Albums could hold key to Nazi art
Published on: 02-Nov-2007
Detail of the paintings looted by the Nazis during the Second World War may be held within the covers of two battered old leather albums.The albums, donated to the National Archives and Records Administration in the US, contain a compilation of artwork ransacked on behalf of Hitler.
They were found in the attic of the family of a US soldier based in Germany at the end of the war and acquired by Robert Edsel, president of an art foundation, for an undisclosed sum.
Mr Edsel said the soldier had taken them from Hitler's home as a war souvenir.
Allen Weinstein, archivist of the US, said: "This material is one of the most significant finds related to Hitler's premeditated theft of art and other cultural treasures to be found since the Nuremberg trials."
He went on to say the documents would play a role in "helping victims recover their treasures".
The Third Reich, through a unit called the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg, created nearly 100 albums cataloguing pillaged collections.
Hitler would then cherry-pick the ones he wanted for the Fuhrer's Art Museum in Linz, Austria.
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