The last few posts have focused on Henry and Bea’s experiences, both together and separately, as MCC relief workers in Europe during the days of and immediately following World War II. We began (here) with a Mennonite Historical Bulletin article about the Mennonite Central Committee’s work in Europe (Shenk 1984), supplemented by accounts from three persons who were interned alongside Henry and Bea in Baden-Baden, Germany (“Guests of the Gestapo” 2013). Following that, we let Bea tell her own story (here) and mined her account for every detail that might shed light on her experience. Finally, two additional posts (here and here) explored photographs and videos that showed Henry and especially Bea performing their MCC service.
It was particularly clear in the last post that Bea and Henry worked alongside some rather remarkable colleagues who also faced obstacles, challenges, threats, and dangers during this time. Peter and Elfrieda Dyck, for example, led thousands of Russian-born Mennonites to new lives in South and North America. Several other MCC workers are also worthy of notice both in their own right and for what light they can shed on Henry and Bea’s experiences.
We encountered one such colleague in the first post linked above: Joseph N. Byler, who worked with Henry, Bea, and other relief workers in Lyon, France. We learn from yet another Mennonite Historical Bulletin article that Byler was director of the MCC’s French operations from November 1941 through November 1942 (Homan 2010; my brother Dan corresponded with Homan about Henry and Bea before Homan passed away).
Although the entire article is well worth reading, one page is of particular interest to our family, since there Homan offers additional details about Henry and Bea. He writes, for example, that, after Byler left in November 1942, “Henry Buller of Mountain Lake, Minn., assumed director responsibilities” (Homan 2010, 7). This is the first I have heard that Henry functioned as the director of MCC’s French operations, but that is not the most surprising tidbit. Was Henry, in fact, living in Mountain Lake prior to his MCC service? I do know that some of Peter D Buller’s children (thus uncles and aunts to Henry) lived in that Mennonite community, but I did not know (if Homan’s information is correct) that Henry did. Homan goes on to report:
Buller quickly learned the French language and came to appreciate the French and their culture. He was asked in 1942 to head the AFSC office in Montauban, one of its most important posts, where they could use his talents to the “fullest extent.” Although tempted, Buller declined the offer. (Homan 2010, 7; in n. 13 Homan states that most of his information about Henry came from Bea)
Homan then turns to Bea, whom he identifies as “an unofficial MCC worker [who] joined the office in late 1941”:
Beatrice R. Rosenthal, a 21-year-old German Jewish refugee, was hired as secretary and interpreter. Her father, Richard, had been a respectable lawyer in Duisburg, Germany. The family, consisting of her parents, a grandmother and brothers Gerd and Kurt, fled Nazi Germany in the 1930s and first settled in Antwerp, Belgium. Kurt left for the United States in 1936, and the rest of the family planned to follow. When Belgium was overrun by Germany in May 1940, the Rosenthals moved to Lyon in Vichy France, where Beatrice learned about Quaker and MCC relief. The MCC office hired her in December 1941 because of her language skills. But she brought more to the office, at least as far as Buller was concerned, as the two of them proceeded to start a romantic relationship. On November 11, 1942, the day on which Germany occupied Vichy France, Henry Buller and Beatrice Rosenthal were married at the Lyon City Hall, which was already occupied by German soldiers. [Samuel] Ybargoyen and MCC worker Lois Gunden were witnesses. (Homan 2010, 7)
Additional details we learn here are that Bea’s grandmother accompanied the family on their flight from Nazi Germany, that the family went to Antwerp (earlier we knew only that they had gone to Belgium), and that Henry and Bea were married in the Lyon City Hall in the presence of two named witnesses. What is most interesting about this page of the Homan article, however, is its copy of two leaves from Joseph Byler’s diary.
The handwriting is clear enough that we can make out just about everything written. The diary is for 1–4 September 1942, a Tuesday through a Friday. All the entries bear the label “Lyon,” which is where Byler served as director at that time.
His entry for Tuesday gives a good sense of the diary:
This was certainly a busy day. Beata and I were busy all day trying to help people. Many of the Jews are in ????? and therefore in need. We purchased a pair of sandals for a six year-old child. There are 120 Jewish children whose parents were sent to Germany. We are trying to help find homes for some of them.
In the evening Miss Barlet called about an ill child whose un-married mother needs help. I agreed to help her, Miss Barlet, to have the child transferred to another place if arrangements can be made.
During the last night I heard for the first time the anti-aircraft guns in action. They really poured it on for a while. Miss Barlet said she thought it was the celebrations of the Fourth of July.
This is not Byler’s only mention of Beata. In fact, they must have worked closely together, for she makes an appearance every day.
When Bea was twelve years old, she and her family had fled Nazi Germany to save their lives; now Bea worked alongside MCC colleagues such as Joseph Byler to preserve the lives of other Jewish children whose parents were not so fortunate. (For additional information on the Byler papers, including his full diary, see here.)
Wednesday: I met Beata at the ??? where I applied for my French visa de sortie [exit visa] for three months. … After we reached the office Beata hurried to several committees about these Jewish children whose parents were sent to Germany.
In the after-noon we again had many callers, but managed to get a number of letters written in addition.
Thursday: I was up at 7:00 a.m. (too late to have breakfast) and met Beata at Rue Republic where we tried to awake Braun but failed. … At about 8:30 we left in the city truck for Grenoble where we looked at a very large chateau for a colony. We had an excellent dinner there and inspected the place. It is very large with splendid equipment. The garden is very much dried up. There is a little fruit. At 4:30 we had a lunch of milk, bread, peaches and chocolate after which we left for Lyon, arriving at about 7:45—very tired. Beata and I had dinner at the cave.
Friday: We had quite a few callers at the office. Two mothers (Jewish) came and begged us to try and take their children to Switzerland. One mother cried—it was very sad—but we are unable to do it. In the p.m. Beata purchased quite a lot of clothing for the colony.
Of course, Bea and Henry were themselves taken into custody; the Homan article recounts their ordeal:
In January 1943, the Germans instructed all Americans to go to the ski resort Mont Dore in south-central France. From there they went to Baden-Baden, a German health resort, where they arrived on February 16. The group of 165 included MCC workers Lois Gunden and Henry and Bea Buller and five Quakers, plus diplomats, journalists, spouses and children. They were housed in the large and comfortable Brenner Park Hotel where they were served by the hotel staff but guarded by the Gestapo.
Negotiations between Germany and the United States for an exchange of interned nationals began early in 1943 and lasted until February 1944. In the meantime, the internees had to entertain and amuse themselves and each other. … The internees were well fed and, under guard, allowed to go outside for walks in the Black Forest and engage in sports. They organized parties, held worship services and established what they called Badheim University, which offered a great number of courses and lectures. Its organizers billed the ersatz school as “education of the ignorant, by the ignorant, and for the ignorant.”
At first Buller felt that internment was a “great university of practicing patience and tolerance.” But boredom eventually set in. … After lengthy negotiations, Germany and the U.S. State Department were able to reach an agreement, exchanging 687 German nationals for 271 Americans held in Baden-Baden and Godesberg. The Baden-Baden internees left on February 19, 1944, and arrived in New York on March 15. After France’s liberation, MCC, including the Bullers, returned to France to provide relief and care for children in five homes. One of those homes…, in Château de Vair in Anetz sur Loire, was run by Bea’s parents, Richard and Marie Rosenthal. (Homan 2010, 7)
Homan’s account offers fascinating details. We learn, for example, that the MCC workers were first taken to Mont Dore, some 95 miles west of Lyon. After that, they were interned in the Brenner Park Hotel (pictured at the right) in Baden-Baden, Germany. They arrived at the hotel on 16 February 1943 and left one year and three days later, on 19 February 1944 (perhaps Bea’s memory of one year and six days included the Mont Dore time?).
The most fascinating new information we find is that Bea’s parents managed one of the MCC’s homes for children. This information comes, Homan reports (2010, 14 n. 43), from Gerard Rosenthal, Bea’s younger brother who apparently still lives in the Denver area. Their home was in the Château de Vair in Anetz sur Loire, an impressive seventeenth-century castle complete with a moat (see below).
The Homan Mennonite Historical Bulletin article that formed the basis for this post discussed a number of MCC workers in Europe, including Joseph Byler and Bea and Henry Buller. Homan also devotes time to Lois Gunden, who was interned alongside Henry and Bea in the Baden-Baden hotel. Gunden’s story is particularly fascinating and will be told in the following post.
Works Cited
“Guests of the Gestapo.” 2013. 9 July post on the website of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training. Available online here.
Homan, Gerlof. 2010. “Friends and Enemies: The World War II Origins of MCC Work in France.” Mennonite Historical Review 71.2:7–14. Available online here.
Shenk, Rachel. 1984. “Mennonite Central Committee in Europe, 1940–70.” Mennonite Historical Bulletin 45.2:1–9. Available online here.
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