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| Registry Number: CCG 180/2302. Pictures and art objects - Czechoslovakia.Correspondence between the Reparations, Deliveries and Restitutions [RDR] Division of Land Schleswig-Holstein and its headquarters regarding their search for looted Czech property which decorated the war-time residences of SS Obergruppenfuehrer Reinhard Heydrich [Chief of the Gestapo and Deputy Reichsprotektor for Bohemia and Moravia until his assassination in 1942] and his wife, dated January 1948-May 1949. Includes reports of the RDR Schleswig-Holstein on their 'extensive enquiries' into the case, with details of their unsuccessful interrogations of Frau Heydrich and search of her home, which led the RDR to file the claim in May 1949. Includes a summary of Mrs Heydrich's interrogation: 'Mr and Mrs Heydrich were first accommodated in a wing at Hradschin Castle, which also housed Herr Hacha and staff of the Czech Ministry. In March 1942 arrangements were made to take over a summer residence in Yungfeinbraschen [sic] near Prague from Herr Neurath, but shortly afterwards Herr Heydrich was assassinated. Being a war widow, this residence was then given to Frau Heydrich as a permanent home and she decided to transfer all her property from Berlin to Yungfeinbraschen. [...] Some time later she was approached by the office of Prof Swoboda, Prague University [now believed to be living in Vienna] and asked to take over Custodianship, until the end of the war, of several objects of Fine Art which came from the Chatteau-Konopitscht [sic]. [...] The items received were listed and valued at approximately RM 80,000 and several copies were made of the inventory which were signed by Frau Heydrich. [...] In the meantime, refugees arrived in the district from Berlin and other bombed out cities and five families were billeted in the summer residence. Instructions were received in April 1945 to prepare immediately to vacate the area [...]. Only one lorry was provided for the whole household [...]. She states that she left with only a few small travelling cases and children's bedding. These people arrived in Tegernsee where they were interrogated and their belongings searched by American troops. There was no time to hand the home over to anybody, but Karl Hermann Frank [Successor to Herr Heydrich] said everything would be taken care of, and the Czech staff was left in possession. She learned that the district was shortly afterwards taken by the Russian Army but she has had no further news since. She arrived in Burg-Fehmarn in September 1945 and found her island residence had already been taken over by the British Military. She went to live with her parents and shortly afterwards the home was searched and she was questioned by the Military. [...] She has been under constant observation by the British and German authorities since her arrival'.Earlier correspondence between the RDR branches in Kiel, the headquarters in Detmold and the Czech RDR Mission requesting the interrogation of Mrs Heydrich, at the time resident on the island of Fehmarn in the Baltic Sea within the British Zone, dated February-March 1949. States that 'according to our information from Prague, the flat of R Heydrich, the Gestapo Chief, and the Reichsprotektor of occupied Czechoslovakia, was well supplied by pictures and other works of art from confiscated Jewish property, mostly from the stores in Panenské Brezany [Yungfernbreschan in German]. There is therefore a great probability that the widow of R Heydrich moved with a part of the looted property to Germany. [...] We would like to add, for your information, that R Heydrich was not just a 'Government official'. He was a high Gestapo officer, second only to Himmler and his death he met in Prague was revenged by execution of 2,000 Czechs and burning down of two villages, Lidice and Lezáki'.Earlier correspondence from the RDR headquarters to the Czech RDR Mission informing them of the impossibility of retrieving the paintings and other property looted from Czechoslovakia, 'as no details regarding the present whereabouts have come to light' and suspending any action on this claim, dated February-July 1948. Includes correspondence between the RDR and the MFA and A branch in Buende asking the latter to identify any of the items recorded in the lists provided by the Czech RDR Mission.Letter from the Czech RDR Mission to the RDR division in Bad Salzuflen regarding the search for a large number of paintings and art objects looted from Czechoslovakia, dated January 1948. Enclosed are several copies of five lists [in Czech and German] of 'paintings and art objects which were confiscated in occupied Czechoslovakia and removed to unknown places in Germany'. Lists no 1, 2 and 4 include almost 200 'paintings and art objects looted during the occupation of the Czechoslovak Republic by the Central Office for the Regulation of the Jewish Question in Bohemia and Moravia', with details of their subject, artist and estimated price. List no 3 describes 81 paintings, furniture and objects looted by several German agencies, including the Zentralamt fuer die Regelung der Judenfrage, the Bodenamt and the ERR, and transported 'to unknown places in Germany', with details of their subject, artist and estimated price. List no 5 describes 609 paintings and art objects looted by the so-called Vermoegensamt of the German protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia and by the Gestapo with details of their subject, author and estimated price.Letter from the RDR Mission to the RDR division in Detmold asking for advice on how to proceed to the retrieval of these objects, 'as there is no possibility of submitting a restitution claim for objects of unknown location', dated December 1947. |
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