OMMEREN, The Netherlands — In the spring of 1945, a couple of weeks before the liberation of the Netherlands from the Nazis, five German soldiers buried four ammunition boxes full of gold, jewelry and watches in a wooded part of a Dutch village.
Nazi soldiers had taken the valuables, which could be worth millions of dollars, from the street after they were shot from a bank vault during an explosion in the city of Arnhem in the summer of 1944, documents show.
Helmut Sonder, another soldier, lay in the bushes with a battle wound, watching the scene. Later, drew a map showing exactly where (next to three poplars) and how deep (between 52 and 70 centimeters) the treasure had been buried.
The document ended up in the Dutch National Archives in The Hague. Last month, it was released along with thousands of documents that are no longer classified.
The map’s release has prompted a renewed search for the boxes and raised the profile of Ommeren — population 751 — as one of the few places in the world where known Nazi treasure could be hidden.
“We are on the map,” said Klaas Tammes, former Mayor of the Municipality that includes Ommeren. “That’s been nice.”
Others share his enthusiasm but express frustration at people coming from all over the country to dig in the town, which is about an hour’s drive from Amsterdam.
It’s not entirely clear what would happen to the treasure if someone found it.
Searching for the treasure could be dangerous, said Sebastiaan Hoogenberg, an amateur metal detectorist. There are unexploded bombs from the World War II era on the ground.
On its website, the municipality of Ommeren urged fortune seekers to stay away because digging for treasure is not allowed. About five people have requested permission to search for the treasure, a spokeswoman for the municipality said.
Rumors of the treasure started among Dutch soldiers stationed in Germany in 1946, according to documents in the National Archives. A government institution in charge of stolen goods learned of the treasure in late 1946 and ordered searches.
After two failed attempts, the agency brought Sonder from Germany in the summer of 1947 to pinpoint the location, the documents show.
They found nothing. After a fourth and final attempt, in August 1947, officials concluded that the treasure was probably no longer there.
Ommeren residents said they had never heard of the treasure.
“We found this map by chance,” said Annet Waalkens, a researcher at the National Archives. “When we saw this, we had already found our own treasure.”
By: Claire Moses
BBC-NEWS-SRC: http://www.nytsyn.com/subscribed/stories/6554379, IMPORTING DATE: 2023-02-01 20:10:07
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