La Jornada: Mystery in France surrounding a Stradivarius looted by the Nazis

Strasbourg. Did a Stradivarius stolen by the Nazis in Poland reappear at the end of March during a concert in northeastern France? The expert Pascale Bernheim, who has been searching for it for years, assures that it is, although the origin of the instrument generates debate.

This violin, made by the famous Italian Renaissance luthier Antonio Stradivari and missing for years, currently has an estimated value of more than 10 million euros (almost 204 million pesos).

The expert tells Afp that her suspicions began after reading the local newspaper’s report. The Latest News from Alsace about an evening on March 31 at the Unterlinden museum in Colmar, northeastern France, which combined a wine tasting and a violin concert.

Emmanuel Coopey played several violins, including three antique ones: “one made in 1624 by the luthier Niccolò Amati”, another “from the workshop of Antonio Guarneri dated 1735” and “one from 1719 by Antonio Stradivari”, according to the newspaper article.

“I am absolutely convinced that it is the Lauterbach,” declares the president of the Musique et spoliations (Music and plundering) association, referring to the violin stolen in 1944 in Poland and named after one of its first owners.

Nazi soldiers stole it in 1944 from the National Museum in Warsaw, but the last time it was seen was in the early 90s in France after spending years in the German Democratic Republic, in the Soviet orbit, according to an investigation by the newspaper The Parisian.

Only nine Stradivarius from 1719 exist, of which two are missing: the Lauterbach and another nicknamed Lautenschlager.

However, the latter has a peculiarity. Its lower cover is made up of two wooden boards, so it cannot be the violin used in Colmar, whose back part is made of only one, according to the newspaper’s information.

The organizer of the evening in Colmar is also the classical music concert producer Emmanuel Jaeger, who in 2017 contacted the expert to investigate the origin of a violin in the possession of Jean-Christophe Graff, a luthier from Strasbourg.

The latter thought he had a Vuillaume, of lesser value, until during a colloquium a renowned world expert, the British Charles Beare (died in 2025), told him: “this is not a Vuillaume at all, it is a Stradivarius and a Stradivarius from the most beautiful period,” explains Pascale Bernheim.

Graff was worried about having a looted violin in his possession, the expert adds.

Investigation from Austria to Argentina

The specialist then began her investigations, identified the owner of the Lauterbach before the Second World War, the Polish industrialist Henryk Grohman – who had given it to the Polish museum before his death – and even located his descendants in Austria and Argentina.

But the origin of the instrument has yet to be determined with certainty.

“To my knowledge, Beare evaluated the violin on two occasions and subsequently underwent dendrochronological analysis,” a method that makes it possible to determine the age of wooden objects in particular, explains Bernheim.

Neither Emmanuel Jaeger nor the Strasbourg luthier responded to AFP.

However, the first declared The Parisian that the expert was wrong. “It is not about the stolen violin,” he also assured last Thursday in The Latest News from Alsace.

According to the organizer of the evening, the violin donated for the concert by the owner of the instrument is another Stradivarius from 1719.

“To err is human and I may be wrong,” Bernheim replies. But if it is indeed a Stradivarius from 1719, without being the Lauterbach, “in that case, please explain to us which one it is.”