Hitler's Third Reich and World War II in the News is a daily edited review of WWII news, providing thought- provoking collection of hand-picked WW2 information.

Category: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures  -- See latest WWII news here. See also 'Collectors', 'Relics of nazi leaders', 'Nazi Memorabilia', Mein kampf, Fake Collectibles, Militaria.

Veteran has WW2 memorabilia stolen: M-1 Carbine used to defeat Axis
Thieves have stolen World War II veteran Vilas Walhood of his treasured memories. The thieves walked off with 20 WWII weapons that he collected while he served in the military. One of Walhood's most prized possessions was his WWII issue M-1 carbine. The thieves didn't steal the military medal he got from that battle, though they did take a one-of-a-kind flag from the 276th regiment - most likely used to wrap one of the stolen guns. "There's a special place in hell for men or anyone who would break into a man's house and steal those kinds of things," one veteran said.     [ turnto23 :: 2008-04-03 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

Rare World War II combat weapon paratroopers wore stolen
A rare World War II combat weapon was taken from a exhibit at the Washington County Historical Society's museum. Described as a combination knife/brass knuckles that paratroopers wore strapped to their legs as part of their combat kit. The knife is also known as the "1918 brass knuckle knife," but its correct identification is actually the US Mark I, according to Historical Society information.     [ gmtoday :: 2008-01-31 :: Weapons, Guns & bombs of WWII ]

Third WWII Maybach battle tank stolen in Bulgaria
The turret of a third Maybach tank from World War II had been stolen. The tank had been buried over 50 years ago in the region of Elhovo and served as a firing point. It is the third Maybach tank theft in Bulgaria. In Dec 2007, military counter-intelligence arrested a gang, who had stolen one WWII tank and tried to steal a second one. The Maybach produced the engines for the Panther and Tiger tank, highly valued by collectors. Tank-theft seems to be profitable as in mid-January 2008 3 men were captured from the Momina Tsurkva, after they sold parts of the turret of an unknown tank for scrap metal.     [ sofiaecho :: 2008-01-23 :: Vintage Military Vehicles (AFV) & Battle Tanks ]

$300,000 reward for info leading to the return of 9 Victoria Crosses
The biggest reward in New Zealand history has been put up for information resulting the return of the Waiouru Army Museum's stolen war medals. $300,000 reward was now on offer to anyone who gave tips about the missing military decorations, including 9 Victoria Crosses, 2 George Crosses and an Albert Medal -- won by some of the country's greatest war heroes. British medals collector Lord Michael Ashcroft and a NZ businessman have provided the money. "By golly, if $300,000 doesn't make someone talk about providing information about the return of these medals, I'm not sure what will," said Raymond Seymour, the museum director.     [ nzherald :: 2008-01-18 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

Relic hunters: For every diamond ring, there are hundreds of rusty nails
When you lose your ring, Dan Dawson is the one who may find it. He's a "hunter", hobbyist who listen to the earth through metal detector's earpieces. "It goes back to a childhood... finding that treasure." During the World War II, heavy metal detectors that ran on battery packs and vacuum tubes were used for locating mines. After the war surplus metal detectors were purchased by relic hunters. The oldest coin Scott Rosenke, another hunter, has found is an 1897 U.S. Indian-head cent. He found his first gold ring at Trout Lake. The best finds are reported to hunting websites. Serious relic hunters, like Chris Turner, have made a living out of discovering ancient relics.     [ vancouversun :: 2007-12-30 ]

Stolen World War II tank - Bulgarian army major, 2 Germans arrested
Bulgaria's police apprehended two Germans and a Bulgarian army major over stealing a vintage tank by Maybach. In November the group dug up the old German battle tank from the time of the World War II, put in the ground near the southern Bulgarian border in order to be used as a stationary gun. In December they attempted steal another buried up Maybach near the town of Yambol but the police stepped in. Military experts said there are few tanks of the same type in the world still outside the military museums and the thieves could gain a good profit by selling the machines to collectors.     [ iht :: 2007-12-19 ]

Medals stolen from NZ Army Museum may end up in private collection
Article no longer available from the original source.
9 Victoria Crosses, 2 George Crosses and other medals, worth £4M, were stolen from the Waiouru Army Museum during a break-in. The Army says the medals will have little resale value because any trader will know they're stolen. Ian McGibbon says there is an underground market for items such as the medals, notable for their rarity. The theft of medals is very awkward for the museum as the medals were mostly on loan. Defence Minister Phil Goff says the medals are national treasures as only 22 New Zealanders have been awarded Victoria Crosses. The stolen VC medals include those of Charles Upham, Keith Elliot, Jack Hinton and Clive Hulme.     [ radionz :: 2007-12-03 ]

Vintage guns, military uniforms stolen - $5000 offered for return
When guns and 50 U.S., Japanese and German uniforms were stolen from the Palmetto Storage building 35 years of collecting was put on hold. Roy Griffin is offering $5000 for the return of the vintage WWI and WWII military uniforms, guns and accessories. He has poured "every spare penny and extra cent I've had for 35 years" into the collection. "I have a military museum. I just don't have a building. I'm 45 years old. I wouldn't live long enough to do this again." The collection has been featured on Veteran's Day at Cleveland Mall in recent years, at Gateway Festival and in "every museum within 30-40 miles."     [ shelbystar :: 2007-11-01 ]

Senior killed over ceremonial Nazi daggers
Elderly great-grandmother Ann Zeidenberg was gagged, murdered and set ablaze by a thief who came to steal ceremonial Nazi daggers. Richard MacKenzie stole one ceremonial Nazi dagger when he had done some plumbing work at her home earlier. The accused sold the dagger and had a ready buyer for more. MacKenzie told others he wanted to steal the other daggers. Zeidenberg's family was disposing of the World War II militaria and memorabilia in a way that these items wouldn't end up in inappropriate people's hands.     [ canoe :: 2007-09-28 :: Nazi Daggers ]

General Patton ID stolen - Vintage heirloom valued around $20,000
In a plastic container on the top shelf of her closet, a woman had been keeping a piece of military history. But several days ago she realized that someone had come into her home and stolen the military id card the War Department issued to Gen. George S. Patton Jr. in 1941. She had recently been contacting auction houses to determine the value of the ID, however she never gave out her address. Letters of Patton's have been sold for $20,000, and the ID would probably be worth much more. Nicknamed "Old Blood and Guts" Patton was known for carrying pistols with ivory handles and regarded as one of the most successful U.S. field commanders.     [ journaltimes :: 2007-09-01 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

HMAS Sydney claim raises treasure hunt and relic hunters fears
There is concern international privateers and relic hunters will seek to profit from what is believed to be the wreck of the warship HMAS Sydney. A group of amateur researchers claim to have found the wreck off the coast of Western Australia, near Carnarvon. The Sydney was sunk off the WA coast during World War II, killing the entire crew of 645. "We've seen an appalling list of cases in the past 50 years where the finders of important shipwrecks have been treated badly and I don't think we have to have that repeated," said Philip Pendal.     [ abc :: 2007-08-13 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

Hundreds of WWII weapons, explosives found in home
An extensive search of a suspected drug dealer's home revealed hundreds of weapons, including a World War II-era machine gun, land mines, grenades and an 81 mm bomb shell. A further search of the house found 50 to 100 weapons and more than 200 potential explosive devices. David R. Plonowski was a collector of World War II "memorabilia." The weapons found also included rifles, among them an AK-47, as well as a grenade launcher and handguns.     [ newburyportnews :: 2007-04-12 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

Hitler painting by German forger Konrad Kujau for sale
Konrad Kujau fooled the world in the early 1980s by forging Adolf Hitler diaries. After being discredited by historians and implicated as the mastermind behind the hoax, he spent years in a prison. But the peddler of Nazi paraphernalia continued his career behind bars, copying paintings, including a number of paintings of Hitler. Those paintings have made it to Central Illinois and will be sold. The bidding will take place on gunbroker site, where a rare German gun that belonged to Hitler sold for about $140,000. Also being auctioned will be a ribbon dedicated to the crew of the German warship Graf Spree.     [ pantagraph :: 2006-10-18 :: Springtime for Hitler ]

A war memorabilia collection including Nazi medals stolen
A war memorabilia collection including distinctive Nazi medals have been stolen in Warwickshire. A silver German Mothers Cross, with distinctive Nazi symbols and given to women who bore six to seven children during World War II, was taken in the burglary on 24 August. Also taken were wound medals given German soldiers who were injured in combat along with cap badges from British and German soldiers.     [ bbc :: 2006-09-27 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

Nazi memorabilia Collectors push Führer to brink of extinction
A rare beetle named after Adolf Hitler is in danger of extinction because of its popularity as a neo-Nazi collector's item. The tiny, brown, eyeless beetle, Anophthalmus hitleri, was found in 1933 by Oscar Scheibel, a German entomologist and Hitler fan, and is found in only 15 caves. Now the "Hitler beetle" is so sought-after that it could disappear altogether, which would mean the demise of the only creature on the planet currently named after the Nazi dictator. Rochlingia hitleri, a flying insect fossil named after Hitler in 1934 was already extinct at its naming. Some thieves just want to cash in on the Nazi memorabilia market.     [ independent :: 2006-08-20 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

Zbiroh castle hides Nazi treasure - A persistent local rumour
Every week team abseils into a well of a Czech Zbiroh castle in search of a secret passage or the Nazi treasure. Around 60 metres down they discovered Nazi documents. A local rumour has it that the castle hides Nazi treasure. "We know from witnesses that a Nazi aircraft landed and large cases were unloaded and taken to the castle. We know that the last SS fled on foot without their uniforms and without taking anything. No one has found any trace of the cases and no one knows what was in them." Castle has a series of tunnels and secret passages but closed off behind cement by the Nazis. Some dream that the "amber room" could be stashed somewhere in labyrinth.     [ sawf :: 2006-07-18 :: Nazi gold & Hidden WWII treasures ]

France protects HMT Lancastria shipwreck from scuba looters
The French Government's decided to offer protection to the final resting place of over 3,000 British servicemen who died when the HMT Lancastria was sunk in World War Two. It was lending support to the war effort, helping to rescue the British Expeditionary Force from France, when she was attacked by german Luftwaffe aircrafts off St. Nazaire on 17 June 1940. At the time she was carrying several thousand troops and RAF personnel. The ship sank rapidly with heavy loss of life. So grievous was the disaster that news of the sinking was initially suppressed by the wartime Cabinet.     [ cdnn :: 2006-06-26 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

Relic from a sunken World War II German submarine
Earl King was unaware a relic he retrieved from a sunken World War II German submarine may be an object of interest to the German government and could have a value in the thousands. He managed to recover a gyrocompass from the sunken hull of a German U-58 submarine in a dive off Block Island on July 4, 1973. He did not disclose an exact amount, but said the gyrocompass is a rare object and would have "high value" to the German government, which would want to place the gyroscope in a museum. Under salvage ownership laws King probably has ownership right now, but German officials might see things otherwise.     [ townonline :: 2006-05-27 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

Ghouls loot war graves and battlefields for medals, helmets
Thieves are looting graves of German soldiers killed in World War II and selling body parts on the internet. The ghouls are digging up Russian battlefields where many of the two million dead are buried in hope of a military memorabilia. And a sinister black market has grown on US auction websites for uniforms, medals, bones and even helmets with the skulls still inside.     [ dailyrecord :: 2006-05-26 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

Antique weapons of historical value will likely be destroyed
Scott Conley was just doing what his mother told him when he brought two rusty old rifles to the Police Department's gun exchange program. One of the guns was a Japanese rifle used during World War II, replete with the emperor's flowery seal and a stamp from the Tokyo Arsenal. Conley's rifle was one of the several antique guns received during the buyback program. The oldest firearm officers received dated back to 1884. The Springfield model was probably made during the westward expansion. Despite concerns expressed by officers about the historical value of the antique weapons, Bradenton Police Chief said the guns will likely be destroyed.     [ bradenton :: 2006-05-16 :: World War II Memorabilia ]

Thieves strike war relics site -- life-size models of fighter planes
Thieves have stolen life-size models of fighter planes that formed part of a unique Territory war memorial. They formed part of a memorial commemorating the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II. The Strauss airstrip was used by American and British aircraft during the war. The aluminium cut-outs are of a P40 Kittyhawk, Spitfire Mark VC and Spitfire Mark VIII. It is one of the last surviving WW II fighter installations in northern Australia. The Strauss airstrip was built in 1942 in response to the threat of a Japanese invasion.     [ news-au :: 2006-05-14 :: Military Scale Model: Aircrafts, Vehicles ]

Military men arrested after treasure hunt of WWII gold
A new rush for gold and other treasures believed to have been left behind by Japanese soldiers during World War Two has led to the arrest of a retired air chief marshal and two captains. But more than 10 people fled into the jungle and escaped capture. Police seized a four-wheel-drive vehicle and digging tools as evidence, and found that wide areas of the mountain had been excavated. The area has long attracted Second World War treasure hunters because there are several caves, some of which house monasteries. Local villagers told someone found three gold bars in a cave about 10 years ago.     [ bangkokpost :: 2006-05-13 :: Nazi gold & Hidden WWII treasures ]

U.S. veteran scours Okinawa's caves for relics of bloody 1945 conflict
For the past 21 years, Ron Fuller has been digging into the past. His mission is to find remains of Japanese victims who perished in the fierce Battle of Okinawa. But the relics are not keepsakes. Here in the deep caves, where Imperial Japanese Army soldiers and Okinawan civilians fled for their lives, Fuller tries to imagine what they thought and felt during those frantic last moments. The so-called Typhoon of Steel raged across the island for 3 months. About 200,000 Japanese were killed. Many of them were terrified civilians who committed group suicide in caves rather than be taken prisoner by U.S. soldiers.     [ asahi :: 2006-02-28 :: RIP (remains of soldiers) ]

The bone collectors: The search for lost heroes of WWII
The bodies of some of the thousands of allied airmen shot down in Germany during the Second World War have been recovered thanks to the extraordinary work of Uwe Benkel and his team. Since 1989, he and the 14 other voluntary and unpaid members of his Research Group for the Missing have recovered the remains of 80 British, American and German wartime aircraft shot down during the Second World War and recovered the bodies of 28 pilots listed as missing. The fate of US Air Force Lieutentant Ronald Potter is typical of the estimated 15,000 to 20,000 pilots shot down over Germany.     [ independent :: 2006-01-16 :: Relic Hunters: Hidden Nazi & War treasures ]

12in Silver cup - The Nazi war relic is locked in a vault
A valuable chalice once owned by one of Hitler's henchmen is hidden in a safe in Scotland. The Nazi war relic is locked in a vault at the Royal Bank of Scotland's HQ in Edinburgh. The antique's owner, Derick Smith, was given the chalice by a British soldier who found it in Hermann Goering's home after WWII. Now he is planning to sell the relic - which experts believe could fetch £2million - if he can find a buyer.     [ DailyRecord :: 2005-11-01 :: Nazi Relics: Personal items of leaders ]

The hunt for Nazi gold - Toplitzsee lake
The search for gold stolen by the Nazis has resulted in a stream of films, books and treasure hunters. Now German television has produced a new documentary about the search for the hidden treasures of Hitler's Third Reich. A word to treasure hunters: forget about it - at least if you're scouring Toplitzsee lake. This is the message from German biologist, Professor Hans Fricke, the man who more by chance led the underwater research of the 107-metre deep lake in the Austrian Alps. Originally setting out to discover biological secrets of the unique lake, the professor instead got caught up in the mystery about vast sums of Nazi Germany's hidden gold.     [ expatica :: 2003-08-13 :: Lake Toplitz - Sunk Nazi Gold ]

Gold rush follows Nazi grail in a Bavarian lake
A gold urn made for a Nazi party leader has been discovered in a Bavarian lake, prompting a scramble by treasure hunters to get their hands on the Third Reich's long-lost riches. The gold urn is decorated with Celtic figures and worth £70,000. The upper Bavarian Walchensee is said to contain £200m in gold bars. In the Seetalsee across the border in Austria a further £500m in ingots is said to repose in a watery grave. Chalices, diamonds and gold looted from churches are said to lie in the Grundlsee. Most famous is Lake Toplitz. In 1945 it was as remote as the moon. And with secrets to keep, that was just what the Nazis were looking for.     [ scotsman :: 2002-10-13 :: Lake Toplitz - Sunk Nazi Gold ]

Germany turns the relics of its Nazi past over to tourism
Lately many sites of importance in the Third Reich have become tourist magnets. In Ravensbruck, 8 of the 23 former SS guardhouses will be converted to cater. Thousands of people traipsed through a museum carved in the air-raid tunnels of the mountain at Berchtesgaden where Hitler had his summer residence Eagle's Nest. In the forests of Karinhall, the country seat of Hermann Goering, amateur treasure hunters rake the ground each weekend for lost artefacts. For every foot of building above ground in Berlin, there are three below; secret tunnels and bunkers begun when Hitler came to power in 1933.     [ telegraph :: 2001-02-11 :: Ruins & Bunkers of Third Reich ]

Nazi-hunters mount search for lost loot
A team of US divers is to search a lake in Austria for boxes of gold and art objects stolen by Nazis. It is believed that Lake Toplitz, could also hide boxes of forged money and documents intended to help Nazis escape to South America. The documents, experts believe, could also reveal how assets seized by the Third Reich were deposited in Swiss banks; show how the Vatican aided in the transfer of funds to South America. It might also be revealed just how the SS planned, in Operation Bernhard, to counterfeit billions of fake pounds sterling for dropping over Britain, in an attempt to destabilise the British economy.     [ divernet :: 2000-08-13 :: Lake Toplitz - Sunk Nazi Gold ]

See also

'Collectors'

'Relics of nazi leaders'

'Nazi Memorabilia'

Mein kampf

Fake Collectibles, Militaria.

What's new - recent & interesting categories.

Although the articles linked from Adolf Hitler's Third Reich 1933-1945 and World War II in the News are reviewed and specially selected, they do not necessarily represent the views of the editor, who is not responsible for the content of any external sites. This service is © Joni Nuutinen 2005-2008. All rights reserved.