“Why can’t I have privacy like any other human being?” Prof. Albert Einstein angrily asked this morning when a number of American newspaper correspondents joined the S. S. Belgenland at Southampton to escort Einstein to New York. Emphatically notifying these unwelcome co-passengers that he would not say a word to anyone, Professor Einstein disappeared into his cabin and instructed the steward not to permit anyone to bother him.
Frau Einstein agreed with him. She told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency’s correspondent who cabled to New York that “anything reported in our name on the Belgenland is untrue. My husband is tired of being hunted. We have begged the newspapers not to molest us, at least on the steamer. We feel miserable being trapped even at sea.”
During the entire day Professor Einstein shut himself up with his assistant, Dr. Walter Mayer. He appeared only in the evening for dinner and later took a walk on deck with his wife, secretary and assistant, all of them keeping themselves isolated.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
