rise-and-fall-of-the-third-reich-william-shirer-pdf

876 THE RISE AND FALL OF THE THIRD REICHand shipped along with other valuables snatched from the condemned Jewsto the Reichsbank, where under a secret agreement between Himmler and thebank’s president, Dr. Walther Funk, it was deposited to the credit of the S.S.in an account given the cover name of ”Max Heiliger.” This prize booty fromthe extermination camps included, besides gold from dentures, gold watches,earrings, bracelets, rings, necklaces and even spectacles frames – for the Jewshad been encouraged to bring all their valuables with them for the promised”resettlement.” There were also great stocks of jewelry, especially diamonds andmuch silverware. And there were great wads of banknotes.The Reichsbank, in fact, was overwhelmed by the ”Max Heiliger” deposits.With its vaults filled to overflowing as early as 1942, the bank’s profit-mindeddirectors sought to turn the holdings into cold cash by disposing of them throughthe municipal pawnshops. One letter from the Reichsbank to the Berlin municipalpawnshop dated September 15 speaks of a ”second shipment” and begins,”We submit to you the following valuables with the request for the best possibleutilization.” The list is long and itemized and includes 154 gold watches, 1,601gold earrings, 132 diamond rings, 784 silver pocket watches and ”160 diversedentures, partly of gold.” By the beginning of 1944 the Berlin pawnshop itselfwas overwhelmed by the flow of these stolen goods and informed the Reichsbankit could accept no more. When the Allies overran Germany they discovered insome abandoned salt mines, where the Nazis had hidden part of their recordsand booty, enough left over from the ”Max Heiliger” account to fill three hugevaults in the Frankfurt branch of the Reichsbank. 1214Did the bankers know the sources of these unique ”deposits”? The managerof the Precious Metals Department of the Reichsbank deposed at Nurembergthat he and his associates began to notice that many shipments came fromLublin and Auschwitz.We all knew that these places were the sites of concentration camps.It was in the tenth delivery in November, 1943, that dental goldappeared. The quantity of dental gold became unusually great. 1215At Nuremberg the notorious Oswald Pohl, chief of the Economic Office ofthe S.S., who handled the transactions for his organization, emphasized thatDr. Funk and the officials and directors of the Reichsbank knew very well theorigins of the goods they were trying to pawn. He explained in some detail ”thebusiness deal between Funk and the S.S. concerning the delivery of valuables ofdead Jews to the Reichsbank.” He remembered a conversation with the bank’svice-president, Dr. Emil Pohl.In this conversation no doubt remained that the objects to be delivered[came from] Jews who had been killed in concentration camps.The objects in question were rings, watches, eyeglasses, gold bars,wedding rings, brooches, pins, gold fillings and other valuables.Once, Pohl related, after an inspection tour through the vaults of the Reichsbankwhere the valuables ”from the dead Jews” were inspected, Dr. Funktendered the party a pleasant dinner in which the conversation turned aroundthe unique origins of the booty. 1216∗in the spring of 1943, some 336 had the gold yanked from their teeth. 1213∗ Dr. Funk was sentenced to life imprisonment at Nuremberg.