Theodor Herzl Writes of a Matter Unknown, He Says, Even to His Editor, Amidst the Dreyfus Affair

July 27, 1899

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Theodor Herzl Writes of a Matter Unknown, He Says, Even to His Editor, Amidst the Dreyfus Affair
Autograph Letter Signed
1 page | SMC 736

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  • Theodor Herzl

    Background

    Whether this enthusiastic letter has to do with Dreyfus’ having just been brought back from Devil’s Island to face a second trial in Paris, is not clear. But whatever is at hand, Eduard Bache, the editor and the part-owner of the New Free Press, “knows nothing of this affair,” Herzl writes, and so, urging his correspondent “not lose one day due to the current situation,” he hastily sends “the manuscript back…with warm thanks!”
    Autograph Letter Signed, in German, 1 page, quarto, on the letterhead of the New Free Press, Editorial Department, Fichtegasse No. 11,  Vienna, July 27, 1899. To Dear Sir.
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    NEW FREE PRESS.
    EDITORIAL DEPARTMENT:
    VIENNA
    Kolowratring, Fichtegasse No. 11.


    27 VII 99

    Very honored Sir,

    Even Dr. Bacher knows nothing of this affair, and so that you should not lose one day due to the current situation, I hasten to send the manuscript back to you with warm thanks.

    Faithfully and devotedly yours

    TH HERZL

    [Translated from German]

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    Historic Context
    Theodor Herzl
    Wikimedia Commons

    Theodor Herzl

    Theodor Herzl (1860 - 1904) was born in Pest (currently the Eastern part of Budapest), Hungary, in 1860 to an assimilated Jewish family. When his elder and only sister Pauline died in 1878, the family moved to Vienna to escape their grief. There, Herzl pursued a law degree before devoting himself to the writing of all forms; plays, essays, tracts, novels, and feuilletons. He also met his wife, Julie Naschauer, whom he married in 1889. The marriage produced three children, though it was an unhappy one. Herzl was often away from his family and was, for the most part, a distant father. He was the Paris correspondent for Central Europe’s most prestigious newspaper, Die Neue Freie Presse, from 1891-1895, where he reported on the Dreyfus trial. That year, he returned to Vienna to accept his promotion to literary editor of the newspaper (a position which he maintained until his death in 1904). Though Theodor Herzl’s Zionism was predated by other Zionist thinkers and movements, he is acknowledged in the Israeli Declaration of Independence as the spiritual father of the State of Israel. Herzl catapulted Zionism onto the world stage as a serious nationalist movement by uniting various Jewish Zionist movements under the umbrella of the Zionist Organization. Furthermore, his reputation as one of Europe’s most distinguished journalists granted him access to many heads of state to plead his cause. Herzl presaged his early death, which happened in July of 1904 of cardiac sclerosis when he was only forty-four years old. He was first buried in Vienna, and later, as his will stipulated, his remains, and those of his family, were reinterred in Israel in 1949 (one year after the State of Israel was declared) on Mount Herzl, which subsequently became the country’s national cemetery, and the resting place of many of its prime ministers.


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