FORMER CONCENTRATION CAMP INMATE CLAIMS HALF OF AUSTRIA'S GOLD

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP70-00058R000100040061-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 21, 1998
• Sequence Number: 61
• Publication Date: October 11, 1954
• Content Type: NSPR

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The 1R bb Iero,Ajproved For Release : CIA-RDP70-00058R0001000400 ~
Former Concentration Camp Inmate
Claims Half of Austria's Gold CPYRGHT
By EDWARD J. Bg NG
Arid the U._S. Army will figure
clean-shaven, broad - shouldered,
32-year-old Herzog turned over the
treasure 4o representatives of the
Lieut. Gen. Geoffrey Keyes, then
deputy commander-in-chief of
the.gold hoard on to Dr. Leopold
THla origin of Herzog's claim
o were
taken to Berlin.
In April, 1945, in a last desperate
attempt to prevent the collapse of
his regime, Hitler decided to con-
centrate the remnants of his shat.
tered armies for a last stand in
the mountains of western Austria.
To provide a war_ chest for the
stronghold Nazi Foreign Min-
ister Joachim von Ribbentrop,
hanged as a war criminal a year
later, transferred 81 sacks of the
Italian gold from Berlin to Aus-
tria's Salzburg area. He assigned
Councilors of Legation Franz von
Sonnleithner and Berndt Gott-
friedsen to find a suitable hiding-
place for the gold.
The two men consulted Joseph
Krennwallner, Nazi political boss
of the Salzburg region. Krenn-
wallner called in Aloysius Ziller,
his local representative in the vil-
lage of Hintersee near Salzburg,
and ordered him to help the two
Nazi diplomats hide the treasure.
During the night of April 29-30,
1945, German military trucks
brought the money to Zilter's
farm at Hintersee. Ribbentrop's
emissaries and a few picked mem-
bers of the Nazi military police
buried the gold in a pit in Ziller's
barn.
A few days later, the American
forces overran the German army
units in Austria.
J IBERATED from the n o t o r i-
ous Nazi concentration camp
of Buchenwald, Viennese Herbert
Herzog returned to Austria in
search of his widowed mother.
In Gastein, west Austrian health
resort, he met Gottfriedsen, whom
he had known for many years.
The diplomat, altho anti-Nazi at
heart, expected to be arrested as
a former Nazi official. He re-
vealed the hiding place of the
Ribbentrop treasure to Herzog
and made him promise to pass
it on to the newly constituted
Republic of Austria.
A few days later Gottfriedsen
was arrested, and Mr. Herzog set
about carrying out his patriotic
assignment. In Salzburg, repre-
sentatives of the new Austrian
government informed him that ex-
ecutive power in western Austria
rested at the moment with the
American military authorities.
Mr. Herzog promptly called on
the latter.
On June 17, 1945, officers of
the U. S. counter-intelligence
corps, accompanied by Mr. Her-
zog and Berndt Gottfriedsen, who
had been located in a detention
camp, drove to the. Ziller farm.
Sack after sack of gold coins was
pulled out of the pit. The sacks
still bore the original seals of the
Bank of Italy. . 11
In Salsburg, o February 19,
1947, the AmerlgoUs hanaeu over
the five tons of old to.Chancellor
Dr. Leopold F -Mr. He zog
then asked _thtrian author
ities to pay him a deY's reward.
He claims that wherever he went
he met with either silence or
procrastination. -
a * *fi"
JN Septerhber-, 1952 Herzog joined
forces with tle National Bank
of' Italy when the bank-stepp
trian National Bank N r ?jestit
tion of the gold.
The return to Italy of the "Rib-
bentrop," or rather "Mussolini
Treasure," might have led to the
collapse of the Austrian economy.
Therefore, last spring, after re-
peated adjournments of the case
labeled "National Bank of Italy
versus National Bank of Aus-
tria" on the calendar of the Vien-
na court, international diplomacy
intervened in this matter of vital
significance for Austria.
To save the country from eco-
nomic disaster, the International
Gold Pool in Brussels deciaea that
the gold was to remain in Vienna,
as partial compensation for the
removal of Austria's own gold
reserves by the Nazis in 1938.
However, the time has not yet
come when the men responsible
for Ausiria's finances can heave
a sigh of relief. Mr. Herzog now
is suing the ? Austrian National
Bank for his finder's reward. His
case- is scheduled for trial this
fall in Vienna.-
Sanitized - Approved For Release : CIA-RDP70-00058R000100040061-9