The Jewish Doctor

[Childress]

1908: August–December, Linz, Austria. The Hitler family send you the best wishes for a Happy New Year, in everlasting thankfulness. AH.

Dr Eduard Bloch was a general physician, practicing on the main street of the poor neighborhood of Austria’s third largest city, Linz. A promise was given to this Jewish doctor by a grateful patient: “I shall be grateful to you forever, A.H.,” followed by a postcard sent from Vienna.

Eduard Bloch was born in 1869 to a Jewish family in Frauenburg, a small southern Bohemian village. He studied medicine in Prague, enlisted in the army of the Habsburg Empire, and was sent to Linz. After his discharge from the army he decided to settle in Linz, where he practiced for 37 years, serving the underprivileged and earning the title of “the poor man’s doctor”. He charged patients according to their financial status; he often took nothing at all.

In this capacity, in 1901, Dr Bloch came to look after the family of Alois Schicklgruber, later changed to Hitler. He cared for Alois’s first wife and two daughters and for his second wife Klara, the mother of Adolf and his sister Klara Jr. The illnesses treated were mainly children’s diseases, with four siblings succumbing to sickness—a statistic not uncommon for that time.

He also published his memories about the encounter in which he painted a remarkably positive picture of young Hitler, saying that he was neither a ruffian nor untidy nor impolite:

This simply is not true. As a youth he was quiet, well mannered and neatly dressed. He waited patiently in the waiting room until it was his turn, then like every 14- or 15-year old boy, bowed as a sign of respect, and always thanked the doctor politely. Like many other youngsters of Linz, he wore short lederhosenand a green woolen hat with a feather. He was tall and pale and looked older than his age. His striking blue eyes which he inherited from his mother were large, melancholic and thoughtful. To a very large extent, this boy lived within himself. What dreams he dreamed I do not know.

 Adolf left school at the age of 16 and lived in Vienna. Twice he attempted to obtain acceptance in the Academy of Arts. He was rejected but was advised to study architecture, a topic more suitable for his talents. This advice was not heeded, and Adolf remained a wanderer in Vienna, surviving by painting postcards, and supported by a Jewish friend, the artist Joseph Neumann (later on called “a very decent man”).

Adolf'a bohemian lifestyle was interrupted in early 1907 when he was summoned to Linz; his beloved mother had been diagnosed with breast cancer. The young son, always neatly dressed and quite courteous, was distraught over the suffering of his mother, and even more so later on following a clearly unsuccessful surgery. After protracted suffering, Klara died in December of 1907. A few days after the funeral Adolf and his three surviving sisters came to thank Dr Bloch for the help he had given to the family. Their gratitude was expressed repeatedly over the years. Indeed, back in Vienna, Adolf sent a congratulatory New Year’s postcard two years in a row. Years would pass until their life-paths would—figuratively—cross again.

1937, Berlin

The Fuehrer received Nazi delegates from Austria. He inquired about Linz and about Dr Bloch— whether he was alive and, if so, if he was still practicing medicine. The Fuehrer stated that Dr Bloch was a noble Jew, (“Edeljude”), further stating that “if all Jews would be like Dr. Bloch, there would be no Jewish question”

1938, March, Linz

The German Army entered the Eastern province (Österreich), recently annexed to the Third Empire. The Fuehrer was in an open car traversing the main street in Linz. Whilst looking up to the old building of Dr Bloch, he made eye contact with the old physician, who was observing the parade from an upper window.

EPILOGUE

Dr Bloch and his family were given special privileges that were probably not accorded to any other Jews in the Reich. Dr Bloch wrote (in his review dated 1941 in New York that two Gestapo officers came to his flat, requesting that he return several of the postcards that Adolf had sent to him in the past. The request was for “safekeeping the cards,” and a receipt was duly issued for them. The Blochs were allowed to keep their passports and their money; they were even finally able to withdraw their funds from the bank. Eventually, Dr Bloch was allowed to emigrate to the US with his family.

In New York, Dr Bloch wrote in his review that during his entire career, he never saw a more distraught person than the young Adolf upon the death of his mother. He recalled asking himself “could this gentle boy be the Fuehrer?” He also asked: “What does a doctor think when he sees one of his patients grow into the persecutor of his race?”

Dr Bloch lived in the Bronx until 1945. Before he succumbed to gastric carcinoma, he declared “I am 100% Jewish.” He was buried in the local Jewish cemetery.

(Adapted from the Maimonides Medical Journal)

Edited June 8, 2017 by Childress

[John Kettler]

Childress,

Now, that's a story! What a tremendous and wholly new to me account you've so generously shared with us, for which I'm deeply grateful. Can well believe Hitler wanted back those postcards, since they were political dynamite of the worst kind, Interesting, too, that the Gestapo, with its oh so German mania for organization and correct procedures, would issue a receipt for said political dynamite.

Regards,

John Kettler 

Edited June 8, 2017 by John Kettler

[Childress]

3 minutes ago, John Kettler said:

Childress,

Now, that's a story! What a tremendous and wholly new to me account you've so generously shared with us, for which I'm deeply grateful'

 

De nada, John. BTW, any donation is appreciated. I accept all credit cards EXCEPT American Express.

[Childress]

One notices that, in his photo, the good doctor's face positively glows with humanity and compassion.

[Childress]

In contrast to Dr Bloch we have the example of Josef Mengele whose post-WW2 existence reveals how a man's super-ego can fail to monitor his id.

Mengele once told his only son, Rolf, “The Jews ought to erect a statue to me! I saved hundreds of thousands of them from death in return for a few blood samples.” Bear in mind that Mengele said this to his son in 1977, when Rolf paid a visit to his father’s hideout in Brazil. Almost thirty years had passed since the end of the war and Mengele still felt that he had played a benign role during the Final Solution.

According to those who knew him in Paraguay and Brazil, Mengele was actually a low-key man, unless the subject of Auschwitz was raised. Then he would fly into a rage and begin to shout about persecution and the lies that had spread about him throughout the world. Incidentally, unlike Eichmann, Mengele never hid his identity for long. He took out a West German passport under his own name in Argentina, and “Dr. Josef Mengele” was listed in the Buenos Aires telephone directory. Mengele traveled easily back and forth across the Paraguay-Brazil border and was photographed in Brazilian newspapers. He made one trip to Germany after the war, to wed his sister-in-law. In South America he confessed his real name to his hosts, first a Hungarian family and later an Austrian woman, and trusted them not inform the authorities. Not surprisingly, the West German government made little effort to bring him back home to stand trial.

Julio Cesar Pino, Ph.D from University of California, Los Angeles