Evening star., 1937-12-15
Missing ''Robinsons'' Prouide
international Mystery Case
N am es on Passports
Those OF Children
Dead for Years.
BY the Associated Press.

Ey the Associated Press.
The American family Robinson
Donald Louis Robinson" and Ruth
Norma Robinson" who disappeared
in Moscow recently-was providing
Government officials with a baffiing
international mystery today, after
State Department officials declared the
names on the couples passports were
those Of children who died years ago.
The passports, issued to the couple
by this country on April 6, 1896, bore
names evidently taken from New York
tombstones, the department said, and
nothing actually is known OF the real
identity or nationality Of the pair.
Numbered 265019 and 265020, respec-
lively, the passports were issued on
birth certificates carrying the assumed
names.
Thus, what began as the mystery
OF two Americans who disappeared
from Russian hotel had deepened
into an international enigma with even
more spectacular ramifications.
Who are they? What prompted
them to 60 to Russia and to use H.
legally obtained passports? Why did
they drop out of sight In Moscow?
Where are they now?
"Taken to Hospital"
These are questions for which the
State Department set out to find
answers while it prepared to turn the
case over to the Justice Department in
routine manner.
AS Mr.. and Mrs. Robinson, the
couple was said to have arrived in
Moscow on November to witness
the celebration of the twentieth ami
verSary of the Bolshevik revolution.
The interest of the American EN-
basSy there was aroused when Mrs.
Robinson" told callers last week that
her husband had been taken to- a
hospital on December suffering
from pneumonia, but that she did not
know the name of the institution.
The next day, acquaintances found
that she, too, had disappeared from
the hotel without a trace.
The Embassy sought the aid of the
Soviet foreign office in locating the
couple. but received no information
concerning them. Whether they are
in the hands of Soviet authorities who
wish for some reason to keep the mat
ter secret, has been a question for
speculation.
Tombstone Names.
Its suspicious aroused by the lack
OF information, the State Department
began delving into their passport
records in the hope that relatives in
this country might throw some light
on their disappearance. Investigators
failed to find any record of family
connections. Then they began comb
ing the documents used as evidence OF
citizenship
This evidence consisted of birth
certificates certified by the New York
Vital Statistics Bureau Birth records
showed that Donald Louis Robinson
was born on March 25, 1905, and that
Ruth Norma Birkland was born in
Brooklyn on December %, 1909. Mrs
Robinson" gave her maiden name in
her passport application as Ruth
Norma Birkland
Special agents discovered that these
two persons actually had died five
years after their births and are now
buried in New York City cemeteries
Starting from an old apartment
house in West Forty-sixth street, ir
New York City, Federal investigator,
sought to determine whether interna.
tional intrigue lay behind the disap.
pearance.
When they applied for passports
they had directed that the documents
be mailed to them in care of M