While Jacob Goldschmidt, Jewish banker, economist and head of the Darmstadter National Bank, the largest in Germany, today denied published reports that he had paid Adolf Hitler 1,000,000 marks, the Communist press, particularly the Welt Am Abend which first gave currency to the report, repeats the charge.
Quoting the Welt Am Abend, the Liberal Montag Morgen editorially charged that Herr Goldschmidt had utilized the Lahusen firm as an intermediary in his negotiations with the Hitlerites whose activities he is accused of having financed. A number of papers, among them the Montag Morgen, took the reports in the Communist press seriously.
The Montag Morgen called on Herr Goldschmidt to state publicly whether or not he had directly or indirectly financed the National Socialists. If his answer was in the affirmative the Montag Morgen indicated that it would further like to know whether Herr Goldschmidt furnished the Hitlerites with funds because of his sympathy with their political aims or for business reasons.
CHARGES BANK LOSSES
In repeating its charge, the Welt Am Abend also publishes a report of allegedly serious financial losses suffered by the Darmstadter National Bank, adding that this information has tremendously impressed the Stock Exchange. The Communist organ also intimates that it was Herr Goldschmidt and Dr. Emil van Strauss of the Deutsche Bank who helped Adolf Hitler frame his plank to nationalize the banks deliberately giving it a ridiculous form in order to make impossible its acceptance.
In view of the fact that the charge is being repeated Herr Goldschmidt today authorized the Jewish Telegraphic Agency to state that neither directly nor indirectly does he support the National Socialists as a party, nor does he back any individual National Socialists.
“I neither know Hitler nor have I ever spoken to members of the National Socialists,” Herr Goldschmidt declared. “I never issue denials because I consider it ridiculous to denounce publicly rumors which are essentially untrue and it is obvious that I could not support the National Socialist movement,” he said.
While the general press is describing the Communist allegations against Herr Goldschmidt as senseless it is being recalled that during the anti-Semitic Hitlerite riots in Berlin on the occasion of the opening of the Reichstag, the Darmstadter National Bank was one of the places of business attacked by the rowdies.
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.
