enrik Bruck’s headstone

At first glance, Enrik’s tombstone appears unreadable but enlarging and zeroing in on the text I realized that a lot of information was decipherable. (Figure 10)

Figure 10. Closeup of (H)ENRIC BRUCK’s headstone showing detailed information

Below is what I managed to construe:

DOCTOR

O.E.P.

(H)ENRIK BRUCK

NACIO EN ALBA JULIA (born in Alba Iulia)

EL 16 DE DICIEMBRE xxxx (the 16^th of December xxxx)

FALLECIO EL 31 DE Mxxxx (passed away the 31^st of xxx (May according to JewishGen))

DE MUERTE PE (of death xx)

Armed with what seemed like rather scant details, I first turned to Google to learn where “Alba Julia” is located. I discovered it is in Transylvania, the historical and cultural region in Central-Eastern Europe, that now encompasses central Romania. Alba Iulia, as it is called, was the seat of residence of the princes of Transylvania in the 16^th and 17^th centuries, and for several centuries was administered by Hungary. In the 17^th century there were about 100 Jews living in Alba Iulia, and by 1930, 1,558 out of 12,282 people living there were Jewish. By 1941, all Jewish community property had been confiscated, and the men seized for forced labor. The Jewish population peaked in 1947 at over 2,000, but by the beginning of the 21^st century, the Jewish population in Alba Iulia, as well as in the rest of Romania, was very small.

Next, I searched in ancestry for Enrik Bruck in Alba Iulia, and surprisingly found two births registers listing a Henrik Brück, with an umlaut over the “u,” born there on the 16^th of December 1888. (Figures 11a-c) Since the place and day of birth match the information on the headstone located in Saenz Peña, I am certain the individual interred there is Dr. Henrik Brück.

Figure 11a. Cover page for birth register listing for Henrik Brück showing he was born on the 16th of December 1888 in Alba Iulia, Romania

Figure 11b. Version 1 of birth register listing for Henrik Brück showing he was born on the 16th of December 1888 in Alba Iulia, Romania

Figure 11c. Version 2 of birth register listing for Henrik Brück showing he was born on the 16th of December 1888 in Alba Iulia, Romania

While disappointed so far not to have tracked down my distant cousin Dr. Erich Bruck in Argentina, I am now certain he is not interred in Sáenz Peña. Ms. Rappaportt, who has relatives in Ushuaia, the capital of Tierra del Fuego, tells me there is no Jewish cemetery there. An online search of the cemetery records in Ushuaia and Río Grande, Tierra del Fuego’s two largest cities, show no Brucks interred there. So, while the question of where Erich Bruck wound up remains unresolved, I was finally able to establish the identity and origin of the Brück who lies in Sáenz Peña.

REFERENCE

Nimcowicz, Diane. Jewish Genealogical Research in Argentina. Arhttps://www.jewishgen.org/InfoFiles/argentina.htmlgentina

POST 62, POSTSCRIPT: THE FAR-REACHING SEARCH FOR MY FATHER’S FIRST COUSIN, HEINZ LUDWIG BERLINER—FURTHER PROOF OF HEINZ’S EXISTENCE

Note: In this postscript, I discuss some intriguing new information that has come to light about Heinz Ludwig Berliner since publication of the original post, details of which bring me closer to determining his fate.

Post 62: The Far-Flung Search for My Father’s First Cousin, Heinz Ludwig Berliner

I can never predict when or from where further traces of ancestors I’ve written about in earlier posts may materialize. In my original publication, I explained to readers the challenges I encountered trying to uncover concrete evidence of Heinz Ludwig Berliner, one of my father’s first cousins. I first learned about him from a fleeting reference in a document written by my third cousin Larry Leyser’s grandmother detailing the fate of some of our family’s ancestors. His grandmother briefly remarked Heinz Berliner immigrated to some unspecified country in South America after WWII, where he purportedly committed suicide.

Figure 1. Cover of March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” showing Heinz Berliner’s stage name, “Enry Berloc,” along with the names of his co-performers, “Witha Herm” and “Maestro Kurt Kohn”

As discussed in the original post, I was able to confirm Heinz Ludwig Berliner’s appearance in South America through the cover of a playbill (Figure 1) sent to me by Tema Goetzel née Comac, the wife of Heinz’s nephew; the playbill showed that Heinz, using his stage name “Enry Berloc,” had performed at the “Teatro Municipal,” in an unspecified South American country, on the 19^th of March 1948 in the accompaniment of a “Witha Herm” and the “Maestro Kurt Kohn.” More on this later.

For two reasons, I never imagined it would be so difficult to track Heinz’s movements and eventual destination. First, both of Heinz’ s siblings, Ilse (Figure 2) and Peter Berliner (Figure 3), wound up in New York and were known to me since childhood. And, second, as alluded to above, I’m in touch with descendants of Heinz’s siblings, and assumed they would have letters or documents showing where he’d wound up; initially, all they found was the playbill cover to the 1948 recital in which Enry Berloc performed.

Figure 2. Heinz Berliner’s older sister, Pauline Ilse Berliner (1911-1981), standing alongside my father, Dr. Otto Bruck

Figure 3. Heinz Berliner’s older brother, Peter Berliner (1910-1977)

Heinz’s siblings were born in the same town in Upper Silesia where my father had been born, Ratibor [today: Racibórz, Poland], and I was able to locate both of their birth certificates when I visited the “State Archives in Katowice Branch in Raciborz”; vexingly, on two separate visits I could never find Heinz’s birth record, though it was logical to assume he too had been born in Ratibor. I even asked my Polish historian friend in Racibórz, Mr. Paul Newerla, to confirm my negative findings, and his initial efforts were similarly fruitless. As previously discussed, I began to think Heinz may have been born earlier out-of-wedlock and/or born in the town where his parents had married, Meseritz [today: Międzyrzecz, Poland]. I even contacted the archives there but was told the on-line birth records would not be available until this current year; this is on account of Poland’s legal requirement prohibiting the release of birth certificates until 110 years after a person’s birth, so in the case of Heinz possibly soon after his parents married in 1909 in Meseritz.

Figure 4. Page from MyHeritage ancestral database entitled “German Minority Census, 1939,” showing a Heinz Ludwig Berliner born in Ratibor on the 24th of September 1916, living in Berlin-Charlottenburg at the time, having immigrated to Bolivia

As readers may recall, this search became moot when I recently discovered a document in MyHeritage entitled “German Minority Census, 1939,” listing a Heinz Ludwig Berliner born on the 24th of September 1916 in Ratibor, showing he lived in the Charlottenburg District of Berlin in 1939, and indicating he had immigrated to Bolivia. (Figure 4) I had some initial doubts this was my father’s first cousin, but after transmitting this new information to Mr. Newerla, Paul was able to finally locate Heinz’s birth certificate in the State Archives in Raciborz, misfiled as it happens, confirming his parents’ names.

Researching the names and information found on the cover of the 1948 playbill, I thought the “Teatro Municipal” was in Buenos Aires, Argentina, as I told readers in my original post. Hoping to locate Berliners who may have wound up there before or after WWII, I turned to family trees on JewishGen, and contacted a lady in Australia who put me in touch with a Ms. Marcia Ras from Buenos Aires with Berliners in her family tree, who turned out to be exceptionally helpful.

Figure 5. Cover of March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” with the circled name of the sponsoring organization, “Ministerio de Educacion y Bellas Artes”

Following publication of my original post, I sent Marcia a link to it, and she explained that Argentina’s Ministry of Education that had supposedly sponsored the 1948 recital at the Teatro Municipal had never borne the name “Ministerio de Educacion y Bellas Artes.” (Figure 5) Quick online searches showed that in both Venezuela and República Dominicana they were called that way. I sent an email to the Dominican Republic’s Ministry of Education but never received a response. Given Venezuela’s severely dysfunctional state, I never bothered to contact them. I searched for a similarly named entity in other South American countries to no avail.

Marcia could find no evidence Heinz was ever in Buenos Aires. She told me that if he was, he did not enter the country legally. Thousands of Jewish refugees entered Argentina and other South American countries illegally, especially between 1938 and 1949, so he may well have been among them. Marcia was unable to find his name mentioned anywhere. A Ms. Silvia Glocer, an expert in Jewish musicians seeking refuge in Argentina whom Marcia consulted, confirmed she’d also never heard Heinz’s or the maestro Kurt Kohn’s names. They stressed this did not mean they’d never been in Argentina, only that no evidence could be found they’d been there.

Figure 6a. Picture of the chatelaine with an attached photo locket containing the image of Heinz’s father, Alfred Berliner (1875-1921) (photo courtesy of Tema Goetzel, Heinz Berliner’s niece by marriage)

Figure 6b. Photo locket with the image of Heinz Berliner’s father, Alfred Berliner (1875-1921) (photo courtesy of Tema Goetzel, Heinz Berliner’s niece by marriage)

My ongoing search might well have ended here. However, out of the blue, Tema Goetzel sent me a photo from a chatelaine (i.e., a clasp or hook for a watch, purse, or bunch of keys) (Figures 6a-b), asking if I recognized Alfred Berliner, Heinz Berliner’s father. While I know Alfred Berliner was once interred in the Jewish Cemetery in Ratibor and included a photo of his former headstone in the original post, I had no photos of him against which to compare; eventually, Tema sent two more photos, a second of Alfred Berliner (Figure 7), and a third of Alfred Berliner’s wife, Charlotte Berliner née Rothe, with their three children. (Figure 8) At long last, I’d tracked down a photo of the elusive Heinz Berliner, albeit as a young child! (Readers are reminded that in Post 18, I told the story of Heinz Berliner’s mother who perished in Auschwitz in 1943.)

Figure 7. Alfred Berliner, Heinz Berliner’s father (photo courtesy of Tema Goetzel, Heinz Berliner’s niece by marriage)

Figure 8. Heinz Berliner as a child with his two older siblings, Peter and Ilse, and his mother, Charlotte Berliner née Rothe (photo courtesy of Tema Goetzel, Heinz Berliner’s niece by marriage)

In the course of our recent conversations, I told Tema the Teatro Municipal I thought was in Buenos Aires was not in fact in Argentina; I related what Marcia Ras had explained to me. Tema, the source of the original playbill, thought it indicated the country. When I told her it didn’t, she again dug out the playbill and found three additional pages (Figures 9a-c) which she hadn’t previously sent, and these sheets specifically mentioned Bolivia, the country the “German Minority Census, 1939” document identified as Heinz’s destination. Armed with a country, I now quickly found a Teatro Municipal in La Paz. (Figure 10) Another puzzle solved.

Figure 9a. Second page of the March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” confirming the theater was in La Paz, Bolivia (courtesy of Tema Goetzel)

Figure 9b. Third page of the March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” with a summary of the critical reviews from different places where Witha Herm and Enry Berloc performed (courtesy of Tema Goetzel)

Figure 9c. Fourth page of the March 19, 1948 playbill from the “Teatro Municipal” with the list of musical numbers in each act and the names of the performers (courtesy of Tema Goetzel)

Figure 10. Teatro Municipal de la Paz in Bolivia (Photo Credit: Gatol fotografia)

Having confirmed from two independent sources Heinz’s connection to Bolivia, I again contacted the Bolivian affiliate of the World Jewish Congress, Circulo Israelita De La Paz, asking if they could check on Jewish musicians who may have sought refuge in Bolivia between roughly 1938 and 1949. This office has been gracious and helpful beyond measure but, to date, they too have been unable to confirm Heinz’s presence there. I think what is true of Jewish refugees entering Argentina illegally is also true of Bolivia. It may well be I’m unable to ever confirm whether or when Heinz died in Bolivia.

Figure 11. The popular British-Austrian orchestra leader, Ray Martin, born Kurt Kohn (1918-1988), whose musical score may have been used in the 1948 recital Heinz Berliner performed in

Marcia Ras discovered one other final intriguing thing. In the original post, I told readers that the Witha Herm mentioned in the 1948 playbill was a stage name for a woman known as Herma Wittmann, who died in 1992 in Los Angeles and is interred there. Similarly, the other musician mentioned in the playbill, Kurt Kohn, used an artistic name, Ray Martin (Raymond Stuart Martin). (Figure 11) A quick online search revealed Ray was born Kurt Kohn in Vienna, Austria on the 11^th of October 1918, and came to live and work in England in 1937. He was noted for his light music compositions, and created a legacy for himself in British popular music through his work with his orchestra in the 1950’s. I even located a descriptive catalog of his musical recordings, and tried to contact the compiler, Alan Bunting, but learned he’d died in 2016. Fortunately, the discography was created in collaboration with a Nigel Burlinson, whom I was able to reach. Mr. Burlinson sent a very gracious reply telling me he did not think the “Kurt Kohn” who performed at the Teatro Municipal in 1948 was the popular music conductor “Ray Martin” because at the time he was in England conducting orchestras. What to make of this is unclear? Possibly, the musical recital in which Witha Herm and Enry Berloc performed in 1948 in Bolivia merely used one or more of Kurt Kohn’s musical scores as accompaniment?

So, as often happens in my forensic investigations, I take two steps forward, one step back. I now know what Heinz Berliner looked like as a child, and confirmed he indeed immigrated to Bolivia after 1939, but am still left to ponder how and when exactly he died and whether he passed away in Bolivia.

HEINZ LUDWIG BERLINER & HIS IMMEDIATE FAMILY

Name (relationship)	Vital Event	Date	Place

Heinz Ludwig Berliner (self)	Birth	24 September 1916	Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Heinz Ludwig Berliner (self)	Death	after 1948	possibly in Bolivia
Alfred Max Berliner (father)	Birth	6 November 1875	Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
	Marriage	17 January 1909	Meseritz, Germany (Międzyrzecz, Poland)
	Death	19 February 1921	Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
Charlotte Henriette Rothe (mother)	Birth	2 April 1886	Meseritz, Germany (Międzyrzecz, Poland)
	Marriage	17 January 1909	Meseritz, Germany (Międzyrzecz, Poland)
	Death	January 1943	Auschwitz, Poland
Peter Hermann Berliner (brother)	Birth	8 November 1910	Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
	Marriage	24 December 1948	New York, N.Y., U.S.A.
	Death	25 July 1977	New York, N.Y., U.S.A.
Pauline Ilse Berliner (sister)	Birth	1 October 1911	Ratibor, Germany (Racibórz, Poland)
	Marriage	2 April 1941	New York, N.Y., U.S.A.
	Death	January 1981	New York, N.Y., U.S.A.