Peter Bergmann, the mysterious man

In short
In June 2009 a man calling himself Peter Bergmann arrived in Sligo, Ireland, checked into a hotel under a false name and address, got rid of all his belongings bit by bit and on June 16 was found dead on Rosses Point beach. He had removed the labels from all his clothes. He had advanced cancer and died of cardiac arrest. More than fifteen years later nobody knows who he was.

The death of Peter Bergmann is one of the most recent and fascinating unsolved mysteries. The man came to Ireland, stayed a few days in a hotel, made strange outings and was finally found dead on a beach. To this day nobody knows who he really was.

The mystery

In June 2009 a slim man, with short grey hair and a black leather jacket, arrived by bus in Sligo, Ireland. His intention, it seems, was to vanish without a trace.

Where he came from and his real name remain a mystery: all we know is that he did everything he could to erase all evidence of his existence, before dying on a beach at Rosses Point.

When his body was found, on June 16, 2009, he had no documents, wallet, money or anything that could give a clue to his identity. Even the labels on his clothes had been removed. Since then investigators have tried to shed light on the mystery, but the only clear thing seems to be the man’s strong will to disappear anonymously.

The last days of Peter Bergmann

On Friday, June 12, 2009 the man was first seen at the bus station in Derry, Northern Ireland, between 2:30 and 4 pm. He boarded a bus to Sligo with a black shoulder bag and a carry-on bag and arrived at 6:28 pm. He took a taxi to the Sligo City Hotel, paid for his room in cash, night by night, and checked in under the name Peter Bergmann, giving an address in Vienna, Austria.

He was about 1.79 meters (5’10”) tall, with blue eyes and tanned skin, and seemed to be between 55 and 60. He spoke English with a thick German accent, was always well dressed, in clothes from C&A, a chain popular in Germany and Austria, and smoked a lot.

Investigations after his death revealed that there is no Peter Bergmann matching his description, in Europe or America, and that the address he gave does not exist.

During his stay, cameras filmed him several times leaving the hotel with a full purple plastic bag and returning empty-handed: according to The Irish Times he did it 13 times. We now know that he was getting rid of his clothes and personal effects bit by bit, then folding the bag and putting it in his pocket.

There is little CCTV footage of him, a sign that he had planned everything carefully to leave as few traces as possible. Sligo has many highly visible cameras, and the man must have avoided them by using their blind spots.

Police searched everywhere for clues that could lead to his identification: rubbish bins, public parks, private gardens, car parks and even the local dump. Without any result.

On Saturday, June 13 Peter went to the post office and bought eight 82-cent stamps and airmail stickers. It was never discovered whom he was writing to or where he sent the letters.

The next day he asked a taxi driver to recommend a quiet beach for a swim. The driver took him to Rosses Point. The man got out, looked around for a while, apparently satisfied, and then had himself driven back to town.

Perhaps he had found the place where he wanted to die.

On Monday, June 15, at 1:06 pm, Peter left the hotel with three bags. At the bus station he ordered a cappuccino and a toasted ham and cheese sandwich, read some papers he took from his pocket, tore them in half and threw them in the bin. Then at 2:20 pm he took the bus to Rosses Point.

Although he spoke to no one, sixteen people remember seeing him walking on the beach, politely greeting passersby. The last sighting was at 11:50 pm. At 6:45 am on June 16 his body was found by a man and his son, who was training for a triathlon.

Oddities of the case

The man was wearing swimming trunks, with his underpants over them and a navy T-shirt tucked in, while the rest of his clothes were on the beach. He had removed the labels from every item, even his underwear, which shows how careful he was not to leave any trace.

The autopsy found no signs of drowning or violence: death was attributed to acute cardiac arrest. But it also revealed that the man had advanced prostate cancer, with bone tumors, and had suffered from heart problems in the past.

Yet there was no medication in his body, not even a painkiller. According to the pathologist, with those illnesses he must have been in severe pain. His teeth, on the other hand, had been well cared for, with bridges, root canals, crowns and a gold tooth.

Irish police compared his photos, fingerprints and DNA with every database, with no result. After a five-month investigation, in September 2009, the man was buried in an unmarked grave in Sligo cemetery. Only four police officers attended the funeral.

In 2015 the French newspaper Le Monde found that the Austrian police had never been contacted by the Irish, and that there is no Interpol notice because no one has ever reported him missing.

Peter probably thought his body would be carried out to sea by the current and never found. Instead fate decided that it would be found, giving rise to one of the saddest and most fascinating mysteries of the century, often compared to that of the Somerton Man in Australia.

Peter Bergmann today

His last days were told in a short documentary, “The Last Days of Peter Bergmann”, shown at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival and awarded Best Documentary Short Film at the Melbourne International Film Festival the same year.

In 2014 the University of Dundee produced a reconstruction of his face, shown on television, and Irish police have renewed their appeals several times, most recently in August 2023. No relative or friend has ever come forward.

More than fifteen years after his death, the man who called himself Peter Bergmann still lies in an unmarked grave.

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