Unsolved mystery of ‘Peter Bergmann' to be explored in new show at Listowel Writer's Week
For those unfamiliar with the story of 'Peter Bergmann', it is the name given to the man whose body was discovered on Rosses Point beach on June 16, 2009. The man, thought to be in his 50's or 60's, had been staying at the Sligo City Hotel in Sligo Town. He checked in there for three days under the name of Peter Bergmann and gave an address in Vienna, Austria.
Both of these proved to be false.
The grey-haired man disposed of his belongings in a plastic purple bag, all while avoiding CCTV around the town. On his second day in the town, he purchased eight stamps and airmail stickers from a post office, but it was never established to whom these letters were sent.
On the day before the discovery of his body, he asked a taxi driver to take him to the quietest beach in Sligo for a swim. This was Rosses Point. Here, Bergmann got out of the car and stared for a short time before he returned to the taxi.
He checked out of the hotel on Monday, June 15, and at around 2.20pm that day, he boarded a bus to Rosses Point. It's estimated that he was seen by up to 16 people on the beach that day over the course of an eight-hour period. He was last seen walking along the beach, alone, near midnight.
A man and his son who were out training for a triathlon discovered the body at approximately 8am on the morning of June 16.
All the labels on the clothes the man was wearing had been carefully removed and despite extensive investigations by Gardaí, the man's true name and place of origin remain unknown.
He was buried in an unmarked grave in Sligo cemetery with just six people in attendance in September of 2009; a postmortem found that he had advanced prostate cancer and bone tumours and had suffered previous heart attacks.
The show on Friday in Listowel, which is called Mr Bergmann of Deadman's Point, is written by and stars Dublin actor and playwright Ronan Dempsey, and he spoke to The Kerryman about the upcoming show and his inspiration for writing it.
'I think I first read the story about Peter Bergmann back in 2019 which would have been the 10-year anniversary and I remember that I was just fascinated by it. I said to myself that there must be something in this I could write about and so what I did was I opened up a Google Doc and I wrote the title 'Peter Bergmann' at the top of it and I closed it straight away,' he laughed, adding 'I knew I'd come back to it someday.'
What really inspired Ronan to return to the story though was the news that a really close friend of his had been diagnosed with terminal Brain cancer and that it was the juxtaposition between how he, Ronan's friend was handling the news and how the mysterious Peter Bergmann chose to handle it that planted the seed that would grow to become the play.
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"I remember chatting to him quite candidly and he was talking about end of life, what sort of mindset it puts you in, and what happens to you. What really struck me though was what he was saying about legacy and tidying everything up for the end and the panic that got into him and how it changed him,' said Ronan.
"So much stuff that wouldn't have mattered to him before in terms of legacy and how he was going to be remembered, it now suddenly really mattered to him. I was quite struck by all this and I thought of Peter Bergmann and he was this fella that rocked over for three days to Sligo and he did absolutely everything in his power to delete himself and to leave absolutely nothing,' he continued.
"Then I looked at my friend who was in the complete opposite boat in that he wanted to write his history and write his legacy. He crossed every t and dotted every. The two completely different trains of thought between these two men just grabbed hold of me and I thought that I would have loved to see these two people in a room and see what happens,' he added.
The show Ronan said is told through a fictional embalmer who is preparing Mr. Bergmann for his final journey while two men (both played by Ronan) watch on. He described it as a comic and mysterious tale of redemption, legacy, and what it is to live so close to death.
'What we experience is the juxtaposition between watching how these two guys move. It's like you have this sand timer and both of these men just have a few grains left in their life and you're just there watching how both of them navigate these last few grains,' he said.
The show will be staged at 8pm on Friday May 30 in St John's Theatre in Listowel. Tickets will cost €20 and are available to buy at https://stjohnstheatre.ticketsolve.com/ticketbooth/shows/1173662810 or by calling the booking office on 068 22566
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