known as the “C.G.R.,” that Lieutenant Colonel Vorenkamp was scheduled
to reach Amsterdam at noon on the day following my arrival, so the next
morning I went to the headquarters of the commission to deliver Major
La Farge’s message. The commission occupied the stately old Goudstikker
house on the Heerengracht. Before the war, Goudstikker had been a great
Dutch art dealer. In the galleries of this house had been held many
fine exhibitions of Dutch painting. During the German Occupation of the
Netherlands, an unscrupulous Nazi named Miedl had “acquired” the entire
Goudstikker stock from the dealer’s widow. We had found many of the
Goudstikker pictures at Alt Aussee and in the Göring collection.
Bancel had told me to ask for Captain Robert de Vries. I was informed
that the captain was in London. In his stead Nicolaes Vroom, his
scholarly young deputy, received me. He had had no word of Colonel
Vorenkamp’s impending arrival. Vroom transmitted the message immediately
to Jonkheer Roel, director of the Rijksmuseum. Twenty minutes later,
this distinguished gentleman appeared in Vroom’s office. With him were
Lieutenant Colonel H. Polis and Captain ter Meer, both of whom were
attached to the C.G.R. They were delighted to know about the plane which
I told them was due at Schiphol Airport. Telephonic connections with
Munich had not yet been re-established. They had to depend on the USFET
Mission at The Hague for transmission of all messages from the American
Zone. It often took days for a telegram to get through.
There was barely time enough to telephone for a truck to meet the plane.
Also Mr. van Haagen, Permanent Secretary of Education and Science,
must be notified at once. I was told that he would accompany us to the
airport. In another hour we were all on our way to Schiphol.
We waited two hours at the field and still no sign of the plane from
Munich. The weather was fine at the airport, but there were reports of
heavy fog to the south. At two o’clock we returned to Amsterdam and
lunched at the Dutch officers’ mess. My hosts apologized for the food.
They said that they no longer received British Army rations. The menu
was prepared from civilian supplies. It was a Spartan diet—cheese, bread
and jam, and weak coffee. But they shared it so hospitably that only a
graceless guest would have complained of the lack of variety. Captain ter
Meer said that it was more palatable than the tulip bulbs he had lived on
the winter before.
After lunch, Cassidy and I drove to the USFET Mission at The Hague.
Colonel Ira W. Black, Chief of the Mission, arranged for me to see the
American ambassador. The temporary offices of our embassy were located in
a tall brick building on the edge of the city.
I presented Colonel Biddle’s letter to Mr. Stanley Hornbeck, the
ambassador, who looked more like a successful businessman than a
diplomat. He frowned as he read, and when he had finished, said gruffly,
“Commander, Tony Biddle is a charming fellow and I am very fond of him.
I’d like to be obliging, but we’ve had too damn many celebrations and
ceremonies in this country already. We need more hard work instead of
more holidays. It’s very nice about the pictures coming back, but steel
mills and machinery would be a lot more welcome.”
I hadn’t expected this reaction and, having had little experience with
ambassadors—irascible or otherwise—I hardly knew what to say. After an
embarrassing pause, I ventured the remark that a very simple ceremony
would be enough.
After his first outburst, the ambassador relented to the extent of saying
he’d think it over. As I left his office, he called after me, “My bark’s
worse than my bite.”
On my way back to Amsterdam, I concluded unhappily that as a diplomatic
errand boy I was a washout. I’d better go back to loading trucks.
When I reached the hotel I found a message that the plane with Vorenkamp
and the pictures had arrived. I met Phonse the following morning at
the Goudstikker house. He introduced me to Lieutenant Hans Jaffé, a
Dutch Monuments officer, who bore a striking resemblance to Robert
Louis Stevenson. Several weeks later Jaffé was chosen as the Dutch
representative for the Western District of the American Zone. His work
at Seventh Army Headquarters in Heidelberg was comparable to that of
Vorenkamp’s in Munich. He was intelligent and industrious. During the
next few months he was as successful in his investigations of looted
Dutch art works as Phonse was in Bavaria. Jaffé didn’t reap so rich a
harvest, but that was only because there was less loot in his territory.
He and Phonse took me to the Rijksmuseum where the twenty-six paintings
from Munich were being unpacked. They were a hand-picked group consisting
mainly of seventeenth century Dutch masters, which included four
Rembrandts. One of the Rembrandts was the _Still Life with Dead Peacocks_
which Lamont and I had taken out of the mine at Alt Aussee. There was
a twenty-seventh picture: it was the fraudulent Vermeer of the Göring
collection. Phonse had brought it back to be used as evidence against its
author, the notorious Van Meegeren.
The Rijksmuseum was holding a magnificent exhibition, appropriately
entitled “The Return of the Old Masters.” Among the one hundred and forty
masterpieces, which had been stored in underground shelters for the
past five years, were six Vermeers, nine paintings by Frans Hals, and
seventeen Rembrandts, including the famous _Night Watch_.
That evening Phonse took Cassidy and me to the country place occupied
by the officers of the C.G.R. It was called “Oud Bussum” and was near
Naarden, about fifteen miles from Amsterdam. The luxurious house had been
the property of a well known Dutch collaborator. Many high-ranking Nazis
had been entertained there. As a mark of special favor I was given the
suite which had been used by Göring.
At dinner I sat between Colonel W. C. Posthumus-Meyjes, Chief of the
Restitution Commission, and Phonse Vorenkamp. The colonel, to the
regret of his associates, was soon to relinquish his duties in order to
accept an important diplomatic post in Canada. Toward the end of the
meal, Phonse asked me how I had made out with the ambassador. I gave a
noncommittal reply. He looked at me shrewdly through his steel-rimmed
spectacles and said, “We would not expect your ambassador to arrange a
ceremony. That is for us to do. It is for us to express our gratitude to
General Eisenhower.”
(Phonse was as good as his word. A few weeks later, officials of the
Netherlands Government arranged a luncheon in one of the rooms of the
Rijksmuseum. It was the first affair of its kind in the history of
the museum. Only the simplest food was served, but the table was set
with rare old silver, porcelain and glass. Colonel Kluss and Bancel
represented USFET Headquarters. I was told that no one enjoyed himself
more than the American ambassador.)
The next morning Phonse suggested that I return with him in the plane. He
had it entirely to himself except for the empty packing cases which he
was taking back to Munich. He said that the slight detour to Frankfurt
could be easily arranged. So I sent Cassidy back in the jeep and at noon
Phonse and I—sole occupants of the C-47 which had been chartered in the
name of General Eisenhower—took off from Schiphol Airport. An hour and
twenty minutes later we landed at Frankfurt.
Before the end of October, a token restitution was made to
Czechoslovakia. The objects chosen were the famous fourteenth century
Hohenfurth altarpiece and the collections of the Army Museum at Prague.
Both had been stolen by the Nazis. The altarpiece, evacuated from the Alt
Aussee mine, was now at the Central Collecting Point in Munich. The Army
Museum collections were stored at Schloss Banz, near Bamberg. Lieutenant
Colonel František Vrečko and Captain Egon Suk, as representatives of
the Czech Government, were invited to USFET Headquarters. We arranged
for them to proceed from there to Schloss Banz, where they were met by
Lieutenant Walter Horn. I have mentioned Horn before as the Monuments
officer whose remarkable sleuthing resulted in recovery of the five
pieces of the coronation regalia at Nürnberg. While the Czech officers
were en route, we directed Captain Rae at Third Army to arrange for the
delivery of the Hohenfurth panels to Schloss Banz. Captain Rae, in turn,
designated Lieutenant Commander Coulter to transport them from Munich.
(Both Ham Coulter and I had received our additional half-stripe earlier
in the month.) This joint operation was carried out successfully and,
in succeeding months, restitution to Czechoslovakia became a matter of
routine shipments at regular intervals.
Also before the end of October, we became involved again in the
complicated problem of the Veit Stoss altarpiece. Major Charles
Estreicher was selected as the Polish representative. The major spent
several days at our office in Höchst studying our files for additional
data on Polish loot in the American Zone before continuing to Munich and
Nürnberg. Because of the condition of the roads, the actual return of the
altarpiece as a token restitution to Poland was delayed until the early
spring.
While we were in the midst of these negotiations Bancel conferred with
Colonel Hayden Smith at USFET headquarters in Frankfurt on the subject
of the proposed removal of German-owned works of art to the United
States. Colonel Smith was Chief of Staff to Major General C. L. Adcock,
Deputy Director of the office of military government, U. S. Zone. Bancel
impressed upon the colonel the practical difficulties involved and
stressed the _technical_, not the moral objections to shipping valuable
works of art to America. As a result of this conference the colonel asked
Bancel to prepare a memorandum on the subject for submission to his chief.
The finished memorandum which Edith and I helped Bancel prepare followed
the general pattern of a staff study—a statement of the “problem” with
specific suggestions relating to its solution. It contained an eloquent
plea for the importation of additional MFA&A personnel to assume
responsibility for the project and called attention to acute shortages
in packing materials and transportation facilities. It also pointed out
that the advisability of moving fragile objects across the ocean would be
balanced against the advantages of leaving them in the Central Collecting
Points, all three of which had been made weatherproof months before and
were now provided with sufficient coal to prevent deterioration of the
objects during the winter months.
Nothing came of our recommendations. Within two weeks, Colonel Harry
McBride, administrator of the National Gallery in Washington, arrived
in Berlin to expedite the first shipment. He flew down to Frankfurt two
days later to discuss ways and means with Major La Farge. We learned
from him that General Clay’s recommendation for immediate removal had
been approved by the highest national authority. The General was now
in Washington. The futility of protest was obvious. Bancel told the
colonel that our Monuments officers were strongly opposed to the project.
He said that some of them might request transfer rather than comply
with the order. The colonel replied that such requests would, in all
probability, be refused. The only other alternative—open defiance of the
order—could have but one consequence, a court-martial. And, assuming
that our officers elected to face court-martial, what would be gained?
Nothing, according to the colonel; the order would still be carried out.
If trained MFA&A personnel were not available, then the work would have
to be done by such officers and men as might be obtainable, experienced
or not. Bancel realized that his primary duty was the “protection and
salvage” of art works. If he deliberately left them at the mercy of
whatever troops might be available to do the packing, then he would be
guilty of dereliction of duty. This interpretation afforded him some
consolation.
As Bancel had predicted, our Monuments officers lost no time in
registering their disapproval. They expressed their sentiments as
follows:
U. S. FORCES, EUROPEAN THEATER[4] GERMANY
7 November 1945
1. We, the undersigned Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives
Specialist Officers of the Armed Forces of the United States,
wish to make known our convictions regarding the transportation
to the United States of works of art, the property of German
institutions or nationals, for purposes of protective custody.
2. a. We are unanimously agreed that the transportation of
those works of art, undertaken by the United States Army, upon
direction from the highest national authority, establishes a
precedent which is neither morally tenable nor trustworthy.
b. Since the beginning of United States participation in the
war, it has been the declared policy of the Allied Forces, so
far as military necessity would permit, to protect and preserve
from deterioration consequent upon the processes of war, all
monuments, documents, or other objects of historic, artistic,
cultural, or archaeological value. The war is at an end and no
doctrine of “military necessity” can now be invoked for the
further protection of the objects to be moved, for the reason
that depots and personnel, both fully competent for their
protection, have been inaugurated and are functioning.
c. The Allied nations are at present preparing to prosecute
individuals for the crime of sequestering, under pretext of
“protective custody,” the cultural treasures of German-occupied
countries. A major part of the indictment follows upon the
reasoning that even though these individuals were acting under
military orders, the dictates of a higher ethical law made it
incumbent upon them to refuse to take part in, or countenance,
the fulfillment of these orders. We, the undersigned, feel it
our duty to point out that, though as members of the armed
forces, we will carry out the orders we receive, we are thus
put before any candid eyes as no less culpable than those whose
prosecution we affect to sanction.
3. We wish to state that from our own knowledge, no historical
grievance will rankle so long, or be the cause of so much
justified bitterness, as the removal, for any reason, of a
part of the heritage of any nation, even if that heritage be
interpreted as a prize of war. And though this removal may be
done with every intention of altruism, we are none the less
convinced that it is our duty, individually and collectively,
to protest against it, and that though our obligations are to
the nation to which we owe allegiance, there are yet further
obligations to common justice, decency, and the establishment
of the power of right, not might, among civilized nations.
This document was drafted and signed by a small group of Monuments
officers at the Central Collecting Point in Wiesbaden. Before being
submitted to Major La Farge for whatever action he deemed appropriate,
it was signed by twenty-four of the thirty-two Monuments officers in the
American Zone. The remaining eight chose either to submit individual
letters expressing similar views, or orally to express like sentiments.
The document came to be known as the “Wiesbaden Manifesto.” Army
regulations forbade the publication of such a statement; hence its
submission to Major La Farge as Chief of the MFA&A Section.
Further protests against the policy which prompted the Wiesbaden
Manifesto appeared in the United States a few months later. The action
of our Government was sharply criticized and vigorously defended in the
press. Letters to and from the State Department and a petition submitted
to the President concerning the issue appear in the Appendix to this book.
Preparations for the shipment—appropriately nicknamed “Westward Ho”—took
precedence over all other activities of the MFA&A office during the
next three weeks. Its size was determined soon after Colonel McBride’s
arrival. General Clay cabled from Washington requesting this information
and the shipping date. After hastily consulting us, our Berlin office
replied that two hundred paintings could be made ready for removal within
ten days.
The next problem was to decide how the selection was to be made. Should
the pictures be chosen from the three Central Collecting Points—Munich,
Wiesbaden and Marburg? Time was short. It would be preferable to take
them from one depot. Wiesbaden was decided upon. Quality had been
stressed. The best of the Kaiser Friedrich Museum pictures were at
Wiesbaden.
The decision to confine the selection to the one Central Collecting
Point had the additional advantage of avoiding the disruption of MFA&A
work at the other two depots, Munich and Marburg. Craig Smyth had long
been apprehensive about “Westward Ho,” feeling that any incursion on the
Bavarian State Collections would be disastrous to his organization at the
Munich Collecting Point. He said that his entire staff of non-Nazi museum
specialists would walk out. This would seriously impede the restitution
program in the Eastern Military District.
So far as Marburg was concerned, I had been in the office the day Bancel
told Walker Hancock of the decision to take German-owned works of art to
America. Walker looked at Bancel as though he hadn’t understood him. Then
he said simply, “In that case I can’t go back to Marburg. Everything that
we were able to accomplish was possible because I had the confidence of
certain people. I can’t go back and tell them that I have betrayed them.”
And he hadn’t gone back to Marburg. Instead he went to Heidelberg for
two days without telling anyone where he was going. When he finally
returned, it was only to close up his work at Marburg, in the course of
which he undertook to explain as best he could to Professor Hamann, the
distinguished old German scholar with whom he had been associated, the
decision concerning the removal of the pictures. “I quoted the official
statement,” Walker said, “about the paintings being held in trust for the
German people and added that there was no reason to doubt it. Very slowly
he said, ‘If they take our old art, we must try to create a fine new
art.’ Then, after a long pause, he added,’I never thought they would take
them.’”
Once it had been decided to limit selection of the paintings to the
Wiesbaden Collecting Point, there arose the question of appointing an
officer properly qualified to handle the job. It called for speed,
discrimination and an expert knowledge of packing. There was a ten-day
deadline to be met. Two hundred pictures had to be chosen. And the
packing would have to be done with meticulous care. We considered
the possibilities. Captain Walter Farmer couldn’t be spared from his
duties as director of the Collecting Point. Lieutenant Samuel Ratensky,
Monuments officer for Greater Hesse, was an architect, not a museum man.
Captain Joseph Kelleher was one of our ablest officers; but he was just
out of the hospital where he had been laid up for three months with a
broken hip. The doctor had released him on condition that he be given
easy assignments for the next few weeks.
At this critical juncture, Lamont Moore telephoned from Munich. He and
Steve had just completed the evacuation of the mine at Alt Aussee. Lamont
said that they were coming up to Frankfurt. Steve had enough points to
go home—enough and to spare. Lamont thought he’d take some leave. Bancel
signaled from the opposite desk. I told Lamont to forget about the leave;
that we had a job for him. Bancel sighed with relief. Lamont’s was a
different kind of sigh.
Lamont’s arrival was providential. Aside from his obvious qualifications
for the Wiesbaden assignment, he and Colonel McBride were old friends
from the National Gallery where, as I have mentioned before, Lamont had
been director of the educational program. The colonel was content to
leave everything in his hands. Lamont and I spent an evening together
studying a list of the pictures stored at Wiesbaden. He typed out a
tentative selection. The next day he and the colonel went over to the
Collecting Point for a preliminary inspection.
Steve was momentarily tempted by the prospect of having a part in
the undertaking. But when I told him there was a chance of his being
included in a draft of officers scheduled for immediate redeployment,
he decided that he’d had his share of packing. Maybe he’d come back in
the spring, if there was work still to be done. His parting gift was the
Mercedes-Benz, a temporary legacy, as it turned out: two weeks later
the car was stolen from the motor pool where I had left it for minor
repairs. Steve didn’t like the idea of having to wait at a processing
center before proceeding to his port of embarkation. He cheered up when
he learned that he was headed for one near Marburg. He went off in high
spirits at the prospect of seeing his old friend Walker Hancock again.
Under Lamont’s skillful supervision, preparations for the shipment
proceeded according to schedule. Lamont chose Captain Kelleher as his
assistant. Together they located the cases from Captain Farmer’s records.
Only a few of the Kaiser Friedrich pictures had been taken out of the
cases in which they had been originally packed for removal from Berlin to
the Merkers mine. The larger cases contained as many as a dozen pictures.
It was slow work opening the cases and withdrawing a particular canvas
for repacking. Seldom were any two of the specified two hundred paintings
in a single case. When they were all finally assembled, each one was
photographed. In the midst of the proceedings, the supply of film and
paper ran out. The nearest replacements were at Mannheim. A day was lost
in obtaining the necessary authorization to requisition fresh supplies.
It took the better part of another day to make the trip to Mannheim and
back. Thanks to Lamont’s careful calculations, maximum use was made
of the original cases in repacking the two hundred paintings after a
photographic record had been made of their condition.
While these operations were in progress, detailed plans for the actual
shipment of the paintings had to be worked out. Colonel McBride and
Bancel took up the matter of shipping space with General Ross, Chief of
Transportation. Sailing schedules were consulted. An Army transport, the
_James Parker_, was selected. As an alternative, temporary consideration
was given to the idea of trucking the pictures to Bremen and sending
them by a Naval vessel from there. But the Bremen sailing schedules were
unsatisfactory. A special metal car was requisitioned to transport the
cases from Frankfurt, by way of Paris, to Le Havre. A twenty-four-hour
guard detail was appointed to accompany the car from Frankfurt to the
ship. Trucks and escort vehicles were procured for the twenty-five-mile
trip from Wiesbaden to the Frankfurt rail yards.
It was decided that Lamont should be responsible for delivering the
pictures to the National Gallery in Washington where they were to be
placed in storage. Bancel drafted the orders. He worked on them a full
day. It took two more days to have them cut. They were unique in one
respect: Lamont, a second lieutenant, was appointed officer-in-charge.
His designated assistant was a commander in the Navy. This was Commander
Keith Merrill, an old friend of Colonel McBride’s, who happened to be
in Frankfurt. He offered his services to the colonel and subsequently
crossed on the _James Parker_ with Lamont and the pictures.
Lamont and Joe Kelleher finished the packing one day ahead of schedule.
The forty-five cases, lined with waterproof paper, were delivered to the
Frankfurt rail yards and loaded onto the car. From there the car was
switched to the station and attached to the night train for Paris.