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Kleinliebental, May 19, 1912 A Famous Doctor - as an Ordinary Swindler On the celebration of the Conception of Mary, there arrived at the local Urjadnik F. Huber a Jew in quite dirty clothes, and asked permission for himself and a "famous doctor" from Odessa to see sick persons in Kleinliebental, in order to give them medical assistance. H. Huber sent the Jew to the village elder, A. Waldmann, but went himself to the pharmacist in order to have a competent person at the investigation of this, as it was immediately clear to him that this story was about a swindle. The "famous doctor" turned out to be an unimportant citizen from Odessa, Albert Schliomowitsch Bernstein, alias Peter Mitrosanowitch Bernstein, who, it seems, is able to do everything except in the medical profession, and who seems to be at the heart of this swindle; his assistant turned out to be a retired military general, and citizen of the village of Akkermann, Benja Meer Bromberg. These swindlers had a lot of many different drugs as well as surgical instruments with them and wanted to visit all the German colonies, where they, as Bernstein stated, from human kindness and charity wanted to give the poor people medical help for very little cost. Bromberg declared that he, as a resident of the small village Bairamtscha, near Akkerman, only became acquainted with Bernstein a few days previously by chance. Bernstein told him that he was a famous doctor and had formerly worked at Odessa University until now, but because of love for the rural population, he had given up this position and now would like to travel through the German colonies. Bromberg claimed that he noticed that the famous Doctor Bernstein was only wearing rags, but he did not dare to ask "Mr. Doctor" for the reason for this strange appearance, even less to have a look at his credentials. But, if this same person really was a doctor, however, he should have quite a proper appearance, so he bought Bernstein a whole set of clothes, including a 3 Werschok(* high-collared shirt, as well as a cap with the insignia of a technical school that the "doctor" did not deny at all. Today this "Doctor Iron-Beard" (?) arrived at Owidiopol with a pushcart, along with his assistant. [This probably means that they were sent to prison]. But Urjadnik Huber... [unreadable] … ------------------------------------------- (* [measurement of length] ---------------------------------------------

... many rubles ended up in their pockets that would otherwise have helped sick people because the medicine they had with them was fake anyway, and, therefore, could not have helped the sick people. Most, if not all, of the papers they showed were forgeries. G. Georgsohn.

 

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Source: Odessaer Zeitung, 1912;
Library of the Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen, Stuttgart, Germany
Found and arranged by Peter Mock ([email protected]) 1998
Translated by Doris Dickenson and Peter Mock - 1998

Comments and suggestions are always appreciated!
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© 1998 Peter Mock
Version 3.0