Buried Nazi treasure Czech Republic

[KANACKI]

The Štěchovice treasure is a purported hoard of Nazi treasure. It is said to be hidden in the town of Štěchovice in the Central Bohemian Region of the Czech Republic.

The story says that Emil Klein, a Nazi general, buried war booty in tunnels in Hradištko near Štěchovice.






The booty included gold, diamonds, jewelry and pieces of art as well as secret files and scientific documents from the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute.



Based on documents found in 1993 in the Weimar area, some experts speculate that the Nazis hid the stolen goods and the missing Russian "Amber Room" in these tunnels.

Only one person, former German Helmut Gaensel, claims that he possesses the original documents about the contents and has exact knowledge of the location where this alleged treasure is hidden.



He says that he received these documents, additional information and a specific area map from Emil Klein, the former SS general in command. Mr. Gaensel worked for the Czech and other secret services and was involved in matters connected with this treasure. In 1964, he arranged the release of Klein from the KZ Valdice prison in Czechoslovakia.



During the 1970s, and as late as 1989, there were some attempts to recover the Štěchovice treasure under the control of the Ministries of Interior and Defence. The last efforts were carried out before the revolution by the foreign trade company Omnipol, which traded mainly in weapons. In 1992, Gaensel bought the relevant property and signed an exclusive agreement with the Czech authorities to obtain the sole rights to unveil the treasure.



As of 2018 some Americans have come on board with the project.

Kanacki

 

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[grantler]

Hi
There is a book called "" Prag Connection"" written by Helmut Gaensel.
Don´t know if there is an english version ? did only see some in spanish and chechoslowenian lenguage .
here is more to read about Klein and Gaensel :-)
Encrypted notes created by a German WW2 soldier ? Klausis Krypto Kolumne
https://helmutgaensel.com/aindex.htm

 

[KANACKI]

Well done! grantler for the link.



Helmut Gaensel released a press statement last year.

Another attempt to find the Štěchovice treasure'
.

Hradištko pod Medníkem Max 13, 2019. – Another stage in the search for Štěchovice treasure has been announced by an American named Bruce Mottl. He announced creation of the Dakota International Exploration Group based in South Dakota, which is about to collect the treasure. This company was founded by four individuals including Helmut Gaensel, a tireless treasure hunter. The legal service to the hunters in the Czech Republic is provided by a legal office rutland and partners
led by JUDr. Monika Rutland. Entrepreneur Bruce Mottl stated to his intentions: “I believe in success mainly because I and my friends have managed to obtain relevant documents recently released from archives of US secret services and sources from South American Paraguay. We dispose of such information that I think wewill not be
complicatedly looking for the treasure but rather we will pick it up“.

Helmut Gaensel, who will celebrate his 85th birthday this June, for the next stage of the Štěchovice treasure search said: “I have been convinced of the existence of the treasure since I met Colonel Emil Klein in the year 1964, who commanded the SS Engineer School in Hradištko during the war. I have devoted many years of my life and tens of millions of crowns to finding the right place. But this time I am convinced more than ever before that we have the right place“.Seekers want to focus on three very specific places around Štěchovice, where the treasure should have been deposited since the end of World War II.

Helmut Gaensel was looking for it in these places already in the second half of the 1960s, when he had to stop the work after the occupation of Czechoslovakia by Soviet troops. He began to look for it again back in the 1990s. The company of Bruce Mottl has a million dollars available for the first stage of work. If they succeed to obtain all
necessary pertmits, they would like to dig the ground for the first time this fall.

It is estimated that the underground at Štěchovice can hide scientific knowledge, especially from the former Emperor Wilhelm‘s Institute. In addition valuables plundered by the Nazis throughout Europe, as well as works of art from Hermann Göring‘s collection and other objects can be hidden here. Interview of the international overlap of this event., the seekers will work in coordination with the European Union‘s authorities and the Czech government.





Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

In the map below Emil Klein gives a detailed description of the location.



Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

Here is the last known picture of Emil Klein before his death in the early 1970s. Not long after being release from jail.



Czechian intelligence officers interrogated and even tortured Klein many times in order to find out what he knew about the Stechowice tunnels. Anyway, this secret facility has never been found.

Kanacki

 

[A2coins]

Great post I love treasure stories would love to find this one

 

[islamoradamark]

ME too

 

[KANACKI]

Careful what you wish for my friends. It must just come true.


But some times one dreams can turn into nightmares.

Just after WW2 a group of Americans found out treasure being buried there. And made a trip into the Russian controlled sector in 1946 under the pretense to recover a downed airman.



Here are pictures of that trip below.


They located a site



The group used a metal detector to locate the buried site.




As you can see metal detecting at the site was deadly because all of the booby trapped mines.



After careful excavation they discovered bunker



Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

The ground consisted of American military personal except for one reporter Lionel S Shapiro. Later a journalist who obtained these astonishing photographs when researching the story many years ago found the photographs. His name was Jaroslav Sveceny who passed away in 2010.



















In all 32 boxes was recovered. But it created a diplomatic incident where Czechoslovakian authorities claimed the Americans had stolen national treasure and they was forced to hand back the boxes.

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

Hello All

Well boxes contained more than anything just documents. Inventory lists of looted treasure.





There was report on the alleged contents of these inventories stating there were 540 boxes? It was alleged Martin Bormann below.



conceived a plan as the Nazi regime had began to disintegrate to move looted money gold documents weapon plans extra to fund a new Nazi regime in the future. The area where the Nazi still had some sort of resistance role against the allies in Prague. Toward the end of the was he recruited the talents of German Nazi war hero Otto Skorzeny below.



Otto Skorzeny was in charge of logistics of moving into looted gold to secure location before Berlin fell to Russians. Bellow in a photograph of Germans under his command unloading boxes of looted treasure at castle near Prague in Czechoslovakia.



The castle was a temporary holding location of the looted treasure because Emil Klein in command of engineers constructed tunnels in the engineering training area south of Prague.



The area where these tunnels was constructed near a former SS pioneer school was based in the town and there are claims there are 540 boxes of treasure, containing diamonds and gold was buried somewhere near Štěchovice - 20 miles from the Czech capital Prague.

Based on documents found in 1993 in the Weimar area of Germany, many experts believe that the Nazis did hide the booty there. However in 1946 the Americans acted from information from another source?

Information on the Febuary 1946 raid on Štěchovice in recorded in the archives of the united states. The commanding officer sent a report to Washington. As you can see this letter memo below dated 1946.



Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

The Americans acting under USFET was lead to the discovery by Gunter Aschenbach who claimed he was part of the SS group that hid the documents in the bunker near Štěchovice.

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

So we have the contents of this report sent to Washington. We will come back to later.

Out of three key players at the time.

1. Otto Skorzeny was only involved in the logistics of moving the looted gold to a castle near Prague. He did not know the exact final hiding place? Otto Skorzeny was an unrepentant committed Nazi to the last. Although he faced charges by the court in the Nuremberg war trials of Nazis. The only charge that held against him was wearing American uniform during a particular operation. That was breach of Geneva convention. However while in Prison he escaped to Spain. In 1970, a cancerous tumour was discovered on Skorzeny's spine. Two tumours were later removed while he was staying at a hospital in Hamburg, but the surgery left him paralyzed from the waist down. Vowing to walk again, Skorzeny spent long hours with a physical therapist; and, within six months, he was back on his feet. Skorzeny died of lung cancer on 5 July 1975 in Madrid. He was 67 years old.

2. Martin Bormann who was instigator of moving stolen gold to Prague. Fate was uncertain. At around 11:00 pm on 1 May, Bormann left the Führerbunker with SS doctor Ludwig Stumpfegger, Hitler Youth leader Artur Axmann, and Hitler's pilot Hans Baur as members of one of the groups attempting to break out of the Soviet encirclement. Bormann carried with him a copy of Hitler's last will and testament.

The group left the Führerbunker and travelled on foot via a U-Bahn subway tunnel to the Friedrichstraße station, where they surfaced. Several members of the party attempted to cross the Spree River at the Weidendammer Bridge while crouching behind a Tiger tank. The tank was hit by Soviet artillery and destroyed, and Bormann and Stumpfegger were knocked to the ground.

Bormann, Stumpfegger, and several others eventually crossed the river on their third attempt. Bormann, Stumpfegger, and Axmann walked along the railway tracks to Lehrter station, where Axmann decided to leave the others and go in the opposite direction. When he encountered a Red Army patrol, Axmann doubled back. He saw two bodies, which he later identified as Bormann and Stumpfegger, on a bridge near the railway switching yard. He did not have time to check thoroughly, so he did not know how they died. Since the Soviets never admitted to finding Bormann's body, his fate remained in doubt for many years.

He was tried at Nuremberg in absentia Bormann was convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity and acquitted of conspiracy to wage a war of aggression. On 15 October 1946 he was sentenced to death by hanging, with the provision that if he were later found alive, any new facts brought to light at that time could be taken into consideration to reduce the sentence or overturn it.

3. Colonel Emil Klein who commanded the SS Engineer School in Hradištko during the war. The officer in charge of constructing the alleged tunnels and concealing looted gold near Štěchovice. He was captured by Czechian intelligence officers who interrogated and even tortured Klein many times in order to find out what he knew about the Stechowice tunnels and treasure allegedly buried there.

However he was a tough nut to crack. In 1964 Helmut Gaensel met him in prison and slowly built up a friendship with embittered Nazi who had been tried and convicted to 20 years imprisonment. Its only after Helmut Gaensel got authorities to release him. Emil Klein wanted to give all the details to the West German authorities but by then the world had changed. Germany did not want the information and Emil Klein gave the documents to Helmut Gaensel.

The documents was written in code. As you can see below.



Helmut Gaensel was looking for it in these places already in the second half of the 1960s, when he had to stop the work after the occupation of Czechoslovakia by Soviet troops. He began to look for it again back in the 1990s.

Was Helmut Gaensel given genuine information or was Emil Klein playing along?

For Helmut Gaensel it changed his life becoming involved in trying to find this alleged buried Nazi gold in Štěchovice.

Kanacki

 

[BillA]

Hi Kanacki,

the next chapter . . . .

Quite interesting, and a more than casual collection of (doubtless edited) documents.
I cannot imagine the magnitude of misfortune that would befall the finders;
every single aspect of their past, and future, to be endlessly examined and speculated upon.
Claimants without end, agreements cut from whole cloth, etc.

 

[KANACKI]

Hello Bill

For one the Czechoslovakian authorities at the time in 1946 was still looking for Bohemian crown jewels. We know the Nazis obtained them during occupation of Czechoslovakia. you can see the pictures below.



Here is picture below of Hitler viewing the national Crown Jewels of Bohemia a national treasure of Czechoslovakia.



The wartime fate of these crown jewels by 1946 was still uncertain. However it not clear what actually happened to them during WW2. However today every 7 years the crown jewels are taken out of the castle of Prague and exhibited on special occasion. You can see below.



However its not clear if the crown jewels today are original one that was captured by the Nazis? There is speculation that these are copy of the original as it is part of national patrimony and a source of pride.

An interesting hypothesis that the original Crown Jewels are buried some where in a underground bunker south of Prague?

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

Helmut Gaensel was Born in 1934 in little town Kovářská near Chomutov, in the area of the former Sudeten. He graduated from the Mining Engineering School in Jáchymov and Příbram. In the 50s he worked as a miner in Jáchymov uranium mines. The period between 1961-62 he spent in prison Valdice, together with Emil Klein. After his release he left the country for Germany and later on for the United States.

The owner of gold mines in South America (Bolivian company Gaensel Gold Mines), later owner of silver mines in Montana in the US. In the South America he looked for nazi officers and VIP, who retired there from Germany. In 1968 he published a book, “The Prague Connection” (Czech translation with the title Štěchovice Treasure, published in 1992 by Horizont publishing house).

He married in 2003, his wife‘s name is Ladislava.

Helmut Gaensel stood as a candidate in the elections for the European Parliament, representing OFD (Civil Federal Democracy).

From 1970s – 1989 there were some attempts to pick up the Štěchovice treasure under the control of the Ministries of Interior and Defence, the last works had been done before the Revolution by the foreign trade company Omnipol, trading mainly with weapons

In 1991 – Gaensel came back to Czechoslovakia to search for the Štěchovice treasure. Gaensel searched mainly in the ravine Dušno and surrounding area, few surveys were done also elsewhere. In 2004 – he localised a place in the Small Klein’s ravine where the seismic radar and other technologies confirmed the existence of ten meters long tunnel.



Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

Here is some of Helmut Gaensel excavations.









Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

While Helmut Gaensel has official agreement with Czech government. It did not stop a host of other would be treasure hunters searching the area.



Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

Štěchovice treasure story is ongoing in 2016 Josef Mužík once a bitter rival came on board with Helmut Gaensel.



Josef Mužík made the search a social media event.





By 2018 it appears that partnership run out of steam.

Kanacki

 

[KANACKI]

In 2019 A new stage in the search for Štěchovice treasure was recently announced by Bruce Mottl of the Dakota International Exploration Group based in Midland, South Dakota USA. DIEG, founded by Bruce Mottl, Britnee Wood, Helmut Gaensel, and Kyle Norman, is preparing to uncover the Štěchovice Treasure.

Mottl recently stated:“The key to our success was to focus on the facts, not myths or legends. The hard work and dedication of our team has led to the discovery of this long lost treasure”



Have they found the 1946 report giving better information on the alleged treasure location? Or it it just sales talk for another soap opera treasure hunt like oak island? Time will tell of course.

Kanacki

 

[deducer]

Very interesting thread. Thanks Kanacki, for putting all this information together.