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Vienna, 28 March 1939

My dear Robert, In this letter there is a copy of the passport in a letter from the Consulate and one from the ship company. It is good that you were able to take the trouble despite the short amount of time to take an interest in this matter. How happy I would be if your efforts would be successful, you can only imagine. I am curious about your announced letter which will make things go faster and this is what I have been dealing with the last few weeks. If you were successful in finding out something in the interest of the children, we could also think about putting more energy into our own issues, for example to travel to Turkey which however wouldn’t be possible with the children. Our relatives seem to be taking all the possible steps they could. It’s probably in a different sense as much as it’s important to have the both of them down there. There’s not anything particularly important to tell from my side and on the 29th of this month the matter of our living situation and I am not doubting at all that it will go well. So I expect a detailed report from you and Paul.

At the time I have passed on your current address to Fritz so that he has the chance to accompany Mela to an old people’s home. With Paul as well as Fritz, but that’s also what was told you by telephone. I am happy because this case seemed to be hopeless to me. 

I am almost always at home since my presence in the store has no purpose, and with Eva since the hope of getting away soon is very unlikely. I take recompense in the fact that I can’t get away by being at home.

I want to mention that we filled out a questionnaire and sent it in to the American Consulate. The reason for expeditious consideration is that the children’s passport will run out at the beginning of May and that getting a new one, according to the law, is impossible since they were not in Turkey since 1928 and they won’t be able to get the passport. The answer: one stamp with the text “cannot be assured at this time” and on the form they sent in, I am hurrying because the letter with the pictures is being sent off and there is a second one which will come to the second address.

Many thanks, greetings and kisses from

Helen

4 passport photos/2 letters/Maybe you can also get in touch with the Turkish Consulate

This is the first letter we have from Helene from 1939 in Vienna. The only earlier documents we have are the eviction notice and response that we saw in the posts of February 27 and March 10.

At this point, Helene is writing her letters by hand. Later she begins to type them after realizing that typing makes it easier for the censors to review and send on. (The typewritten letters were also much easier for my translator.)

By 1939, Helene’s nephew Robert Zerzawy was a refugee living in Hampstead, London, England. He was the first in the family to get out. His brother Paul Zerzawy arrived in the U.S. on April 21, 1939. The fact that we have this letter is probably thanks to the fact that Robert was in England.

Helene explains the challenges of getting the paperwork for her children Eva and Harry to be able to leave Vienna. Since their father Vitali was Turkish, they were not considered Austrian citizens, even though they had been born in Vienna. So they could not get an Austrian passport. Since they had not lived in Turkey, whatever passport they had thanks to being children of a Turkish citizen would be void once Eva turned 18 in May. Without a passport, they could not leave Europe for the United States, even though they have ship tickets and relatives in San Francisco who would support them. As we will see in coming weeks, Eva and Harry must go to and live in Istanbul while Eva is still a minor in order to qualify for Turkish passports.