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Sworn Deposition of Karl Germer 9 December 1955
STATE OF NEW JERSEY,
COUNTY OF WARREN.
KARL J. GERMER, of full age, being duly sworn according to law, upon his oath deposes and says:
1. I am one of the grantees in a deed from Jacob Rich, et al., dated December 19, 1948, and recorded in the Hunterdon Country Clerk's Office in Book 476 of Deeds, page 48, the other grantee in said deed being my wife, Sascha E. Andre Germer [Sascha Germer], and in said deed the grantees are referred to as husband and wife.
2. Deponent married one Maria Ertl, in Germany, in April of 1921, the said Maria Ertl Germer traveling with deponent in his business, and when we resided at New York she continued to have many affairs with other men, and on the return from a trip to Chicago, by deponent, in the year 1926, deponent ascertained that the said Maria Ertl Germer was having affairs with other men, and confronted her with this information, so that she then left deponent, and was not heard from for many years. During the year 1929 deponent secured a Mexican divorce from Maria Ertl Germer, by proxy. The defendant, Maria Ertl Germer, did not, apparently enter an appearance, since, after inquiry she could not be found. During the year 1935 deponent was arrested and placed in a concentration camp, in Germany, during the Hitler regime, and at said time was confronted by the Gestapo, who had a written statement in the handwriting of Maria Ertl Germer, which stated that she had obtained a divorce in Germany from your deponent, and had married a lawyer, and that she was living in Gera, which is in the Eastern Zone of Germany. The statement signed by Maria Ertl Germer, in addition to the statement of her divorce and remarriage, contained many damaging remarks about the private lives of deponent and said Maria Ertl Germer, including their friends, and particularly their life at Tunis, all of which was apparently done to effect deponent's confinement in a concentration camp. When deponent was confronted by the Gestapo with the illicit information contained in the letter deponent could not believe how they found such information, and stated that their information, that is oral information, was all a fake, and it was then that the Gestapo brought to deponent the statement signed by his wife, Maria Ertl Germer, which was written in her own handwriting, and which he clearly recognized. After 1935, deponent had a discussion with some friends, whose name or names he cannot recall, who knew Maria Ertl Germer, and was advised by them that she had children by her marriage with this wealthy lawyer.
3. During the year 1929 deponent married one Cora Eaton [Cora Germer], who died in July of 1942, who is interred in a cemetery at Ellenville, New York.
4. Deponent then married Sasha E. Andre Germer during the month of September, 1942, and has been living with her ever since.
Deponent makes this affidavit to clarify his marital status for an affidavit to be had in a closing with Jack J. Burke and Jean B. Burke, on the sale of premises to them.
Subscribed and sworn to before me this Ninth day of December, 1955.
Karl J. Germer
Frances E. Lattanzi Notary Public of New Jersey.
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