Miss Blanche: 'The Lady Magician' uses magic to survive Nazi experiments

This is the amazing survival story of Miss Blanche (aka Ruth Iris Wachsmann) who was one of the leading female magicians in pre-war Europe. An expert manipulator, she headlined in venues across the continent, until war intervened...

Ruth Iris Wachsmann was a German Jew. Born in Berlin in 1910, she first trained as a ballerina. In her mid-teens, after seeing a performance by Austro-Hungarian magician Larette (Cornelius Hauer), she switched from dancing to magic. Wachsmann became Larette's student and she learned the art of manipulation. She could manipulate billiard balls and playing cards, but showed special aptitude for cigarette manipulation.

Miss Blanche, performing cigarette manipulation, 1936

(Source: Artefake)

Inspired by a brand of cigarettes designed to appeal to female smokers by the Rotterdam-based Vittoria Egyptian Cigarette Company, she adopted the stage name Miss Blanche. Larette was sponsored by Miss Blanche cigarettes and helped promote Wachsmann as another act to market the brand. 

Promotion card for Amsterdam-based Larette, with an advert for Miss Blanche cigarettes on the reverse

(Source: Quicker Than the Eye, Potter & Potter Auctions)

Adopting an androgynous look - short, boyish hair and a tailcoat costume - Wachsmann's act included manipulation, the Chinese rings, tricks with cards and ropes, producing glasses of beer from an empty barrel, and a finale production of Japanese banners and paper flowers. 

Miss Blanche's beer from an empty barrel prop

(Source: German Magic Foundation, by kind permission)

Often billed as 'The Lady Magician' or 'The Only Beautiful Lady Magician', she was one of very few female magicians able to produce and vanish lit cigarettes. "Combined with her charming personality, and her unique sweet way of presentation, every performance of hers is a delightful sight worth seeing," said Austrian magician, Ottokar Fischer.

Miss Blanche (Ruth Iris Wachsmann)

(Source: Artefake)

With Larette as her excellent mentor and teacher, Wachsmann emerged as a successful magician. Able to present her act in Dutch, English, French, German and Italian, she toured throughout Europe. Eventually becoming a headliner, she came to be regarded by many as the 'Premier Lady Magician' in the continent. She played top venues like the 'Pik-Bar' in Zagreb, Schiefe Laterne Kabarett in Vienna, and the Moulin Rouge in Budapest. While touring Yugoslavia, Wachsmann was called on to perform for Peter II, on his fifteenth birthday. And she was accepted into the Magischer Zirkel von Deutschland (The Magic Circle of Germany). In the mid-1930s, she married a Jewish man, N.W. Teitz. He was another artiste, performing as Max Peltini.

Promotional advert for Miss Blanche

(Source: Artefake)

After the Nazis took power in Germany in 1933, life became increasingly difficult for the half a million Jews living there. The persecution of Jews became an official Nazi policy. In 1935 and 1936, the pace of anti-Semitic persecution accelerated. About 60% of Jews emigrated, many after they were banned from holding professional jobs. Wachsmann was kicked out of the Magischer Zirkel and soon after she fled from the Nazis.

She settled in the Netherlands and, initially, was able to earn a living. There were even plans for her to perform in the U.S.A. in mid-1940.

But, in May 1940, Nazi Germany invaded and occupied the Netherlands and Wachsmann's situation grew worse. The Nazis imposed arduous rules on Jews, concentrated them in ghettos, and later sent them to concentration and death camps where they were immediately or eventually murdered. Tragically, Wachsmann's husband, N.W. Teitz, was arrested and deported to a concentration camp in Poland, where he was killed. 

Max Peltini (N.W. Teitz)

(Source: Artefake)

Understandably in these circumstances, Wachsmann struggled to find work. Bookings for all performers, magicians or not, Jewish or not, were becoming few and far between as the war progressed. Once over-crowded, night clubs and theatres were emptying out. Now the patrons frequenting the clubs were German soldiers and many Dutch performers did not want to entertain the enemy. Restrictions on Jewish performers would have denied Wachsmann the scraps of bookings that were still available. Now under the name Ruth Wolf, she died her hair blond to look less Jewish.

In late Spring 1943, the Germans intensified their deportations of Dutch Jews and 33-year old Wachsmann was arrested. She was probably moved first to the Westerbork transit camp in the northeast of the country. Westerbork was a staging camp from where the Germans would deport Jews and other Untermenschen (sub-humans: Nazi term) to camps in Germany or Poland. Camp Westerbork had a school, orchestra, hairdresser and other facilities, designed by S.S. officials to give inmates a false sense of hope for survival and to aid in avoiding problems during their onward transportation. Wachsmann likely only spent a few days at Westerbork. From there, she was sent by train to the Auschwitz in Poland. 

Auschwitz concentration camp entrance

(Source: Creative Commons)

As the war developed, the Nazis constructed three main camps at Auschwitz, along with many sub-camps. Auschwitz I was originally built for Polish prisoners-of-war and later used as a concentration camp. Auschwitz II was an extermination camp and also housed some slave labour. Auschwitz III was mainly a slave labour camp.

Wachsmann was allocated to Auschwitz I. She has put into an accommodation block reserved for women on which medical experiments were carried out. S.S. physicians working at the camp included Professor Dr. Carl Clauberg, who developed a method of non-surgical mass sterilisation. He treated the women with chemical irritants, which killed some. He put others to death so that autopsies could be performed to examine the effectiveness of the chemicals.

In these terrible conditions, Wachsmann's magic skills were identified by her captors. They forced her to perform magic for S.S. physicians and visiting German dignitaries. While she took no pleasure in entertaining the Germans, magic earned her scraps of food and protection from execution.

In some small way, Wachsmann's experience in World War Two mirrored that of her mentor, Larette. During World War One, as a conscript in the Austro-Hungarian army, he was captured by the Russians. While a prisoner, he performed magic to boost the morale of his fellow captives and entertain guards to earn food and privileges.

Female prisoners at Auschwitz concentration camp

(Source: Creative Commons)

Auschwitz-Birkenau was the largest of the German Nazi concentration camps and extermination centres. Over 1.1 million men, women and children lost their lives there.

Wachsmann endured imprisonment for almost two years. Eventually, in January 1945, when she was on the brink of death, the camp was liberated by advancing Soviet troops. Severely malnourished, Wachsmann weighed just 65 lbs (29 kgs). But, she had survived, thanks to her magic.

She returned to the Netherlands and started to rebuild her life. In 1949, Wachsmann remarried and became Mr Ruth Neumann. With her new husband, she emigrated to the United States in 1956, and magic gradually disappeared from her life. 

Ruth Neumann (nee Wachsmann), skilled lady magician and Holocaust survivor, died in 1989, aged 79.

Larette (Cornelius Hauer) was also a Jew. Unlike his student, Larette did not survive Nazi Germany's anti-Semitic persecutions. On 14th May 1943, fearing he was about to be arrested by the Gestapo secret police, Larette shot himself. The German magic magazine, Magie, reported that he died "after an Allied bombing raid on Amsterdam". 

Related article: 'Dutch magician deported to extermination camp', tells the wartime story of card magician Louis Lam.  Blog link.

Related article: 'Hungarian magician, Dr. Laszlo Rothbart survives Nazi concentration camp'.  Blog link.

Research supported by The Good Magic Award 2021 from The Good Thinking Society 

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