Ernst Bratfisch

 was a cabdriver for nobility in Vienna, Austria.

He had a wife and several sons. He was not very brave. His dream was to earn a crest "" for his cab.

He made it a point to study the habits of potential and past clients, knew their names and where they lived but was not very discreet with this information. For instance, it was Bratfisch who blurted out the address of Alfred Stahlbaum to his enemy, Johan Drossel.

On 11 September 1873, Bratfisch singled out the Eighth Doctor and Mary Shelley as Englishmen and followed them around Vienna from Café Demel to the Vienna Exposition, so he could get their custom. Bratfisch told them about his encounter with a black driverless cab on Wolfstrasse, the cab rumoured to have been connected to the gruesome Ringstrasse murders. The Doctor and Mary employed his services several times during the day. However, when Mary was kidnapped by Johan Drossel's puppets, Bratfisch refused to help Doctor save her because he and his horses were too tired and hungry.

The next day, 12 September, Bratfisch was employed to deliver a letter from Empress Elisabeth to Alfred Stahlbaum, a simple task that proved to be fatal. First, Stahlbaum threatened Bratfisch with a revolver into helping him take the Silver Turk to the Hofburg Palace. Bratfisch's cab was then pursued by the black driverless cab. The cabs crashed into each other at the turn from the Ringstrasse to the Hofburg Palace, killing Bratfisch and his horses.

Even before his death, Johan Drossel arranged for Bratfisch's puppet to be made. (AUDIO: The Silver Turk)