The first instance of Chancellor Hitler’s taking personal interest in the plight of a Jew was reported in yesterday’s Tilsiter Zeitung. A Jewish peddler, Max Bergmann, lost his only horse, which made the continuance of his hawking business impossible. Since horses are very cheap in Memel, or in Klaipeda, Lithuania, which is across the border from Tilsit in East Prussia, Bergmann wrote a letter and mailed it directly to Chancellor Hitler, asking permission to import a horse from Memel duty free in view of his impoverishment.
Bergmann enclosed documents in his letter to Hitler proving that he was a war veteran who had seen service in the front line trenches.
In reply to Bergmann’s letter, customs officials on the border between East Prussia and Lithuania received instructions from Chancellor Hitler to permit Bergmann to import a horse from Memel without charging him so much as a pfennig in duty.
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.
