The most mysterious murder case in Europe after the Second World War

The way of the Isdal woman via Waldfischbach-Burgalben to Bitche/Lorraine

The long prehistory, which we have discussed in detail, can be found here. 

The fate and above all the path of the Isdal woman, who was found in November 1970 in the Norwegian Ice Valley under the most mysterious circumstances, still lie in the dark. 

But the eternal mystery seems to be clearing up.

In this article we want to shed a little more light on the contents of the beautiful stranger's suitcases, it utters bulks about the woman's itinerary and activity. 

There was a backstory that accompanied the Isdal woman, who was born in Nuremberg, through the circumstances of the time, World War 2.

The evacuation of the young civilian population at the end of the war, practised by the Nazis as the so-called Kinderlandverschickung, led the Isdal woman to the German-French border region around the then shoe town of Pirmasens. To Waldfischbach-Burgalben, a small town in the Palatinate. At that time a rather sleepy place. Children and young people from Nuremberg came there in swarms. 

She, too, who was probably born around 1930, fell into the Kinderlandverschickung of the last days of the declining German Reich. The Kinderlandverschickung was an instrument of the National Socialists to evacuate children and young people, whom the Nazis could not abuse for the "armed resistance", from the cities bombed by the Allies. This was not done out of philanthropy but because the Nazis could get the single mothers into the armaments' industry. The children were raised to be Nazis, living in camps and subjected to a repulsive military drill that determined their entire daily lives. 

Von Bundesarchiv, Bild 146-1983-056-13 / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, Link

This is the backstory, which also emerged from the isotope analysis carried out at the university in Canberra. 

However, the Kinderlandverschickung is completely incidental to the later events, but these historical connections help to reveal the identity of the beautiful stranger. After the Allied advance on the German south-western border in 1944, the children who had been sent could hardly be returned to their parents due to the lack of a functioning infrastructure. Therefore, the children were first "outsourced" in the direction of Bitche and then handed over to families in the surrounding area as the front drew ever closer. The Norwegian journalist Marit Higraff was already that far when she tried to "dig"2018 in the KLV documents. Many of the documents were lost without a trace at the end of the war or lie in tunnels in the Palatinate and Lorraine that have not yet been opened or are simply unknown.

The trail of suitcases

The objects she had with her in the suitcases are also helpful. A list of these was published by the Kripos in Bergen during the investigation. From the suitcases it is obvious that she led a regular life while travelling. It is strange, however, that the money was in envelopes, as if it had been given to her by someone else.

To understand that no one was really interested in the identity and real mission of the Isdal woman in Norway, one only has to read the articles of the day. In the Bergen Tidendes, the managing editor wrote a very different story from the one that was later told to the world. Parts of the Isdal woman's luggage were missing. Everything had been carefully searched before the police seized the suitcases at the railway station. Hotel employees remembered a peculiar quirk of the unknown woman, namely that she always squeezed two lemon halves. She was seen as an artist by numerous witnesses at the time. This was only one of the countless oddities of the woman with the pretty face. 

The items from the Isdal woman's suitcases

It is quite obvious that before the police found the suitcases of the so-called Isdal woman, someone had searched them and made numerous manipulations. Like cutting off labels etc. That this was done by a third party, and not by the Israel woman herself, becomes clear when one looks at the contents of the suitcases as found by the police in Bergen in the locker. Hans Thue, one of the investigators in the case wrote on 12/6/1970 in the protocol marked 4968 A. 1970 (file sheet XI-13) (Likfunn i Isdalen 29.11.70) about how the Isdal woman had handled her suitcases and the contents.

At the same time, a rumour arose that she had been Belgian or French. However, in early December 1970, when the homicide investigation was still in full swing and only a preliminary autopsy result was available, a witness who was never mentioned again came forward claiming that the Isdal woman lived with someone in Bergen and had travelled together with a man on the Hurtigruten ship.

The chief investigator at the time, Oskar Hordnes, quickly settled on the spy theory. There was no proof of this, as the traces and also the observations that witnesses instead of the police communicated to the newspaper were hardly evaluated. In the end, these only served to increase the daily circulation, which is quite understandable from the point of view of the newspaper makers of the time.  They managed to do this for weeks with ever new information that could not be found in the file. (Part2)

By <a href="//commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Bjoertvedt" title="User:Bjoertvedt">Bjoertvedt</a> - <span class="int-own-work" lang="en">Own work</span>, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link

The former Hotel Viking in Oslo, where the unknown woman was also staying. 

All this time, there was speculation about whether the Isdal woman was a spy. At that time, pictures were important, but neither a camera, nor a film apparatus, nor films were found in the unknown woman's belongings. Now there is no way of knowing whether there might have been microfilms in the countless tubes or in the pottery clay that she had given to someone. Of course, she may have given the microfilms to the two unknowns in small containers, but that is where the speculation begins. 

It was not entirely clear why the Isdal woman was carrying a scalpel from the Tuttlingen company Aesculap in her luggage, along with 5 blades. She had probably acquired these items in Germany. On her way to Norway. The price tags had been removed, as had other labels from items in the Isdal woman's possession. It was very unusual, even in those days, to travel across Europe with a scalpel. But there was a reason for this scalpel: the Isdal woman needed the items for works of art, namely to cut pictures out of frames, etc.

Her Nicol Shoes, Nicolbaby, Roma - Via Barberini 30, raise even more questions and suggest that the Isdal woman had been in Rome. What can only be conjectured. But the shoes were sold exclusively through the shop there at the time. A shop very close to countless galleries, such as the Palazzo Barberini, which, no one is surprised by the connection, dealt with old pottery. Several times she had also given under her alias the profession of waiver, known from the porcelain industry.

It was chic to shop in Beate Uhse's mail-order business. Every customer received a promotional gift and that was the matchbox. The famous matchbox. 

Germany in the 1970s, and one should not forget that at the beginning of 1971 there were still countless ruins in Germany from the Second World War, which had already been over for 26 years. It was the time of German separation. A wall criss-crossed the country with barbed wire and mines to prevent escape from the East. The Isdal woman was a creature of her time and would not be at all possible in today's society.

The real existing socialism of the German Democratic Republic had already failed at that time. Only East Berlin was not in a position to dismiss communism as an experiment instead of heaven on earth and to ask the Federal Republic of Germany, which was anchored in the market economy, for help, which the GDR would certainly have received from the Federal Republic of Germany. It was the thaw between the two German states and Willy Brandt had travelled to Erfurt in March 1970. 

(Continue in part 2 and 3)  

30 years later from a different perspective

Everyone remembers the momentous day of German reunification, October 3, 1990. The sea of flags in front of the Reichstag, at the Brandenburg Gate. No one will not remember the words of the then Unification Chancellor, Dr Kohl.

A year earlier, the resistance against the concrete-headed Communists in the Politburo in the former GDR had reached its peak. The people were braver than the thugs of the all-powerful Stasi and simply ran away from the state. That was a good thing. And the courage, the determination of the GDR citizens must never be forgotten, who brought the East Berlin regime to collapse. The scenes were very similar to the refugee crisis of our days; many people forget that they too were refugees. They were led by the help of those who helped the thousands.  

Was the reunification of Germany the best thing that could happen to the country? Certainly not, if you look back. Germany should have stayed with two German states. In a confederation of some kind, in which the respective states could have slowly got used to each other. But the DM was roaring and the consumption of capitalism. Attentive observers noticed that the longest queues were not caused by the banana boxes but by the so-called "welcome money". At that time, it was 100 DM per person.

In the days of the silent revolution, nobody saw the consequences of reunification in a trite way, which Kohl literally whipped through in the slipstream of the shattering Eastern Bloc. The chancellor was right: it was a unique moment in history that made the German reunification possible, that made the 2nd Berlin Republic possible. 

Someone in the GDR had supported the SED regime, which had come to an end. This circumstance was utterly forgotten in the exuberance of the times after the end of 1989. A revolution was underway. Kohl's ambition was to create the unity of a country that was no longer a "Unity of the Fatherland" and could not become one.  The henchmen around Honecker and his cruel apparatchiks, who could hardly be surpassed in dictatorial violence and who washed their hands in blood, did not entirely disappear overnight. The system of the FRG was simply imposed on the East.  Whether the citizens of the GDR wanted it or not. Nobody was asked or even thought about a pure referendum. There were critical voices even then. 

But Kohl made a mistake; he forgot that the communists in the East shaped the generation that once experienced the end of the war. Indeed, thirty years later one can say that one German confederation, two German states, of course without the wall and the order to shoot, without the machinations of the Stasi, would have been the model for success. States that could have come closer slowly, without the social explosives that the SED dictatorship had left behind. 

Kohl forgot the imprint left by the system. Now, 30 years later, the generation must bear the consequences of reunification. Those who did not like the democratic system of the Federal Republic, but who were quasi liberated with unification, want and are pushing for the abolition of democracy in Germany. In the present Federal Republic, a dangerous anti-democratic mood has formed in the ideological blocks of the SED successors and the nationalists. The European house conjured up by unification has cracks in it anyway, which are difficult to repair. Putin, who is doing everything he can to disintegrate Europe, the already repulsive Polish nationalism and the guarantors of freedom at the time, the Hungarians are sinking into another dictatorship. Indeed, another dictatorship is not the panacea for the problems of today. 

No, the October 3 may be a date in history that certainly brought about a turnaround, but whether for the better? That remains to be seen and left to other generations to judge. At the moment, it does not give the impression. 

To those who want to celebrate the memory of reunification, an excellent October 3!

Traces in the fog of one of the most mysterious murders in post-war history

The case of the Isdal woman becomes more exciting than it initially appeared, even after the newer investigations by the public prosecutor's office in Bergen in 2016. 

If you look at the case of the Isdal woman from the point of distance, it becomes clear that many documents from the police investigation from those days did not find their way to the Public Record Office in Bergen. These documents seem to have been withheld until today.

The reason is elementary; the purchasers of certain items would inevitably have to return them to their rightful owners. Other documents that were found in the suitcases of the unknown deceased, however, have already been published like the unfortunate matchbox from the Beate Uhse sex shop. 

Why documents disappeared is or was the case can certainly no longer be determined today. 

The Norwegian military intelligence service certainly did not cover itself with glory these days. 

The probability that the Isdal woman also had a stay in Hamburg is very high. The German goods could have come from the Kepa / Karstadt in Hamburg, which was within a stone's throw of the station at that time. In the assortment, the items were found at Isdal woman's luggage. Numerous prehistories and journalistic research can be found here. 

PHOTO: POLITIET / STATSARKIVET I BERGEN

It is 50 years ago in fall that prosecutor Carl Halvor Aas took over the investigation on that misty November day in 1970.

An alleged suicide with 60 Fenemal pills in her stomach and carbon monoxide poisoning was ruled out. These tablets were not available in Norway. Even the investigators did not believe in suicide. 

Even after the fisherman's statement, one could have doubts about the completeness of the files. This statement is now in a different context. No espionage tools such as mini cameras etc. were found in the records of the unknown dead. Nevertheless, after meeting the two southern looking gentlemen on a forest path shortly before her death, which was observed by a witness, she was seen as a spy. The code she used in her diaries was simple and somewhat naive. Shoes and deodorant from Germany immediately pointed to a female spy. Besides, all signs had been removed from her clothes. 

The penguin missiles will not have played a role in this context. Even the later interrogated employee of the Israeli Mossad "Lillehammer Affair" did not know the name. Instead, the visit to the Hotel Bristol in Trondheim is more interesting - as Vera Jarle from Antwerp from November 6 to 8. Before that, she had stayed at the Hotel Neptun in Bergen from 30.10.1970 - 06.11.1970 under the name of Alexia Zarna-Merchez, born on 27.11.1943 in Ljubljana. 

According to the oxygen and strontium isotope analysis of the University of Canberra, the trail also led to the then internal border area between Serbia and Croatia. On an imaginary line between Užice and Sarajevo.   

PHOTO: KART FRA PROF. JURIAN HOOGEWERFF/NATIONAL CENTRE FORENSIC STUDIES/UNIVERSITY OF CANBERRA 

The Isdal woman stated not only once that she was an antique dealer. This seems to be valid 50 years after the body was found in Isdal. The statement of the Italian photographer and the hotel report is available for this purpose. Apparently, she travelled again and again under false legends, but on several occasions, she also stated her profession as a decorator. She knew a lot about porcelain, the Italian photographer Giovanni Trimboli stated. Trimboli was a dubious figure who was said to have connections with the Mafia and smuggling, only long after his death it became public. Photographing him would only have been camouflage.

It was about art smuggling from the former Eastern Bloc

Border crossing point Helmstedt FRG/GDR 1969, kasaan media, 2020

East Berlin had since Aktion Licht (Action Light) in 1962, in which all the safe-deposit boxes in banks that had not been used since the war were opened by employees of the Ministry of State Security who had not reported in after the war.

The currency gorge of the GDR needed money. This "Aktion Licht" brought in more than 4 million DM at that time. Among them were countless works of art that were smuggled all over the world.

Incredibly valuable pieces (paintings, jewellery, antiques, etc.) were thus handed over to their owners in the respective countries by couriers. Only in February 1973, the KuA GmbH (Kunst und Antiquitäten GmbH) was founded in East Berlin. This company continued to operate as a "seller" via the former Yugoslavia until well into the 1980s. Years ago, a trace had already been revealed to an artist who lived at that time in Norway and in the south of France. 

To a certain Kjell Varvin, to whom the trail of the Isdal woman now led, also in other contexts.

Riksarkivet (National Archives of Norway) from Oslo, Norway - Vidkun Quisling og hans kone Maria.

Probably the henchmen had found clues to the legendary art treasure of Vidkun Quisling during "Operation Light" years earlier. Quisling, whose name today still stands for the greatest shame of Norway, was the governor of the Nazis in Norway and had built up a considerable art collection together with his Russian wife since the end of the 1930s, some of which disappeared in Eastern Germany after the war.