The foreign diplomatic colony in Berlin has been much aroused by an anti-Semitic incident involving the wife of one of the foreign ambassadors stationed in Berlin. Because of the international complications that might arise his name cannot be disclosed.
The ambassador’s wife took a taxi from the railroad station Amzoo, in Berlin in order to keep a luncheon appointment with her husband at Kempinsky’s restaurant on the Kurfuerstendam. Upon reaching the restaurant, she gave the taxi-driver two marks, and waited for change since the taxi meter registered less than one mark.
However, the driver not only refused to give her change but began to insult her yelling at her, “You dirty Jewess. You drink our German blood. You live luxuriously because you exploit our people. You should all be slaughtered.”
Embarrassed and confused, the ambassador’s wife, desiring to avoid the crowd that had collected, asked the taxi driver to take her to the nearest police station, whereupon the driver exclaimed: “Right you are. Your place is in the police station. My friend who is chief there will teach you, dirty Jewess, the right lesson.”
When they reached the police station, the chief, also a Nazi, sided with the driver and made insulting remarks to the diplomat’s wife, She produced her diplomatic passport and demanded the right to telephone her husband. The ambassador immediately communicated with the German Foreign Office, which sent the chief of the protocol section to the police station while the lady was still there.
The German diplomat apologized to her and promised strict action against the taxi driver and the police chief.
The lady, however, was dissatisfied and declared that the incident could not be allowed to pass off quietly, especially in view of the frequent declarations that foreigners are safe in Germany.
Anxious to avoid publicity that the incident would bring, particularly abroad, the German foreign office representative suggested that his government would be willing to donate any amount of money to any charitable institution that she named, if she would consider the incident closed.
The wife of the foreign diplomat accepted this offer and left the police station. Later she related the story in diplomatic circles.
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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.
