Book Review: History of von Schatt (1913-1960)

Reviewed by Erin Britton

The remarkable life story of a deeply troubled and troubling man

Richard Daub’s History of von Schatt (1913-1960) is an often farcical, sometimes disturbing, and always gripping historical adventure that chronicles the life of Heinrich von Schatt, a troubled man whose life spans almost five tumultuous decades and sees him cross both oceans and continents. The truly interesting times in which he lives, including two world wars and momentous social changes, first in Europe and later in the United States, form the compelling background to von Schatt’s epic tale of survival, a tale that is certainly not short on either extraordinary accomplishments or dark deeds.

For someone destined to have a significant impact on 20th century history at both the micro and macro scales, Heinrich von Schatt’s life gets off to a surprisingly inauspicious start. The nameless fifteen-year-old girl fated to be his mother is desperately seeking escape from an arranged marriage when the pseudonymous “Christian Schmidt” arrives in her life on a December afternoon in 1913. Unlike the other men who stayed at her family’s inn, he is “young, tall, and handsome, clad in a black silk suit, the kind that Father would describe as ‘Satan’s garb.’”

A bit of basic guile convinces Christian that the girl needs rescuing from the kind of monsters his father had warned him about when he set off to make his fortune as a clockmaker. A moonlight flit closely followed by a shotgun wedding finds the pair living in Eisenbach with a baby due. Sadly, while Christian has heeded his father’s advice and disguised his Jewish heritage, he otherwise pays scant attention to current affairs in Germany. “While everyone else in the Black Forest, including the cows, pigs, dogs, and sheep, heard the gongs of war to the east, all the aspiring horologist heard was ticking.”  

As a consequence, Christian is surprised when the only employment option left for him is the Bavarian Army recruiting office. Even worse, his training officer is just despairing of being tasked with turning “the daydreaming clockmaker and the creepy Austro-Hungarian watercolorist [and] this ragtag regiment of misfits into a tight unit of killing machines” when the aforementioned creepy watercolorist—one Lance Corporal Adolf Hitler—shoots and kills Christian during a fracas on the parade ground.

Upon hearing the news of his demise, Christian’s teenage bride promptly abandons her newborn baby boy on the steps on the Bremerhaven Orphanage and then stows away on a ship bound for New York, tragically dying before the ship docks. And thus the orphaned Heinrich von Schatt comes to be raised by the Ancillary Sisters—“widely regarded as some of the cruelest nuns in a land known for tough mothers”—although by the age of five he is already feared by nuns and fellow orphans alike.

From this point onwards, Heinrich’s life is dominated by his love for the sea and seafaring, which leads to him signing on as First Officer of the Iron Maiden at the age of just thirteen, a step that launches him on a nautical career that exposes his impressive strengths and catastrophic failings. In describing Heinrich’s highly varied life on the ocean wave, including various hijinks-filled trips ashore, Daub vividly portrays his transformation from a cocksure and determined youngster to a steely and formidable captain who inspires fear in both friend and foe.

As expected from his deeply unusual start in life, rather alarming childhood, and remarkably purposeful young adulthood, Heinrich’s life is full of surprising twists and turns, which lend History of von Schatt (1913-1960) a cracking pace and a real sense of excitement. More surprising is the fact that for all his single-mindedness and thoughtless cruelty, some of those twists and turns involve Heinrich seeking to do a stranger a good turn. For instance, on Christmas Eve in 1936, while the Iron Maiden is docked in his old home of Bremerhaven, Heinrich intervenes when he spots a Nazi soldier harassing an elderly Jewish man:

“Heinrich punched the soldier in the jaw, stunning him. Then, from behind, he put him in a headlock, lifting him off his feet and squeezing increasingly tighter. Knowing he would kill the man if he didn’t stop, he kept squeezing anyway, until his windpipe crunched like a crab shell in the crook of his arm.”

This selfless if rather foolhardy act sends Heinrich’s life in an important new direction, leading to him gaining a Swedish fiancée, fleeing to the United States, and ultimately, joining the US Navy. Still, while there are moments of heroism, Daub keeps Heinrich very clearly positioned as an antihero, ensuring that his adventures are engaging but he, as a person, remains distinctly off-putting, with his unwavering determination and somewhat robotic interactions meaning that he consistently remains a step apart from the other characters.

In fact, while crafting a life story that guarantees Heinrich be perceived as a complex, multifaceted, and intriguing protagonist, Daub takes pains to keep his deepest feelings and real motivations hidden. Heinrich is obsessed with the sea because he has always been obsessed with the sea and he pursues a career as a ship’s captain because that is what he has always wanted to do. In this way, he remains enigmatic and deceptively deep, given the likelihood that there’s actually not much going on below the surface.

For all its darkness, warfare, and tragedy, History of von Schatt (1913-1960) is still a highly amusing story about a man who, while he arguably fails to capture the heart, certainly captures the imagination. Daub’s portrayal of Heinrich’s intensely turbulent life, as well as the earth-shattering events that unfold around him and the various peculiar persons he meets along the way, together ensure that his story is surreally engaging and thought-provoking throughout.

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