Category Archives: -Claire Murray

What Happened to Abram’s Money?

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What did happen to Abram’s money? He never made it to Switzerland so he couldn’t have taken the money out or sent it to America. I used to wonder, when I was a child, and my Mom entertained us each night before bed by telling us stories about her two trips to Europe and how hard it was trying to bring Abram to America, what happened to the money?

As I got older I understood that, in those days, once you put money in a Swiss bank account, you only needed to know the account number to take your money out. No account ever had a name attached to it. People put their money in Switzerland’s banks because their laws allowed depositors to keep their accounts secret and anonymous.

Then I remembered Maximillian, Abram’s younger brother. He had come to America twice with Abram, in 1919 and 1929. From Mom’s stories the two seemed to always be together. According to the letters I read, they were both together in Beirut, Lebanon in the early part of 1941. Abram was thinking about money at that time because he wrote to my grandparents that he was almost without funds and so he couldn’t stay much longer.

Did Abram give Maximillian the account numbers then? Just in case something bad should happen to him?

I talked to my Mom, who’s 101, and asked her why Maximillian didn’t go with Abram when he started out for Switzerland? It seemed strange that the two of them would separate at that point.  She didn’t know. But the two did separate with Abram traveling to Switzerland and Maximillian going to Romania.

She remembered that at some point, when Maximillian was in Romania, he was captured by the Nazis and put in a German concentration camp. She didn’t know which one. He escaped once. But then he was caught and imprisoned again.  At the end of World War II the Russians liberated the concentration camp. He was out for a while. Then the Russians arrested him and put him in one of their camps. Some time later, he tried to escape and this time he was successful.

Maximillian contacted the Red Cross. They were able to connect him with my grandparents. He told them that he was out, but he needed money desperately. I remember that for years my parents and grandparents talking about what they were sending to Maximillian to sell. At one point he wanted material to make men’s suits so he could sew and sell them. My grandparents wanted to send him ready-made suits. It would have been easier for them. But, no, he insisted they send him the material instead. Why? We never found out.

Another time, they thought he could make more money, and it would be cheaper for them to mail, if they sent him watches. He was very angry. Apparently, the Russians or the Germans, I’m not clear which, beat him. They thought the watches contained some type of device to make a bomb.

Then there was the period when they would send him jeans. American Levi’s were a big hit in Europe after the war. He could sell them easily on the street.

Somehow, during this time, he made his way from Bucharest, Romania to Dusseldorf, Germany. I don’t know how he did it. I just googled his journey. It’s 1,221 miles, the distance from San Francisco, California to Denver, Colorado.  He had to travel through Hungary, Austria and halfway across Germany to reach Dusseldorf.

One time, when he was in Germany, in1955, Grandma sent him a copy of A Star of Hope, the poetry book Papa had written and dedicated to her for their 50th Wedding Anniversary. Maximillian wrote back. He was furious. Apparently the German censors, or someone in authority, thought it was some secret code and he was in serious trouble for a while.

Time went on. More packages were sent to Europe with things to sell. Then, at some point, Maximillian wrote to my grandparents and parents. He thanked them all for their help and let them know that they no longer needed to send him things to sell. He was fine. Life was good. He was working in a bank in Dusseldorf, Germany.

My parents and grandparents always believed, after they got that letter, that he had found a way to access Abram’s money. They were so close. He was his younger brother. It seemed only logical that Abram had told him the numbers of his Swiss bank account. We always believed that that was the money he lived on. The job in the German bank was helpful but the salary wouldn’t have been enough for the life he was living.

“Well, time marches on,” as my mother says.  My parents and grandparents wrote and Maximillian wrote back. Many years passed. Grandma and Papa were no longer here. One day my Mom got a letter from Dusseldorf, Germany, from Fanny. Who was Fanny? She wrote to my Mom that she and Maximillian had married shortly after the war. Maximillian had just died. She wanted his family to know.

My parents were stunned. Maximillian had never mentioned a wife. They had no idea. To this day my Mom says, “Why? Why didn’t he tell us?” They would have been so happy to know he had somebody.

Mom and Fanny corresponded. It was complicated. My Mom would write a letter. Fanny would get it. She didn’t speak English. So she would take several buses to a friend’s house who did. The friend would translate Mom’s letter for her. Fanny would write an answer. The friend would then translate it into English and Fanny would mail the letter to Mom.

This would happen once a month for many years. Then one day Fannie wrote that she was very old. All the traveling by bus and transferring from one bus to another to get to her friend’s house so the letters could be translated was too much for her. She couldn’t do it any more. My Mom heard nothing more for a while. Then Fannie’s friend wrote that Fannie too had died.

In the end, Abram’s money did a lot of good. Knowing how generous he had always been in life with his family, I think he would have been happy with what his money accomplished after he was no longer here: It helped Maximillian and Fanny have a nice life and allowed Fannie to live comfortably all the years after Maximillian died.

Why Go to Switzerland?

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Just as suspense keeps a story going and your audience interested, there comes a point when you have to tell them what happened. You have to answer the questions you’ve implied or asked directly earlier in the piece.

Why did Abram insist on stopping off in Switzerland first and then coming to America second? The world was at war. He was in Beirut, Lebanon. Switzerland was a long way away. The Nazis controlled many of the countries he would have to pass through and he was a Jew. All good reasons, I would think, to come to America immediately now that he had the Visa and could do it. There was nothing more to wait for.

The excuse he gave my parents and grandparents doesn’t make sense. He needed to stop off in Switzerland first because he had some medical problems. After the Swiss doctors helped him, then he would come.

The world was too dangerous for him to make a stop like that for health reasons. The chances of him being killed were too high. There were plenty of doctors in America he could see after he arrived. No, I believe he had another, much more important reason for going to Switzerland first and then coming to America.

Abram had been a very successful businessman. He grew up in Bucharest, Romania. Later, after he became head of an Italian-American shipping line, the King of Italy knighted him. He was important and wealthy. He was also very generous with his family. He took care of his mother for many years, supporting her in Bucharest and later moving her to live with him in Constantinople (now Istanbul).

Abram was also very generous with his oldest sister, Clara, my grandmother.  World War I ended on November 11, 1918. Abram came to San Francisco sometime in 1919. He invited Grandma, Papa, my Mom and Maximillian, his younger brother who was traveling with him, to travel around Europe for a year, visiting family and seeing the sights.

Everyone was thrilled at the opportunity. From the stories my Mom tells, they had an absolutely marvelous time! They started by taking the ferry from San Francisco, across the Bay to Oakland, where they caught the train to New York City. From there, they sailed on the RMS Aquitania, one of the most luxurious ocean liners of the time.

Mom was six and Maximillian sixteen, not exactly a child but not all grown up either. He used to take her to the park, the circus and out for ice cream while the adults went to shows like the Folies Bergère or out for drinks.

They traveled to France, Switzerland, Rumania and Turkey. From my Mom’s stories, Paris was one of the highlights of the trip: the Louvre, the shops, the people, and the atmosphere. I grew up always wanting to go to Paris, walk down the Champs-Élysées and see if it was as wonderful as she said. It is!

At some point they took the Orient Express to Constantinople. The trip took 80 hours—three days, eight hours. They had a sleeping car and ate in the dining room. Mom talked about how exciting and wonderful everything was!

They stayed a while in Constantinople visiting family. Mom became fast friends with her cousin, Eva, who was about the same age. I’ve seen pictures of them standing together, dressed the same—two cute six year olds with smiles from ear to ear.

Later they went to Romania. One night there was a birthday party at Papa’s mother’s house, with lots of singing and dancing. The highlight of the evening was Papa dancing a Viennese waltz with his mother on her 80th birthday. Many people had tears in their eyes.

Then, in 1929, just before the Stock Market Crash, Abram came again to San Francisco to visit. He also brought Maximillian. Mom was now sixteen and Maximillian twenty-six. Soon they and Grandma and Papa were off for another year in Europe, traveling and visiting family.

Mom had just graduated early from Lowell High School so she could make the trip. When she came back a year later, she started college at the University of California in Berkeley.

When I think about this, it seems clear that Abram was a very generous man, who was also well off, and was happy to share his good fortune with his family. I also think, like many other well off Europeans of that time, he put his money in Swiss banks. It would be safe and secure and the Nazis couldn’t touch it.

When my Dad got Abram the American Visa in 1941, and let him know that the family in America would take care of him, Abram must have thought, I’ve got money in Switzerland. There’s a war going on. Hitler may win. I may never be able to return to Europe. I need to take it with me.

There were no computers in those days. Abram couldn’t just go online and transfer his money from one bank or country to another. He must have found it hard at that point in his life to leave all his wealth behind and be dependent on his America family for the rest of his life. Why not try to bring it with him?

Considering all the odds against him, I don’t know how he thought he could do it. He did know a lot of people and maybe he thought some of them might help him. He spoke a number of languages and he might have thought that would help too.

Abram’s always sounded like a very optimistic person; someone who believed they could succeed against all odds. It must have been awful for him to come so close, Trieste, less than a day’s travel from Geneva, only to be captured. I can’t imagine what it must have been like for him when the Nazis took him off the train and to the Savoia Hotel, where he’d lived for so many years. Did he think he could make some kind of arrangement with them until the very end, or, once they took him off the train, did he know it was over?

If my interpretation is correct, what happened to the money? Abram was murdered in his hotel room at The Savoia Hotel in Trieste, Italy sometime in late 1941. He never made it to Switzerland. So he was never able to send his money to America.

For that answer, you’ll have to come back next month.

Suspense

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Suspense! That’s what brings readers back again and again. If you want your readers to keep reading, you have to give them a reason to go to the next paragraph, turn the page or come back a month later. That’s why I ended my blog last month the way I did.

What did happen to Abram? He had the visa. He could come to America right away. Why did he insist on stopping off in Switzerland first? And, most of all, why did he never get to America?

Abram tried. He really did. His plan was to go from Beirut to Geneva by train.

I just finished looking at a Google Map of the area. I can’t imagine what made him think he could pull it off. He was a Jew, in the middle of World War II. He’d have to travel from Beirut, Lebanon to Aleppo in Syria and then on to Istanbul, Turkey. From Istanbul, he’d have to pass through Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia to Trieste, Italy. Then it would be a relatively short shot to Geneva.

This is a journey of over 2,395 miles. It’s the same distance as from San Francisco, California to St. Petersburg, Florida. Only he’d have to travel through seven countries, all of them either at war or on the edge, and most of them on Hitler’s side. Today, when I put the information into Google, it said, “We could not calculate directions between Beirut, Lebanon and Geneva, Switzerland.”

Map Picture

I would love to know what he was thinking. How did he plan to do it? Why did he even want to?

Traveling by train, all that distance, would be difficult. How many days would it take? Where would he sleep? How would he pay for his tickets and food? Money was already a problem in Beirut. He wouldn’t be able to travel first class like in the past. And, at his age, he was in his sixties…

I wonder, was Abram ever frightened as he planned his journey? Did he feel overwhelmed? Did he worry that he wouldn’t be able to do it?

To try to figure out how Abram might have planned it, I did a little research on my computer. If I wanted to make the trip today, I’d have to take a bus or taxi from Beirut (A on the map) to Aleppo (B). That’s 186 miles. Then I’d take the train to Istanbul (C) for 768 miles. After that I’d travel for another 991 miles by train to Trieste (D). From there it would be 450 miles more to Geneva (E) and he would have made it!

But I’d be doing it as an American on an American passport. Abram was doing it in late 1941 as a Jew with an American visa that could be dangerous for him to show until he boarded the ship because the countries he was passing through were controlled by the Nazis.

Germany’s puppet government in France controlled Lebanon and Syria until the Allied Invasion of July, 1941. Turkey was neutral in 1941 but Hitler had taken Bulgaria on March 1, Croatia on April 10 and Serbia on April 17. Abram didn’t start out until sometime after June.

What was he planning to use for papers? What acceptable reason could he give for traveling? How did he disguise himself so he could blend in with the other travelers? How did he get enough sleep and to eat so he could function?

The one thing he did have going for him, besides his American visa, was that he spoke a number of languages: Romanian, German, French, English, Italian and probably Yiddish.

Looking at the map, I still can’t believe it that Abram made it as far as he did. He must have been very brave, determined and resourceful. He had a lot of guts. He made it most of the way. He was so close. Then he had bad luck, very bad luck.

Somewhere on the train between Serbia and Italy some Nazis found him. He had almost made it to Trieste, only half a day’s travel from Geneva.

The Red Cross finally found out the truth but not until after the war was over. So for years my parents and Grandma and Papa wrote, telephoned and cabled the Red Cross and anyone else they thought could find Abram and help him come to America. They always believed he was still alive until the night the telegram came.

It was a Sunday in 1948 or ’49. There was a knock at our door. It was Western Union. The messenger had gone to my grandparents’ apartment in Pacific Heights first, and when no one answered, their neighbors told the messenger that every Sunday night Grandma and Papa went to their daughter’s house out by the ocean. They gave him the address. The telegram was from the Red Cross.

I remember my father coming into the dining room, taking my brother’s and my dinner plates, telling us to bring our glasses of milk, and come with him. He took us to our room, put the plates on the floor and turned on the radio to the “Lone Ranger”. Dad told us to stay in the room, keep the door closed and listen to the program. He’d come back and get us.

I remember thinking, this is strange. We were never allowed to bring food to our room or listen to the radio during dinner.

Then I heard my Grandmother scream. I can hear it today in my imagination as I write this. It was so loud and so sad and it came again and again, drowning out “The Lone Ranger”.

I could hear Papa saying, “Clara, Clara”, over and over.

The telegram was from the Red Cross. It said that Abram had taken the train to Switzerland. Somewhere, along the way, just before Trieste, Nazi soldiers had boarded it and found him. When they got to Trieste they took him off and to a hotel room. There they robbed and killed him. All this had happened in 1941. He’d been dead all this time and we never knew.

Why, once he had the visa to America, didn’t he come right away? Why did he insist on making this long, dangerous journey to Switzerland first?

We may never know for sure. But I don’t think it was what he told the family: He was sick and wanted to see a doctor to help him get well before he came to America. I think he had a much bigger, more important reason, one that would make him, a man in his sixties, a Jew in a world at war, make this 2,395 mile journey first.

Next month I’ll write about what I think his reason was.

 

Abram

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After two serious pieces, I was planning on writing a lighter, more humorous blog, this month, something more tied to my first piece which came out in February.  That seems so long ago. It’s hard to believe that I once was having a problem thinking of something to write about.

Then I reread the comments people made about “More Voices From the Past”. I immediately noticed something new. I had readers. Real readers. Readers who not only read what I wrote but took the time to comment on it! I was convinced. I needed to stop worrying about lightening the mood and write about what they wanted to know: What happened to Abram?

I’ve grown up with the story of Abram. I’ve known it by heart, ever since I was a young child. Writing about him now, I wanted to see if there was something more, some detail that I didn’t know or might have forgotten. So I decided to call my Mom. She’s now 101 and living with my sister in California. She remembers everything as if it happened yesterday.

We talked for a while and went over the major points. I had a few more questions I wanted to ask when she said, “Claire, this is so sad. I don’t want to talk about it anymore. Let’s change the subject.” Imagine, I thought, this is seventy-three years later and for my Mom it was like it had happened yesterday. Poof! Seventy-three years vanishing in a few seconds and the terrible sadness and loss is still there.

Mom remembered that my Dad had finally gotten Abram the visa to come to the U.S., probably sometime in late 1941. But Abram had insisted (and I remember Grandma and Papa saying the same thing) that he had to stop off in Switzerland for his health first. He wasn’t feeling well. He’d see a doctor and after that he’d come straight to America.

Why? Why? Why did he insist on stopping off in Switzerland first and then coming to America? I remember my parents and grandparents asking this question over and over for many years. There was never an answer.

Abram never came again to America, not in 1941 or ’42 or ever. It was a fateful decision.

Next time I’ll talk about what happened to him and how we found out.

More Voices from the Past

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When I was thinking about my blog post for April, I had several ideas. But one gripped me and wouldn’t let go. It came from other letters I’d read and copied when I was in California last month. This time they were from my mother’s side of the family.

In Europe in the late 1930s and early 1940s, Hitler was annihilating the Jews as fast as he could. Grandma’s oldest brother, Abram Bonomi, was Jewish, born in Romania but an Italian citizen. He been knighted by the king of Italy and now he was stuck in Beirut without papers, and trying desperately to get to his family in the United States.

Grandma and Papa were doing everything they could think of to get him a visa to come to America. They weren’t having much luck. My parents were dating at the time and my father offered to help.

The letters are so frustrating. Apparently my father had written to his senator, Hiram Johnson from California, asking for help and saying that he and my grandparents would be financially responsible for Abram when came to the United States.

On February 5, 1941, Leslie Reed, the American Consul in Athens, Greece, writes back that “The records … show that on two occasions during … 1940 Mr. Bonomi called at the Consulate General requested a visitor’s visa to proceed to the United States for the purpose of travel and for visiting his sister Mrs. Clara Wein, 1855 Pacific Avenue, San Francisco. In the course of these interviews it was established that Mr. Bonomi had no fixed domicile in Greece and no occupation or interests which would require his return to this country or to Roumania, where he had formerly been in business, and that as a retired businessman with near relatives in the United States the inducements would be rather toward strengthing his ties in the United States and prolonging his sojourn there. Accordingly it was decided that Mr. Bonomi could not qualify under the regulations for non-immigrant visas.”

From reading the letter, I get the impression that the American Consul thinks he has all the time in the world. It doesn’t seem to faze him that there’s a world war going on, Greece is falling to the Nazis, and this man, as well as others, desperately needs to get out.

On June 10, 1941, four months later, never having been contacted by Leslie Reed, Abram writes from Beirut “My Clara dear, my dear Josephine (my mother), my dear Julius” that “the Palestine Government refused me the entrance visa, as there arrived a disposition from the Foreign Office, not to accept any Rumanian, who left after February 15th.”

He says he cabled my grandparents in San Francisco on June 2 but received no answer back. He “cannot continue to remain here, as my means are very anemic and I am not allowed to accept a position because I am a stranger. Besides, I am continually asked to leave the country, as they do not want us.”

He goes on to say that “The Mexican Counsul over here cannot understand why you did not succeed yet. If I get an engagement over there with a Company which needs me as specialist, the immigration visa is quickly granted. In case one wants to go there as a tourist for six months, he must have over there a deposit of 200 pesos for his monthly expenses (that means about 40 per month, total 240) and the visa is quickly given. If somebody goes there for six months, he easily can arrange to remain more. All other ways are difficult – he says.

Well! I’m sure you know quite well what can be done. Otherwise nothing new. I hope you are all well.

With best wishes,

Abram”

After that there are more letters to the person in charge of visas in Beirut, to the representative from California, etc., etc., etc.– all very bureaucratic and proper documenting the fact that they were doing nothing.

I keep thinking, what must it have been like for him, older, in his sixties, running out of money, not allowed to work, knowing he had family in the U.S. that wanted him and would take care of him and no one, no one would give him the paperwork he needed?

Only when they were prodded by Washington, would they do something. But only if Abram would come them. How was he to know that if he came back a third time, he might actually get the precious papers? They never looked for him, assuming he was no longer there. But he was for four more months at least, February through June and maybe even longer.

During this time, Grandma and Papa were frequently writing letters to Abram in Beirut, to the Red Cross and sending telegrams.

The saddest letter is the last one, written to Abram in care of the “Hotel Diana, Ekali (Athens), Greece, Europe”. My mother writes how much she misses him and of her coming marriage in August. My grandmother writes how they haven’t gotten any mail from him in a long time and “are very anxious to hear from you.” My grandfather’s ends with “We haven’t heard from you lately and hope to receive good news from you real soon.”

Stamped on the envelope is the message, “Return to Sender    Service Suspended.”