Page "Herschel Grynszpan" Paragraph 38

The Nazis, however, were on Grynszpan's trail.

Friedrich Grimm, by now an official of the German Foreign Ministry, and SS Sturmbannführer Karl Bömelburg arrived in Paris on 15 June with orders to find Grynszpan.

They followed him to Orléans, then to Bourges, where they learned that he had been sent to Toulouse, which was in the Unoccupied Zone to be run by the authorities of Vichy France.

France had surrendered on 22 June, and one of the terms of the armistice gave the Germans the right to demand that France surrender all " Germans named by the German Government " to the German occupation authorities.

Although Grynszpan was not a German citizen, Germany had been his last place of legal residence, and the Vichy authorities made no objection to Grimm's formal demand that he be handed over.

On 18 July Grynszpan was delivered to Bömelburg at the border of the Occupied Zone.

He was driven back to Paris, flown to Berlin and locked up in the Gestapo headquarters at Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse.