Kathrine Taylor - Address Unknown

As ever your, MARTIN SCHULSE

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA, U.S.A.

AUGUST 1, 1933

Herrn Martin Schulse (kindness of J. Lederer) Schloss Rantzenburg Munich, Germany

MARTIN, MY OLD FRIEND :

I am sending this by the hand of Jimmy Lederer, who will shortly pass through Munich on a European vacation. I cannot rest after the letter you last sent me. It is so unlike you I can only attribute its contents to your fear of the censorship. The man I have loved as a brother, whose heart has ever been brimming with sympathy and friendship, cannot possibly partake of even a passive partnership in the butchery of innocent people. I trust and pray that it may be so, that you will write me no exposition, which might be dangerous for you, — only a simple “yes.” That will tell me that you play the part of expediency but that your heart has not changed, and that I was not deluded in believing you to be always, a man of fine and liberal spirit to whom wrongs are: wrongs in whosoever’s name they may be committed. This censorship, this persecution of all men of liberal thought, the burning of libraries and corruption of the Universities would arouse your antagonism if there had been no finger laid on one of my race in Germany. You are a liberal, Martin. You have always taken the long view. I know that you cannot be swept away from sanity by a popular movement which has so much that is bad about it, no matter how strong it may be.

I can see why the Germans acclaim Hitler. They react against the very real wrongs which have been laid on them since the disaster of the war. But you, Martin, have been almost an American since the war. I know that it is not my friend who has written to me, that it will prove to have been only the voice of caution and expediency.

Eagerly I await the one word that will set my heart at peace. Write your “Yes” quickly.

My love to you all,

MAX

Deutsch-Völkische Bank und Handelsgesellschaft.

München

AUGUST 18, 1933

Mr. Max Eisenstein Schulse-Eisenstein Galleries San Francisco, California, U.S.A.

DEAR MAX:

I have your letter. The word is “no.” You are a sentimentalist. You do not know that all men are not cut to your pattern. You put nice little tags on them, like “liberal” and expect them to act so-and-so. But you are wrong. So, I am an American liberal? No! I am a German patriot.

A liberal is a man who does not believe in doing anything. He is a talker about the rights of man, but just a talker. He likes to make a big noise about freedom of speech, and what is freedom of speech? Just the chance to sit firmly on the backside and say that whatever is being done by the active men is wrong. What is so futile as the liberal? I know him well because I have been one. He condemns the passive government because it makes no change. But let a powerful man arise, let an active man start to make a change, then where is your liberal? He is against it. To the liberal any change is the wrong one.

He calls this the “long view,” but it is merely a bad scare that he will have to do something himself. He loves words and high-sounding precepts but he is useless to the men who make the world what it is. These are the only important men, the doers. And here in Germany a doer has risen. A vital man is changing things. The whole tide of a people’s life changes in a minute because the man of action has come. And I join him. I am not just swept along by a current. The useless life that was all talk and no accomplishment I drop. I put my back and shoulders behind the great new movement. I am a man because I act. Before that I am just a voice. I do not question the ends of our action. It is not necessary. I know it is good because it is so vital. Men are not drawn into bad things with so much joy and eagerness.

You say we persecute men of liberal thought, we destroy libraries. You should wake from your musty sentimentalizing. Does the surgeon spare the cancer because he must cut to remove it? We are cruel. Of course we are cruel. As all birth is brutal, so is this new birth of ours. But we rejoice. Germany lifts high her head among the nations of the world. She follows her glorious Leader to triumph. What can you know of this, you who only sit and dream? You have never known a Hitler. He is a drawn sword. He is a white light, but hot as the sun of a new day.

I must insist that you write no further. We are no longer in sympathy, as now we must both realize.

MARTIN SCHULSE

EISENSTEIN GALLERIES

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA, U.S.A.

SEPTEMBER 5, 1933

Herrn Martin Schulse c/o Deutsch-Voelkische Bank und Handelsgeselschaft Munich, Germany

DEAR MARTIN :

Enclosed are your draft and the month’s accounts. It is of necessity that I send a brief message. Griselle has gone to Berlin. She is too daring. But she has waited so long for success she will not relinquish it, and laughs at my fears. She will be at the Koenig Theater. You are an official. For old friendship’s sake, I beg of you watch over her. Go to Berlin if you can and see whether she is in danger.

It will distress you to observe that I have been obliged to remove your name from the firm’s name. You know who our principal clients are, and they will touch nothing now from a firm with a German name.

Your new attitude I cannot discuss. But you must understand me. I did not expect you would take up arms for my people because they are my people, but because you were a man who loved justice.

I commend my rash Griselle to you. The child does not realize what a risk she is taking. I shall not write again.

Goodbye, my friend, MAX

EISENSTEIN GALLERIES

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA, U.S.A.

NOVEMBER 5, 1933

Herrn Martin Schulse c/o Deutsch-Voelkische Bank und Handelsgeselschaft Munich, Germany

MARTIN :

I write again because I must. A black foreboding has taken possession of me. I wrote Griselle as soon as I knew she was in Berlin and she answered briefly. Rehearsals were going brilliantly; the play would open shortly. My second letter was more encouragement than warning, and it has been returned to me, the envelope unopened, marked only addressee unknown, (Adressant Unbekannt). What a darkness those words carry! How can she be unknown? It is surely a message that she has come to harm. They know what has happened to her, those stamped letters say, but I am not to know. She has gone into some sort of void and it will be useless to seek her. All this they tell me in two words, Adressant Unbekannt.

Martin, need I ask you to find her, to succor her? You have known her graciousness, her beauty and sweetness. You have had her love, which she has given to no other man. Do not attempt to write to me. I know I need not even ask you to aid. It is enough to tell you that something has gone wrong, that she must be in danger.

I leave her in your hands, for I am helpless.

MAX

EISENSTEIN GALLERIES

SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA, U.S.A.

NOVEMBER 23, 1933

Herrn Martin Schulse c/o Deutsch-Voelkische Bank und Handelsgeselschaft Munich, Germany

MARTIN :

I turn to you in despair. I could not wait for another month to pass so I am sending some information as to your investments. You may wish to make some changes and I can thus enclose my appeal with a bank letter.

It is Griselle. For two months there has been only silence from her, and now the rumors begin to come in to me. From Jewish mouth to Jewish mouth the tales slowly come back from Germany, tales so full of dread I would close my ears if I dared, but I cannot. I must know what has happened to her. I must be sure.

She appeared in the Berlin play for a week. Then she was jeered from the audience as a Jewess. She is so headstrong, so foolhardy, the splendid child! She threw the word back in their teeth. She told them proudly that she was a Jewess.