Jewish books stolen by Nazis during World War II returned to Prague — by way of Washington University Libraries
(17 Jun 2023) For decades, WashU librarians didn’t realize that tucked among the Brisman Collection were 30 volumes that bore a stamp revealing a longer, and more disturbing, journey. Thirty years before the books’ arrival in St. Louis, Nazis had forcefully taken the texts from a library in Prague to the ghetto-concentration camp in Terezín (Theresienstadt). After World War II, some books made an additional stop at Bamberger and Wahrmann, a Jewish bookstore in Jerusalem, before being purchased by UCLA and then WashU.
The books’ journey finally concluded last August, when WashU successfully repatriated the volumes to their rightful owner: the library of the Jewish Museum in Prague.
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