I don''t see much significance in the missing clothes tags - I've been ripping those out of my clothes my entire life - they're itchy.

I, myself, "went missing" in 1997 when I left the family farm without leaving any forwarding address. In my case I had gotten fed up with my family for various reasons that I won't get into here. A brother finally did find my address 8 years later. My point is that some of us "go missing" on purpose.

Up until you mentioned prostate cancer, it was really eating me up that he was a disturbed soul either running from something or seeking solitude. Now I think that he was sick and just wanted to go on his own terms

A heart attack when people, especially older people with pre-existing heart conditions, hit cold water or struggle in cold water is actually pretty common. I've heard of it a lot in my days paddling whitewater from people falling out of rafts into cold rivers

The saddest thing is that one day someone will think about you for the last time. This man obviously accepted this. Now he's immortalized.

The video of him writing something something down, intently re-reading it, then tearing it up coupled with the numerous hours of walking back and forth along the beach screams someone contemplating their impending death.

Lori Ruff is my favorite case like this. Lori Ruff was born Kimberly McLean. She ran away from home at 17 and obtained the birth certificate of a girl who died in a fire through the mail, got an Idaho ID under that name, and moved to Texas where she changed her name to Lori Kennedy and obtained other documents including a social security card. She committed suicide in 2010 and her husband found a lockbox containing evidence that she wasn't who she said she was. He ended up going to the internet to try to find who she actually was and in 2016 her real identity was found through a DNA database.

Why did people assume he was throwing his belongings on random garbage bins? My immediate assumption was that he was probably mailing those things to his family abroad, and that's why he needed the stamps

I think he was having a lot of anxiety about drowning himself, that’s why he was pacing all day and some of the night. When he finally pushed himself to jump in to the icey cold water he was already freaking out, and his heart couldn’t take the situation. Poor guy.

The most haunting thing for me is when he writes something down in that cafe, reads it, and then rips it up.

It's probably been pointed out by somebody already, but it's very very rare to be asked for an id/ passport when checking into a hotel in Ireland. You might be asked to fill out a form if you haven't provided your details during the reservation stage, but neither I nor any of my family have ever been asked for an ID and we have stayed in many hotels around the country. Irish are a pretty relaxed bunch 😁

I've struggled with suicidal ideation for the most part of my life. What this man did, especially knowing he was going to die soon anyway, is relatable. Whenever I was planning to die, I also heavily considered disappearing. The guilt of being a burden even after death can weigh heavily on you. When you're ready to die, you think of these things, and disappearing to try to make it as easy as possible for either surviving relatives or anyone else that might stumble upon your body just seems like the best thing to do. Sort of tie up loose ends. Nobody truly wants to die. But when the pain is too great, it just seems like dying is the only solution. The pacing back and forth for hours on that beach reflects that. Not truly wanting to die, and yet knowing it's the only way to make the pain stop. Drowning is also such a horrible way to go, I wouldn't be surprised if he had taken something that would stop his heart, thinking that would be an easier death out there in the water. Or maybe his heart just simply gave out, considering the physical state he was in, and the stress he was under knowing he was about to die. Either way, this is just a sad story. People often try to make situations like these out to be some grand mysteries, because most people fundamentally don't understand what it's like wanting to die on your own terms. He clearly did not want his identity to be known. Maybe it's best if people just respect that and leave it as it is. At the very least, he chose a beautiful place to spend his last few days at. I hope he found at least a semblance of solace before his death.

I must be the weird one here but to me, the fact that he had the tags removed from his clothing is not that strange to me 🤷🏻‍♀️. I've always removed the tags from my clothes because they are incredibly uncomfortable and irritating to my skin.

I hope that this man found the peace that he needed in spite of his circumstances. Rest in Peace.

Bear with me here.... Thomas Hardy's 'The Mayor of Casterbridge' has a central character that makes some terrible decisions in life. When his end comes, he writes a note about how he wants no ceremony at his funeral, no gravestone or mourners. He basically just wants to exit the world and be forgotten. There's something immensely powerful about this, and I'm sure Hardy was expressing something many people have felt. The desire to leave the world and it carry on as if you had never existed. If you are lucky, you might never feel this. Or you might feel this every now and then, but ultimately find some reason to keep going. I'm not sure everyone is this lucky though.

Dear Sir, Rest in peace. While death is something hard to avoid, I am sorry for the pain and suffering you went through. I hope one day we will be able to find happiness for all of us.

Damn, dying with your t-shirt tucked into your briefs is a power move.

Peter: “I think I’m ready to go out on my own terms now” His heart: “I think the fuck not”

I'm late to the party but here's an insight from a person who went to another city with the intent of un-aliving myself. When I finally made the decision everything else was almost automatic, devoid of excitement. In all 3 of my attempts I felt relief once I made the decision to go ahead and go through with it so the feeling is hard to explain but it's almost like you're already not here so you feel like a ghost, like an entity existing but not being alive. I too went to a coastal town and spent alone time at the beach, completely sticking out like a sore thumb. I spent days wandering around just not existing as myself but as this empty vessel. I tried writing a un-alive note and read it over and over again until I realized that it wasn't really explaining anything and that how I felt couldn't be explained to people without mental illness. My plan was also to walk into the sea and drown. Something about the sea feels like going back to the primordial soup that we all came from. Like going home. I ended up not going through with it due to a nightmare I had the night before the set date. Although I'm "better" now I still feel it should've ended for me then and there. Now... His "German" accent could also be Dutch or Danish since all three are pretty rough sounding languages. Doubtful that he's military or law enforcement, he might just be a guy who once moved to Ireland to start his life and ended up being completely alone and isolated. He might also been isolated in his home country and always wanted to visit Ireland and thought it would be poetic to end it all there. To me, it's not a mystery. I see a lonely person being liberate from his own thoughts but I might also be projecting.

That managed to go beyond regular internet mystery to something really touching. Thanks man. Have subscribed.

"To the living we owe respect, but to the dead we owe only the truth." - Voltaire

It sounds like he wanted his identity hidden so that his family/friends or peers wouldn’t know he committed suicide, they would just think he went missing. He’s most likely from a different country, which is why they never connected the dots on missing ppl in the area (cuz he’s not from the area). His passport must’ve been fake since his ID was also... I think his ultimate goal was to drown, but had a heart attack right after jumping in the water. Realizing your about to die is terrifying for most ppl, which could’ve caused the heart attack before he was able to drown.

I absolutely love how gentle and tender you are when discussing these things.

My first thought was that this was a very, very lonely man, and that he wanted to die in a way that represented how he felt. He wanted to be anonymous to others, just like he was in life.

He reminds me of my dad who recently passed away from cancer, he decided to go out on his own terms as well but in the hospital with morphine. I didn't realize it until his passing that he just wanted to die in peace with no pain and I can respect that. His name was also Peter. ❤️🙏

Sounds like a guy trying to make the most of his last moments. Pretty nice actually

i know you probably wont see this, but ive been binging your videos while recovering from a cold. thank u for giving me something to do while im sick and cant focus on much.

I appreciate the tact and consideration you show when you make these videos.

most of the missing people are not really missing, they are found within a relatively short amount of time, and a whole heaping of them are children in custody disputes.

The fact that he had asprin in his pocket, yet died of a heart attack, stands out to me. It sounds like maybe he knew he was going to have a heart attack or had a history of heart trouble. Aspirin is used to thin the blood during a heart attack and it sounds like he knew that. My papaw had heart disease and sometimes he would carry aspirin in his pocket also.

He was not a middle-aged man. He had clearly seen a lot of life and likely lived it all the way he wanted too. He may have watched his wife die or other family members pass on and be pretty much alone in the world. And then the lack of ability to pee showed up and so did the diagnosis of prostate cancer. I respect this man for his leaving life in a way that harmed no one. His dna still exists so eventually we might get a name but that won't really matter. What matters is he enjoyed a beautiful seaside village, ate some great meals, had a few smokes and went to meet his Maker. And when he did that, his Maker intervened and saved him from the minutes long experience of drowning and delivered him home to his deceased loved ones with an almost instantaneous heart attack way out. He hurt no one and he left in peace. Actually, not killing himself but actually dying of natural causes. Let life do it's thing. Live long and smile at the dawn. Life goes so fast, no need to rush the ending.

These are by far my favorite videos that you do. You could do people mysteries every time and I would watch every one of them. Maybe it's the lack of awkward joke cuts 😂

The cardiac arrest can happen due to a phenomenon called "dry drowning" . Due to very cold water coming into contact with larynx causes vagal activity to increase

As an Austrian, I would have immediately noticed that "Ainstettersn 15, Wien 4472" is a bogus address. But it sounds weirdly familiar to "Amstetten" which is a nice town, I know some people there, but unfortunately, it has become known around the world for a tragedy that involves a human monster that lived there. He is in prison now forever, and I find it very sad that a rich history can be overshadowed by an event like this. This town also does not deserve to have the name of that despicable person connected with it. But forgetting is complicated. Sometimes great people are being forgotten, sometimes horrible ones are remembered forever.

Having witnessed my father slowly waste away to nothing from prostate cancer I completely understand why he wanted to go out on his own terms

Some of us want to be forgotten, but do we really? I think he got the best of both worlds. He is forgotten and yet cared about.

Another really strange thing is that whenever people go missing alot of the time their clothes are just found missing folded neatly somewhere near their disappearance

Maybe a guy with no family who cut tags out of his clothes for comfort simply had a heart attack while swimming. Someone found his clothes and took his wallet. Everything else is just a coincidence.

As a sligo native, THANK YOU for pronouncing Sligo properly. I remember this man being found, it was so unsettling for everyone in the town.

Wow Joe, great video, seen your channel on my recommended and now im binge watching. hahahaha!

Whoever this man was he seemingly chose the place and time of his death with meticulous care, and I respect him for that. God bless you, sir...

He went there to die peacefully alone in a beautiful place, and ended up proving that when you just want to be alone, we idiots won’t allow it, lol. Your message at the end is perfect. We have the right to be forgotten.

Rest In Peace man, its sad that many people take this path to exit life, its horrific to know how much times it occurs and how many people feel this way at this moment, if you are feeling down please speak out for you are loved very much by someone you just may not know who they are yet, but please find help :).

This reminded me of Somerton Man in Australia who was found dead on the beach in Adelaide with no identification and all the tags cut out of his clothing. All kinds of theories abounded about who he was and why he died when and where he did. No one reported him missing. He was finally identified using sophisticated DNA analysis after 75 years. Turns out that he likely poisoned himself due to personal problems.

"to live is to suffer; to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering" -Fredrich Nietzsche

I'd deduce that the items he left the hotel with were posted, not disposed of. After all, it is known he bought several international stamps.

I used to think the number of disappearances was strangley high as well until i looked up how many people were found each year. Turns out only a couple thousand people actually disappear and stay disappeared every year.

First time here Realky good stuff Thank you

Such a poetic way to go out. Pre heart attack, that is.

"Do we have the right to be forgotten?" "Should we just respect this man's wishes to be left alone?" " *Here's a podcast that goes into More detail about Every Aspect of this story possible* "

I come from era that had a show called "unsolved mysteries" which has an abundance of stories EXACTLY like this one. No tags on clothes, no wallet, ID, no information, itinerary, family, NOTHING. Not the first time hearing this for me.

My mothers home town is 20 minutes away from Sligo. Been there countless times. Never heard of this mystery. Amazing to think the story of Peter Bergmann isn't well known at all in Ireland

Food for thought: How many times has this happened without a body being found and the person really just vanished without a trace. How many Peter Bergmann are there that we will never hear about...

Rest in peace and solitude, Mr. Bergman. You will eventually be forgotten, as will we all.

I cried. This is so tragically beautiful. No one will ever truly know what was going on. But I want to ask the people in these comments, speculating on if he was this or that or a spy of some sort. To let him be. He went to, more likely, a beautiful place he had read from a poet he well liked, took in the sights and sounds, and decided it was time to leave this plane of existence. I can only hope it was everything he hoped it would be. He did it at night so no one see the tragedy, I don't think he anticipated being found. More than likely he only wanted his clothes to be found, and be considered forgotten tourist clothing and tossed or donated. This man is going to live with me for a long time in my mind now.

This case reminds me of the Summerton man. An unknown man with tags missing from his clothing and found on the beach after wandering around.

Ok just started the video but, what if the ability to “disappear” has only become more challenging? What if the 90’s disappearances being high only meant it was harder to track people that just wanted to start over on the East Coast? Kind of like how early tracking of “earth quacks” showed very few a year, but modern technology shows we have them damn near daily.

“The truth is, for all my struggles to make my mark in life, for all I've accomplished, in just a few short generations my name will be forgotten. Even the greatest of us can't compete with time... and death.”-Lex Luthor

Very late addition but a combination is the cold shock response and diving reflex from diving into cold water can cause fatal arrhythmias due to the opposite actions of these reflexes which result in cardiac arrest almost instantly so that part of the case doesn't surprise me too much

Great story telling! You speak fast yet with a tightly woven fabric of thought

Walked everywhere. For hours. That's a lot of cardio, especially for someone dieing of cancer. Only an idea. I believe he intentionally gave himself a heart attack. He chose the beach, sand has a lot of resistance. when his heart started to give out he undressed and wade in the freezing water to finish the job. Hoping the waves will Wash him away. May he rest in peace 🕊️

Minor point: we pronounce Gardaí as "Gar-dee" _An Garda Siochana_ means "Guardians of the peace"

I'm only halfway through the video now but, this case really reminds me of another case from Oslo. The Oslo Plaza lady was shot dead in Hotel Plaza in Oslo. She had the tags torn from all her clothes, few or no personal items, and checked into the hotel under a false name and adress (an adress which didn't exist). Have you made a video on her yet? If not, you really should. It's been a case that's been stuck in my head for years, as I live not far from Oslo.

Something that may be a bit of a relief to people is that while the number of missing people is high, the majority of the missing persons are found relatively quickly. It tends to be runaways, drunk people who don't report home for a day, or someone who just forgot to tell others they were on holiday for a week.

Missing in the 90’s. Was easy without the internet.

Is a heart attack on a man ate up by cancer a "freak" accident? He was a private dude that wanted dignity in death & he got it. Bless his heart.

He was a trooper, to be walking and moving around with no sign of pain with such advanced cancer.

I'm addicted to these, just fascinating.

If it isn’t INSANELY obvious that this dude was contemplating suicide, it’s wild. He even was writing a suicide note, decided against it and tore it up like “it’s not gonna matter anyways”. And then he paced the entire beach for several hours as if to contemplate his life before he walked out to drown himself. And I believe he might have walked around the entire city for 3 days essentially waiting or internally begging for somebody to care for him, ask him what’s wrong, just try to care and be there for him. He even paced the beach back and forth in an odd manner and NOT A SINGLE PERSON came up to him to talk and see what’s going on what’s wrong is he ok etc. This story should show you that genuinely people really do contemplate suicide without begging for attention. IF YOU SEE SOMEBODY DOING SOME WEIRD ACTIVITIES AND ITS OBVIOUS THEY ARENT OK MENTALLY/EMOTIONALLY/PHYSICALLY, TALK TO THEM. ASK THEM WHATS WRONG. MAKE THEM KNOW THEY ARE NOT ALONE.

He visited that vacuum salesman, got his identity erased, just to die as an unknown. Pretty badass. It’s a theory.

Just as a side note: in some places the tags in clothing can start the alarm in shops. Here in Germany this is quite common by now... It's always kind of funny to see people totally shocked when they leave a grocery store and the alarm starts. Many cashiers know the problem by now and ask the customer if they forgot to remove the tag in some of their clothes.

I see you credited ThatChapter a lot. That was the channel where I first heard of this case. It reminds me of the case of the Somerton Man...and then you mention him 😂

What amazes me is that we usually ty to find the most elaborated theories for the most simplistic events...

I’ve had some experiences in life that have reminded me, sometimes a person is the last of their family or group. It’s easier then to imagine why this mans identity hasn’t been revealed and no one seems to be looking for him. There may actually be NO ONE TO LOOK for him. No one is missing him.

I went missing in ‘97, best summer of my life and have not been back to my old self since.

Your kindness is also appreciated sir.

Great video. Even greater: the way you are applying this situation to our life and your comments at the end, which many of us can identify with.

This peter guy would be a perfect candidate to make a *Nord VPN* advertisment 😂

Your first points about how many people have disappeared in various years is very interesting. I wonder how many of those are runaways or people who skip town maybe from a rough situation to start fresh. Even so in those cases it would be really hard for that many people to start fresh in another part of the US. I would like to see an episode looking into the topic of what makes up that number.

He was most definitely an intelligence operative. Most likely Ex-Stasi. Ironically, Stasi was trained by Romanian Securitate, I started my career before Securitate was disbanded. My dad’s side of the family had some Securitate operatives in it. The poison he most likely used was NICOTINE. Nicotine in very high doses (not from cigarettes) will cause sudden cardiac death, usually within minutes. It’s a lot less painless than the arsenic pill. Operatives in the Stasi and Securitate would kill themselves by nicotine mostly. I’m purposely leaving out the KGB, because while Stasi collaborated closely with KGB, their tactics were Securitate. As small of a country as Romania is and was (22 million) the Securitate was the most feared even over KGB, and Stasi. His name is two ciphers. Monoalphabetic substitution cipher and an affine cipher. A=5,B=2 = HADBEMADECU (Had been made see you). Both ciphers especially Affine and mono-alphabetic were used by Securitate and Stasi. It could be a third cipher possibly Caesar cipher. Most likely it was a code to his handler that he’d been made or had bed made (code for his cover was blown. Both cipher come out to 26. Which would be the Felix Dzerzhinsky Guards Regiment (his old unit in military) and 26 also is zersetzung. (Operational procedures-operational psych ops).

The problem with the missing stats is that there not a very good representation of those that are truly missing. If someone runs away from home 3 times in a year and come back a couple days later it still represents 3 missing person cases for just 1 person for that specific year.

im irish and its pronounced guard - e. in irish that line over the i is called a fada and it basically extends the sound of the vowel that its over.

I know these cases are unsettling and we'll most likely never have answers but most likely there is a family looking for them/hates and cuts them off/they all died or left... its sad. They always strike me as devestating. Ive almost embarked on similar journeys when i was dealing with my untreated bipolar mania/depression. I feel for these people even though i'll never understand them, i empathize.

If you think about it, trying to be forgotten in the way that this man did, is one of the most convoluted and interesting ways to be remembered! You will actually be forgotten a lot faster after you die when you’re identity IS open to the public. But for these few mystery people, they are remembered for a long, long, time. Perhaps some of these people knew this and it was the reason they chose to “not exist”, just something interesting to think about.

Maybe the heart attack was due to cold shock, or perhaps just the mental stress when he entered the water knowing he was going to die. There's also a chance that maybe he panicked when he realized he was going to drown, and fought to swim back only for his heart to stop. Regardless, it's still sad and terrifying.

The ONE Austrian city, every American should know how to pronounce because of the saussages: Wien. Joe: "Wine ?"

Why is this so emotionally touching

The saddest part to me is that he had to do this alone. I work in hospice and 80-90% of my patients tell me that they would rather go the route of assisted euthanasia if it were available. If and when it becomes an actual idea being discussed in your country, just remember that terminally Ill people would much rather go on their own terms with the comfort of their family. I suspect Peter chose to do it this way so he wouldn't have to pain his family.

The right to be forgotten is a thought-provoking idea. We live in a world where it is (almost) impossible to be anonymous. What's more, it seems that a lot of people are terrified of the thought of going through their lives unknown and are obsessed with being famous for any reason or for no reason - that speaks volumes about the paranoia that dominates affluent societies. I think I rather respect anyone who can slip into the great unknown without leaving any kind of an identity behind. I hope that by the time I pass, an enlightened future world will permit my remains to be exposed for the vultures and ravens to consume and the nutrients my body contains to return to the natural cycle of things. No headstone for me, please!

“A mermaid found a swimming lad, Picked him up for her own, Pressed her body to his body, Laughed; and plunging down Forgot in cruel happiness That even lovers drown.” ― W.B. Yeats

I think that maybe he did this to protect is family/friends. Maybe he lived alone and didn't have much contact with his family and so when he got the cancer diagnosis, he just didn't want to 'burden' them and decided to spare them the pain. Maybe he was worried that if police found his body and identified him that they would contact family and they would be hurt that he went out by suicide or that he didn't tell them about his cancer?

There have been cases of people "going missing" because they genuinely did not want anything more with their family or friends, for whatever reason. In Italy we have "Chi l'ha visto?", "Has somebody seen him?", a TV program dedicated to boost cases of missing people, and at least once they received a call from the missing person themselves saying "I am not lost, I'm gone on purpose, do not look for me". And well, a reason why missing people cases have steadily been going down is because we are constantly connected. What thirty years ago was going to be a missing case is now a "oh they were online three minutes ago on Messenger".

The French newspaper 'Le Monde' found out in 2015 that the Irish Police did NOT send out any inquiries either to Austria and Germany or to Interpol. From a more recent German documentary it appears that in 2019 it was established he had relatives in Germany who had been estranged from him for a considerable time.

Honestly, God bless him the poor soul, I'm glad he's in a better place now and don't blame him for wanting to spend his last days for himself in charming old Sligo, I just hope he really was just making the most of his last days and that's all

The more you want something to be forgotten, the more others will want to remember it.

I heard about this case a long time ago and think about this man often. He was found with socks and headphones in his mouth too which you missed! Great case though, awesome work!

I reckon he just swam and swam, until his heart gave out. Mind over matter.....

Maybe he went to the town to die, since he knew he was dying, but actually just went for a nice swim, but his heart gave out because of the effort and his already fragile health.

The man from taured is also an interesting case of someone who just appeared. I just found this channel so I dont know if its been covered already or not, but I thought that's what this was going to be about.

do we have a right to be forgotten? thank you for this video, truly