TREATMENT OF JEWS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20084, 2 November 1939, Page 14

TREATMENT OF JEWS

WANTON DESTRUCTION ESCAPEE FROM VIENNA TREASURE LOST The contents of the British White Paper on the treatment of minorities in Nazi Germany must shock everyone who has not had previous opportunity of learning the lengths to which the present rulers of the Reich carry their scorn and contempt of all who are not able to offer effective opposition. Those familiar with descriptions of life in Germany during recent years will feel that the evidence put forward in the White Paper has been sifted with the greatest care, and that many sensational cases have been excluded for lack of documentary evidence. One Gisborne lady resident who recently returned from the United Kingdom encountered en route a man of considerable culture whose case reilects the attitude of the Nazis towards all who do not share their code. This man was formerly living in Vienna, and was unfortunate enough to be still there when Austria was forcibly incorporated in the Reich. He had the still greater misfortune, for a Vienna resident, of being a Jew. Eviction and Sale

His house was seized by the Nazis, i who-simply told him to get out. It was sold later, and he was advised that he could call at the Nazi headquarters for the net proceeds, which amounted to the equivalent of less than £1 sterling. Still later he received advice that he must leave Austria, if he wished to remain safe, and he undertook the journey to the near- I est point on the border on skis, through mountainous country, carrying only a little food and a minimum of personal possessions. I One of these possessions was an ex- ; quisite model of a horse, a porcelain, hundreds oi years eld and valued as a family treasure as well as for its antiquity and its artistic worth. When he reached the frontier, he was held up for hours, and when his turn, came j for examination by Nazi officials, he ! was subjected to rigorous cross-exam- : ination. He was able to prove that he had no money which he was trying to take out of the country, but his possession of the porcelain treasure aroused keen suspicion. Contemptuous Officials The trinket was turned over and over by official hands, in an endeavour to establish some sinister motive In his carrying it to the border. The Nazis seemed to be particularly anxious that no messages should go abroad without censorship, and it took a long time to satisfy them that the art object was no more than it seemed. At last, however, they expressed themselves as convinced. "Here, take it!" the refugee was ordered. He put forward his hand, but the contemptuous official dropped the concrete floor of the guardhouse. In a moment it was shattered upon the concrete Hoof of the guardhouse. This deliberate act of vandalism, betraying a complete imperviousness to any appeal from the artistic angle, robbed the refugee of his last shreds of respect for the new regime in Austria.