Approximately 25 years ago, sacks-full of documents were discovered lying around Fort St Elmo, the paper content of which was being used to make paper-mâché for the construction of Carnival floats. Someone who recognized the value of these dumped…

Douglas MacArthur II was a member of the Yale College Class of 1932 and a member of Wolf’s Head Society. His long Foreign Service career included tours as ambassadors to four nations. The nephew and namesake of the famous five-star…

Hermann Günter von Berg (* March 29, 1933, in Mupperg; † March 21, 2019, was a secret diplomat of the GDR from 1962 to 1972 and at the same time an agent of the GDR State Security. GDR Diplomat Secret…

Werner Stiller (* August 24, 1947, in Weßmar; † December 20, 2016, in Budapest) was a German agent and defector. From 1972 to 1979 he was a full-time employee of the Ministry of State Security (MfS) of the GDR, last…

This beautiful document was recently offered at an auction platform as a direct buy, and of course, it sold instantly as such an early GDR diplomatic passport is most rare. A sad moment for me. The good thing was, I…

Parallel to the Western powers, the Soviet Union also formed its own state from its occupation zone. It was under the domination of the SED. The military authorities call communist people’s congresses, which are supposed to give the founding of…

A Lady, her Maid, and her Male Servant – an urgent need for a new passport Lady Georgiana Grey By the mid-ninetieth century, an ever-increasing number of Britain’s wealthy nobility traveled to Europe with servants, visiting the great cultural and…

This East-German passport was issued on 23 November 1989, just a few days after the fall of the Berlin Wall on 9 November 1989. german passport Karl-Marx Stadt This passport is fascinating on multiple levels. First, it keenly portrays the…

A recent TV report inspired this article. The story was new to me, and I believe the brave actions to save looted artworks must be told to a broader audience. Rose Antonia Maria Valland (1 November 1898 – 18 September 1980)…