Schirmer's inheritance

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Schirmer's inheritance (English original title: The Schirmer Inheritance ) is the title of a novel by the British writer Eric Ambler from 1953. As the second work after the Second World War , it belongs to Ambler's second creative period. It is the story of an inheritance in the USA for which a young lawyer is to look for an inheritor on behalf of his law firm and, with his research, delves deeper and deeper into the political events of Europe from 1807 with the battle of Prussian Eylau to the late 1940s in Greek Civil war immerses.

Historical background

As usual with Ambler at that time, the events are spread over several historical levels. The prologue of the book takes place at the time of the Napoleonic Wars in Prussia and tells the story of a sergeant in the Prussian service who deserted after the battle of Preussisch Eylau in a hopeless situation in order to survive. The second storyline tells of the research of an old, respected American lawyer in Nazi Germany in 1939, who was exposed to massive pressure from the German government, which is claiming the millions of inheritance, but who has come very far with his research. But after the start of the Second World War he had to give up his search. The third level of the plot tells about a young aspiring lawyer from the USA who should continue to find someone who is entitled to an inheritance of millions for his company, a well-known law firm specializing in inheritance cases, because the state of Pennsylvania claims the inheritance due to a new law if no authorized person is found. So he continues the work of his predecessor in post-war Europe. The search finally leads him to northern Greece , where remnants of the communist DSE are still waging their hopeless civil war (1946–1949) as partisans against the right-wing conservative government in Athens . When in 1949, due to Josip Broz Tito's departure from the Soviet Union, there were no more possibilities for the DSE to retreat and reorganize in Yugoslavia and Albania and the dissolution began, he finally found the DSE among its last fighters and scattered mercenaries who came from different countries rightful heirs.

Structure and content

The novel consists of a prologue and twelve chapters. The prologue is about Sergeant Franz Schirmer, a dragoon from the Principality of Ansbach , who is now in Prussian service with his men. He is a mercenary through and through and works for various rulers, as was common for soldiers at that time. But when the battle at Prussian Eylau ended in a draw, he found himself in a hopeless situation. Plagued by pain and cold, as well as weakened by a severe wound, he can barely hold on to his horse. He realizes that he will not survive an orderly retreat and decides to desert. In the landscape completely looted, devastated and depopulated by the troops passing through, he meets the last still inhabited farmhouse in the abandoned village of Kutschitten and faces a young, half-starved woman, Maria Dutka, who is determined to kill him. But he promises food for her and her exhausted father if she helps him. He drops out of the saddle and with the last of his strength kills the horse with a shot from his carbine .

When external conditions normalized again after the Peace of Tilsit and the woman's father died, the two of them left this area and moved to Mühlhausen in Thuringia in November 1807 , where they married and their two sons were born. When Mühlhausen became Prussian again in 1815, Schirmer felt compelled to change his name to Schneider in order not to be discovered by chance as a deserter of the Prussian army. After the death of his wife Maria, he remarried and lived undisturbed as a respected citizen until 1850. Such a name change was not possible for his firstborn son Karl, because he had been registered by the Prussian military authorities shortly before.

In 1938, the widow Amelia Schneider-Johnson, who lived in inconspicuous circumstances, died in the USA, leaving behind a fortune in the millions, for which there was apparently no heir, because Amelia did not write a will. The case makes headlines in the press and leads to thousands of unjustified claims. Amelia is the daughter of Hans Schneider, who immigrated from Germany in 1849, the younger son of old Sergeant Schirmer. His older son Karl stayed in Germany. One of his descendants, Franz Schirmer, was a sergeant in the German Wehrmacht in Greece during World War II , who was wounded after a partisan attack when the demoralized German occupation forces withdrew in October 1944 and saw no way of returning to Germany. He joins the communist DSE and is eventually identified as the legal heir under adventurous and dangerous circumstances by American lawyer George Carey and his translator Maria Kolin, a cool aloof woman.

Ambler tells the story in many ramifications that stretch right across post-war Europe, and by means of flashbacks and interviews with witnesses he puts the events into the respective historical context. At the end of the story with its numerous tragic, violent and also comical scenes of war, the story repeats itself in a new version. The Ansbach Dragoons of 1807 met a courageous woman after a well-considered, rational decision and was able to start a new life. The German Wehrmacht soldier of 1944 also met such a woman with the translator Maria Kolin hired by George Carey and began a new life with her under a new name and renouncing the inheritance.

reception

In 1957, a six-part television series called The Schirmer Inheritance came out, each with 30-minute episodes, in which Philip Dale directed and Kenneth Hyde wrote the script. The black and white film adaptation was produced by ABC Television for British television; the broadcast began on August 3, 1957. Cast in all six parts were William Sylvester (George Carey), Vera Fusek (Maria Kolin) and Jefferson Clifford (Robert L. Moreton).

In the same year, RIAS Berlin, together with Süddeutscher Rundfunk, produced a radio play directed by Cläre Schimmel . Contributors included Heinz Drache as lawyer George Carey and Horst Niendorf as Franz Schirmer.

expenditure

  • Eric Ambler: The Schirmer inheritance . William Heinemann, Melbourne 1953, OCLC 154470168 .
  • Eric Ambler, Harry Reuss-Löwenstein, Theodor Knust: Schirmer's inheritance (= Fischer library. 78). Fischer, Frankfurt / M. / Hamburg 1955, OCLC 73224415 .
  • Eric Ambler, Harry Reuss-Löwenstein, Theodor A. Knust, Rudolf Barmettler: Schirmer's inheritance (=  Diogenes Taschenbuch . No. 75/4 ). Diogenes , Zurich 1975, ISBN 3-257-20180-X .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Schirmer Inheritance by Eric Ambler (1953). In: Books & Boots. wordpress.com, accessed on May 20, 2015 (with detailed table of contents).
  2. ^ Schirmer inheritance, The (1957) by Philip Dale. In: Cinefania. Retrieved May 20, 2015 .
  3. ↑ Eric Ambler - The Schirmer Inheritance, 1953. In: authorscalendar.info. Retrieved May 20, 2015 .
  4. ↑ Olaf von der Heydt: Schirmer's inheritance. hoerspieleipps.net, accessed on June 15, 2018 .