London: Nearly 65 years after his death, two Belgian Hitler hunters have tracked down some 39 relatives of the Nazi leader in the US and Austria.
Journalist Jean-Paul Mulders and historian Marc Vermeeren claim to have decoded Adolf Hitler's DNA and matched it to discarded cigarette butts found in an Austrian hamlet, a
used napkin from a New York restaurant, and letters sent from France more than three decades ago.
The duo apparently tracked down three brothers living in Long Island in New York, who are directly descended from the Fuhrer's father -- the brothers Louis, Brian and Alexander
Stuart-Houston are said to be the great-grandsons of Hitler's father Alois, the 'Daily Express' reported.
The two Hitler hunters claim the brothers have entered into a pact never to have children to avoid producing further descendants of Hitler. They also say more descendants live in
Austria's Waldviertel region, near where the Fuhrer was born.
"They live under new names which slightly differ from Hitler, such as Hietler, Hiedler or Huetler. Most of them probably don't know of their relationship," Mulders was quoted
by the British tabloid as saying.
Last year, a senior academic at an Israeli university claimed to have a "family connection" to Hitler. Michael Mach of the Tel Aviv University had said that his grandmother had married the Nazi leader's nephew Hans Hitler after divorcing
his grandfather.
However, Ben Barkow of London-based Wiener-Library, an archive of Jewish history, described the investigation as "ghastly".
Bureau Report
First Published: Tuesday, September 15, 2009, 15:13